Your customer relationship management (CRM) system is the most important tool in your arsenal for managing potential and current customer relationships. As great as your CRM is, it does present certain obstacles that can make your system less effective. One of these is the risk of having duplicate leads in your CRM system. Let’s take a look at why duplicate records are bad news for your business, how they come about, and what you can do to make sure you have clean and valuable data.
A duplicate lead or a lead de-dupe, as its name implies is when the prospect or customer appears more than once in your CRM’s database. Often times, duplication occurs with multiple customers and is detrimental to your business.
There are several reasons duplicates are a no-go for your business. These include:
Most importantly, you will lose the trust and loyalty of potential and current customers. The reason is that duplicate records mean that the same person is being contacted multiple times with the same pitch. This leads a customer who is annoyed, turned-off by your sales tactics, and skeptical about how well your business is run if your sales team doesn’t even realize that they have already contacted you.
Duplicate records can happen for a number of reasons. Let’s take a look at the most common:
Failing to conduct frequent duplicate checks and setting up the appropriate alerts is the number one reason that causes duplicate records to build-up in your CRM system.
Duplicate leads can be prevented first and foremost by educating your team members on the importance of clean data. Frequent duplicate checks and properly set duplicate alerts will help red flag any duplicate records that enter the system. It is also important to implement clear protocols for importing, classifying, and grouping data.
Duplicate records are one of the most dangerous data quality issues that any CRM can have and should be avoided at all costs. LeadAngel has the experience and know-how to help your business eliminate duplicate leads and prevent future duplicates. Contact us today for information on how we can make sure your CRM is working for you!