Zimplu CRM is now FREE for NGOs

Starting from today, any NGO can use Zimplu CRM for free. To use Zimplu CRM for free, visit  http://www.zimplu.com/, create an account and let us know you are a Nonprofit Organization so we can provide you full access to the service.


If you ask yourself how can an NGO use Zimplu CRM, the answer is pretty simple. If a company needs Zimplu CRM for the Sales Team, an NGO can use Zimplu CRM for the Fundraising department. In this case we are not talking about Customers anymore, we are talking about Sponsors.


Nonprofit Organizations are part of our every day life, even if most of us don't realize this and we are more than happy to help them.

Zimplu CRM now has a Time Clock

Time Clock was added to Zimplu CRM application. Users can now Clock in when they start working and Clock out when they are off.

If you are in a company where the sales activity is the most important, then you will probably use Zimplu CRM all the time. This feature was added as a result to our customers request who needed this kind of feature to track the employees work time.

Enjoy the Time Clock from Zimplu CRM !

Inventory Management Systems

Inventory Management of raw materials, parts, or finished products by an organization requires a set of rules and conventions, under which a bar code system is being used. Developing an IT Module aimed to manage the Inventory starts, basically, from assigning to each item an unique code. Ensuring a uniform and consistent coding is in fact a mandatory prerequisite for automatic processing of information.

The goal is to improve Inventory Management activities, to reduce costs incurred by all domain-specific operations (storage costs, purchase and transport costs, additional costs related to lack of Stock, etc...)

Another important premise in building an IT Module consists in necessity of using multiple methods of Stock assessment and calculation of prices, such as LIFO, FIFO, SP (Standard Price), LP (Last Price), AC (Average Cost). All these methods are useful for understanding the Stocks level, or in case it falls below safety Stock, or when it exceeds the maximum level.

Developing the IT Module must start from the importance accorded to ensure flexibility of production, meaning more accurate knowledge of what and how much is being produced to ensure market performance of the organization. Thus, an efficient Management of Stocks of raw materials – supported by appropriate IT tools – is the "key" to avoid a large chunk of disturbances recorded in the production flow.

The IT Module's utility for Inventory Management can increase significantly if you choose to use the JIT method ( Just in Time) also known as "zero Inventory". The basic principle of the method is to reduce inventories of raw materials that need to be brought from suppliers in the exact moment the production process needs to start so the final products will be delivered on the date stipulated in the contract with the beneficiary. Obviously, implementation of such methods can lead to methodological changes in the programming and manufacturing production itself . In addition, it can lead to an integration of a powerful IT infrastructure with components for Production Management, Commercial Management, Financial Management and Accounting.

The direct users of this IT component are those responsible for Management activities of the various categories of existing Stocks in the organization. The general functions of the IT Module are:

• Managing the entire flow of Stock, meaning reception, bookings, consumption, transfers, adjustments so you can monitor the evolution in time of material consumtpion, based on the transactions made;
• Tracking costs on different administration levels and in different location;
• Tracking Inventory by multiple criteria (different prices for the same item, serial number, cell manufacturing, supplier, etc..);
• Issuing reports in real time (balance of Stocks etc...);
• Provides the support for purchasing decisions, programming, production launch and sales planning.

Automate Inventory Management brings certain benefits for all operations, but we also have to highlight the effects on other related activities, whose efficiency increases when Stock tracking is optimized. These are some of the most obvious advantages for using the IT Module:

• Access to information in the database is controlled by the mechanism of passwords and access rights, structured by users;
• Estabilishing the necessary products and achieve an optimal supply, based on a model provided by the system;
• Daily update of Stock levels and accurate movement tracking in correlation with accounting records, ensuring a better base for decisions;
• Tracking the dynamics of inventory costs associated with the posibility of adopting measures to reduce them.

Knowledge Management System

Knowledge Management System ( KMS ) consists in a set of methods and techniques with which Knowledge Management processes can be operated, including document retrieval solutions, expertise databases, discussion lists and search engines.

