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Google Sheets is the most popular spreadsheet app on the market. In 2015, Google released a new version of it that brought more features to help users with their work and make managing data easier. This article will teach you how to use this tool for both personal and business purposes!
Sales teams may use customer relationship management (CRM) software to keep track of leads, contacts, and opportunities. While specialist CRM systems provide comprehensive functionality and automated tools for effectively processing company and sales data, Google Sheets may be used to create your own CRM. Start tracking and organizing customer information, interactions, and sales by following our step-by-step instructions on how to utilize Google Sheets as your CRM.
Getting Started with Google Sheets CRM
Using Google spreadsheets to create a CRM is simple—especially if you’re already comfortable with Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel. To get started, follow these five steps, then look for our additional suggestions on how to get the most out of your new Google Sheets CRM at the conclusion of this post.
1. Determine the information and data that will be processed in the CRM.
The first step in creating a Google Sheets CRM is deciding what kinds of customer data you want to capture. You must also pick what data you want to pull from your trades and connections. Identifying this data ahead of time saves time and work afterward. It’s more difficult to make process modifications in the future if you don’t have access to the extensive data management features that most CRMs provide.
As you become acclimated to using Google Sheets as a CRM, we suggest monitoring no more than three different sales process data sets. You don’t want to overwork yourself since you’ll be manually entering the majority of the data at first.
Only contacts, transactions, and sales status will be tracked in our case. Then, by establishing a column for each snippet of data, we’ll dive down into the exact data that each sheet collects.
2. Separate the process tracking sheets into tabs.
Create three distinct tabs in the Google CRM worksheet, including contacts, deals, and your sales summary, after you’ve decided what data you want to manage.
Contacts, Sheet 1
All of the key information about your contacts is maintained on the contacts tab. These comprise the firm name, contact information, contact type, source, and any other relevant information, such as the desired time to call or a preferred communication channel.
In Google Sheets, there’s no simple method to categorize your contacts by categories, such as lead, referral, or other categories. As a result, the ideal approach is to develop a drop-down menu for that data column. In the fourth stage, we’ll go through how to achieve this in further detail.
Pre-define contact types in your spreadsheet so that users may choose from a drop-down menu when creating new contacts.
Sheet 2: Offers
These are the chances of the sale you’re attempting to close, so keep track of their progress at each step of the process. Create a second page in your Sheets worksheet devoted to deals if you don’t have access to a standardized CRM visual pipeline to examine the information at a glance.
Include the transaction name, business, deal value, deal status, and a chance of closing on this page. This is where you may specify whether a transaction is in the interest stage, proposal stage, or has been won or lost so that the sales overview page can auto-calculate your revenue.
Sheet 3: Overview of Sales
The sales overview page provides a fast picture of your predicted sales during a certain time period. It demonstrates the worth of all negotiation phases, from interest and proposal through successful and failed agreements. This will provide you an overview of where you are in terms of incoming income and areas where your team will need to focus more attention in the following months.
3. Name Your Column Headings Effectively
Create headings on the first row of your CRM spreadsheet when you’ve finished setting it up. For each contact and transaction, these columns will house the various sorts of information you wish to keep track of. Each of these headers is a data point that you’ll use to sort, search, and locate individual items later.
We suggest using the headings below for your contact sheet, but you may change them to capture any other sorts of information you require. It’s simple to eliminate columns if you find you’re recording more data than you need. It is, however, more difficult to add data after the fact.
Headings for Contact Sheets
Basic contact information and a few more data items should be included on this page.
- Contact information: Every contract, whether it’s a lead or a current client, should be connected with a person. Include columns for each contact’s email address, phone number, title, company, and address in addition to a column for their name.
- This specifies if the contact is a lead, a referral, a customer, or another form of contact.
- Lead source: Regardless of the result, it’s important to keep track of where your leads come from so you can make educated choices about where to focus your future marketing efforts.
- Keep track of the last time you communicated with a contact. Each time you email or chat with them, use this box to change the date.
- Notes: Keep track of any talks or other interactions you’ve had with the contact, as well as any action steps you’ll need to take.
- Owner: Fill in this form to indicate who in your team is in charge of contacting a particular contact.
Headings for the Deals Sheet
This keeps track of your transactions and gives you key information about each one at a glance.
- The deal’s name (for example, “Adcom Group Spring 2021 Project”) is what you call it. Use titles that are easy to remember and connect to particular sales possibilities.
- Include a short description of the offer in addition to the name so that you and your team can reference the extent of the sales opportunity.
- Use this column to monitor the % possibility that each sales opportunity will close to provide yourself a picture of which transactions are most likely to close.
- The estimated, verified or planned worth of the agreement is referred to as the deal value. This might be a one-time payment or the value of a contract spread out over time, depending on the sorts of items or services you offer.
- This field is used to indicate where each sales opportunity is in the sales process.
Pro tip: To make calculating the overall prediction for your transaction value easier, group deals together by stage. Cut and paste the whole row to the deal stage where it now belongs if a transaction’s status is modified.
Headings for the Sales Overview
This gives you a brief summary of your sales forecast for a certain time period.
- Deal stage: In your deals tab, make a list of the deal phases you’ve discovered so you can view the income forecasts for each one precisely.
- Timeline: Determine the time period for which you want to track your sales progress—the best option is to do it on a month-to-month basis.
- Revenue projection: Using the data referencing algorithm, this column auto-calculates the amount for each deal stage based on the total amount in your deals tab. It gives you a fast overview of your sales outreach as well as predicted revenues for each month and deal stage.
