ACT! is the well acclaimed CRM uniquely designed to meet the needs of small and medium business regarding customer and contact management, automation of customer interaction process as well as better sales and marketing process management. The usability of ACT! CRM is felt in domains other that just customer management. The software is uniquely placed to meet the needs for capturing the data for developing better marketing strategies, campaigns, inter department collaboration as well as further customization of the ACT! features for meeting specific business needs.
Modern day organization comprise of a greater proportion of mobile workforce, especially their sales and marketing personnel. Hence, there is demand for applications that may be accessed from anyplace anytime, besides the necessity for secured online access to the data for enhanced data security as well as the concerns regarding reduction in local IT support cost. These factors have led to increasing use of cloud computing technologies, for example Application Hosting service, which provides not only Software as a Service but also provides Hardware as a Service. This means that instead of having all the network and IT infrastructure and Hardware locally, they are available as a service by the Third Party Services Providers.
It is in this context that ACT! Hosting is more beneficial than the local standalone deployment of ACT! by Sage CRM. The usefulness of ACT! Hosting can be analyzed in terms of the benefit it bring to the organization in terms of providing the much needed technological edge, affordability and enhanced productivity for the small and medium business. Here is the list Ten benefits of ACT! Hosting for small and medium Business.
Anytime anywhere access to the ACT! Application: ACT! Hosting allows the users to access the ACT! Application from anywhere anytime thus eliminating the accessibility constraint of the local network. Thus either you are travelling or outstation, the customer database is accessible to you from any online connection. Not only have that as distinct from online accessed the ACT! Hosting access on third party terminal server is quite fast. The CRM application is installed and run on the thirds party terminal servers and the users access it just like a desktop application. Since all the operation is done on the terminal servers, the bandwidth requirement at the users end is quite low which explains the fast access speed as compared to simple online access.
No more system upgrades: Running specific the ACT! By sage CRM requires different system requirements. This means that each time you buy a new editions of the CRM application you have to invest in upgrading your systems so that the ACT! CRM can run optimally. With ACT! Hosting the local system is not needed as the CRM application is installed and run on the terminal servers and users access it just like a local desktop interface.
Reduced IT support costs: Running ACT! CRM needs local network, elaborate security features installation to protect the servers as well as assured backup of data. Also monitoring tools for detecting and troubleshooting real time online security threats need to be in place. This may exhaust a considerable resource of small and medium business, which additionally is not related to the core area in which they are focusing. ACT! Hosting helps the users to access all these features as a service The business not only saves IT infrastructure installation and maintenance cost they also save the cost involved in recruiting IT support staff as assured backup, IT helpdesk support and real time online monitoring is included with the ACT! Hosting service.
Hosting ACT! Add-ons: There is a number of ACT! Add-ons that enhance the functionality of ACT! by Sage CRM software. Getting all these ACT! Add-ons integrated with the application is more easy if both of them are hosted on the terminal servers. The ACT! Add-ons that can be hosted are ACT! Companion link, Scan IT, Address Grabber Suite, Extract for ACT! etc.
Integrating ACT! CRM with different Application: ACT! can be integrated with Peachtree and QuickBooks accounting application for providing an end to end CRM accounting solution. This integration is more easy and effective if all these applications are hosted on the same terminal servers.
Enhancing the Productivity through ACT! Hosting in specific small and medium business context: ACT! helps better mobility of the sales, management as well as help in collaborative use of the CRM software for better productivity.
• Sales Team: anytime anywhere access to the customer database and history help the sales team to be better prepared for customer queries and hence more fruitful customer interaction and satisfaction.
• Marketing team: an effective marketing team needs strategic customer database and forecasts about customer preferences for better customer targeting and analysis. ACT! Hosting allows them to have access to the database pertaining to all the relevant departments which in turn help them to devise better customer retention and acquisition strategies.