(This is another in our continuing series of posts with insight into how our office is going paperless – and so can yours!)
Did you ever wonder how to maintain the record-keeping system the SEC requires you have to prove you had pre-existing relationships with investors before you invited them into your Regulation D, Rule 506(b) Offering? And how you can enable access to that system to multiple people from different parts of the country? We’ve got the ticket.
Most people start off with an Excel spreadsheet, but you may progress to the point of needing something more sophisticated. When you get to that point, you can go the path we did and try every imaginable product; or you can take our word for it and try the one we ended up with (which is where we started out, by the way). In our law firm’s quest to figure out how to keep track of our database (yes, if you are receiving this newsletter, you are on it) and of potential and existing clients, we tried many different Customer Relations Management (CRM) Systems. We started with Insightly, and then tried Hubspot and Podio, as well as Lexicata and Rocket Matter (law firm software). Finally, we ended up right where we started: with Insightly.
Insightly is a Google app that allows you to keep track of Contacts (people you meet), Leads (people who express interest in investing), Opportunities (deals you might do), Projects (deals you close on) and Organizations (supporting services for your business). It was the only CRM product we found that allowed us to track people and projects in the same software app. As an added bonus, it also works with MailChimp (another Google app), which you can eventually use to set up an automatic drip system for your potential investors (so they don’t forget about you), or for apartment owners (so they know you are out there as a prospective buyer).
We suggest you check it out. It’s free for two users, and Insightly even offers free trials if you have more than that number in your organization. There are loads of videos on the site, and no doubt a few of you techies could teach us a trick or two after you watch them all!
