ZOHO Canvas: Personalizing your CRM is one of the new challenges in the B2B sector. The software can be criticized for its moderately developed interface, unlike some competitors. The result is an unpleasant UX.
Zoho, who has already been singled out for these reasons, decided to fix it. In this article, we present their brand new solution: Zoho Canvas.
In short, it is an innovative solution, which allows you to personalize your workspace. In this article, we present it to you from A to Z!
Zoho Canvas design: Principle and operation
A drag & drop builder, but for your CRM interface
Like WebFlow or Wix, to create your newsletters or your website, Zoho Canvas design allows you to “build” your CRM interface through a drag and drop tool. An easy-to-use feature that allows you to personalize your CRM user experience.
Canvas design comes in a context where Zoho was criticized for offering a somewhat outdated CRM interface. This tool now allows you to customize all the elements of your CRM interface!
Zoho Canvas design is a typical example of new no-code use cases. The tool allows you to personalize your experience directly in the software. This makes it possible to consider its teams as the real users of the solution.
A large gallery of templates to personalize the user experience
Customizing your CRM interface from a template makes the creation process faster. As such, Zoho Canvas design offers many themes to support you.
These templates were built from scratch, using the Canvas tool. This offers good leads to better understand what the tool has to offer, to get the most out of it.
Who can access the Zoho Canvas feature?
Zoho Canvas design is available for all CRM subscription plans. However, the number of views per organization changes depending on the plan selected:
- I view / organization for the Standard plan
- 3 views/organization for the Professional plan
- 5 views/module for the Enterprise plan
- 25 views/module for the Ultimate plan
Canvas by Zoho: what for?
In what context was the Canvas tool developed? Since its launch, Zoho has adapted its offer to respond to market realities.
The context: Zoho’s vision
Zoho justifies its new Zoho functionality, with the history of CRM, from its arrival in the market in the 90s to today:
Data management
The challenge behind the launch of Zoho on the market was to promote the digitization of paper documents and offline processes. Zoho centralized information. It was then very quick to access it.
Management of activities
These are the Salesforce era, the distinction between SDR and Account Executive, and the systematization of commercial processes.
This period linked to the development of Zoho gave the CRM its reputation as a tool for tracing, even “coping”. However, this is a misinterpretation.
Automation management
The implementation of systematic processes presupposed the arrival of automation. It saved a lot of time.
We are thinking in particular of data enrichment tools, which replace the manual entry of your data. We also think of prospecting tools, such as automated reminders!
Intelligence management
More recently, many tools have turned to the development and use of artificial intelligence. We think for example of lead scoring software, like Einstein at Salesforce or intelligent conversation/chatbot, like Gong.io.
Experience management
The next step, according to Zoho, will be user experience management. The idea is to offer tools to optimize our consumer experiences, rather than the tools we use.
Give access to data to CRM administrators
In addition to the UX aspect and customization of the Canvas CRM interface, Canvas allows you to add very powerful features. Features that previously could be overlooked because of the associated development costs.
Let’s take an example. In case you are using Zoho Desk, you can import all user tickets to their customer record.
Generally speaking, this is an operation that requires the intervention of a sales op. He must set up all the connections between the solution used by customer support and your Canvas CRM. Usually, tools like Zapier or Integromat are used.
By using Zoho Canvas, you solve this problem in less than a minute. You just need to click and drag a data source called “Tickets” before customizing the listing.
This is a real no-code breakthrough for the increasingly mature CRM integration and customization sector.
Read more: Top 10 Best Free CRM to use
Personalize the experience according to the stage of development of a business
Depending on the prospect’s status, you can set up “Conditional Styles”. These are defined rules allowing certain elements to be displayed or not.
This makes it possible to go a long way in collecting and transmitting clear information to its teams. This saves them a lot of time.
More concretely, this can result in an evolving color code depending on the status of the prospect. Within seconds, sales reps know where the lead is in the sales funnel.
Zoho Canvas: Next Steps
The upcoming Zoho Canvas features are quite numerous and suggest some nice improvements:
- A Sandbox mode: this will allow you to work on Canvas views, without affecting the current processes
- A native mobile version: this will provide an optimized mobile CRM experience
- The possibility of adding custom code: this feature aims to encourage the modification of certain elements that would not be foreseen by the Zoho team
- Creating component galleries
The following are also planned for the longer term:
- A reporting tool: It will analyze the rate of use of Canvas and the use made of it. This makes it possible to optimize it is CMS and its functionalities so that all of its teams adopt it definitively.
- Add Canvas to all Zoho tools to customize all interfaces. One thinks in particular of ZohoDesk.
- The establishment of a marketplace. This could open up new possibilities, such as a market for CMS interfaces. You could buy themes and templates there, like with WordPress or Wix.
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