CRM stands for customer relationship management. In practice it means two things: a way of working in which every customer interaction is recorded and used, and the software that makes that possible. A CRM system stores your contacts, their history with your business and what you plan to do next, so the whole team works from the same information.
What a CRM stores
- Contact details: name, email, mobile (in +61 format if you send SMS), business name and location.
- Interactions: emails, calls, meetings and support requests.
- Transactions: purchases, quotes, invoices and renewals.
- Marketing activity: which emails a contact opened, which links they clicked, which forms they filled in.
- Consent: whether and how the contact agreed to receive marketing, and whether they have unsubscribed.
See the glossary definition of CRM for the broader concept.
Why Australian SMEs adopt one
Knowledge doesn’t leave with staff
In a small team, one person often “owns” the relationships. When they take leave over the long summer break or move on, that knowledge goes too. A CRM keeps it with the business.
Better timing
A CRM can remind you when a customer’s service is due, when a lease or subscription is up for renewal, or when a business client might want to buy before EOFY on 30 June.
Targeted communication
Instead of sending every message to everyone, you can email only the customers in Western Australia about a Perth event, or only past buyers about a product upgrade.
Cleaner compliance
Under the Spam Act 2003, you must be able to show consent and must honour unsubscribes within five working days. A single record of consent and opt-out status makes that far easier than juggling spreadsheets.
Types of CRM
- Sales CRMs focus on pipelines, deals and forecasting.
- Service CRMs focus on support tickets and customer issues.
- Marketing-focused contact management focuses on segmentation, email, SMS and automation. This is where Mailpro fits: see CRM for Australian businesses.
CRM and the Privacy Act
A CRM is a store of personal information, so privacy law applies to how you use it. If your business is covered by the Privacy Act 1988, the Australian Privacy Principles require you to tell people why you collect their information, use it for expected purposes, keep it accurate and secure, and let them access it. If your CRM provider stores data overseas, APP 8 requires reasonable steps to ensure it is handled consistently with the APPs. Since December 2024, the OAIC can issue infringement notices for some breaches.
Mailpro stores contact data in Switzerland on private infrastructure, outside US jurisdiction, and never sells or rents it. See our page on Swiss data residency.
Getting started
- List the information you actually need; don’t collect data “just in case”.
- Clean your existing spreadsheets: remove duplicates, fix mobile numbers and record where each contact came from.
- Import them into your CRM, keeping unsubscribes suppressed.
- Decide who can see and edit what.
- Start using it for one process, such as welcoming new customers with an automated email.