Three Ways Microsoft Excel CRM’s Could Hinder Your Business Rather Than Help

 

Many businesses wouldn’t be able to run efficiently without packages such as a Microsoft Excel CRM, which can be a vital tool for storing information. As companies continue to run with these systems, they may not notice how these programs are causing inefficiency within the business, because they aren’t adapted to their company’s needs. 

 

It’s vital to have processes in your business that add value. People spend so much time on the day-to-day, it’s good to take a step back once in a while. Instead of focusing on the task itself, it’s also important to think about ‘How you are doing it’.

 

Whilst Microsoft Excel offers a quick fix for many companies, we’ve created a list of reasons how the programme may be causing your business problems, rather than solving them.

 

 

Too Much Flexibility from your Excel CRM

 

An Excel CRM from Microsoft Excel offers the freedom to model and change data with ease. 

 

If you need a new column for a different type of data entry, it can easily be added. If you need to do sums, or colour coordinate rows and sections to differentiate data, within just a few clicks it’s sorted.

 

This amount of flexibility can be great, but since it’s not made specific to your business and its needs, it can create problems for your team. 

 

For example, imagine you’ve just spent a few hours creating a new Excel CRM document. You’re happy with the end result as not only do you have every bit of this information in one place, but it’s clear, concise and makes sense to you. 

 

Now, imagine the next day, a colleague updates some information on this document. When you open the document a few hours later, everything is changed. The calculations you made have altered and are now incorrect. There are also columns deleted and ones added that weren’t there before. As a result of the flexibility of the system, it’s made it easy for hard work to be undone. 

 

This is when it makes the task at hand, tasking for workers. A bespoke software package from Source Code Software can help you solve these problems. 

 

We can set up a model with a permission system director, who can control which person can do what action. You can decide permission levels and even get specific with it. For example, restricting certain documents to certain departments so your team only sees what they need to see. 

 

By restricting access to documents that only certain departments need to use on a daily basis, you limit the amount of mistakes possible from people who may not know how to fix them. All this can help your business run in a way that’s effective for you.

 

 

Who Did What and When?

 

Similar to its flexible nature, Excel is great for providing accessibility for companies and their teams. Everyone working from the same document can be a real time-saver 

 

As this information is readily available for colleagues to open at any time, it means that there is no over-communication between team members. This is because they don’t need help finding information and asking other colleagues for access to data.

 

Consequently, their time can be spent focusing on other daily duties and improving the business. 

 

However, this accessibility can cause issues in other ways. 

 

For example, new-starters or junior team members may open important documents, and accidentally change and save new information. As there is no audit trail on Excel that displays who altered what and how, it makes it difficult to fix mistakes. These mistakes can then become time-consuming for all parties when attempting to correct misinformation.

Source Code Software can help set up your business on rails and prevent issues such as the above by occuring by creating audit trails on your systems.

 

On the off chance someone does make a mistake and note down the wrong information, these audit trails show who changed what and when. With a system that is also backed up every fifteen minutes, it can be restored to its previous state with ease. 

 

 

One at a Time

 

 

Another practicality issue with an Excel CRM is that only one person can access it at anyone time. 

 

When it comes to time management, this can become an issue as it means colleagues may have to wait to update information on a document, as it is in use by another user. Whilst they can still be productive by getting on with other tasks, it may put a halt on urgent tasks that need to be completed, or have an effect on the rest of their to-do list. 

 

With a tailored package from Source Code Software, we make a system which means that multiple team members to work on a document at once. Similarly, we will create software that allows you to lock certain tabs. This means that only specific people can access it, giving you the option to choose who can see what. 

 

An Excel CRM only lets you lock a whole document. A system from Source Code Software is designed to potentially have locks on a tab by tab basis. This gives your business the flexibility to work without inaccessibility. 

 

The First Step to Your Business’ Future

Switching to a bespoke software package gives you complete flexibility. A bespoke system means that you can customise your system in a way that works for your business.

 

Source Code Software can include a number of features to your bespoke package to make it foolproof. For example Validation checks, such as data validation, alerts you to any information duplicates. This means that your data entered makes logical sense.With a foolproof system, it’s virtually impossible for your team to get it wrong. As your team simply wouldn’t be allowed to continue until it fits the requirements that you are happy with. 

 

By using our services, we could help your company free up time. You can then spend this time on more useful projects e.g. growing the business and delighting customers.

 

Source Code Software can help by starting small and taking repetitive tasks off your teams’ hands. Let’s give you a free consultation. Get in touch today to see what we can do for you.