Your CRM software needs to work wherever you are. Now it does, since the new version of Maximizer CRM works on any smartphone or tablet on the market.

When salespeople and executives have real-time access to the information they need before a sales call, they’re more likely to close the deal. That’s why Maximizer CRM^®12 is now available on all of the popular mobile devices used in offices today.

There’s no need to purchase a variety of software based on the different mobile devices used throughout your organization. Thanks to this change, executives and employees have the freedom of choice among different devices. If the CEO prefers BlackBerry^®, the sales representative already has an iPhone™ and the IT expert is never without his Android™ phone and tablet PC, they can all use the same CRM. 

Mobility brings opportunities. Consider the following scenarios where it might save the day: 

• A salesperson in between meetings gets a call from a customer who is ready to move ahead with a deal faster than expected. Thanks to the CRM on his mobile device, the sales rep has all of the real-time information they need about the client and their correspondence to date available with just a few clicks.
• A CFO attending a conference suddenly gets a notice from their assistant that an audit is required. Without getting up from their seat, the executive can direct their department about next steps.
• A supervisor responsible for work crews at several different locations. She has access to complete client records from whatever location she is assigned to, so she can make an immediate decision and direct the crews on how to rectify a sudden customer service case escalation. (Take a look at how mobile CRM has enabled Corporate Cleaning Services to take their customer service to a whole new level.)

Did you know that in Maximizer CRM 12 Web Access, you don’t need to press the Edit button in an open entry in order to edit the user-defined fields? Clicking in a field will evoke the control for editing value. This allows accessing the edit controls quickly and helps you work more efficiently.

Address Book entry, opportunity and case dialogs

In the User-Defined Fields tab, clicking a field will display the controls for editing value. You can make a selection from a list; pick a date; or directly typing in a value; without extra pop-up dialog box. Only the fields that allow multiple selections will use a pop-up dialog box.

Following window

 In-place-edit a date UDF

In-place-edit a numeric UDF

This is just one of the features in Maximizer CRM 12, discover how you can Email Dashboards, Add Hyperlinks, and use Dependant Activities in your Action Plans.

By Margarita Orlov

Mobility is on the mind of many people in today’s ‘plugged-in’ environment. Businesses know that when they need to access their information fast they need something they can depend on. For instance would getting real-time reports on your latest sales pipeline have been a possibility even 3 years ago? Maybe, but certainly not at the rate and efficiency the world saw in 2011.

“The other thing we started to see, from the back-end analytics side, was the ability to actually capture, expose and report analytics data on a mobile device. That was an important emergence for 2011.” – Neil Davey, CRM in 2011: The Experts’ View.  www.Mycustomer.com

Read more insights from Neil Davey: http://www.mycustomer.com/content-by-user/15225  

The word ‘trend’ gets thrown around when talking about mobility, but is it really a ‘trend’ when it’s undeniably applicable to the success of your business from every angle? Only time will tell for sure, but one thing that is certain is that now is a time for decision-makers to decide on whether they’re on the mobility bandwagon or not. Standing on the sidelines could impact the success of your business in the near future.

Maximizer Software’s President, Vivek Thomas, sat down with Customer Management IQ to discuss if mobile and social CRM can transform the customer experience). This podcast dives in to go ‘Beyond the Hype’ of mobile and social CRM to determine what you and your business should be focusing on.

Before you go mobile do you know what is that one must have feature that’s pivotal to any mobile CRM suite? Vivek Thomas shares:

“I think it’s important for an organization to have a centralized repository of all of this data and information…For example, the updates from a mobile interface should be able to drive a business process with improved speed and agility. There should be sufficient accuracy in that update to create the kind of custom engagement experience that is being demanded today. What you don’t want is all that information lying in different areas of the organization so that you cannot get a cohesive response out to a customer. “

This means that your business needs a reliable CRM that has the right information to get you that report on your iPad the minute you need it. Find out what else Vivek Thomas has to say on this topic by listening to the webcast or downloading the transcript: Can Mobile and Social CRM Really Transform the Customer Experience?

Are you using mobile solutions or social CRM to enhance your customer engagement or is it all just hype?

Did you know that in Maximizer CRM 12 we have introduced the ability to include an iCalendar attachment when sending appointment notification emails to Address Book entries? This means that you can book meetings with almost anyone, thus increasing your chances that the second party will attend the meeting and not forget about it. Before when meetings were established you had the worry that it was up to the second party to make a note of it on their own, but with iCalendar that worry is extinguished as it sets the appointment for them.

iCalendar is an industry standard file format that is supported by a large number of products, such as; Google Calendar, Apple iCal, IBM Lotus Notes, Yahoo Calendar, Microsoft Outlook and various others.

