Information

Business as usual – 8 Apps every business needs to survive Covid-19

In Brief

COVID-19 is causing chaos, what can you do to keep your business operational?

Unless you have been living under a rock, then you will have heard of the damage that the coronavirus is doing to economies around the world. With tens of thousands of people getting sick, its ground some businesses to a halt, cancelled major events, and sent scores of people to work from home.

In this post we explore 8 applications that every business should have in place to enable them to keep running and maintain business continuity in the event of a health-scare

Introduction

Unless you have been living under a rock, then you will have heard of the damage that the Coronavirus is doing to economies around the world. With tens of thousands of people getting sick, its ground some businesses to a halt, cancelled major events, and sent scores of people to work from home.

Tec Legend Bill Gates has often cited a global pandemic as one of his greatest concerns – and he has suggested that countries and businesses are woefully under-prepared for such an event.

Given the economic stress that the world is facing from this latest outbreak, we are inclined to agree! However; there are some businesses which are a lot better positioned to have uninterrupted operations during these unfortunate events.

While there have been other widespread diseases in the past, the Coronavirus is by far the most travelled and while it might not be the most lethal, it is certainly causing widespread insecurity and chaos.

In this post we explore 8 applications that every business should have in place to enable them to keep running and maintain business continuity in the event of a health-scare, pandemic or slow-moving zombie invasion.

1. Sales

This is potentially one of the top app requirements for the business. A good CRM will allow your entire business to have a clear vision of what’s going on. It’s the hub of your business activity and will tie everything in together nicely.

Your CRM will record everything you and your team needs to know, including customer interactions, tasks, what’s happening in the sales pipeline, quotes and a range of useful analytics.

2. Visitor Tracking

It may already be the case for you, but in a scenario when people aren’t able to get ‘out and about’ your website will become your ‘shopfront’ it’ll become your main point of interface for your customers. Visitor Tracking Software will allow you to see what people are doing on your website.

What pages they’re visiting, what links they’re clicking, how long they’re reading your content – and if you’ve got a good solution, you’ll also be able to interact with your customers by using an online chat widget to reach out to them or to answer questions.

3. Marketing Automation

Automation is really going to be a useful mechanism for your business on a good day, during a global health crisis or serious weather event, it’s going to be immensely helpful.

Being able to engage with users, nurture your customers and warm up leads using a cloud-based marketing automation suite will help you keep a nice steady stream of marketing qualified leads coming in without putting any pressure on your employees – and with the ability to schedule communications in advance, you can rest safe in the knowledge that you won’t need to be scrambling to produce content at an inopportune time.

4. Social Marketing

Even when the world isn’t stuck at home due to a pandemic, social media marketing is an important area for your business.

Getting the word out, engaging with your audience, building your brand and keeping the lines of communication with the outside world open are essential for success. Having some Social Marketing Software will help you along with this immensely.

Social Marketing software should allow you to keep sight on all your top channels – cross-post to all your networks, schedule posts and collaborate remotely with your colleagues.

5. Help Desk

Being able to service your customers remotely is going to be a key element in a pandemic situation. By using Help Desk Software or Remote Assistant Software you can log, track and solve your end users’ issues without the need to interact directly without anyone!

This doesn’t just need to be for technical help, either. You can use Help Desk software to track any sort of issue – including returns, negative feedback, refund requests and so on.

And, for an added bonus for this category is the addition of new augmented reality software – with the use of a smartphone, a customer or a remote technician can show a scene to a specialist technician working from home that can then give them instructions on how to fix the issue, including drawing on the live feed of the problem. Imagine the possibilities.

“In order to deliver your ‘business as usual’ approach to this crisis, you’re going to need Project Management Software that will enable you to track all the work that’s being done.”

6. Analytics

Information is going to be essential, especially in one of these global events – the goal here is to keep business going as usual, but that doesn’t mean everyone else will be fully operational – they might not have read this blog, after all – so having your finger on the pulse of what’s happening with your business will allow you to respond and shift resources appropriately and ensure that clear messaging is being delivered.

Your Analytics software should take in streams of data from all your business areas and give you on-demand reporting, stunning data-visuals and insightful dashboards to enable you to keep your finger on the pulse and enable you to make informed decisions.

7. Project Management

In order to deliver your ‘business as usual’ approach to this crisis, you’re going to need Project Management Software that will enable you to track all the work that’s being done, who’s responsible for it, how they’re getting on – but also allow you to respond to change by updating deadlines and shifting resources around – especially as people get sick and need to take time off to recover.

8. Surveys

You’re not going to be able to be out there, having face-to-face meetings with clients in a crisis like this – but that doesn’t mean that you need to give up on that valuable interaction. What your customers want and how they feel is really important (obviously, you don’t need me to tell you that.) and Survey Software will allow you to collect that valuable feedback, catalogue it all up into one place and analyse the feedback – keeping you informed and making sure that what you’re doing is relevant to your audience.

Have you heard of Zoho CRM Plus?

CRM Plus from Zoho is a piece of software that will deliver all 8 areas of functionality that we have discussed. It’s a unified customer experience platform which will allow you to fluidly operate an exceptional customer experience at all stages of the lifecycle.

Why not give it a try for free and see how you find it?