The Best Sales Database For Small Business How To Make An Affordable Choice

The rise of cloud based or online sales database software brings a new level of affordability to small business sales database solutions. The development of web-based solutions such as Google docs is just the start of a new evolution in the way business people and sales professionals interact. Now its possible to keep your sales database at your fingertips in an affordable way, no matter where you are and when you need it. Plus, the best sales database will bring even the smallest of companies the power previously reserved for large corporations.

Having a sales database designed to meet the needs of small business is the cornerstone that anchors all other customer interactions and data management without the best sales database software for your company, the organization is still operating with a mishmash of card files, email programs and spread sheets that leave money on the table and keep opportunities in dark. The resulting cost is precious employee time, money, lost productivity and often lost business.

Choosing the best sales database software to match the specific requirements of small businesses is a mission critical decision that will have immediate and lasting impact on company profit. Questions to ask are: How much training is involved in using the product and is it available as online video? How flexible is the access to the sales database, does it work on any computer or browser? How quickly can someone import existing sales data and add new opportunities and activities? Is there a long term commitment or can the company simply subscribe to the software on a month-to-month basis? Are there free trial periods and how much of the sales database can the company use during that time? How current is the technology?

What is Best for Small Business?

Even today the biggest online sales database software products are based on 5 to 10 year old technology. This is because large corporations cater to the needs of other large corporations and rarely push the envelope in terms of what these larger customers are willing to except in terms of change. Would anyone buy a VHS tape player instead of a blue ray disc player just because large corporations still stuck with video tape?

The best web-based sales database software products are now so sophisticated that even companies of 1- 50 employees can subscribe and leverage their information to grow their business, get more customers and turn existing customers into increased sales immediately. Unlike in the past where sales database packages had to be purchased and installed on a series of computers, then employees needed a week of expensive training, the best sales database software can be accessed immediately over the web. Each employee can sit through brief training videos or work with an online trainer to learn quickly. The best web-based or online sales database are used by groups gives the ability to collaborate on information no mater how far apart sales people are in the world. Company sales people can be in San Francisco, New York and Houston, with their support people in Seattle and all share the same information and interact from desktop computers, smart phones or ipads. These best sales database solutions are frequently referred to as SaaS (software as a service) or Cloud applications.

The best benefits of cloud based sales database software for small business are:

Tracking customer information The best sales database information isnt limited to just contact details anymore. Sure everything can be included from their phone number to the date of their daughters birthday but once can also track buying habits, budget dates, past purchases, relationships to other contacts and all activities any employee has had through the relationships history. All of that data can be searched and available during every sales or support call to keep the customer engaged and demonstrates the best level of appreciation for their time and business.

Reporting: Reporting is no longer simply limited to past performance and trends, the best sales database software brings you features like interactive pipeline and projections that let one see where your future income lies. Reports can bring to light opportunities that otherwise may slip buy. Reporting can also give you detail about the success of company email campaigns and more.

Integrated Email Marketing Campaigns and Form Letters The best sales database solutions can provide a company with way more power than simple email marketing services and keep one in constant contact with company customers. The ability to create mailing lists based on specific information about customers such as location, last order date and more, then send personalized specific email to those lists will increase your success rate with your message. Features to let one track what types of email each customer tends to open and respond to can increase your sales and make your current customers more loyal.

The best web-based sales database software is the cornerstone for any small business to rapidly grow their income in todays economy. Choosing the best sales database that leverages all of the current web technologies and is designed to work the way sales people work is key for small to mid-size businesses. The biggest advantage one can have over competitors is customer connectivity and constant contact using email marketing and social services like twitter. Above all else having access to customer data anywhere, anytime will deliver the best return on investment at a low monthly subscription price that anyone can afford.

Disadvantages In A Salesman’s Life

The disadvantages connected with the work of a traveling salesman are so great that they must be taken into consideration. He is away from home and family frequently two or three or four months at a time. He may find poor hotel accommodations in some localities. He must endure irregularity of meals, poor food often, and loss of sleep caused by the need of making towns on schedule time.

