Regardless of which market you operate in, customer portals offer a multitude of benefits for businesses. Keystroke realized this many years ago when we developed the Keystroke Account Manager, allowing our customers a wide range of self-serve options unavailable with any other reseller or even Act! themselves.

The general benefits of a customer portal include the following:

• Self-Service Capabilities: They empower customers to independently resolve their queries and access information, aligning with the preferences of the vast majority.
• Round-the-Clock Access: Customers have the freedom to view their account information, monitor their orders, and adjust their settings whenever they choose, ensuring convenience and self-reliance.
• Enhanced Customer Contentment: Portals contribute to increased customer contentment by providing a tailored and efficient interface.
• Increased Operational Productivity: They enhance the productivity of support agents by minimizing the volume of routine questions that necessitate direct interaction.
• Augmented Security: Portals add a robust layer of security to customer interactions with the business.
• Valuable Insights and Feedback: They are instrumental in collecting critical insights about customer behavior and preferences, aiding in the improvement of services and products.
• Cost-Efficiency: By facilitating self-service, businesses can significantly lower the expenses related to customer support.

The common obstacle to setting up a customer portal for most businesses is simple. They often require some kind of expensive ERP to surface the data required to be of value to customers. This is why we believe that portal technology needs to be integrated with a CRM for it to be accessible to businesses of all kinds. For example, Act! Premium Cloud starts at $30/month/user and includes the required API technology to connect an Internet-facing portal to the customer data in Act!

This was the design of our own Keystroke Account Manager, where in addition to numerous key website features, all the data surfaced in that platform comes from Act!, including:

• Subscription and licensing details
• Support Contracts and Support Details
• Transaction History from Qsales integration with Act! 

We built KAM because we strongly believe customer portals foster more robust and reliable relationships with customers and provide us with a competitive advantage by elevating the overall customer experience. We also believe this is the goal of other small businesses, and that is why we aim to bring this technology within the reach of Act! users.

Stay tuned.