Announcing Early Access to "Zoho CRM for Everyone" — A new and exciting update to Zoho CRM

Announcing Early Access to "Zoho CRM for Everyone" — A new and exciting update to Zoho CRM

We are delighted to announce an Early Access to Zoho CRM for Everyone— a truly democratic approach to managing a CRM, gift-wrapped in an exciting and intuitive user interface. Here, multiple teams across an organization can coordinate among each other towards a singular objective —to delight their customers everyday.

Quote
Summary of this post: Zoho CRM for Everyone is a progressive and fundamental shift towards making the CRM a truly democratic system for every stakeholder that needs it in an organization. Zoho CRM for Everyone is not a new product, rather it is a new and visionary approach that tackles the challenge of disconnected processes by imbibing the philosophies of CRM democratization, team empowerment and coordination right into the DNA of a CRM. This is very much an updated version of the existing version of Zoho CRM. The key features in this release include Teamspaces, Team Module and Requests, all of which are presented in a reimagined user interface.

To learn more, please take some time to read this detailed post. Request Early Access Here

Why do you need Zoho CRM for Everyone?

Challenges of any current-day CRM

While CRM is indeed a powerful system that houses every piece of customer data, in most cases, it continues to be a system that is largely accessible by ONE primary section of an organization — Sales. While sales teams are indeed the champions that lead customer conversations and make the tough negotiations with prospects, the ultimate clinching of a business deal is the result of cumulative efforts of multiple minds.

Consider a deal convergence process. You are likely to have various stakeholders responsible for different parts of the process, where they come in, play their part, and pass the baton to the next team. For example, in a typical SaaS company, once the sales team starts pursuing a prospect, they may need the help of the marketing team to provide them with sales collateral to pique the prospect's initial interest. Then, they may need to work with the Presales team to showcase a well-tailored demo of the application to convey the value of the software. After negotiation, the salesperson will need the help of the legal team to draw up a deal contract and process it further.

So, as you can see, various stakeholders have an important role to play in the convergence of a single deal. However, when the CRM as a system is made accessible ONLY to the larger majority, that is the sales teams, there are quite a few undeniable challenges. Sales often has to spend time translating context and coordinating with these multiple teams offline— simply because these various customer operations teams do not have a place in the CRM system.

Think of the time and efforts that the sales teams have to put into:
  • Establishing customer context (which is already present in the CRM) to the other teams.
  • Coordinating and following up with each stakeholder for the convergence of a single deal.
In the following screenshots, the sales agent coordinates with marketing and pre-sales teams via communication platforms including say, email and chat.

Now at the receiving end of these emails and chat conversations, each of those customer ops teams may have their own separate gamut of apps and systems to process these deliverables. Once they understand the requirement from the sales teams, they swing into action using their own separate system or application, such as spreadsheets or project boards.


So in the end, the same customer context originally available in the CRM is now translated across different applications, in different ways by multiple stakeholders — in other words, this is a very disconnected process.
This way of working presents the following key challenges
  • All stakeholders work in silos. Different communication tools are used to achieve coordination, which could ultimately lead to a disconnected process.
  • The processes of stakeholders and related follow-ups are extremely fragmented.
  • There is a potential lack of customer context and communication gaps when teams have to coordinate with each other, but they are doing so across different apps and platforms.
These challenges lead to internal delays and poor coordination, which could ultimately impact the customer experience that the organization provides.

Here is where Zoho CRM for Everyone presents an all-new refreshing direction and exciting possibilities.

Zoho CRM for Everyone is a progressive and fundamental shift towards making the CRM a truly democratic system for every stakeholder that needs it in an organization. This new and visionary approach tackles the challenges of current-day CRM by imbibing the following philosophies right into the DNA of a CRM.
  • Democratization of CRM
  • Empowerment of teams
  • Achieving coordination as part of the CRM's process flows.

1. Democratization of CRM powered by Teamspaces

The ultimate goal of every business is to achieve customer delight—and as we noted above, achieving customer delight cannot happen with the effort of a single person or function. In such a case, why not empower all of these customer operations teams and processes with rich CRM capabilities?

Zoho CRM for Everyone effectively democratizes the CRM system by allowing a platform for all key stakeholders involved in an organization's customer-facing processes to get onboard the CRM system and have their dedicated, clutter-free space to organize their data and orchestrate their work.

This democratization of CRM is powered by what we call Teamspaces— which is quite simply a dedicated work area for every team that gets onboard the CRM system. Every team could have their own set of modules that are relevant to them. Teamspaces effectively offer this unique setup in which the teams are very much now part of the same CRM system where sales operates and which is rich with customer context—and at the same time, they are not overwhelmed with a hundred modules irrelevant to them. They are connected to CRM — at the same time, have their own private, clutter-free work area.

For example here are two Teamspaces — one for the Marketing team and one for Legal. Each team member will log into CRM and find that they are part of THEIR OWN Teamspace, with modules and data only relevant to them.



2. Empowerment of teams powered by Team Module.

Once you bring multiple teams onboard the CRM system, what next? Well, they need to set up and manage their own processes. Each team comes with accurate knowledge of their day-to-day activities and processes, and so they could be the best people to set up their workflows. So, in Zoho CRM for Everyone, teams are empowered to capture every unique process via what we call Team Modules.

Team Module is a bespoke module that, by design, is accessible only to a specific team and not across the organization.

Examples of Team Modules in the Marketing Teamspace for instance, could be "Sales Documents", "Win-loss analysis", "Beta-launch program" and more. Essentially every process of a team in question that needs to be systematically managed, can be set up using Team Modules.
Sales Documents Team Module (From Marketing Team)
Legal Reviews Team Module (Legal Team)
The unique attribute of Team Module is that it could have its own Team Module Admin. One of the main challenges of current-day CRM could be attributed to the fact that there is a huge dependency on central admins (with good reason). You don't want a chaotic setup, and you want the right people in control of the system's security and data.


However, consider this new proposition where an additional 50 teams will get on board the CRM system. If the central admins have to configure each and every aspect of each of those 50 teams, there is going to be a significant setback — an overall dependency on central admins not just by Sales but by a few other hundred members.

Therefore Zoho CRM for Everyone includes a possibility where the administrative activities of a Team Module, that is a module specific to a team's process, could be taken care by the senior leaders of that team themselves.



This is akin to delegating routine administrative tasks and entrusting responsibility to those teams. Not to forget that the central org admins continue to retain the highest authority across CRM— they can revoke a Team Module admin's access at any time. In fact this Team Module admin will be supervised and work with the central admins — it is just that the team need not wait on central admins now for minor admin tasks such as adding a new picklist field or a quick workflow. They are empowered in the system to organize their process flows the way they feel is needed, under the close supervision and guidance of the central admins.

Say hello to Team Modules, where every team's process can be captured via bespoke modules, complete with automation, process management and customization capabilities.



3. Achieving coordination among teams via Requests

Now that multiple teams are on board the CRM and able to setup and manage their own processes— the next thing to do is ensure a seamless coordination between them which is rich with context, and easy to execute without relying on third party platforms. "Requests" in Zoho CRM achieve exactly that.

A request is simply a record added by Team A directly in Team B's module so that their requirement is recorded in their module and ready to be processed. Instead of conveying a message to a colleague via phone, chat or email which could be fragmented, you now coordinate with them by directly leaving a record in their Team Module. This saves time in translating context and the fellow team in processing your requirement.

For example, Heather Woods, a salesperson can create a "Request" in the Marketing team's Team Module called "Sales Collateral". She can directly add a record which captures details of the particulars such as what she needs, the customer or deal that the document is for, by when it is needed and other important details. Then the marketing agent, say Tai Chang, can process the request directly from this Team Module and need not spend time in again organizing the requirement in a separate system. 

Sales team adding a request to the marketing team



Marketing team processing the request and handing the deliverable back to Sales



As you can see, the placing of a Request and the processing of the same are done in CRM. What's more, the "Requesters", that is the members who have placed the request can track them all in a consolidated manner via their My Requests tab.
My Requests
This way, follow-ups are far from fragmented, they are neatly consolidated and you can track various key aspects of your Requests such as the status, the stakeholders, the deal associated and so on.

So with these three pillars— that is democratization of CRM with Teamspaces, empowerment of teams via Team Modules and achieving coordination between teams via Requests, you essentially ensure a seamless experience AKA a CRM for Everyone!

Team Module — Quick information on Availability and Limits

Team Modules are available from the Standard Edition onwards, including all Free Trial editions.

For detailed Availability and Limits: Learn more

Now what's the incentive to bringing all of your team members on board the CRM?

Well, great news! You do not have to pay full price for using only a small portion of the CRM system. Introducing Team User Licenses, which acts a limited access to CRM at a subsidized rate. This is introduced in order to encourage more and more users to get onboard CRM, and leverage this powerful system for their specific processes at a nominal rate.

The fundamental difference between a Team User and an Org User is that a Team User by default will have access to only the Team Modules they are added into. They will not own any organization modules, nor be able to share them. They can view certain org modules as that may be needed as a reference point for their work, but they will not be able to modify org module data.

For example, while the sales team members in an organizaiton will use the full CRM license, the Presales team or the Legal team members could be added under the "Team User License". Here, they will have access only to their respective Team Modules. They could view Leads, Contacts and Accounts if their tasks call for it— however they won't be able to own or modify any of these org module data.


Here is the price breakdown for Team User licenses.
— $9 / user / month if billed annually.
— $11 / user /month if billed monthly.

As part of this announcement, we are thrilled to offer 100 free team user licenses for 100 days as a trial for all early access customers of Zoho CRM for Everyone. Post this 100 day period, the above prices will apply.

Public Fields:

In a different scenario, you may want to further restrict a Team User's access to the org modules. You don't want them to view the entire record but only a handful of fields. For example, you don't want to expose the contact details of a customer or their deal amounts, but you only want a legal executive or presales engineer to view the customer's industry and employee size to further understand how to tailor their work. In such a case you can mark these specific fields — such as Account Name, Industry, Employee Size etc as Public Fields. Public fields are those specific fields which you can make visibile to anyone across an organization on a read-only mode, while the rest of the fields in the record except for those public fields, remain hidden.

Introducing the Next Gen UI of Zoho CRM

The CRM user interface has been re-designed to accommodate the needs of multiple teams in an organization and support easier configuration of key settings such as modules, reports, and dashboards, apart from several other visually pleasing surprises!



Primary and Secondary sidebar:

The menu options from the top band menu bar have been moved to the left-hand side vertical sidebar. The sidebar is now an extremely functional piece of the UI with contextual shortcuts for quick settings, neat folders for better organization of modules and more. The sidebar now has two divisions— Primary Sidebar and the Secondary Sidebar.


  • The Primary Sidebar is for first-level navigation of the product. The top portion of the Primary Sidebar houses icons to view and work with Modules, Reports, Dashboards, Requests, Marketplace, and Global Search. The bottom portion of the Primary sidebar now contains intuitive utility icons such as Quick create record, Mail magnet, Calendar and more. (originally located on the top right corner of the UI).

  • The Secondary sidebar opens up quick-controls contextual to what you choose in the Primary sidebar. This is collapsible in order to allow you to maximize your right-hand side work area. 

    You have contextual shortcuts to Setup options on the Secondary sidebar. Ex: You can create a module, a report or a dashboard right from this location without having to navigate to the backend Setup. (While the backend Setup is still intact, the Secondary sidebar options offer a quick shortcut).

    You can also directly create layouts, webforms, wizards, canvas pages, etc from the Secondary sidebar.


    Besides, the Secondary sidebar houses folders for better sorting modules, reports, etc.Folders

Chart view alongside list views — where the records in a module can be organized in the list view space as a chart component.
Learn more. 

Chart View
An omni-channel Interactions tab — where you will be able to see the complete timeline of communication via multiple channels with a customer. Learn more

Interactions Tab

Well, what are you waiting for? We hope that this detailed elaboration gives you a fair idea of our directional progressive improvements with Zoho CRM for Everyone.

Notes
NOTE:
  • "Zoho CRM for Everyone" is NOT a new product from Zoho. This is the name of this latest release, which promises a host of features and possibilities that makes Zoho CRM a system that is easily accessible for "everyone" in an organization. Hence the name. Rest assured, these releases are part of the Zoho CRM product.
  • Early Access to Zoho CRM for Everyone including Team Module and Next Gen UI is being rolled out in a phased manner. This means, our customers will receive this option to try the new version in batches over the next few weeks.

That said, we are happy to enable this on priority to those who submit an early access request.

Submit your entry for EARLY ACCESS to the Zoho 
CRM for Everyone today. 
https://www.zoho.com/crm/ea/crm-for-everyone.html?drlnk=request-access


We are continuously innovating and adding feature sets to substantiate our claims as part of this release. We appreciate any suggestions, criticism and feedback on this direction.

Useful Links

Start your journey with Zoho CRM for Everyone by bookmarking the following useful links. 