This can be done by setting the ‘Email appointment notification’ to Ask or Always and enabling the checkbox, ‘Include the iCalendar (.ics) attachment’ through the user’s Calendar and Hotlist preferences.

The recipient of the iCalendar email (if using supported software) will have the appointment created in their calendar and can respond to the sender with their RSVP or counter propose another date/time for the meeting.

Making appointments using iCalendar is one of the top CRM features in Maximizer CRM 12, find out what the others are here: Top 12 Features in Maximizer CRM 12

Join us for the “Planning for 2012 Success: Navigating Roadblocks with your CRM” webinar series, next webinar is Optimizing Marketing Campaign ROI on November 30, 2011. Register Now!

Press the Email button to open the compose email dialog. The screenshot of the dashboard will be embedded in email body and if your email is in plain text format, the screenshot will be attached. The name of the dashboard is added to the email subject line so your Manager knows exactly what to look forward to in your report.

This is a great feature that allows staff to quickly and efficiently update their leaders on their progress with just a click of a button!

Emailing Dashboards in Web Access is one of the top CRM features in Maximizer CRM 12, find out what the others are here: Top 12 Features in Maximizer CRM 12

Join us for the “Planning for 2012 Success: Navigating Roadblocks with your CRM” webinar series, next webinar is Optimizing Marketing Campaign ROI on November 30, 2011. Register Now!

Did you know that dependant activities have been introduced into Action Plans as part of the Maximizer CRM 12 release?

This provides a Maximizer CRM user with the ability to create a rigid action plan where all activities should be completed in a specific order.  If an activity is completed out of order Maximizer CRM will prompt the user with a warning that there are incomplete activities that precede the one they are currently completing.  Additionally, if an activity is being completed early or late, Maximizer CRM will prompt the user and allow them to dynamically move the following activities.

To set an action plan with dependant activities you must enable the checkbox, ‘Set activities as dependant’, when scheduling the action plan.

Dependant Activities is only one of the Top CRM features for Maximizer CRM 12, find out what the others are here: Top 12 Features in Maximizer CRM 12

Join us for the “Planning for 2012 Success: Navigating Roadblocks with your CRM” webinar series, next webinar is Monitoring Performance with Business Intelligence on November 23, 2011. Register Now!

Did you know that in Maximizer CRM 12, the Web Access users can now upload a photo for a contact, individual, and company Address Book entry? This allows the users to view the photo of a contact or the logo of a company when reviewing the detail information of the entry.

In an open Address Book entry, you will find the Upload button.

Press the 'Upload' button to open the dialog box where you can upload an image from your computer. You can use the whole image, or use part of the image by marking the area that you want to display.

 Once the image is saved, it will be displayed in the Address Book entry dialog.

Find out what else is new in Maximizer CRM 12. 

Join us for the “Planning for 2012 Success: Navigating Roadblocks with your CRM” webinar series, next webinar is Monitoring Performance with Business Intelligence on November 23, 2011. Register Now!

by John Easton, Director of Product Management

Did you know that Maximizer CRM 12 Windows Access and Web Access allow you to create a new Hyperlink document type? This hyperlink document can be attached to an Address Book entry, as well as to an Opportunity, a Customer Service case, a Campaign, a Knowledgebase article, and inserted as a Company library document. 

This allows you to link to HTML files stored on an Intranet, on the Internet, on MS SharePoint servers, and in any other locations that can be expressed as a URL, thus providing you the convenience of accessing all these documents from one unified interface inside Maximizer.

A great use of this feature is to build complete customer and prospect profiles by capturing links to all relevant social networks in one place. You can obtain up-to-date information on your contacts with direct links to external websites and social media profiles (blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn).

This new functionality can be accessed from within the Documents following windows for each of the modules listed above, as well as from the Knowledge base window and the Company Library window.

Windows Access: Address Book module main Ribbon menu and Following window right click menu

Web Access: Address Book - Document following screen and Address Book entry form screen

This is definitely one of the Top CRM features in Maximizer CRM 12 and brings value by allowing you to build better customer relationships by having access to dynamic social profiles of your contacts.

Find out What’s New in Maximizer CRM 12

Join us for the “Planning for 2012 Success: Navigating Roadblocks with your CRM” webinar series, starting November 16, 2011. Register Now!

By Herbert Yen

Have you been using Maximizer CRM Software for so long, that some of your Address Book entries have amassed a pile of notes that takes a while to sift through (and load), not unlike the new Facebook layout?

In the latest release, Maximizer CRM 12, you can work more efficiently by filtering out irrelevant and older notes. When you select a more recent time period (such as “Last 30 Days”),  the only notes that get loaded and displayed will be ones which were created in the last month. 

