Before talking to a CRM vendor, you will need to know the following information about your current situation:

• How many employees are in your organization?
  

• Will your company be in growth mode over the next five years?

• How quickly are you looking to deploy a CRM solution?

• What are your total CRM project cost limits?

• Do you have the in-house IT resources to support an on-premise solution?

• What degree of customization are you expecting from a CRM application?

• Do you have the safeguards in place to securely manage in-house datacenters?

• How could you benefit from an in-depth view of your sales pipeline?

• How could your salespeople be better managing customer relations?