He may be troubled by local train facilities or by driving from town to town in severe weather. He may have to work nights and Sundays to keep up to schedule and to make sales. He often undergoes heavy mental strain in making sales, especially to large customers. The monotony of extended yearly trips over the same routes, with conditions that wear more and more upon a person after several years, leads in most cases to a strong desire for change of occupation.

Then the problem of changing to a profitable occupation or of establishing himself in some other position may become a difficult matter. Unless one is a member of his firm while still a salesman or holds some relation to it of especial importance, he is not likely to find a place with his firm, either in the offices or in the factory. Nor does his experience fit him to go into any other line of work, unless as salesman for a concern dealing in some other kind of product.

In general the traveling salesman, because of the reasons above stated, becomes unfitted for taking up a new occupation as late in life as must usually be the case. The traveling shoe salesman in seeking another line of work most frequently enters a retail shoe store as selling clerk, becomes manager of a shoe department in a store or of a branch store conducted by a factory, or opens a store for himself in some locality where he has found an opportunity during his traveling experience.

In some such cases the firm which he has served as salesman favors him, even to supplying a stock of goods. This method opens an additional outlet for merchandise and is a natural step in the continual change in the personnel of the selling force.

I have made a research into every available source to ascertain the cause and conditions that created that national institution the traveling salesman.

In a musty volume of yesteryear I find a press clipping attributed to a New York newspaper printed in 1847, as follows :

The wholesale stores employ clerks whose business it is to go to the hotels and make the acquaintance of the visiting merchants in order to induce them to buy goods of the firms which employ them. . . .

And later as history is written we find that a few years previous to the War of the Rebellion, ” the house ” frequently sent men on road trips to investigate the credit of customers and to report impressions and conditions in communities.

Very often these emissaries returned with memorandums of orders to be sent, filling, so to speak, between trips to market. This was of course before the days of the mercantile agencies which, as is natural to suppose, came into existence after the traveler had hewed the trail.

Jumeirah Group Announces New Appointments For The Sales Team At Their Dubai Hotels

The Jumeirah Group has announced the appointments of several new sales team members in the city of Dubai.

The Dubai-based company specialises in operating luxury properties for travellers seeking luxurious Dubai holidays as well as hotels and resorts in major cities all over the world including London, New York, Shanghai, the Maldives and Frankfurt.

It has been revealed that Daniel Weihrauch will be joining the hotel group as the new Director of Cluster Sales in Dubai. Weihrauch has worked within the luxury holidays sector for years and previously held roles at Kempinski Hotels and Resorts in Germany and Jumeirah hotels in Dubai and New York. His most recent role was at IHG, where he worked as the Director of Sales and Marketing at InterContinental Phoenicia Beirut in Lebanon.

The Austrian national, Katja Graf, has been promoted to Director of Sales Leisure in Dubai and has 10 years of experience in the hospitality industry in Europe and the Middle East. She previously worked for the InterContinental Hotels Group in Vienna and Dubai and she was the Business Development Manager for Atlantis, The Palm Dubai.

Olinda Morais is the new Director of Sales, Groups & Events Conversion, Dubai and she has worked for Hilton in France, Brazil and Venezuela, as well as the Madinat Jumeirah The Arabian Resort.

Jan Kaspar Rienermann has worked for the Jumeirah Group since 2005 and is the new Director of Sales, Groups & Events, Dubai. The German national was the Cluster Associate Director of Sales for Jumeirah Hotels & Resorts in 2009.

Jad Doumet is now the Director of Sales, GCC & Government, Dubai and he has plenty of experience working for Dubai hotels after his time at the Armani Hotel, Dubai as the Director of Sales; Crowne Plaza Dubai as the Director of Sales in 2009; and InterContinental Dubai Festival City as the Senior Account Manager.

Jumeirah boasts a portfolio of upscale hotels, resorts and high end properties for luxury holidays in Dubai and cities across the world.

Some of the groups most famous hotels in Dubai include the Burj Al Arab with its iconic ship sail structure, fleet of Rolls Royce vehicles and 24-hour butler service; Jumeirah Emirates Towers with 400 rooms and suites, 15 bars and restaurants and private beach access; and Madinat Jumeirah the Arabian Resort with two boutique hotels and Courtyard summer houses, 44 restaurants and bars, and two kilometres of pristine private sandy beach.