Guide to Getting Started with Zoho CRM Features

Guide to Getting Started with Zoho CRM Features

If you are interested in sales, have a knack for selling absolutely anything to people, or work in the sales department of a company, then you would identify with having that desire to be a smart sales representative at work.


Winning the sales game has a lot to do with using a sound CRM system to its full potential. For example, with the Zoho CRM features, your sales can be automated entirely, leaving you to focus simply on customer interaction and closing deals.


In this blog, we will be seeing the features of Zoho CRM that can help you become an efficient sales representative who knows how to ace customer relations and be one step ahead. Keep reading to see and understand these features one after another.


Use Zoho Mail Integration

 

Sales have a lot to do with being prompt with the customers. If you are a sales representative, you cannot afford to miss out on an important email from a customer. Let’s imagine running through all of your emails and replying to them simultaneously.


However, you realize that you ignored an important email from a hot lead by evening. The probable reason for this could be a cluttered inbox with many emails. Missing out on this important email may not be by intention, but the fact is that as a sales representative, you cannot afford something like this for your business.


It is important for the sales representative to attend to all the leads as soon as possible and for doing the same, there needs to be a filtered view of all the prospect emails. One of the most used Zoho CRM integrations, called Mail Magnet, allows you not just to receive emails but also get a filtered view of your prospect’s emails as well.


With this email integration, you will not need to keep checking the emails all the time. Every time you receive an email from a prospect, you will be notified by the mail icon that pops up right on the Zoho CRM home page. Remember that MailMagnet will be available with the Zoho Mail Integration only, so ensure that you ask your Zoho consultant to enable it and configure the email account with Zoho CRM.


Organize Emails According to Sales Priorities


Another essential thing to remember while dealing with customers is that the most recent email is not always the most important. For example, if a lead has emailed asking about the price of a product or negotiating on the price of a product, these emails must be immediately accessible. This can save considerable time and effort.


Naturally, you will be organizing the sales activities based on the pipeline and the level each deal is in. What’s notable is that you can similarly manage your emails using Zoho CRM features. For example, using the SalesInbox, you can access columns, filters, folders, and columns that can show your sales priorities and allow you to stay at the top of the emails that matter.


SalesInbox functions smartly by organizing all emails according to how you have set up your CRM. For example, even though the regular email clients allow you to filter emails based on a sender's address, SalesInbox enables you to filter emails based on the sender’s email address and sales parameters.


For instance, if you get emails from customers offering you deals of more than 1 lakh, that can be specified with the name Top Leads. Using SalesInbox allows you to create many folders and shows them right on the side of the folders you have.


Using SalesInbox, you can also automate the lead creation in your inbox, get automatic reminders, and work with helpful information.


Monitor Customer Activities

 

One of the most critical aspects of ensuring sales success for all sales representatives will be timing. SalesSignals gives you an immediate notification about what the prospects are up to. You will also know if the lead that you have been chasing has opened your email or not. An alert will be sent to you as soon as the email is opened.


Remember that the prospects and customers can reach out to you from different channels. They can visit your website, fill out surveys, raise support tickets, and post on your social media. To improve customer relations, you will have to be consistent and prompt. SalesSignal helps you track all customer activities by displaying them in an organized way.


SalesSignal will give you a prompt when your leads send you an email, open the email sent by you, click on the links in the email, or when the email gets bounced. You will also be notified when missed calls are received, surveys get filled, new tickets, comments, and responses are received, missed chats are received, or the support tickets are overdue or escalated.


Leverage Social Media for Getting Leads


As a sales representative, you must be aware of all that interests your prospects, the kind of products or services they are looking for, and what their likes and dislikes are. Like most people in the world, your potential customers use social media and post regularly. In this process, some of them may also be talking about the prospects they are using, their influencers in decision making, and the product and services they wish to use.

Being an intelligent sales representative, you must convert every like, reshare, or comment from your prospects into an asset. You can effectively convert the social media conversations into actionable leads by lead generation automation through a workflow. All you have to do is configure your social media channel properly.


If someone tags your organization’s replies to your social media posts, you can add this person as a lead and assign the lead to a sales representative. Likewise, anytime someone messages you on social media or comments on your posts, you can also add that person as your contact and assign this contact to another sales representative.


