What Is a CRM Database & Why Does Your Business Need One?

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5 min. read
Trevin Shirey
Trevin Shirey
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VP of Marketing
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With so much alphabet soup out there in the technology and digital employment database space, learning and building out a CRM database is often one of the most impactful actions for many businesses. Whether you are looking to improve your CRM database or want to learn what CRM stands for, you’ve come to the right place. We’ll discuss:

What is a CRM database?
Benefits of CRM databases
How businesses can use CRM databases
Examples of CRM databases
Keep reading to learn more, or jump to the section you’re most interested in!

What is a CRM database?
CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. A CRM database is a log of all interactions with a customer, typically from the first touch point in the sales cycle through a customer’s entire relationship with a business.

This provides companies with a single source of truth in their customer communications and is a key record often used by multiple departments, such as sales, operations, and client services. If you’re familiar with an enterprise resource platform (ERP), a CRM is similar, except it focuses specifically on customer data.

There are different types of CRMs, including operational, analytical, and collaborative.

Benefits of a CRM database
There are many benefits to using a proper CRM database. This has been true for a long time. In the pre-digital days, companies would often store this information in a rolodex or ledger. With modern technology creating new ways to leverage this data, CRM databases are even more critical for a business.



Speed and Organization
Instead of digging through endless emails or notes from phone calls, a CRM database gives a single source of truth for all customer interactions. Everybody in an organization knows where to go to access this information and it keeps teams moving faster. You can onboard new employees quicker and get account reps up to speed on a certain key customer more efficiently with a CRM database.