You can see this new feature as a new filter option beside the “Show All” checkbox in the Notes window.

A drop down list called “Filter” has been added, which gives you options such as All, Last 30 Days, Last 6 months, Last 12 Months, Last 2 Years, Last 5 Years, and Custom.

Selecting “Custom” brings up another window which simply allows you to enter a “Date Range”.

The best part: The option you’ve selected is sticky, and will persist even if you close out of Maximizer CRM 12. So next time you’re looking up that client with 15 years of history, you won’t have to wait 15 minutes for every single note to be retrieved. This makes your CRM implementation in your day-to-day work much quicker. (The email Joe who doesn’t work here anymore sent to Bob, who is no longer with your client probably isn’t important enough for your business anyway).

You will also find this feature present in both Web Access AND Mobile Access, as shown below:

Another neat little change to Maximizer CRM 12 is the concept of “My”, which you will see in places such as the Favorite Lists, Search Catalog, and Column Setup windows.

For those of you who have been with a company for many years and worked in different teams and departments, you probably have accumulated a large assortment of Favorite Lists and Saved Searches.

In Maximizer CRM 11, finding a favorite list meant bringing up the “View Favorite List” dialogue, and then scrolling through a seemingly endless list of favorite lists, created by yourself as well as those created by everyone else in your company.

When you open up the View Favorite Lists, Search Catalog, or Column Setups dialog in Maximizer CRM 12, you will be greeted with a new dropdown box near the top that says “Show: My Favorite Lists”.

Here you can choose to see just yours, or “All” of the Lists, Catalogs or Column Setups in your corporate database.

And, just as with the Notes filters, you can see this change has been made all across the CRM platforms: Windows Desktop, Web Access and Mobile Access.

Bonus: You may have noticed that I used a few different browsers, and even an iPhone to show screenshots in this blog. Maximizer CRM 12 has really improved cross-browser and mobile device support over the previous versions. Browser support when using Firefox/Chrome/Safari, as well as mobile devices such as iPhone, iPad & Android has come a long way from what you may have seen in Maximizer CRM 10 and 11.

Check it out how you can now have Android CRM, iPhone CRM, iPad CRM all in one by trying Maximizer CRM 12 today!

When executives and managers think about Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software, the first use that comes to mind (naturally) is sales management. But CRM can do a lot more for companies.

Here are 5 non-traditional uses of CRM for business:

1.    Corporate branding. Every company is obsessively focused on building brand, but there’s more to becoming a top brand than just being top of mind. CRM helps companies ensure consistency in messaging and a positive experience for prospects, customers and channel. CRM allows for multiple points of contact so you can build those customer loyalty relationships and your business’ reputation at the same time. (See our related webcast, A Personal Branding Tool for Financial Advisors)

2.    Enforcing compliance. For legal firms, financial services providers and a wide range of industries, government regulations like HIPAA, the Patriot Act, and Sarbanes-Oxley are forcing companies to pay more attention than ever to issues of privacy and security. Customizable business rules built into CRM processes help make sure your employees don’t inadvertently put the company (and your clients or partners) at risk.

3.    Tracking investment opportunities. CRM helps financial services providers more easily track investment projects, potentially matching them up with the right investors. (A good example is the South Carolina Department of Commerce, which used Maximizer CRM to exceed their investment goals by $62 million.)

4.    Project and Bid Management.  Manufacturers, construction companies and other project- and bid-based organizations use CRM to manage all of their projects from the proposal stage right through to completion.  Having one centralized database enables them to record all activities such as estimates and proposals, drawings and purchase orders, project status updates plus management teams can easily forecast resource needs and track project bid win/loss ratios through business reporting. (Take a look at how Roberts Onsite has built their business with CRM)

5.    Citizen relationship management. Municipalities and other levels of government can use CRM to streamline the process for handling complaints, communicating with special interest groups and notifying residents of new initiatives and policies.

Learn more about how all kinds of organizations, from manufacturers and financial services providers to high tech companies, are using Maximizer CRM

This week Maximizer was proud to introduce the world to our new pride and joy: Maximizer CRM 12.

With exciting new features like LinkedIn social CRM integration and extensive enhancements to our built-in mobile and web access products our new release should provide a whole new level of capability for your businesses to attract and engage with customers. The big improvement that webinar attendees couldn’t stop raving about was the powerful CRM functionality now available for the Apple iPad and Apple iPhone (as well as any other Smartphone or tablet device) through mobile access.

Of course, you can’t just take our word for it– here’s what we heard from the 250+ webinar attendees:

What was your initial impression of Maximizer CRM 12?

 “Great new features for CRM mobility.”

 “Flexible, able to be used on a number of platforms.”

 “Looks like a good progression from Maximizer 11.”

 “Kudos to making Maximizer 12 work with the iPad.  This is a big deal for my company.­”

 “With Maximizer CRM 12 we are able to pull up accounts on the road to do personal contacts with clients.“

 “Improved speed, search filters, LinkedIn, improved mobile access.”

 “Our sales team is always on the road so the mobile access and its features are important.”

 “Dashboard improvements and new mobile iPad and iPhone applications.”

 “The iPad functionality could be a game changer for some of our current processes.­’

 “Liked the new iPad tablet look. Sales team’s our moving to tablets and the clean, bigger look will be great!” 

NEXT WEBINAR

If you missed out and would like to see Maximizer CRM 12 in action, we’ve got great news!

Join us at the next webinar on October 25, 2011 at 10:00am PT/1:00pm ET. The webinar will feature a live demo and Q&A session.

Register Now

Maximizer has just released a bunch of new training videos on Youtube!

Take a look at the latest:

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Sales Opportunity Module

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Creating Email Templates

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Creating Favorites Lists

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Integration with MS Outlook

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Inserting Documents

Maximizer CRM 11 Entrepreneur Demo - Opportunity Pipeline Report

Carlos is out doing service calls for the commercial heating and air conditioning system servicing company he works for. He is dispatched to inspect an office building furnace that has stopped working in the middle of winter.

Carlos has never seen this particular model as it is really old and he isn't sure that he can get replacement parts. His colleague John has been with the company for 30 years and has seen it all, he'll know for sure.

John is working out of town but that is not a problem for Carlos. He takes a photo of the furnace with his Blackberry and saves it to the customer's service case in Maximizer CRM with a single click, and hotlists John to respond.

John knows exactly what it is and where to get parts. He sends Dave the contact information for the parts supplier. Carlos calls the supplier, receives a quote, gets customer approval to go ahead and schedules a follow-up appointment to install the parts as soon as they are delivered.

The process went so smoothly that it didn't even cross the customer's mind to get a second opinion or quote. Carlos checks the next service case assigned to him and carries on with his day, smiling to himself and thinking... "Maximizer CRM, as handy as any wrench or screwdriver."

Meanwhile, back in the office, Carolyn the account rep sees Carlos' service case alert and creates a reminder in her calendar to talk to her customer about a longer term solution - replacement of the furnace.

Curious about mobile CRM? This webcast might interest you:
Mobilizing with CRM... Your Competitive Advantage

While waiting in line to buy a coffee at his usual morning café stop Mark plans out his day. Using Maximizer on his Blackberry, he looks up a few details to familiarize himself with his new prospect, Cynthia Kent, a category manager at Assentis Pasta, prior to their meeting.

Mark looks up Cynthia's address and with the click of a button, pulls up a map. He realizes she is located very close to Goodstuff Foods, one of his best customers.

So to make the most of his day, Mark phones and also schedules a meeting with Tim, the operations manager at Goodstuff Foods. He adds the details to the entry and sees from his records that Tim's birthday is a few days away. Instead of the usual e-card he would normally send he sets a task to remind himself to buy Tim a Canuck's NHL cap on his way to their meeting...  "Appreciation goes a long way" he thinks to himself as he orders his coffee.

Mark does all of the above in less than 5 minutes, his competitors haven't even opened their laptops yet.

Curious about mobile CRM? This webcast might interest you:
Win More Deals & Increase Customer Satisfaction with Mobile CRM
presented by Barton Goldenberg, Founder, ISM Inc.

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Capturing in Real-Time

By Margarita Orlov

One of my favorite things about MaxMobile for BlackBerry is the new feature to capture and save images, videos or sound clips directly to a customer or prospect’s record within Maximizer CRM. That way I never miss an opportunity to add important information to the database and since it’s all done in real-time, I can save my capture immediately and share it with the sales team back at the office or bring it up on my laptop at home.

It’s extremely useful for capturing critical spur of the moment information and now after having it on my phone I’m not sure how I used to go about without it. For example if there is an office space that you know would be great for a certain prospect, you can capture it, save it to their file and bring it up in the next meeting. It’s also great for meeting notes when your pen and paper can’t keep up, you can just turn on the voice recorder on the BlackBerry and store the voice file for future reference. Amazing!

Here’s how it works:

1.      When you’re in a client or prospect entry, click the main menu key and select ‘Capture’.

2.      Select what you would like to Capture.

3.  ‘Capture’ it by clicking on the trackpad.

4.  Rename it, save it (it'll be saved under the record's documents tab) and you’re done. Now you have all the information you need wherever you are anytime, anywhere.