Picnic CRM is a web-based customer relationship manager developed by Social Heads that focuses on managing contacts and tasks. It allows you to conveniently access your contacts and to-do list from anywhere you have access to the Internet. The target market of Picnic CRM would be that of a small business or a single entrepreneur.
Website
The Picnic CRM website is simple and clean, giving you the ability to sign up easily. Picnic CRM is available with two plans. The first is the “Lunchbox” plan which is free. The second is the “Basket” plan which is $12 a month with the first month free. The only differences between the two plans is that the lunchbox plan has a maximum of two user accounts and 300 contacts while the basket plan has unlimited users and contacts and has the additional feature of hosting up to 15 GB of shared files.
Features
Picnic CRM organizes its data under five tabs:
- Dashboard: this is the main tab which shows upcoming tasks and recent notes on contacts.
- Contacts: under this tab is a list of all of the contacts; 300 in the free Lunchbox and unlimited in the Basket. you can click on individual contacts to bring up further detail about them including notes. You can also import contacts from various e-mail accounts or CSV as well as exporting them to a CSV file.
- Tasks: this tab displays the all tasks entered and sorts them by overdue, today, tomorrow, and upcoming.
- Files: this is where you can store files in the basket version to be accessed later from the cloud
- Settings: this is where your account information is set up as well as where you would set up other users.
In addition to this, on the right side of the interface are buttons to add a contact and task and below that is where you can put your company logo, in this case a gear, and below that are recently added contacts. Picnic CRM includes an integrated search feature via the search bar on top of the page which can be used to sort contacts by their details; name, location, company, etc.
Function
Picnic CRM is very well made and thought out. It functions very intuitively and is extremely user friendly. Picnic CRM is highly focused on the organization of contacts. All contacts and their notes are shared between the users of Picnic CRM. All notes include the users name who posted the note so that other users can know who posted it. Tasks are divided by user account and can only be seen by the user who created the task.
Issues
Unfortunately, the simplicity that gives Picnic CRM its user-friendliness also limits the extent of how much one could customize or scale Picnic CRM to their needs. There is no real customization possible with Picnic CRM. Beyond adding your company logo nothing in the layout is changeable. Also, if you are in the tasks tab when you add a new task that new task will not be shown until the tab is reloaded if you add a note to a contact you cannot edit that note beyond deleting it and adding a new one. While Picnic CRM is excellent at organizing your contacts organizing their information, that’s really all it does. There’s no way to actually add on or change the layout or function of Picnic CRM.
Though it is easy to navigate through their website and is quite well laid out, at the time of the writing of this review I was presented with an SSL error on attempting to sign up. Specifically, the site security certificate has expired by over 15 days. This security certificate is the basis of the security protocol used to make sure you are connected to the actual website and not a spoof site so it is impossible to tell for certain you are on the actual website. If you are on a spoof site you are at risk for being infected with malicious software and, if signing up for the basket plan, potential credit card fraud. Since they are also handling consumers data, up to 15 GB worth, this could be compromised as well. While it is possible for this to be a simple oversight on their part, it reflects poorly on their claim of using a 256 bit SSL security encryption and 99.9% uptime with 24/7 monitoring. It is important to keep your servers up as much as possible but it’s also important to make sure you maintain security protocols.
We posed a few questions to SocialHeads, developers of PicnicCRM:
Any forthcoming developments/features you wish to share?
- We are looking to build out a revenue tracking component to allow for companies to keep track of new sales.
Your USP. How do you feel you differ from the other CRM’s out there?
- We offer a social CRM component that allows for you to keep up with what is happening in the prospects professional and personal life. This arms the sales professional with the inside info he needs to help close a sale. Picnic CRM is also the simplest and easiest to use CRM. We pride ourself on that!
Any particular vertical markets you are targetting, or where your CRM is well-suited?
- We’re perfect for small b2b businesses and start-ups.
Integration to 3rd Party Apps eg. Quotation products like QuoteRoller, QwikQuote; Do Social Media eg Facebook, Twitter; Accounting; MailChimp, Gmail?
- We integrate through MailChimps’s API, Google/Gmail, and ConstantContact. Looking to integrate with Jigsaw and Salesforce in the near future.
Anything else that might help our visitors consider selecting your CRM with confidence?
- Our ‘Lunch Box’ plan is completely free so users can signup and start using Picnic right away!
Conclusion
Picnic CRM is an excellent contact organizer. It is an excellent way of keeping all your notes together and keeping tabs on what you need to do and what you have done with those contacts; however, if you need a more powerful system than simply focusing on contacts, you might need to look further.
And while its ability to share contact information to other users over the Internet is a nice benefit and it is actually quite excellent at managing contacts, PicnicCRM lacks any significant features that really distinguish it from other programs. It also doesn’t particularly add to collaboration between users beyond making notes about the contacts. Then there’s the simple security failure of the website itself having an out of date security certificate, but I’m sure that is easy enough to address.
