Data isn’t just about the bits of information that fly across your screen. In every single industry operating today, data is the circulatory system of your company. Without access to your contacts, information about your customers, and vital documents your business would be dead in the water until that access is regained.
Taking a long term view, data almost directly equals currency and the clarity and detail matters when it comes to how much it is worth. For even a small business, a client list is something that would be sold as part of your business. This can apply to any form of data but think about it as a buyer of a business.
If you had a choice between two companies, would you buy the business that has a clear record of all interactions with each client on a well-organized Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, or would you buy a company that just had names and addresses for billing in the accounting system? The choice is clear - you would choose the company with the well-documented client relationships.
Looking at both the short-term and long-term view, you can see that data is one of your company’s most important assets. So how can you protect it, and gather it so that it is worth more to your business?
Treat Your Data Like It’s Money
Your data is money in the bank for your business. Why not treat it the same way you do your online banking? You wouldn’t think about logging into your online banking over public Wi-Fi (and if you do, you shouldn’t) or emailing someone your passwords for your online bank accounts. The same mindset should apply to your data. The push/pull comes when a number of employees need to have access to data, but that access needs to be secure. If a security measure is too complex, your employees are less likely to follow it and it can interfere with their productivity. Using G Suite for your business will lock down your valuable data and allow your employees to use the same secure sign-on they use for Google for multiple solutions.
G Suite - Lock Down Your Email, Documents, and Important Files
G Suite offers security from one of the largest Internet companies on the planet: Google. Google is known for plugging security leaks, protecting users, and keeping code tight so that hackers can’t find their way in. Gmail, Google’s version of email, is protected with TLS encryption, which is a step up from the standard encryption used by most email hosting providers.
If you get G Suite for Business or Enterprise, you can change administrative rights to files based on departments and other granular data, and have access to Team Drives which keep important files within departments. You can even set up filters on Gmail to alert administrators when sensitive company data is being emailed to someone outside of your organization, and stop the email if needed.
As far as ease of access goes, your employees can get into everything with just their Google account sign-on. All of the security happens in the back end, although you can choose to have your employees sign on with a hard-coded USB device or other security measures if you need to go that far. Security with G Suite is customizable and almost invisible to your users.
CRM: Store Valuable Data About Customers
If your business is of any size, you’ll need to start storing data about your customers - and a spreadsheet isn’t the right way to go about it. You’ll be able to see how much contact you’ve had with them, when your last contact was, what promises you’ve made to them, and basic data like contact information. If you have Vonage Business, you can take advantage of features like gUnify that automatically log calls and data into your CRM. Most of the Customer Relationship Management solutions UpCurve Cloud offers allow users to sign on with their Google accounts, which locks down secure access to this information. They also bring in information from G Suite, including Gmail, documents relevant to the client, and so on.
A good CRM gives your employees less work, not more, and automates simple tasks such as logging when an email goes to a client. At the end of the day, you’ll have more valuable data about your clients and your business will run more smoothly as a result.
Contact UpCurve Cloud to find out more about how secure we can make your data, and the solutions we offer that will help you collect more of it.
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