Why I left Radius BOB, best CRM discussion

[MedicareMillionair]

Social Media - targeting agents for a downline or clients?

Both. They have an option to set up multiple business accounts. As compared to Hootsuite and other comparable programs, it is very competitively priced.

 

[MedicareMillionair]

Not really sure I understand the question - do you mean to pay sub agents? Or to automatically calculate and/or track expected commissions?

As far as I know, it can't do that.

I've customized it quite a bit over the years and changed a bunch of things, I'm not sure what "out of the box" looks like exactly...

But, in my system, when I pull up a "client" (a "converted lead"), I can enter a sale (attached to the "client"). I then manually enter carrier (I pick from a drop down of my pre-loaded carriers), then enter the AP (just started doing this), then enter my estimated FYC in the "amount" field and then connect it to the marketing campaign that generated the lead/sale. I enter a few more things, like effective date, name of plan, etc.

So, no, it doesn't know my comp %'s to figure out commission but I (for now) only track two things: Annualized Premium and FYC compared to $ spent on marketing to generated the sale. If total FYC is one penny higher than the campaign's cost, I'm happy (if it's 8x higher than the campaign cost, I'm really happy!).

Not subagents (that's not the direction I'm going) but for my own commissions. Your correct, i don't think it will do that. They have a module called "Subscriptions" I thought might handle it, but it won't.

 

[sshafran]

I've used Zoho CRM since 2011 - recommended here numerous times.

Today, I made the decision to switch to Agile CRM (enterprise). It looks like I'll get a few (better) features and an overall upgrade.

Hoping the transition goes smoothly - I think it will. We'll see!

 

[jerkstore]

Why'd you switch?

 

[sshafran]

Why'd you switch?

Zoho ticked me off over the weekend. On Friday, the voicemail greeting went down - so anyone who called in got basically dropped - no chance to leave a VM.

They didn't get it fixed until this morning. So, yesterday and Monday, if I wasn't sitting at the desk - the call basically went to nowhere. Very frustrating.

-----

So, I signed up for Agile this morning after talking to them for quite a while. I'll admit though that I'm already annoyed at Agile.

A big selling point was texting - Zoho can not send/receive SMS. Agile supposedly can (Twilio is my telephony).

So, I get in there this afternoon to set everything up, and while you can send a text, you can't receive one. Really? To me, this makes the SMS feature on Agile worthless.

Secondly - I get in there (after subscribing) and there is one module - contacts. Rather than two (Leads / Clients). You can't customize it, either. I don't like that at all. With Zoho, you enter a lead, then when you sell, you convert the lead to client.

I called them and they recommended that I "tag" the contacts with a "lead" tag or "client" tag.

Third - they make it very difficult to upload a custom greeting for the voicemail... i.e., "You've reached the office of Scott... blah blah blah... I'll be in from 8 to 5 today... blah blah blah..." They told me that I have to create a Timlet. Really? Why can't I just upload the .mp3 for directly to Agile (Zoho could do this)?

Finally, while playing around with it today, I took a call that was not connected to a contact yet (had not imported everything yet). Finished the call, then tried to assign that inbound call to a contact that I had created. Nope. Can't manipulate a call within the Activities tab and assign it to a contact of your choice (Zoho could do this).

One upgrade that I do think is better in Agile is 3-way calls. Zoho can't do that, and when doing e-apps with immediate calls to underwriters, the 3-way call would be helpful (my workaround is to hang up and call client with my cell).

All this to say, while Zoho annoyed me this weekend, I'm not sure if I upgraded as much as I thought. The SMS function is a joke. You can't manipulate Activities easily. You can't easily change custom voicemail greetings. No lead / client separation.

All in all, I feel like Agile was a step back (except 3 way calls). Maybe I'm missing something, but my initial few hours using it were not great.

 

[JJ2713]

Zoho ticked me off over the weekend. On Friday, the voicemail greeting went down - so anyone who called in got basically dropped - no chance to leave a VM.
........
All in all, I feel like Agile was a step back (except 3 way calls). Maybe I'm missing something, but my initial few hours using it were not great.

deleted most of your post to save space

Have you ever considered using different software products and connecting them?

I'm not a fan of all-in-one solutions. They sound very appealing, but do each of their "product departments" serve your needs?

Or instead of using an all-in-one solution, why not use a few different software products and connect them via zapier (or other way)?

Like a CRM, texting company, email, phone, etc. Find the software company whose product serves your needs and connect them all.

 

[Heist]

How does radius compares to agencybloc in terms of processing commission for agents. I’m using ab now but I am considering switching to radius because of google integration.

 

[SusieQ2]

I'm curious to see what those of you that went with AgileCRM now think of it. Are you still using it? I'm considering RadiusBob right now. I'm on the free trial but it's really hard to decide to pay for it when you can't test the email or the dialer to see if they work the way you want. Those features are only available after you fork out some $$$$.

Also, it seems like most of the CRMs are meant for teams. I want something simple that will let me autodial, drop a voicemail, send "tracked" emails, etc. From what I've seen it's really hard to find something that's simple with those features.

Seems like the dialer systems, phoneburner, salesdialers, dyl, calltools, etc. charge a lot for what they provide. RadiusBob now has the dialer and voicemail drop and CRM for much less. I feel like I'm missing something.

RadiusBob can be a fantastic solution for managing an agency or BoB - however - is it the "end-all" or "be-all" solution?

No - its not perfect but nothing is. You even mentioned an alternative that was a multi-platform solution ... because you couldn't find the "perfect" CRM ...

RadiusBob has listened to clients and updated/upgraded their system over the years ... which is more than I can say for many SAAS platforms that I have seen.

I also stand firm that everyone has different needs/wants with CRMs. 1 CRM might be a great fit while another CRM who is well-liked by many might just not be a good fit for you.

***I always recommend shopping around and finding the system that fits best

Here is my comparison article on CRMs I published last year that I will be updating in the near future with more CRMs: TOP 10 CRMS FOR INSURANCE AGENTS

 

[radiusbob]

I'm on the free trial but it's really hard to decide to pay for it when you can't test the email or the dialer to see if they work the way you want. Those features are only available after you fork out some $$$$.

While there are hard costs involved for sure with those features, it is more about Spam Prevention as we learned the hard way many years ago that having those types of features available during the free trial get abused.

All it took was for one user to upload thousands of leads and then try to send out thousands of emails. Fast forward down the road and another user set up a toll free number that was routing all over the planet with call forwarding burning through thousands of minutes and we turned that off feature off during the three trial.

And yes, we could allot so many minutes, so many emails, so many text messages during the free trial, but each user would ask for 10 more minutes, 10 more emails, 10 more sms messages.

Short answer, create a Support Ticket (Knowledge Base - Radiusbob Support) and we can chat ti see what cane be done. It's much easier to make something available short term after confirming they are human

 

[SandraB]

this thread was started in 2018 and I'm looking for a CRM now. I'm independent, just me with an assistant every now and then. Hope to have one FT, but not yet. So for those who used Radius in 2018, are you still using RadiusBob?