Finding the right software solutions for a business can be tricky. For some, it’s love at first sight. You ask a friend or colleague what they use, try it out for yourself, and after falling in love with it you never look back. For others, it can take ages of “trying on” the right solution before finding the perfect fit. SKYFORM, a small creative studio in Slovakia, tried over 40 different software solutions before finding the right CRM & Project Management tool for their team of eight. In a post on their blog titled Everyday Daylite, they wrote in detail how they went about choosing the right CRM & Project Management software for their team, including all their requirements and a list of solutions they evaluated. After reading about their process and how they decided on Daylite, we reached out to learn more about how they’re using Daylite within their team.
Tell us about SKYFORM…
Barbora Sablova: We are a small creative studio ready for anything close to interactive & real-time graphics, 3D animations, 3D visualisations and 3D printing. Our work varies not only due to the diverse products in our portfolio but also to the increasingly demanding clients’ needs. And of course, our workflow varies with it. Thanks to Daylite, we have a system in all our projects.
What are you mainly responsible for at SKYFORM & what do you love about your job?
Barbora Sablova: SKYFORM is a small studio which brings more overall responsibility to its people. I, for example, am responsible mostly for all the administration processes, marketing presentation, finance management, recruitment and a part of project management. However, from time to time I find myself finalizing the 3D printed objects. This diverse work in a creative environment, producing beautiful things, is exactly what I love about my job.
What have been some of the methods you found most effective in expanding your business/growing your client list?
Barbora: To be honest, we work mostly on reference basis. We are very grateful to have satisfied clients in Austria and Germany who recommend us to their clients, suppliers, or partners. Slovakia, on the other hand, is quite a small country where almost everybody knows everybody. When you are the only or one of a few companies with a professional 3D printing machine, the clients find you sooner or later. To answer your question, our most effective method of expanding our business is focusing on the best work results. You have to be proud of what you do, and people will notice. Other methods are quite ordinary– good Google results, contacting the potential customers directly instead of unsolicited spam messages, etc.
What were the main problems you were having that caused you to look for a CRM/Project Management solution?
Barbora: We work on several projects at once, which includes hundreds of client & supplier contacts and thousands of email messages. We didn’t like to have shared contacts in one app, calendar in another one, notes in the third, project folders in the fourth (and in the email client). We felt the need to establish a uniform system and to put everything under one roof.
How did Daylite solve these problems?
Barbora: We wanted to have everything interconnected – we wanted to click on the particular contact and see who the contact is, who he is related to, which projects he is linked to, who started the communication with him, and what communication has been led with him since. We wanted to have him synced among all of us and all our devices. The same with projects, tasks, etc. Thanks to Daylite, we have our dream system in all our projects!
We use Daylite as a main Customer Relationship and Project Management tool. Daylite is with us throughout the whole project, from the first email (within which we can create a new Project opportunity and a new Client in Daylite), through the communication, planning, setting tasks and goals until the final feedback. We use it as a smart contact list, project planner, marketing storage system, even a very simple finance overview system.
How did you find learning Daylite?
Barbora: Actually, we were looking for such a user-friendly software that we wouldn’t have to lose precious time reading long manuals. We wanted an intuitive interface, and we’ve found it! Daylite is very easy to understand. Ok, to be honest, I’ve had a quick look into the user guide, but most of all I appreciated the videos. I also contacted the support for help because I wanted to ask about the best way to do a few things and I must say, everybody from the support team was very kind and helpful.
What are some of your favourite Daylite features?
Barbora: My personal favourites are: contacts synchronisation, linking & relationships, Mail integration and smart calendars & folders. Why? Because everything makes sense! Me and my colleagues can easily share the contacts and the project information among each other. We can immediately understand what a particular project is about thanks to the basic information in the project folder such as the project stage, category, linked administrator, participants, client, suppliers, and all the important email communication. Whenever a client calls and you have no idea who he is, just click on Daylite and there it is, all the information about him in one place! One word: Fantastic.
In a nutshell, how has Daylite helped your business?
Barbora: A few years ago, we worked only on a few bigger projects which were really easy to manage. As we grow and our portfolio of clients, suppliers and products extends, we aren’t able to manage it with the same old paper notebook. Daylite helped us in many ways. It saves us time, it saves our nerves, and it helps us to know exactly where we stand. The contact and project management is now a lot clearer and easier. We would like to say a big thank you to the whole Marketcircle team for creating such a 5-star software.