Knowledge Management is a systematic process of collecting, organizing and storing employees Knowledge so that it can be accesed and used by other members of the organization.

The growth of the innovative Management in an organization is dependent to the use of intangible assets of the company. Thus, in the recent years there was an increase of initiatives in Knowledge Management, resultated in significant investments in IT. The early efforts in this direction consisted in developing "data warehousing" applications and building intranet networks to allow unrestricted access to resources regardless of physical location of the user. In this context, along with the improvement of tools associated to Knowledge Management, the first KMS have been developed.

Any KMS must fulfill two fundamental requirements: to facilitate collaborative work between users involved in developing Knowledge Management processes and to manage information from the System. In order to meet these requirements, KMS use a series of tools that allow integration of Knowledge in the form of database Knowledge or collective memory. Within these, the data is structured in units of Knowledge that are found usually in the form of documents, the Knowledge units must be organized so as to allow interconnection of Knowledge.

Organizational Knowledge is the result of phase mixing browsing, internalization, socialization and externalization. This dynamic process involves the definition of rules for communication between groups of individuals within the organization. Even if sometimes there are different perspectives among groups because of the meaning and terminology used, communication ensures resource sharing and acceleration of innovative processes.

The effects of implementing a Knowledge Management System over the learning processes, innovation and development of expertise are difficult to quantify. Considering that, generally, experience plays an important role in organizational learning, the benefits on KMS is growing as it is more used by the employees. In the long run, organization's members will expand their experience in obtaining and using not only explicit Knowledge but also silent/implied Knowledge who require a greater effort to be accessed.

Considering the above arguments, we conclude that KMS use can lead to both positive and negative effects. An organization can gain efficiency in the short term, by standardizing the access to Knowledge, but gradually may lose the ability to innovate. Therefore, an effective Knowledge Management System is to ensure a balance between operational processes and the Knowledge to explore new solutions.

To implement a Knowledge Management System you must start from locating the Knowledge who determines whether a user will be directed to a document or to contacting an expert and from defining the Knowledge organization level that provides problem transformation in a form that meets a certain logical structure. Either way, the implementation of KMS differs from one organization to another and what matters most is the number of employees in that organization.

How can Social Media Influence your Business ?

We can consider Social Media to be a form of communication through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages and other content (like videos).


Forms of Social Media that are well known until now:

• Forums;
• Social Networks ( like Facebook or LinkedIn );
• Blogging;
• Microblogging ( like Twitter );
• Video Sharing ( like YouTube or Vimeo );
• Social Bookmarketing ( like Digg );
• Broader Content ( best examples are Slideshare and Scribd);
• Social Gaming - this concept has just been recognized even if it exists for a long time, even before some of the ones listed above.

Most of the Businesses perceive Social Media as a good thing, as an opportunity, but there are not many Executives that think about the negative effect Social Media can have on their Business. Before Social Media existed, if you had a problem with a company or a business, the information would have stayed in the circle of your friends with a very small chance to move forward to other people. With  Social Media, your information will circulate faster and more persons will know about it.

Social Media is what makes Word of Mouth more powerful, a lot of businesses acknowledged this effect and as a result today we are using concepts like Social Media Marketing, we didn't even imagined it would exist years ago. Nowadays, one in seven companies have a formal process for Social Networking in their business and one in five companies have established policies about the use of Social Media in their Company.

Email Dropbox in Zimplu CRM

There was a time when Sales Managers were asking employees to forward him all the Emails they sent to Customers, that's ridiculous and it might be hard to believe that some of them are still doing this. Either way, there is a simple reason for asking this thing, Sales Managers and other co-workers need to know what they talked to a customer and more important than that is how they talked to the customer, how was the message transmitted.

Zimplu CRM will help you solve this problem, all the Emails you send to your contacts can appear in Zimplu too so all your co-workers will know what Email you sent and what does your contact know until now.

Watch our Tutorial to learn how to use your Email Dropbox in Zimplu CRM: