A CRM isn’t a simple warehouse for information about leads and sales. CRM definition implies handling relationships with clients through regular analysis of sales data.
If you set up and use the CRM system correctly, you can manage all interactions with leads and prospects from a single control point, which is very convenient for both big and small businesses.
And CRM reporting is what makes the difference.
Think of a CRM report as a kind of performance summary for the given time frame. It is an essential component of business intelligence because it provides insights for strategic and tactical planning, measuring goal completions, identifying issues with operations, etc.
You can use CRM data for standalone reporting or incorporate it into marketing reports - to conduct retrospective studies, build funnels, and calculate key marketing metrics.
In this article, we're going to reveal how you can build more holistic marketing reports using CRM data.
> Skip ahead:
- Campaign leads by channel report
- Opportunities generated report
- Lead source analysis report
- Campaigns by revenue generated report
- Call report
- Profitability report
CRM reports every marketer should use to align with sales
There are 6 common types of CRM reports - each characterizing commercial performance from a somewhat different perspective. Together they give a 360-degree view of how effective marketing channels, sales pipelines, and employees are, and what revenue a company may expect to earn in the future.
“An example of a lead funnel composed using CRM data”, source
Campaign leads by channel report
How long does it take for leads to convert? You may be surprised by the fact that the sales process may last months or even years. For example, around ⅔ of B2B companies claim that their average sales process lasts for at least 4 months.
With this much time to close, sales funnels often turn out to be multi-channel. Although you may use a particular conversion attribution model (e.g. first- or last-click), you should understand to what extent different channels contribute to revenue. In other words, you should know how many leads every lead generation channel brings.
Also read: The 7 types of marketing reports you need to know about
To prepare the report, you first have to assign a “source” label to every contact in your CRM. A set of labels will depend on the lead gen channels you use most commonly, as well as on your business type. For example, if you sell online, you can label lead flows using Google Analytics Sources and/or Mediums:
- organic
- direct
- referral
- and a CPC.
To track these, use UTM parameters every time you launch a new online marketing campaign.
Opportunities generated report
An opportunity is an event that can result in revenue. Different businesses may track distinct opportunities, and some even implement Opportunity Management Systems (OMS). With these, you can forecast sales, predict deals and their close dates, and even adjust prices and special offers - to persuade leads who are almost ready to make a purchase.
Fill in opportunity forms with relevant information about qualified leads in your CRM. These may be people who asked for a demo of your product or contacted Sales with the price request. You can specify in these forms:
- Expiration or closing date of an opportunity
- Estimated revenue
- Status
- Topic
- Contact
You can compile and review the CRM data in terms of key accounts, teams, or individual salespersons who manage opportunities.
Lead Source Analysis Report
Similar to the campaign led by the channel, this report shows where clients come from. However, instead of reviewing aggregated lead gen channels, lead source analysis is studying and comparing specific lead sources.
For example, if a company uses different lead magnets on its website, all these can be included in the lead source analysis report. Or - if there are various referrals, the company may choose to include and analyze them independently.
To prepare the report, along with standard UTM values, add self-explanatory labels for your marketing campaign. For example, “Facebook”, “clutch”, “google”, etc. Thus, every time a lead converts, the information about the source is recorded in the CRM. You can build a pivot table and define what source brought more leads during a chosen interval.
Lead source analysis is useful when calculating efficiencies, such as ROAS and CPA. Acquisition channels differ in price, so when you prepare a budget for promotion, you need to predict how many “target actions” the campaign will bring and what revenue you will earn.
Campaigns by revenue generated report
A company may launch parallel, subsequent, or omnichannel marketing campaigns. These may cover various target segments and communication channels, include varying ad creatives, and have differing allocated budgets. To compare effectiveness it is better to evaluate revenue per campaign rather than the number of qualified leads per campaign.
Consider an example. An online retailer sells household appliances. The average price of an item is $400. The company has launched 2 campaigns and spent $50,000 each. The campaigns' results were as follows:
- a sponsored influencer post on Instagram brought 1,000 leads, of whom 100 made a purchase; sales totaled $40,000
- a search ad brought 100,000 website visitors, of whom 1,000 made a purchase; sales totaled $400,000.
Although a CTR for Instagram publication was higher (10%) than for ad banners (1%), the latter had higher coverage. This resulted in a higher number of conversions and, ultimately, brought more revenue. So, the company should better proceed with Search Ads in the future rather than invest in paid social promotions.
To create a “Revenue Generated by Campaign” report, you have to group closed deals according to their sources. After, you should sum revenues per every group and compare results in absolute values (a bar chart).
Call Report
Customer satisfaction depends heavily on timely, friendly, and knowledgeable help to customers. Happy clients are willing to pay up to 16% more for products or services, so monitoring how your reps nurture clients is definitely worth the effort.
One of the methods is - to prepare call reports using CRM data. You can measure:
- talk time metrics, e.g. the average time that employees spend on calls with clients
- talk quantity metrics, e.g. the number of calls every sales rep makes
- calls results, e.g the number of unanswered calls or dialogues that advanced the lead towards MOFU and BOFU of a sales funnel
“Average duration of a call can be a telling metric to compare employees' KPIs”, source
After, you can prepare reports - either by metric type or per every employee. You can use results to assess individual performances or to compare them with the market benchmarks.
Profitability Report
This report shows what returns you receive on sales and marketing expenses. Profitability reports usually include several metrics:
- Total revenue
- Total leads
- Won deals
- Total expenses
- Gross margin (in both absolute and relative values)
- ROI (return on investment)
It can be compiled as a marketing campaign report, or for a group of campaigns, or for a time period (e.g. quarterly profitability reports).
Perhaps, this is what company management is interested in most. The report demonstrates campaigns costs, how many leads and opportunities were generated, and how these were reflected in monetary terms.
How Teams Use CRM Reports
CRM reports can bring insights for several teams within a company:
- Marketing - can use them to adjust user acquisition strategies, email and advertising campaigns, switch between channels, personalize communication, and predict ROI
- Sales - refer to CRM data when communicating with prospects, leads, and clients
- Finance - use CRM reports to see expense items, calculate income, margin, and EBIT, build cash flow forecasts, etc.
Different types of reports give distinct insights about sales operations and marketing campaigns. If you doubt which report to use, start with all 6 and then see which turns out to be most telling.
This blog is a contribution from Snov.io.