    • Recent Topics

    • Able to change project on timelog entries

      Ability to move the timesheet entry from one project to another. When a user adds a wrong entry a manager can change/update the timesheet entry to the correct project.
    • Caso de Uso | Menos trámites, más salud: Clínicum optimiza sus recursos con Zoho One

      "La automatización del proceso de solicitud de bajas y su trazabilidad a través de Zoho nos ha supuesto una mejora en el ROI." - Carol Rodríguez, Responsable de Experiencia del Cliente interno y externo en Clínicum ¡Hola a todos! Estamos emocionados de
    • How do I stop getting notified about upgrading to Upgrade now and save big!

      How do I stop getting notified about upgrading to Upgrade now and save big! There is no way to clear this notification, and EVERY Day I get alerted to upgrade, but there is no permanent way to dismiss this alert! How can I permanently dismiss this a
    • Double opt-in notifications and customizable confirmation messages for your webforms

      Dear CRM Community, We are excited to announce a major upgrade to our Webforms feature. You can now customize the confirmation message shown to your users who double opt-in from your webform and also customize your confirmation emails when they submit
    • Bulk create tasks - Zoho Projects API

      Hi Zoho/Community, I am trying to create multiple tasks in a single API call, is there a way we can combine multiple request bodies into one single payload? The issue I am facing is the rate limiting on the API, I wanted to create certain amount of tasks
    • Task Due dates and Reminder Date & Time

      I like to have a reminder on many tasks in Zoho Recruit. I find the process cumbersome in that each task requires the following: 1. click and select due date 2. Click the reminder box 3. Click on (Reminder) Start Date 4. Click on (Reminder )Time If one
    • Unable to Access Admin Console and Email Sending Issues

      Hello Zoho Support Team and Community, I hope this post finds you well. I am currently facing two significant issues with Zoho services: Admin Console Access Issue: Every time I try to access the Zoho Admin Console, it gets stuck on the loading screen
    • Tracking new lead response time

      Hi, I have a team of Sales Development Reps, who have a KPI of responding to a lead within 20 mins or less once it hits the system.  I seem to recall that Zoho CRM had the capability to track this in a previous version, but don't see it anywhere.   It's
    • Getting The Following Error.. 550 5.4.6 Unusual sending activity detected

      I just launched a marketing campaign and I got this error. Everything was working fine previously. This is a big launch so need to fix it asap. Can anyone help?
    • Printing on 80mm bluetooth Pos Printer

      Hello. I am trying to print receipts and invoices using my 80mm bluetooth connectivity Pos printer. I have configured the Templates to Retail so that it matches the paper width of the Pos printer. However, when I click Print in zoho, first it opens the
    • Trying to integrate gmail but google keeps blocking Zoho access for integration??

      hi i am trying to integrate a gmail account so can track/access business emails this way. I have followed the instructions but after selecting my email account it gets re-routed to this message (screengrab below) Can anyone advise a way around this or
    • Which attribute in Zoho books invoice api represent branch attached to the invoice?

      Hi Zoho Team, We have done the integration with Zoho Books API. While fetching data from Invoice API we want to get branch value attached to the invoice. We could not figure out which field in "Get an Invoice" api represents branch value attribute. Thanks
    • How to Billed from two different GST Numbers

      How to Billed from two different GST Numbers. Suppose ABC & Co had GST registration in Delhi and Haryana and Zoho account is created with Delhi GST Registration number. Now i also want to issue invoice from Haryana GST Registration number. How can i proceed ?
    • How to hide Predefined views

      Hi, I would like to know how to hide: Predefined views and Recent views or some records from this list. If I'm using it form iPad I have to scroll to see User created views. Or maybe it's possibility to move User created views on the top. All the best,
    • Is it possible to trigger the review process when a record is edited?

      Hello, I need to trigger a review process whenever a field is updated to a specific value. This field is empty when the record is created and is only filled later. I know the approval process exists, but that's not what I'm looking for in this case. What
    • Deleting Views

      How do you delete views? Please syd
    • Fixed Assets

      Where would I manage my fixed assets
    • Report on Assets

      Hi,  Is it possible to report purchased assets on a specific year? The Balance Sheet shows everything up to the current date, and the expense reports will not show purchased assets because they are assets not expenses. If it is not possible, then is it possible to setup an API connection with Books to extract data from to another Reporting application?
    • Purchase of Fixed Assets

      How can I record the purchase of assets using zoho books? For example, I purchased 4 laptop for 100000 $ each and paid it through my bank account. How can I record this transaction and maintain track of how much of the assets I bought?
    • Where is the Fixed Asset Register?

