If you’re looking for a CRM, there are lots of choices out there. And they probably all sound pretty terrific when you give them a quick glance.
But if you dig deeper and go below the surface, do they do all that you need them to do? (And maybe a few things you didn’t even know you needed them to do?)
You want to be careful where you’re putting your time, energy, and money. After all, they’re all precious commodities and things you don’t want to waste.
That’s why I love Dubsado. It’s user-friendly and packs a big automation punch.
Plus it has some pretty awesome features that even people who are currently using Dubsado overlook. I often hear on the Dubsado training calls I do with my setup clients – “I didn’t know Dubsado could do that!”
And while the Dubsado webpage does a great job of sharing its capabilities, let me share a few things you might not know that it can do – but you should! Because they’re the things you’re going to want to take advantage of to save you time, energy, and money.
1. Automate Your Billing
Keeping track of invoicing can be a real pain. Not only do you have to remember when to send invoices, but remembering to follow up with invoices that haven’t been paid and keeping track of how many invoices are left can be a real timesuck.
Invoicing is one of the first things a business owner should automate (because you want to get paid obvs!). BUT if you’re like most of the business owners I work with, diving into Quickbooks can feel a bit intimidating. You’d also be like a lot of the business owners I work with if you didn’t realize you could automate billing through Dubsado.
Incorporating automatic billing into your client onboarding Dubsado workflow (what Dubsado calls the automation piece) not only saves you a ton of time but also makes sure you get paid and paid on time!
2. Client Portal
Struggling to find the best way to share resources with your clients?
Do PDFs, logins and images get lost in email?
Annoyed by a messy Google Drive and updating file sharing permissions?
The Dubsado client portal is your answer!
Not only is the portal great for housing invoices, questionnaires and call links (yes, Dubsado has a scheduler) it’s also great for sharing PDFs, video links and other resources with your clients.
Simply set up a task board (this is kind of like a Trello board but in Dubsado) and share it to your client portal. And voila! You have the perfect place to share #allthethings with your clients.
Feeling extra fancy?
A quick bit of code (I promise, it’s not scary!) added to your site and your clients will have easy access to their portal via your homepage navigation – password protected of course.
3. Set Up Recurring Payments
One of the questions my Dubsado setup clients always ask me is “Can Dubsado do recurring payments?”
And they are delighted to hear that answer is a big, ole yes!
You’ll start by setting up a recurring invoice (because remember- Dubsado also has automatic billing!). When the invoice is sent to your client, they have the option to make the payment recurring.
Want to encourage recurring payments?
Add a sentence or two to your invoice delivery email letting your clients know it’s an option. You can even include a screenshot in the email to draw attention to it.
Wondering what happens should a payment fail?
No worries! You get notified if a payment fails so you can follow up with your client.
How easy is that?
4. Set Expiration Dates for Proposals
Ever send out a proposal and have someone take their everloving time getting back to you? They show up months later ready to get started?
Problem is, now you’ve had a rate increase, or don’t have room in your schedule or have made some tweaks to your program.
Do you honor the proposal?
Have the uncomfortable conversation that you aren’t available anymore?
Make some compromise?
No, no and nope!
I encourage all my Dubsado setup clients to set an expiration date on their proposals. This is a simple but way overlooked feature in Dubsado. A feature that makes sure you get paid your current rate, don’t get overbooked and avoid uncomfortable conversations.
Plus, a little sense of urgency on your proposals never hurt anything!
5. Nurture and Cultivate Leads
Nurturing a lead so they become a potential client can take some time. And while your weekly newsletter is a great start, what do you do about the people who are further along in your sales cycle?
***The person who had a Discovery call with you and asked you to follow up in 2 months?
***The person who requested a proposal but then said, “not yet”?
***The person who is interested in an intensive but wants to wait until next month after their new site is live?
While these are the people who should be in the forefront of our minds, they are often the same potential clients who get forgotten about.
***You scribble down on a Post-it note to follow up with so and so.
***Or write it in your legal pad (the same one where you write everything down and never actually look back through) to follow up.
***Or make a “mental note” to check back in with them.
I can tell you none of these options are going to get you the client. Post-its get lost, your legal pad gets tossed around and that “mental note” – no need to say more.
What’s a better way?
Put all this information in, wait for……
Dubsado!
Dubsado is a great CRM to not only automate client onboarding but is also tremendously useful in helping you to nurture and cultivate leads. Once a lead is in Dubsado (which can happen automatically when they fill out a contact form on your site) you can keep notes using the call log feature.
Simply notate what you talked about in the call log and it will get time stamped and the information will stay attached to that prospective client. Plus, since Dubsado integrates with your calendar, you can create tasks that tell you when to follow up all in one place!
Yes, I love Dubsado. And yes, I could probably list 10 additional reasons why Dubsado is the best CRM out there, but why not just give me a call and we can talk about it more?
Let’s see if Dubsado can help you save time, energy, and money!