Small Business Ideas: Salesforce—Mobile Applications for Better Business (Guest Contributor, Celina Durgin)
Are your sales strategies keeping up with our increasingly mobile world?
Sales Cloud Mobile is a software mobile application that accesses Salesforce.com software.
It keeps your critical records and information at your fingertips no matter where you are.
Its applications help you maintain communication with coworkers and employees by constantly updating you on sales opportunities, numbers, and leads.
www.Salesforce.com is an enterprise cloud computing company that offers two mobile applications—one is free—for small businesses.
How Do They Work?
Sales Cloud Mobile
From pop-up reminders to customizable layouts, the Sales Cloud is made for doing business on-the-go. Sales Cloud Mobile allows you to perform tasks or find what you need in the Sales Cloud on your mobile device.
The app helps you stay productive in the field with instant access to your customer data.
You can update records, look up maps and directions, and respond immediately to leads, cases, and requests.
You also have instant access to your small business’s information on your mobile device so you always know how close you are to meeting and exceeding your goals and budget.
(Our article on best small business budgeting gives suggestions about recording revenue and expenses so that you can stay within your budget).
Cost for Sales Cloud Mobile runs from $2 a month for the most basic plan to $250 a month for the most advanced. The $15-a-month edition will most likely work best for a small business.
This edition includes opportunity tracking, a customizable sales process, email templates and tracking, Google AdWords, lead scoring, routing and assignment, and more.
For $15 a month, this app will facilitate the sales process and keep every member of your team in constant communication in an efficient and organized way.
Solopreneurs can also use this app to create a plan of attack for making sales.
Chatter Mobile
Chatter Mobile is a free mobile networking application. Chatter feed informs you of all of the late-breaking developments at your small business.
You can take photos with your mobile device and upload them instantly onto your Chatter profile for coworkers and employees to see.
Chatter Mobile provides you with your colleagues’ contact information, so you can call, email, or text them directly from your mobile device using the profile record. This method of networking is not limited to those within your company; you can also use the app to communicate with partners, collaborators, etc.
Why Salesforce?
- Efficiency: Instantly access dashboards, accounts, opportunities, cases, solutions, and more, including your company’s custom objects and applications. Keep in touch with all of your coworkers or employees at once and share pictures and information from your small business right on your mobile device using only one social network.
- Convenience: Even if you’re in an area with no cellphone service, you can still access your information through the Sales Cloud’s app. When you reenter a wireless coverage area, the app automatically begins exchanging updates and syncs any changes made while your mobile device was offline. The Chatter Mobile app enables you to continuously monitor feed for the latest information and updates for your small business. You can also use this app to make updates, upload photos, and call or text coworkers from their Chatter profiles.
- Customization: You can use the Sales Cloud app to add custom tabs, screens, and applications with clicks instead of code. Use the Chatter app to create a profile with all the contact information your coworkers and employees will need.
Overall, Salesforce can help you increase your sales productivity. With all of your important information organized and presented to you on your mobile device, your small business can use these mobile applications to close more sales in less time.
Check out our Top Ten Mobile Applications for Small Businesses to learn about other applications that might be the best mobile apps for your small business.
Our Instant CFO, Instant Marketing Manager and Instant Sales Manager Courses will teach everything you need to know about running a successful small business.
Thanks, Celina! We’ll be publishing more reviews of the best mobile applications for small businesses.
