customer relationship management Archives

HIPAA Compliance Is Vital For Your Business

Protecting confidential information is always important. Letting unauthorized parties see personal data is bad for customer relations, and it can lead to lawsuits and loss of business. Some failures are worse than others, though, at least from a legal standpoint. HIPAA compliance is vital.

A business that stores individually identifiable medical information may be subject to the requirements of HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, and HITECH, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act of 2009. Since HITECH basically expanded and updated the scope of HIPAA, it’s common to talk about both of them together as HIPAA requirements.

HIPAA compliance originally applied only to organizations directly involved in health care, but HITECH expanded security and privacy requirements to their business associates. Any business with a substantial quantity of ePHI records needs to check whether it’s required to comply.

A breach of the security and privacy rules can result in heavy fines. In 2014 the Office of Civil Rights investigated over 15,000 complaints of alleged violations. The annual number is still rising.

Compliance requires physical, technological, and administrative safeguards to make sure there are proper limits on access to electronic personal health information (ePHI).

The business needs to control physical access to information. It has to keep unauthorized people away from places where they might see it. Workstations near public areas should never be left unattended with confidential information on them.

Technological protection includes access control and encryption. It’s mandatory to encrypt all ePHI that’s stored on a system. Contingency plans need to be maintained in case of a data breach.

On the administrative side, a business needs to control who has access to information and log its use. Training in proper handling of confidential information is necessary. It’s mandatory to report any breach promptly.

The Advocate Health Care Network recently agreed to a $5.5 million settlement after being cited for several HIPAA violations. At the same time, the Office of Civil Rights is paying increased attention to small breaches.

The effort of making sure there are no HIPAA violations may require investing some time and money, but it’s well worth it considering the potential cost of a violation. AE Technology Group’s HIPAA consulting can help to make sure you’re doing what’s required. Contact us to learn more.

4 Benefits of Custom CRM Solutions

Custom CRM solutions are geared towards increasing business productivity. With marketing technologies, you can take control over the customer lifecycle and increase your customer loyalty. Here are four benefits of using custom CRM solutions.

Increase customer engagement

CRM solutions provide sales representatives with more tools to do their job. Rather than relying on their memory and intuition when speaking with clients, they can refer back to their file.

The more data the software collects, the more you learn about individual clients. Your sales representatives can then use this information to increase customer engagement.

Establish customer loyalty

An important aspect of CRM solutions is alerting users when a customer returns. Since he’s now worth more to your business as a repeat customer, it’s up to you to establish customer loyalty.

You can do this by calling him personally, sending him an email, or even meeting him in person. The main thing is that you know you have to up your efforts to take advantage of the opportunity.

Improve communication between sales representatives and other departments

All departments are encouraged to use and refer back to CRM data. We’ve already said that sales representatives can use the information to increase sales, but marketers and customer service reps can also benefit from it. CRM solutions are most effective when used by the entire business.

Learn more about your target audience

And finally, CRM solutions can help you pinpoint the wants, likes, preferences, and habits or your target audience. You can detect certain patterns in their behavior and try to incorporate that aspect in your sales process.

Your marketing team can also use this information to create a more targeted campaign. The more you know about your target audience, the better you’ll be able to appeal to their needs.

To talk more about custom CRM solutions, or anything else, please contact us. Thanks.

crm customer relationship management

CRM Customer Relationship Management Benefits

Business is all about customers, and not only developing but also maintaining a rapport with them. As such, a customer relationship management software developer is vital for any organization. There are major benefits that accrue from an effective CRM among them reduced costs and high customer retention, all which lead to an increase in returns.

With CRM software, information technology consultancy is basic. Many firms are struggling to get the right IT consultants to better their CRM and gain a competitive edge in the market. This is to ensure that a firm is using the right software and in the right manner. IT consultants are the people to turn to when systems crash. They evaluate the cause of failure and address it accordingly. This ensures continuity in businesses.

Hiring a CRM software developer saves businesses from closure resulting from data loss. These firms have disaster recovery strategies through which their clients can get all the data they had in their systems prior to the occurrence of a peril. They have data centers that provide a backup of vital company details, including list and contact information of prospects and current customers, suppliers and investors.

As Wiki has it, “the cloud is transforming IT infrastructure…” This new networking paradigm allows businesses to filter any content that is available for its web visitors. Partnering with a competent cloud hosting service provider ensures that an organization will get a cloud cluster, something that is vital when it comes to scaling and reconfiguring in order to address its project needs. With cloud networking, organizations are assured of connectivity to the Internet over any physical infrastructure, and this gives them unlimited access to their database.

Another service that CRM software developers provide is IT support. This is more or less like IT consultancy, and it also works towards ensuring that a firm’s IT systems run effectively. With this service they can install, move or even change any IT machinery in an organization. The highly trained and experienced engineers also provide anti-virus software to guarantee safety of systems. Information technology support ensures optimization of not only software but also hardware performance.

The above are just part of the list services that a customer relation software developer can offer you as a business. By the end of it all, the aim is to make the most out of CRM and achieve set objectives.

crm customer relationship management

How Can a Customer Relationship Management Software Help Me Get Serious About My Sales Process?

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software is an especially useful solution for any business to utilize, as long as they do so with a strategy in mind. Let’s go over why this strategy is so important, and how it should be shaped. Let’s begin by defining what Customer Relationship Management really is, and how it can help you get serious about the sales process.

THE CONCEPT OF A CRM STRATEGY

Using CRM software has a pretty low bar for entry. Basically, you just have to procure it and populate it with the data you have collected. The purpose of a CRM strategy is to really use your solution to the fullest extent that you can, which allows you to optimize your outcomes.

There are a few ways that your CRM strategy can enable you to do so:

It condenses data in context to help you reference it as you make decisions and set goals.
It makes customer service efforts more comprehensive, which can boost retention and loyalty.
It assists you in making sales by scaling your process properly and eliminating redundancy.

Naturally, these are benefits that can assist any business in its pursuit of its goals, so it is important that you create a proper CRM strategy to guide you. Here is a simple process for you to follow:

UNDERSTAND YOUR GOALS AND STRATEGIZE FOR THEM

What is it, exactly, that you want your business to accomplish?
What is your intended use of your CRM software, and what do you want to achieve with it?
How will each department use it to do strive toward their goals?
How will your offering be distributed?

Once you have conferred with your team and answered these questions, it is time to consider the business landscape and who your ideal clients are. Then, determine what makes your offer different, and commit to providing this difference each time in the way that best suits your prospects.

ANALYZE AND ORGANIZE YOUR TEAM

How will the introduction of your new CRM software impact your team? Speak with those whose job responsibilities will be affected by your new solution, and look for any past experience with such platforms for their impression of different options.

You will also need to identify those team members who will be using the software to collaborate and be sure that everyone understands their particular roles. It is also helpful to determine the goals that each department should strive toward, and identify the key performance indicators that will help measure their progress.

IMPLEMENTING YOUR NEW SOLUTION AND STRATEGY

Determine how different contacts will be divided within your CRM, and establish a policy of collecting all the information you need from a contact that is going to be included. You should also strongly consider mapping out your sales processes for each of your services so it is easier to manage your brewing business.

It is also a good idea to keep your software requirements in mind when selecting your CRM, as you will want to select a title that plays nicely with your existing solution. Is your chosen email platform Outlook? Make sure to find a CRM that integrates with it for optimal benefits.

AE Technology Group is here to help you with these considerations, and more. To learn what we can do to assist your customer relationship management through IT solutions, or any other of your business processes, reach out to us at (877) 771-2384.

applications business cloud crm customer relationship management