Customize Templates

 

All sales professionals do not like manual data entry. However, there are times when entire days get wasted in typing emails while leaving only a little time to do what you are actually hired for, and that is selling. Email Templates is one of the Zoho CRM features that can help get rid of this.


You can personalize the emails for every activity and send these emails to individual prospects. In addition, you can also send mass emails to a list of leads. For example, if you have imported leads from market research and wish to engage prospects, you can send thank you emails. All that you have to do is choose the list of leads and send a mass email.


To customize the templates, you have to design your template with the help of text, images, and tables; merge fields to your template, and add headers and footers to the templates.


Track Email Performance


You can also monitor how your emails have performed. Remember that you will not be able to send better emails in case you do not know how they have performed. Hence, an innovative sales representative must be able to consistently send engaging emails that can grab the attention of prospects get them to read and respond as well.


There are smart insights available on how the templates are performing, and by using these insights, you can get closer to writing better content. The email insights can also get you weekly and monthly reports on the emails' open, click, and bounce rates. In addition, the dashboards can tell which email templates have the best open and click rates.


Keep in mind that you can use the templates with the highest open rates, update existing content, and create new templates. In case you have been sending the email template, your job is done.


Complete Sales Activities On the Go

 

The sales representatives work while also being a part of customer meetings, events, and conferences. While managing so many meetings altogether, there must be something handy to update the activities, keep the team in sync, and do important things on the go. Zoho CRM features solve this problem by coming into your pocket.


With Zoho CRM Mobile, you can add leads, create tasks, receive email notifications, find customers, etc. You can locate all prospects near you using Map View and locate leads, contacts, and prospects in any area while scheduling meetings on your trip. In addition, you can log in all your visits so that your team knows about all locations that you have visited.


In addition, you can also record your takeaways from a recent meeting with a customer effectively. Again, there is no need to type out lengthy notes; you can just record the voice notes when walking and driving, associate the audio files with the records, and download them for reference.


Use AI-Based Sales Assistant


Being a sales representative, you should not let multiple calls go unanswered. There is a smart approach called Zia, an artificial intelligence-based sales assistant that shows you the notifications that let you know if your leads, prospects, or customers have been opening up and replying to your emails.

This assistant keeps track of when the prospects participate in surveys and posts on social media and based on this information. It tells you the correct time for reaching out to the prospect. If you know the best time to get in touch with your customers, you will get more replies from them at the right time.


Automate Actions

 

Being a sales representative, you will follow a fixed set of actions while contacting leads. For example, if you target to reach 40 leads a day, and 30 of your calls get answered, you can leave an email or voice message for the other ten leads.


After you complete your daily activities, you will update the tasks done. However, there is no need to manually follow a similar routine because you can automate these actions with macros. You have to choose the records and run the macro so that the repetitive tasks are taken care of automatically.


The Zoho CRM features know that a large part of your day includes a standard set of actions, which prompts you automatically with a suggestion to run a macro. For example, if you call a lead, send that lead a follow-up email, and create a task, Zia can suggest the same list of actions as a macro the next time. All that you need to do is run the Macro if it suits your needs.


Use CRM View for Activities

 

The workday of a sales representative is full of multiple events and activities that could be anything from visiting a prospect, demo shows, task creation for calling a prospect, or following up with customers after visiting a website. How can a sales representative know which task needs to be taken first on priority?


The CRM View for Activities lets you prioritize all sales activities by being available for tasks, calls, and events in the Activities module. In addition, the interface uses a view that lets you plan who should be followed up on that day. This view is divided into the categories called Customers, including all tasks associated with the customers; Open Deals including all tasks associated with deals in the pipeline, Leads including all tasks associated with leads and contacts; and Others including all other records.


Streamline With Tagging

 

You will need unique identifiers associated with your CRM records to help you effectively search, sort, categorize, filter, and segment the records. The tags can help you clearly prioritize all records and contact them as well. For example, if you have some leads in your account that must be prioritized, you can tag these leads as Important and filter all of them easily from other leads in the Zoho CRM account.


