Between 25% and 60% of CRM projects fail to meet expectations according to studies conducted over the past decade. Enterprise apps can dramatically improve work through "speed, connection and information" with front-line employees.

These apps are for internal users and are tied to your company’s network. This single fact reduces the cost and complexity of this technology. Enterprise Mobile Apps are simpler and less expensive to develop and maintain. The two main companies developing the platform for these apps are Google and Microsoft (ok not too surprising). The promise of this technology is that mere mortals can develop and program, although from this mortal’s experience, they have made progress but fallen short on this promise. The improvement potential and power that these apps have, however, has exceeded my expectations.

These apps are for internal users and are tied to your company’s network. This single fact reduces the cost and complexity of this technology. Enterprise Mobile Apps are simpler and less expensive to develop and maintain. The two main companies developing the platform for these apps are Google and Microsoft (ok not too surprising). The promise of this technology is that mere mortals can develop and program, although from this mortal’s experience, they have made progress but fallen short on this promise. The improvement potential and power that these apps have, however, has exceeded my expectations.

1. Local Business Intelligence

There is a close relative to mobile apps that deserves some mention – Business Intelligence. To date, Business Intelligence (or BI) has been generating corporate or “top-down” reporting of key performance indicators. Mobile apps can turn that standard “upside down” by capturing local intelligence and updating CRM from the field and/or providing local opportunities when sales talent have available unique insights.

Why not get more participation from your front-line sales team? Why not include this group in planning at a local level with scorecards to identify progress and opportunities everywhere? Why not make best practices more meaningful with collaboration and reporting?

2. CRM User Interface

User satisfaction with CRM systems averaged a meager 50% for medium and large companies (software advice). Mobile apps are designed for a specfic job within an organization. This is an important distinction that allows mobile apps to provide the right information, at the right time to the right person. This provides two immediate benefits: better employee engagement and productivity. This also allows organizations to decide who needs a full CRM user seat versus limited interaction directly with the database.

27% of salespeople spend an hour or more each day on data entry.

— HubSpot, 2018

Manual data entry is sited by 23% of salespeople as the biggest challenge when using the existing CRM (HubSpot 2017) and 27% of
salespeople are spending an hour or more each day on data entry (HubSpot 2018). Why not tailor your CRM user interface to eliminate the busy work of scrolling through screens that don’t relate to people’s jobs? Why pay an average of $1,000 for full user seat privileges unless they are useful and productive? Why not demand more for your dollar?

3. Field Service

Enterprise apps are a natural fit with field service employees. The ability for enterprise apps to facilitate a two-way communication is a game changer. Imagine a service rep describing an unusual part, noise or configuration with the aid of live “audio/visual” to show the technical support staff in real time. Imagine having positive closure of the service call with GPS and photo verification for that skeptical client.Imagine an app with the intelligence to predict the chance of failure for a critical part or system before an expensive downtime event.

Why not provide the tools to better engage your employees who will then better engage your customers?

4. Sales & Marketing Funnel Optimization

Managing the sales funnels with a focus on salesperson level planning, and best practices for each step in the sales process. While most CRM systems claim this ability, they generally fall short in specifically what is being optimized. Ask to see how marketing campaigns optimize your cash flow or company value, and then wait patiently for a blank stare. 39% of marketers say proving the ROI of their marketing activities is their top marketing challenge (HubSpot 2018).

39% of marketers say proving the ROI of their marketing activities is their top marketing
challenge.

— HubSpot, 2018

Why not expect your sales funnel to be optimized on the metrics that are most important to you? Why not expect that reporting on salesperson performance mirrors that sales funnel and comes complete with best practices and video tips from top salespeople? It’s time to expect more from your CRM!

5. Contract Performance Management

Do you sometimes feel that you’re the last to know about service issues? Enterprise apps are a game changer for contract management and ensuring customer satisfaction. Finding out that the work wasn’t completed to your customer’s satisfaction only when they won’t pay an invoice is tragic, but all too common an occurrence in business today. Enterprise apps allow you to manage contract performance or customer success within your organization. Why not systematize contract delivery/payment thresholds that require the approval from both sales/service teams and the customer.

There are several other enterprise mobile app opportunities. Many companies are leveraging talent within the organization to identify improvements. Enterprise apps can also be enablers of corporate strategy. Examples of this range from a simple to strategic economic model game that is both visual and interactive to a comprehensive customer strategy that demands the full potential that CRM systems and mobile apps can deliver.

Much has been written about the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI), yet little has been written about the synergies with CRM, mobile apps and AI. Currently, about 15% of firms utilize AI (Adobe 2018). The promise of AI is simply the ability to predict accurately. The power of AI is that we make predictions on things that matter constantly. But to make a prediction matter, AI needs data and a process to get the prediction in the hand of the person who needs it, and precisely when it is needed. AI gets data from CRM (and business intelligence systems) and makes its predictions useful by getting it in the right hands through enterprise apps. There are several powerful 􀁺rms committing massive resources to plugging AI predictions into company’s decision processes.