Picnic CRM Review
Review of PicnicCRM:
The old adage which says “customer is king” has always rung true for every business. Modern businesses have taken this age-old adage seriously, and the result is every business devising customer friendly business strategies to surge ahead of their competitors. You also see businesses striving hard to build a loyal customer base and promoting their product as a brand.
Repeat customers can provide businesses with a steady revenue stream while they explore other markets worldwide and tap new consumer segments. Besides bringing in the revenue, repeat customers also bring in new business opportunities in the form of referrals.
The modern consumer is not only conscious of quality of the product offered, but also judges the company or the brand by the kind of customer service it provides. Some of today’s leading brands were able to survive competition in the past only because they were valued by their customers.
Today, you will find many CRM applications designed specifically to reach out and build a relationship with the customer. Most of the CRM applications available in the market are complicated and expensive and are therefore not useful for SMEs and business startups that do not have a large budget for CRM. The solution to such a problem is using a CRM which is simple, useful and affordable.
Picnic CRM is one such business management application that only presents the required tools and functionalities of a CRM at an extremely low price. Picnic CRM is affordable even for business startups and SMEs who do not have adequate financial
resources to invest in advanced CRM.
Getting started with Picnic CRM:
Picnic CRM is a web based customer management system loaded with simple and useful features required to handle day to day business tasks and activities. The best way to judge any application is by using it and exploring each feature. Users who want to test the functionality of the CRM have the option to choose from two versions of Picnic CRM:
- LunchBox Plan and
- Basket Plan.
The LunchBox Plan is the basic CRM account which is offered as an “Always FREE” account. The user is not required to present credit card information to avail this offer. This “Always FREE” CRM account does, however, come with some limitations- such as 2 users, only 300 contacts, and no storage space.
The Basket Plan is a premium account available for $5 per month. Businesses enrolling for this account can store unlimited contacts, have unlimited users, and are provided with 15GB storage space for files. Users can register for a free trial account to learn about the advantages of the premium account. The free trial period offered for this premium account of Picnic CRM is 30 days.
Let’s take a look at the different features and functionalities of the different tools offered in Picnic CRM:
Features offered in Picnic CRM:
Easy task management:
Every time a user logs onto the system, he/she is presented with all upcoming tasks on the dashboard. Users can check mark the completed tasks from the list, which are then saved in the completed tasks section which can be accessed from the dashboard. You can assign tasks to different users and keep track of their progress.
Organized and intelligent contact information database:
The contact section displays email addresses and phone numbers of clients along with their respective names. User can assign tags to every contact as per business requirements. All contacts can be categorized by interests, industry, job title, leads, or other tags. You can quickly view all contacts in any particular category by clicking the contact tag. In simple words, if you want to see all leads, you just need to click on “Lead “tag in the contact info. Users can export the complete contact database to a csv file.
Intelligent integration with social networking sites:
Developers of Picnic CRM have a clear idea about the importance and potential of social networking from a business point of view. Picnic CRM enables you to keep track of a contact person’s social activity by monitoring his/her tweets or linking his/her LinkedIn profile or Facebook account. In this way, you always have updated information about your contact, which includes personal and professional information. This updated information can give you an edge when striking a deal with your customer or making a sales proposal.
Intelligent integration with leading online applications and services:
Picnic CRM offers smart integration with some of the leading business applications and services. It allows you to import contact databases from various sources such as csv files, Mailchimp, Constant Contact, Gmail, Yahoo and AOL accounts.
Reminders for Tasks:
Picnic CRM offers the functionality of setting task reminders for various important tasks. Whenever you enter a new task in the CRM, you have the option of setting a task reminder such as an email reminder. The system will send an email reminding you about the task to the specified email address 48 hours before the task’s due date.
Files and important documents at your fingertips:
Picnic CRM allows users to attach important files and documents to related contact or leads. This helps a user access any important information related to a lead or ongoing business proposal in no time. The files section in the CRM gives you an overview of all documents recently uploaded by you. All documents and attachments uploaded to your account are stored in a centralized server. This means you can access these files even while you are on the move or out of the office.
Efficient use of stored leads:
Picnic CRM allows you to export your targeted list to your future email marketing campaigns. This feature helps you create a successful campaign, and most of the work of the campaign is done automatically.
Intelligent note tracking:
The process of converting leads into customers involves several steps. Your sales team will conduct meetings or initiate a conversation with a customer several times during the sales process. Picnic CRM allows you to create and attach a note for every conversation and meeting with your customer. This will keep your entire sales team updated about recent activities and progress pertaining to every lead.
Final word:
Picnic CRM is an ideal contact and list management application for new business startups or small and medium businesses who cannot afford the expensive and complicated CRMs available in the market. It provides businesses with only the most useful and important features such as lead and contact management and better handling of all day to day business tasks.
PicnicCRM has a small learning curve, which means you do not have spend time and money training your employees to use different features of this unique and simple to use CRM.