Conclusion

 

If you use all the fantastic Zoho CRM features listed above, you will see your productivity go very high. You can use Zoho CRM to maximize your potential as a sales representative, but you need to understand all the features offered by it. And now you know all the basics :)


If you need further support in implementing Zoho CRM, you can get in touch with our expert Zoho consultants. They come with years of experience that can lead them to help you maximize your potential.



I hope that you learned something new 
Cheers!
Abhi
(Seasoned Zoho Authorized and Certified Partner)

Feel free to contact me if you have any queries
Email: abhishek(@)encaptechno(dot)com
Call: +1-416-405-8185

    • Sticky Posts

    • How to reach the official Zoho Support channels and avoid fake ones.

      Dear Customers, Thanks a lot for choosing Zoho! Our applications are built to help achieve your day-to-day business goals. We are committed to engaging with you, to understand and develop solutions that enhance your productivity.  We are happy and ready to help you use our services effectively. Understanding and avoiding fake support Just like using popular bank names and financial applications for phishing purposes, using Zoho and claiming to be providing Zoho Support or services with false numbers

    • Function #35: Close all tasks associated with a lead and create a new task.

      Welcome back everyone! Last week, we learnt how to close all tasks of a deal depending upon the deal stage. This week, let's look at a custom function that lets you close all of the tasks associated with a lead while simultaneously creating a new task, like when you need to halt all progress towards a lead while the lead is not available at the moment but create a reminder task. Business scenario: The success of a company, in one way or another, is determined by the leads it gets. Each lead is just

    • Zoho CRM Webinar - Redesigning Daily User Experiences with Canvas

      <br> Your users across roles use the CRM for day-to-day tasks that are necessary. Whether they perform their tasks on time, the right way, or at all depends on a lot of factors, including User Experience. Many businesses struggle with rigid layouts,

    • Join us at the Canada ZUG Meetup: What’s New in Zoho CRM

      Hello Zoho Community! Start your year with fresh insights into Zoho CRM’s latest updates and tools. Whether you're a CRM beginner or a experienced user, this meetup is crafted to help you optimise your processes and leverage new features. Explore practical

    • CRM Hack #2: Automate sending of birthday greetings to your customers.

        Hello everyone! What sets you apart as a sales person is your ability to add that personal touch to your business relationship with your customers. Sending a gift on a special day, or leaving a note wishing them on their birthdays, are small, yet significant actions that show your customers that you care. And these are actions done without any expectations :) You must be engaging with a lot of customers and it is highly unlikely that they all are your friends on Facebook or some social channel,

    • Recent Topics

    • How can I see the actual copy sent to the specific contact?

      I have setup a journey in Marketing Automation and created addition of contact in a specific list as the trigger, emails are sending to the contacts, but I can't see the actual copy sent to any specific contact in the list. Please guide me, where can

    • Client Script for Task Module

      When do we expect the client script for the tasks module?

    • Formula Fields inside of Blueprint Transitions

      We would like to have formula fields inside of blueprint transitions. We type in currency fields and would like to see the result inside of a formula field. Our use case: Send out a price for XY 1. Filling out cost fields 2. See gross profit

    • inventory based on bills and not physical stock

      Hello, I have noticed a very annoying issue with zoho books/inventory. I use composite items. If I have an sub assembly item on back order, I am unable to make up the composite item, even when I have received the goods and it is in my stock. I have to convert the PO into a BILL in order for the item to show as 'Accounting Stock'. The problem is that the supplier Invoice is not shipped with the goods, but can follow even a week later. So I have to make the bill have a 'dummy name and number' until

    • Using Zoho Inventory for managing Item compatibilities

      Use case: Using Zoho Inventory for managing (as an example) aftermarket car parts, where a single part can suit many makes, models and years. How do most businesses assign and manage compatibility for each part? Do ZI users typically do this using multi-select

    • Unable to enter manual journal entries in AR/AP.

      Hi there, i am facing some problem relating to AR/AP. I want to make some entries in AR/AP through manual journal. for example. some time I send cash 500 to Mr. A (Customer) for any purpose and then after 2 or 3 days Mr. A returned back 700 to me and

    • Questions regarding WorkDrive

      Here are my questions regarding WorkDrive: Does WorkDrive have a limit on the number of downloads? What will happen if a file is downloaded excessively? Does WorkDrive have any restrictions on download speeds? Are there any limitations on downloading

    • How to record tips from customers

      I run a cleaning service business and on occasion customers include a tip with their check payment. How can I record the amount paid for service and the tip separately? Any amount over the invoice is looked at as an overpayment and suggest a credit note

    • Multi-currencies in Zoho Books

      I'd like to request multiple currencies in Zoho Books. I have customers paying in USD, CAD, CNY. I need to bill customers in these currencies too. I can set up a base currency, and then set up a exchange-rate table to convert these currencies.

