A relatively new option is available for small businesses to track their sales opportunities for those who use Google. With Google Apps, one can access a large number of applications that support Google and Google Apps through what is called the Google Apps Marketplace. Google Apps is a free application platform with email, shared calendars & documents, and much more for up to 50 users. There is a cost associated with Businesses who need more than 50 users on the same system.
One of the obvious advantages for salespeople would be the shared calendar for scheduling meetings/presentations and the ability to share sales materials etc. through the Google Docs app.
On the Google Marketplace, one may find literally hundreds of applications, however a few notable ones for sales purposes would be Insight.ly and Gist.com. Insightly is a fully functional CRM housed within Google Apps that is integrated with Gmail and the Google Calendar. It is very easy to use and is able to keep up with contacts, companies (called organizations in the app), Tasks, Opportunities, Emails and more. For instance if an email is received in Google Apps, the CRM attaches the email to the corresponding record in the system. If no such record exists, it creates it automatically. For emails that are sent, and a personalized email (unique to each user) is included, the email can also be recorded and attached to the corresponding file in the CRM or a new contact is created if none exists.
Gist.com is another helpful app to help keep the most up-to-date information on contacts that are in the Gmail Inbox. It will automatically look for the email on Gist and help the organization stay up to date when the prospect moves to another company, changes phone numbers, etc.
Google Apps can be a free alternative to traditional corporate email and a much better option than using many popular free email tools in existence today. Google Apps can be configured to run similar to a exchange server and is compatible with most email clients and smartphones. The system is not the easiest in the world to setup, but definitely worth a look.
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