4. Create easy-to-use sales formulas and automation
It’s time to add automation functions to make your data work together to build a workable CRM system once you’ve named the columns in your different tabs. Simple functionalities that you may add to your spreadsheets include the following:
Conditional Formatting should be added.
Conditional formatting allows you to create rules that help you identify things that need to be addressed.
You may use conditional formatting to construct rules depending on the contents of a cell. For example, if the date in the “Last Contact” column is more than four weeks ago, you may set up a rule that colors the cell backdrop red, signaling that you need to contact that lead. In Google Sheets, there are instructions for conditional formatting.
Use Validation Lists for Data
Data validation lists prevent users from entering customized data into certain columns, allowing for better data segmentation.
To guarantee that only particular kinds of data are added to a cell or range, consider utilizing data validation. To restrict the information to certain lists, we utilized this functionality in the “Contact Type” and “Stage” columns in the example template. This makes it simpler to filter and report on your CRM data since it’s clean and organized.
Data from Other Sheets as a Reference
When data from other sheets is referenced, its value is immediately mirrored, boosting accuracy and minimizing human data input.
You may combine the most significant numbers in a condensed style by referencing data from other cells. To present the values of the sales outreach, we summarized the values of the different deal phases into a table on the sales overview tab of the example template. Learn how to use data from other sheets as a reference.
5. Import Data from Other Sources
The simplest approach to fill your new CRM spreadsheet is to manually insert data into each row of the spreadsheet: one contact record, or deal, for each row. This is a reasonable technique to get your information into the CRM with minimum effort if you simply have a few connections.
Alternatively, you can generally export your contacts as a CSV file if you’ve previously utilized a digital contact management application like an address book, such as Mailchimp or Constant Contact.
After you’ve completed this step, you’re ready to use your Google Sheets spreadsheet workbook as a CRM.
Using Google Sheets CRM to Its Full Potential
One of the advantages of utilizing Google Sheets as your CRM is that it can convert basic spreadsheets into an automated tool capable of processing corporate data. Other things you may do to make the most of your new CRM are listed below.
Produce Reports
Google Sheets makes it simple to alphabetize your contacts, making it simpler to filter through your list, particularly if you have a large number of them.
Your CRM data can simply be sorted by column, enabling you to create meaningful reports based on any contact information characteristic or category. You may organize your transactions and contacts in alphabetical order, by deal value, or by most recent contacts, for example.
Move your mouse over the top row and click the selection arrow that appears to sort the data. Select whether to arrange the column in ascending or descending order by scrolling down the menu.
Users will not be able to add random information and values if you prepopulate columns with specified filters. This will make it easier for you to maintain your CRM structure.
Another useful feature is filtering, which allows you to build reports based on certain circumstances or data. You may, for example, construct a view that displays the leads with whom you haven’t interacted in the previous month. You can also filter rows to display only transactions worth more than $5,000 that have a chance of closing of at least 80%.
Share and centralize your CRM use.
If you want to utilize your CRM with a group, be sure the sharing options are configured appropriately. Working with just one document is excellent since everyone has access to the most up-to-date information about your contacts, prospects, and sales progress. To offer particular employees or your whole team access to the CRM workbook in Google Sheets, click the blue “Share” icon at the upper right of the interface.
Who Can Benefit from a Google Sheets CRM?
It’s simple to transform Google Sheets into a basic CRM system for keeping track of your most critical customer-related data, but it’s not for everyone. The following are some of the users who will most benefit from it:
- Users seeking an easy way to keep track of their connections and deals: If you’re searching for a means to maintain all of your contacts’ information and basic deal updates in one place, Google Sheets is a good option.
- Keeping track of many income streams for solopreneurs: Google Sheets is a great tool for solopreneurs who wish to keep track of their current and predicted earnings from different sources.
- Owners of small firms with just one or two salespeople: If you simply have a handful of salespeople, utilize Google Sheets to track the progress of their lead and deal outreach to make sure everything is in order.
Who Isn’t a Good Fit for a Google Sheets CRM?
Users who will benefit from specialist CRM software are listed below.
- Businesses that deal with a high number of contacts and customer data: If you’re dealing with hundreds of contacts, utilizing Google Sheets as your CRM might result in data duplication owing to significant amounts of manually entered data.
- Users that use a lot of third-party programs include. If your firm utilizes a lot of other third-party applications, such as social network management, project management, invoicing, and sales automation, specialized CRM software that interfaces with other apps are a better option.
- Larger sales organizations that wish to keep track of their sales employees’ performance should: If you want to keep track of sales representatives’ objectives and quotas, Google Sheets isn’t the best solution since it only allows for very rudimentary automation.
Freshsales, for example, is one of several free and effective CRM applications accessible. It offers a free plan with unlimited user allotment, is simple to use, and includes key CRM features including contact and account management, transaction management, in-app telephony, and a mobile app.
Conclusion
Google Sheets CRM makes it simple to manage your contacts and prospects, as well as track your sales success and incoming income. It’s important to remember, though, that it’s only suitable for managing and processing tiny quantities of data. Those that deal with a lot of customer and company data should use a specialist CRM instead.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I create a CRM in Google Sheets?
A: There are two ways to create a CRM in Google Sheets. The first is by importing data from an external spreadsheet you might already have. Many people use these spreadsheets for tracking their spending, revenue, and expenses throughout the year or month. You can import your data into this new spreadsheet with one of two methods:
1) Importing files that come attached to Excel documents
2) Using Microsofts Data Connector tool
The second way you can create a CRM in Google Sheets is using templates provided on our site under the Tools tab (which has been linked above).