    • I want refund of Zoho standard subscription on WEB payment

      Hi, Kindly help to refund the WEB payment made on 13/07/2025 for Zoho standard annual subscription. I didn't find the software useful for my project. Regards

    • Is Conditional display of field(s) possible in a Canvas Customer Portal?

      Is Conditional display of field(s) possible in a Canvas Customer Portal? How?

    • Automate Backups

      This is a feature request. Consider adding an auto backup feature. Where when you turn it on, it will auto backup on the 15-day schedule. For additional consideration, allow for the export of module data via API calls. Thank you for your consideration.

    • View Linked Subscription on Invoice list

      When looking at the list of invoices in billing is it possible to see the subscription that an invoice is for. This would allow you to see if it's a subscription a customer is behind on, or they simply haven't paid a one time invoice.

    • Recording Credit Card Fees when Recording Payment for Bills

      It seems I am unable to record credit card fees when paying a bill. I pay close to 100% of my bills with a company credit card via online portals. I'm happy for the CC fess to be recorded as Bank Charges but it will not allow that field to be used if

    • Workerly/Zoho One Pricing

      Hi What is the pricing model that is suppose to be as a Zoho One user? If i use the services of a freelancers or temp workers (Sometimes for a few hours a week/month), I need to purchase a zoho one license for each of them as well as workerly licenc

    • DKIM

      I have my DKIM in Titan, which is another email service provider. I get this notification on my portal. What shall I do? ( Improve the deliverability of emails sent from Zoho Social by adding DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) records to your DNS settings.

    • Show All Notes For A Single Record

      I would like to be able to view a list of all Notes for a particular record. We can add several (unlimited) Notes for the Leads, Contacts, Accounts and Potentials records. The subject line and some of the note content for up to 10 notes is visible on the first page. You can select the arrow to view additional notes in the list. I would like a button next to the New Note button that says View All. This would bring up a printable list of all notes listed in descending order by Modified Time (newest

    • Zoholics Europe 2025: Build Smarter with the Zoho Creator Low-code Workshop!

      Why should you attend? This year, Zoholics Europe 2025, Zoho’s official user conference, is your opportunity to connect directly with the teams behind the tools you use every day. Don’t miss one of the most requested sessions: dedicated, hands-on workshop

    • Assigning multiple roles to a user in Creator

      Hi I find we can assign only one role and permission to an user in creator. There is a requirement to assign multiple roles and corresponding permission to one user. Is there any solution or workaround for this? Refer the screenshot below

    • 【Zoho CRM】ウィザード機能のアップデート：セクション要素の追加

      ユーザーの皆さま、こんにちは。コミュニティチームの中野です。 今回は「Zoho CRM アップデート情報」の中から、ウィザード機能のアップデートをご紹介します。 ウィザード機能に新たに「セクション要素」が追加されました。 各ウィザード画面内で項目、テキスト、サブフォーム、ウィジェット要素などをより柔軟に整理できるようになりました。 セクション要素とは？ ウィザードの中で、関連する項目や要素をひとつの「サブエリア」 としてまとめられる新しい構成要素です。 セクション要素活用メリット 入力内容やプロセスによっては、より細かな構造や階層化が求められる場合があります。

    • Edit PDFs from within your web app using Zoho Office Integrator

      Hi users, We are excited to introduce PDF editing capabilities in Zoho Office Integrator. You can now open, edit, and collaborate on PDFs from within your web app—in addition to documents, spreadsheets, and presentations—and save them in your configured

    • Zoho Recruit > Job Opening Module> Editing, Deleting, Adding (Fields)

      Hello All In the Job Opening Modules How do i go about deleting the Positing Title or changing to Job Title or can i hide it from all? I want to add a Look Up User Field, however when i select the look up field i do not see that Can i have the industry

    • Can you create a lead without assigning an owner?

