Zoho CRM Brings Relevant Email, Chat into Sales Dashboard

Cloud-based business applications provider Zoho  (the company behind the enterprise IT platform ManageEngine) is rolling out an update to to Zoho CRM, the company’s online customer relationship management software, adding four major new features and a host of smaller ones that enhance a sales rep’s dashboard view of interactions with customers, including all emails and chats. Here are the details.

Zoho CRM had already introduced MailMagnet, technology that filters email based on active deals and puts those emails into the CRM system and associates them with the customer. The technology shows the sales rep everything that’s relevant and nothing else, providing a focused view. Now MailMagnet’s functionality will be available to mobile users, too, via the Zoho CRM apps for iPhone, iPad and Android.

Chat Gets CRMed

The update to Zoho CRM also adds integration with the company’s web-based intelligent chat software, Zoho LiveDesk. The combination of chat and CRM brings customer support and integration together into a single view, letting agents view previous interactions with customers during the web chat.

Another new feature lets users associate customer emails with CRM customer records by BCCing those emails and thereby associating them with the customer record. Users are required to enter an email address in the BCC field of the emails sent to their customers. Zoho CRM copies these emails, including attachments, and associates them to the right lead or contact. Called BCC Dropbox, the feature works across multiple email clients.

And finally, the new Custom Related Lists brings customer information from multiple sources, including third-party applications, into Zoho CRM, making it the central place to aggregate customer information. Customer information can be aggregated from multiple Zoho apps and custom applications created in Zoho Creator. In addition, Deluge scripting lets customers create their own information aggregations from other sources. The update is launching with a handful of supported third-party applications and organizations can add their own via scripting.

Zoho Hosts Second Annual Zoholics Conference

Zoho evangelist Raju Vegesna told MSPmentor that these are the features that Zoho users have been asking for. “Some people are very passionate about these features,” he said. Indeed, Zoho’s will be holding its second annual Zoholics user conference May 29 to 31 at the San Francisco Airport Hyatt Regency and will offer CRM and other training. The company is expecting 400 to 500 Zoho enthusiasts, Vegesna told me.

Big Growth in Mobile Zoho Users

Many of them will likely be toting iPads. Although he has no official numbers to share, Vegesna’s ballpark estimate on Zoho CRM mobile users was about 30 percent of all Zoho CRM users, and growing fast. Users don’t need to be connected to the network to use the system. Data can be synchronized the next time the user connects, he said. There are some users who are using only the iPad app, he added.

Zoho appeals primarily to the S part of the SMB market, and offers a free version of Zoho CRM for three or fewer users. Other versions with increasing levels of functionality are available at $12 per user per month and $25 per user per month.

Separately, yesterday Zoho rolled out a new version of Zoho Project.