Basics 101: Beginner’s Guide to Get Started with Zoho CRM

Zoho CRM Overview?

Zoho CRM is a cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) platform that manages the sales, marketing, and customer support of a business. It is an all-in-one office suite that offers all the tools needed by an organization to improve digital performance.

The features and functionalities of Zoho CRM are to identify, understand, manage, and cater to the needs and requirements of existing and potential customers.

Depending on the needs of the business, Zoho CRM offers a variety of pricing options, including Free, Standard, Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate.

This blog will help you to understand how to use Zoho CRM software and the key features of Zoho CRM.

Why Use Zoho CRM Software?

Customers are the center of the corporate world. Many Businesses invest time and resources to manage their current clients while no automation is in place.

When the business expands, it becomes more challenging to manage the processes manually. To ease the process and make things automated this CRM software come into existence.

Zoho CRM software helps cater to your businesses across various industries making customized processes as per the business requirements.

Some other uses of Zoho CRM are given below:

• Using this cloud-based CRM software, you can increase client interaction, increase conversion rates, and save vital customer and vendor data.
• You can migrate data from CRMs and spreadsheets to Zoho CRM through its user-friendly interface.
• Zoho CRM provides numerous extensions and third-party plugins.
• Other prominent features worth mentioning are reports and analytics, automation of tasks, and omnichannel communication.

How to Use Zoho CRM?

A) Zoho CRM Login or Sign-Up

1. You must go to the ZOHO CRM login page to sign up, sign in using an existing account, or sign in using one of the other various modes.
2. Read the Terms and Conditions and privacy policy carefully before checking the box and then press the “Continue” button.
3. The next stage asks you to take the tour or migrate the data because this is a beginner’s guide to Zoho CRM.
4. You can now view the default dashboard by logging in to your account.

B) Dashboard Customization Using Zoho CRM

You may log in and see the dashboard reports from the Home page. This section allows you to customize reports and track team activities across several modules.

You can modify reports in the Zoho CRM dashboard by the team’s snapshot activities, and you have access to a variety of views, including the Classic management team, member, and super-admin idea.

Points mention in this section:

• Sales Funnel – Qualified Leads for Closure, Pipeline by Stage
• All Created Leads & Deals – All data created in each Module
• Today’s Created Data – Created Leads, Deals, Contacts, & Quotes within a day
• Converted Leads– Deals & Funnels about to close the month
• Deals Closing this Month– Deals & Funnels about to close the month
• Open Tasks & Activities– Activity updates and overdue happening within CRM

All these features are present in Zoho CRM. You can click “+” to add shortcuts to various features like lead, account, campaign, and contact. The dashboard features can add quickly using the three dots on the right side.

C) Leads Creation

• On the top bar, you will find the “Leads Modules” from where you can create and Track your existing leads.
• Choose “Create a lead” and enter the necessary details, such as Last Name, Title, Phone number, email, Lead Source, etc.
• Remember to save the information by clicking Save in the top-right corner to create the lead.
• Modify the lead’s information and Edit the data whenever necessary, add notes (i.e. follow-up reminders), attachments, Open & Closed activity (task, meeting, calls) Send Emails, Send meeting invites, etc.
• Lead Stage can be updated so that you can turn the lead into a contact/client (just by one click, where you can also create a new deal for this client)
• Here, you either import leads (a simple procedure) or build a new one.

In the three dots, you will see

• You can Clone the lead (with minor changes made at your end)
• You can delete the lead (only when permission is allowed)
• You can print a preview and other options.

D) Adding Contacts

• You can navigate over to the menu, and select the ‘Contacts’ button
• Here, you have two choices import contacts or add/create new ones.
• You can create a contact using Zoho CRM using a procedure similar to that described for creating a lead.
• Contacts are created from the Standard Sales Conversion Leads.

E) Creating B2B Accounts

• The account menu in the Zoho CRM offers the option to add Business to Business (B2B).
• Click “Create an Account” to get started.
• Provide all the necessary information quickly, then click “Save.”

F) Managing Deals

• In the ‘Deals, you can track and manage your sales pipeline.
• In this, you can monitor your overall performance. You can click ‘Create a Deal’ and enter necessary information like Deal Owner, Deal Name, Associate Account & Contact Name, Amount, Lead Source, and many more.
• Choose “Save” You can now edit each deal’s sales pipeline phase.
• If you scroll down, there are other details similar to Contacts and Leads.
• Within your deals, you can also see ‘STAGEVIEW’ where you will see a visual representation of your sales pipeline.

You can easily drag and drop them to advance a special deal to the following level of the sales pipeline.

G) Track Your Activities

• Choose “Activities” from the menu bar.
• Zoho CRM tool keeps track of clients’ activities.
• Some options include Scheduling a Call, Creating a meeting (and sending it to the participants), and Creating a Task.
• All activities can be quickly filtered using the drop-down menu on the left side of the screen.

H) Custom Report Creation

• Now, when you move next to ‘Activities’ you will find ‘Reports’
• Zoho allows you to create custom reports and leverage analytics as it is one of the best CRM software.

For instance, you can construct a report based on your main accounts, leads by ownership, pipeline by probability, and other factors.

I) Manage Customer Quotes

Quotes refer to discussed agreements between the two parties- Vendor and Customer. It includes details related to the delivery of the product at a mutually agreed cost and within a stipulated timeline. Just like other categories, you would need to provide details about customer quotes asked under various sections like Quote information, Address information, Quoted Terms and Conditions, and Description information.

J) Checking Activity Feeds

• In Zoho CRM, the feed part is next to the reports section.
• Finding team interactions and monitoring lead and customer progress is simple.
• The Users are informed about all Zoho CRM Communications using the feed option.

Read More: 7 Best Reasons to Choose Zoho CRM for Your Small Business

Wrapping Up

To be Precise, Zoho CRM is the best customizable tool of ZOHO which offers plenty of things to learn and implement for every business. It is hard to talk and guide about all of them in this short space.
By following the above steps outlined in this guide, you can set up your account by Zoho CRM login, customize your dashboard, import contacts, create leads and use the various other features of Zoho CRM. With the help of Zoho CRM, you can gain valuable insights into your sales activities and identify areas for improvement.
Still, the cloud-based Zoho CRM offers the best out of affordable customer relationship management with a user-friendly interface.

For more assistance, please feel free to approach us at CRM-Masters. We are the Premium Zoho Consulting Partner and can help appreciably in starting your stint with Zoho CRM.