      Here is the question I have:   Is there a way I can create a bunch of leads without assigning it an owner?   What I want is for my salespeople to pick and choose their own leads without me assigning them..   right now all leads are owned by me because

    • Bug - Incorrect example in the documentation

      I found an issue in the Zoho API documentation. The example "Sample Request" on this page is incorrect — it shows the example for "Get Email Attachment Info" instead of "Get Email Attachment Content". Wrong example: curl "https://mail.zoho.com/api/accounts/12345678/folders/9000000002014/messages/1710915488416100001/attachmentinfo"

    • Power of Automation :: Dynamically generate Tasklists based on values selected in Task Custom Fields

      Hello Everyone, A custom function is a software code that can be used to automate a process and this allows you to automate a notification, call a webhook, or perform logic immediately after a workflow rule is triggered. This feature helps to automate

    • WhatsApp Enhancements to Boost Customer Engagement

      We're excited to introduce a series of powerful enhancements to the WhatsApp integration in Zoho FSM, making customer interactions faster, smarter, and more actionable—right from your Zoho FSM interface. Here’s a quick rundown of what’s new: Try It Out

    • Store reviews module just got smarter in Zoho Apptics

      Hello, Apptics community! Every app deserves better visibility in the marketplace, and reviews play a crucial role in improving your app's App Store Optimization (ASO), rankings, and credibility across stores. That's why we've rolled out a set of enhancements

    • Try CRM for everyone button in the way of workflow

      Please consider using the bottom bar for offers. Using the top bar for offers like "Try CRM for everyone" really gets in the way of my day to day workflow.

    • Include EVERYTHING in Language Files

      Hey, we are building out a system, that needs to be translated. The language files lack a few things though. 1. Blueprint names 2. Canvas View elements like tab names Please include everything into these files, otherwise it's not really a multi language

    • A way to create kits (groups of items) that do not require bundling and are added to an order as the individual items

      We are evaluating moving off of Sage BusinessWorks (which handles accounting, order entry, inventory control, accounts receivable, etc) to Zoho Books/Inventory. One of the things we heavily use is a feature called Kits, which allows creating a group of

    • Allocating Salesman To Customer

      Hello, please add a feature to allocate a salesman to a particular business customer/account. Regards

    • Shipment

      I have 70 shipments Out of which 40 delivery date are updated( since it is live tracked) 30 numbers i need to update manually. How to do it in bulk?

    • arabic not printing

      Qatar has a legal requirement to have invoices in English and Arabic. When writing invoice fields in Arabic, they don't print. Why?

    • How to show Order Number/SO Ref on Invoice emails

      When creating a sales order or invoice we have an option to input an order number or ref# (see attached images). For the Sales Order email template we can add a placeholder for the SO_REF. However, for the Invoice email template there's no option to reference

    • Specify in-line image size in question

      I have an image inserted into a file upload type question. I can click and drag the corner of the image to make it larger or smaller, but I would like to manually input the dimensions I need. No matter what size I make the image in photoshop before uploading

    • Can you limit who creates tags?

      Hi there, I'd like to find out if it's possible to limit which Agents create tags on Zoho desk. Thank you. 

    • Sudden Layout Issue After Last CSS Update for ZML (Temporary Fix Inside)

      Hi, Our clients have noticed today that every section laid out with ZML suddenly shows an unwanted top padding/blank space that interrupts the user screens. It appears that Zoho has changed the default CSS for the .zcp-col.zcp-panel-rowtype-auto element.

    • Customer paid excess. How do I record payment?

      A customer has paid me Rs. 7150 which is in excess. The amount due is Rs. 5388 I owe them Rs. 1762 back which I will be transferring to their account tomorrow. How do I get this entered into Zoho Books? I'm a little lost. :) Rishi

    • Tabular View Report | Scale To Fit Screen

      Please add the option to scale Tabular View reports to fit the screen. I constantly have to adjust the column size of Tabular View reports to fit various screen sizes and it just looks messy. You can see in the screenshot below there is a blank gap after

    • Why Server error in creatiing Landing Pages

      Hi Zoho Team, pls see my screenshot and tell me, what's wrong. Thx

    • Next Page