More Cool Technology
A look at free (or nearly free) sales tools
n my February Office Technology article,
I I told you about some pretty amazing
free tools that could help power your
marketing efforts. In this article, I will
focus on some free, or nearly free, sales
tools that can improve your sales tracking,
build customer relationships and even save
you some money. At the BizCAT Group
(www.thebizcats.com) we have reviewed
and tested each of these products and, the bottom line is:
We love them! So, give them a try and drop us an e-mail to
let us know what you think.
Zoho CRM
The state-of-the-art technology for small businesses is cloud
computing, which simply means that the business programs
you use and where you store your files is online, not on your
PC. Google offers Gmail, Google Docs and much more, as does
Microsoft Live. Not only is this a good strategy that allows you
to manage your business applications from any PC (even an
older, slower one), they are basically free. But if you want to see
a suite of cloud applications that will knock your socks off —
and just might give your business everything you will ever need
— then you need to check out Zoho (www.zoho.com) right
away. What do you get? Office-compatible Writer (word
processor) and Sheet (spreadsheets), Mail (similar to Gmail or
Microsoft Live), Docs (like Google Docs) and Planner (tasks,
calendar and more). Add to that Zoho Show for online presen-
tations and Zoho Meeting (desktop sharing Web conferencing).
There is more too, but we saved the best for last: Zoho CRM.
Zoho CRM is our pick for the best full-featured online
CRM application. Similar to Salesforce.com’s offering, Zoho
CRM offers easy management of accounts, contacts, oppor-
tunities and activities combined with robust forecasting and
reporting — and it is fully customizable. It is also intuitive
and truly easy to use. The best part is that it is free for up to
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by: Tim McMahon, The BizCAT Group
three users and just a small monthly charge
for additional ones.
What I like is that Zoho organizes every-
thing together into its Zoho Business appli-
cation . Not only doe s thi s make th e
applications easy to use, but everything is
fully integrated. This means all the applica-
tions w ork togeth er. And w ith Z oho
Reports, a small business owner can easily
manage his (or her) entire team and business.
Gist Relationship Management
I found thi s sit e, Gi st Rel ationship Mana gem ent
(www.gist.com), and cannot stop playing with it. I still
cannot figure out what to call it. CRM? Social media mar-
keting? Business intelligence? Relationship management?
Something else? I have no idea. Still, it is the business tool I
wish I had created because it is fantastic. If you are in sales
or marketing, or are a small business owner, you absolutely,
positively need Gist. With Gist, you have a powerhouse of
customer and prospect information right at your fingertips
that can help you manage your customer relationships at a
whole new level.
What is Gist? It is a free online site that takes all of your
business contact information — from e-mail contacts, Face-
book, LinkedIn, Twitter or anywhere else you have informa-
tion — and aggregates it all together in one simple system. It
then goes a step further and searches the Web for more infor-
mation about your contacts and their companies, like arti-
cles, blogs, company profile data, stock performance,
management team information, phone numbers and so
forth. Finally, it interrelates everything; you can see your con-
tacts by company (or related companies), who is connected
with whom and a lot more. There are three views: Company
View, Contact View and a slick Dashboard that shows you
what is new every day with contacts or companies so you do
 not have to dig for it. we will ever need.
Is it an individual CRM system? It can Many of the free L et ’s lo ok at Rond ee (www.ron
be. By cleverly using tags and setting conference calling dee.com). You can set up a free account
“importance rankings,” I can track com- services are now in less than a minute that gives you
panies where I have an open sales op- offering a no-charge completely free conference calling for
portunity, a project underway or even product with basic up to 40 participants, as well as some
track my “top prospects.” When you view pretty nice features like on-demand or
functionality as well as
a company or contact profile, Gist has scheduled calls, Web invitations and
a premium offering ...
provided a handy “notes” function that response tracking, view all attendees
lets you add comments or track activi- and comments at a glance, U.S. and
ties. Your e-mail and attachments history shows up in the European dial-in numbers, Outlook and iCal integration,
individual records, too. Does it have all the bells and whis- and free audio call recording. With this product, everyone
tles of a full-blown CRM system? No, but what it has ( for calls Rondee’s Bridge number (United States or Europe) and
once) is exactly what you really need. enters an assigned passcode to connect to your meeting. It
Gist is good. Very, very good. Visit www.gist.com and see could not be much more simple or easy for all concerned.
how you can get set up and running in ten minutes or less. Now let’s look at FreeConferenceCalling.com. Like Rondee,
you can host a free conference call with your dedicated Free
Rondee & FreeConferenceCalling.com Conference Calling account anytime, from anywhere. The dif-
Do you conference call with customers, employees, ference is that FreeConferenceCalling.com assigns you a per-
vendors or your sales team? Do you hold telephone semi- sonal, permanent telephone number and passcode. With this
nars or meetings? For a lot of us, conference calling has product you can access conference call reports after each call
become a way of life. Today, it is one of those fundamental to review when and which callers attended your call, and
business tools that we seem to be using more and more. The record your conference call for easy reference and playback
thing is, conference calling can be an expensive proposition via MP3 so you can listen, download and podcast easily. What
— but it does not have to be. we like is that you can watch your conference call from your
At the BizCAT Group, we have been using free conference Web browser and manage the individual rights of conference
calling services for the last seven or eight years. Here’s how call attendees for up to 500 callers. Attendees can join a con-
they work: Instead of you paying a fee for each of the callers ference call from a regular telephone, cell phone and popular
on your conference call, each participant simply calls in to a VOIP services without issue.
predefined telephone number assigned to your event or your Whichever product you choose, we think you will be more
company. The thing is, this is not an 800 number, so rather than happy. Both do a great job and seemed to be pretty
than you paying a charge, each caller pays whatever amount problem-free. And if you are concerned that your customers
he would normally pay to call that number — typically a might think you are being cheap by not having an 800
long-distance call. Just to clarify, there are no surcharges number for them, we can pretty much assure you that will
from the conference call companies or the telephone compa- not be this case — at least that’s what our years of experience
nies to your participants; they only pay long-distance using these services for our calls tells us. Besides, your cus-
charges. Now, at first that might seem offputting, especially if tomers might just be impressed that you are focused on
they are customers, since you are causing people to incur an saving a bundle of money in today’s economy (especially
expense. But today, most people have unlimited long-dis- when it is probably not costing them anything either).

tance plans built into their landlines or cell phones, so it Tim McMahon held senior executive positions for many years
really does not make much of a difference, if any. with IBM and DEC before founding Catalyst, a global
Many of the free conference calling services are now consulting firm, in 1995. He is a best-selling
offering a no-charge product with basic functionality as well as author of four books and has been
a premium offering with additional capabilities, such as call featured on CNN and CNBC International.
recording and on-demand playback, Web scheduling, desktop He can be reached at
sharing and more. The good news is that for most of us in tim.mcmahon@thebizcat.com.
small or medium-sized businesses, the free offerings will be all Visit.www.thebizcat.com/reviews.

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