      I am a Zoho One user for 18 months, using invoicing and CRM and now ready to migrate my books to Zoho Books. Where do I keep the fixed asset register for the equipment that I use in my business? I have a service based business with a lot of gear and business
    • Kaizen #168 - Incremental Authorization

      Welcome to this week's post in the Kaizen series. In this post, we will discuss Incremental Authorization. What is Incremental Authorization? Incremental Authorization is an OAuth strategy that allows a client to request specific authorization scopes
    • Configure Notes Title for Blueprint Transition

      It'd be very helpful to be able to configure note titles on blueprint transitions when requiring notes. This would help tie back the history of notes to the blueprint actions. We have some approval processes in our blueprint and require notes for the
    • An update to improve email delivery | Email Authentication & Relay

      Dear Zoho Recruit Community, We hope this message finds you well. This post is to inform you about an important update regarding the authentication of all email domains in your Zoho Recruit account. Effective 31st December, 2024, emails sent using email
    • Stop adding Default ID column to xls exports

      When anything is exported to xls, Zoho adds a column with an ID.  WE DO NOT WANT THIS COLUMN.  We use an automated report to a team.  We have our own tracking number.  1. This makes the report messy, it just pushes OUR data off to the right.  2. We have
    • Zoho cases and remote work api

      How to use zoho cases listing api? When i try to hit the endpoint specified in the docs , i get the error : the page you are looking for does not exist with a 401.
    • Calendly does not show scheduled Meetings

      I use Calendly as my standard booking tool, but no matter what I am doing, Calendly shows any appointment as free (when in fact there already is an appointment in CRM Calendar or Zoho Calendar). Drives me nuts - cannot go away from Calendly due to various
    • I want the currency in my account to be Mexican pesos.

      Hello, I am a Mexican citizen and live in Ukraine. When I registered to your system, it was seen that I was from Ukraine, so the default currency is Euro. This is causing me a problem. Please change the standard currency in my account to Mexican Pes
    • Year-End Wrap: Don't rewrite - Switch to Email Templates

      As we're half-way through December, now is the perfect time to start sending out festive greetings. Whether it is to your clients or your team, it is important that every mail is tailored to the recipient and feels genuine, which allows you to make better
    • Elevating Email Security on Zoho Desk: DKIM Now Mandatory

      Hello Zoho Desk Users! It has been a wonderful journey with you on Zoho Desk. As we prepare to welcome 2025, we are strengthening our efforts to ensure a secure and seamless experience for you. To enhance email security, DKIM configuration will be mandatory
    • How to view shared mailbox in Outlook

      How to view shared mailbox in Outlook or in another software
    • Necesito el código ZB para mi cuenta

      Hice cambio de servidor y no encuentro el codigo unico de cname.
    • Privacy error

      Privacy error on Chrome for all embedded forms and reports, this is a huge issue: "Your connection is not private Attackers might be trying to steal your information from creator.zohopublic.com (for example, passwords, messages, or credit cards). NET::ERR_CERT_COMMON_NAME_INVALID"
    • 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.
    • Customise Search Bar in CRM

      Is there a way to customise this search bar in the CRM to add fields?
    • Counting downloads of a file

      Hello Could anyone help me, I would like to use a custom script to count how many times a file contained in a record has been downloaded. Is that something that is possible in Creator? Thanks Estelle
    • Is there any way to prevent emails from being sent from zoho crm without pressing email opt out?

      When I left my desk yesterday I excitedly thought I had fixed my problem, by making use of the "Inactive" field ... However after contacting the support chat, they have advised to stop emails being sent I need to update the "Email Opt Out" field - which
    • New Search Function

      Hey Team, The search function updated in our CRM about a week ago, so I assume it was an automated update across Zoho. It no longer displays leads/deals etc in Chronological order so that the most recently created or updated is the first to display which
    • New permissions for accessing emails sent via Zoho CRM

      Last modified on Nov 4, 2024: Permissions for accessing emails sent via Zoho CRM have now been extended to the IN DC. With this rollout, the feature is now available to all users across all DCs. Resources: Data sharing for emails, Configuring email compose
    • is it possible to add more than one Whatsapp Phone Number to be integrated to Zoho CRM?

      so I have successfully added one Whatsapp number like this from this User Interface it seems I can't add a new Whatsapp Number. I need to add a new Whatsapp Number so I can control the lead assignment if a chat sent to Whatsapp Phone Number 1 then assign
    • Request for Alerts on Workflow and Function Changes.

      I want to get an alert whenever a new workflow or function is added or an existing workflow or function is edited. Is there any way to do that? I need to log all changes whenever updates are made or new ones are added.
    • Next Page