Why a Client Portal is Essential for Your Business Success

When your business starts growing, you are likely to feel pride, motivation, and inspiration – and, at the same time, a lot of frustration. Having to keep track of the customer data – each client’s details, preferences, and points in their customer journey – is overwhelming. On top of that, you also have to ensure a personalized approach to each and every client.

As Forbes states, using the research by Epsilon, 80% of customers indicate that they are more likely to do business with a company that offers personalized experiences and 90% of them state that they find personalization appealing. So how do you, as a business, meet this challenge and satisfy clients while maintaining your sanity?

2 in 1: A Tool for Your Business and Your Clients

There are many software that help businesses meet this need. For example, there are Customer Relationship Management, or CRM, tools that can organize all client data. They offer secure and easy-to-use tools for data storage, reporting, automation, and better team collaboration. They facilitate business on your side – but do little for your client.

On the client’s side, you may have a knowledge base – a self-service tool where your customers can find how-to articles, manuals, troubleshooting guides, and FAQs without needing to contact your support desk. Being accessible without any logins, a knowledge base is a great source of information about your product or service, but it does not solve any personalization issues or store a particular client’s search history.

Today, there is a tool that provides the benefits of both: endless capacity for storing personal details, like a CRM, and resources for finding answers to most questions, like a knowledge base. But most importantly, this tool enables communication between you and your clients, offering each of them a personalized space for one-on-one interaction. This tool is a client portal.

What is a Client Portal?

A client portal is a private, secure website where you can interact with each of your customers individually, sharing and exchanging data, including sensitive financial data. Forget long email threads that get confusing very quickly, making it impossible to find that particular message you are sure you sent. Forget messaging in external IM tools, where you have to scroll back and forth.

With a client portal, you can streamline your communication with clients, providing them with the information they need when they need it, keeping all documents in one place, monitoring all processes involved, and talking to them one-on-one. Your company portal is a reliable tool that both you and your clients benefit from.

Use Cases for Client Portals

Let’s look at what makes client portals so useful for any business, regardless of size and industry.

For large companies

Suppose you are a large company with hundreds of customers, each with their payment method, invoice history, standing orders, individual quotes, and discounts.

According to McKinsey, large corporate clients appreciate having a self-service client portal that functions as a single point of engagement, featuring a smart, personalized interface that only asks for information relevant to that client, tailored to the client’s previous answers to questions and based on client feedback. What is a client portal for?

For small businesses

Now, let’s look at a small business down to a sole entrepreneur, like a coach or a personal trainer. What can a client portal do for you?

In this case, a client portal gives you a handy platform to keep all this in one place, neat and clean, with easy client onboarding and support.

Benefits of Using a Client Portal

Whatever your business is, a client portal can meet all your needs for smooth client interactions, customer data storage, and branding – giving you a huge competitive edge. Here are a few more benefits that a company portal offers:

Ensuring security

A client portal provides a secure way to save and store clients’ personal, business, and financial data. Once you set it up, encourage your customers to use the company portal without being afraid of losing, disclosing, or compromising any confidential data. By granting different levels of access, you can always be sure that no sensitive details leak into the wrong hands.

Once your clients know that you value their privacy and protect it, they trust you more – and a secure client portal can help you achieve the customer trust and loyalty that is every business’s goal.

Reducing clutter

Client portals are effective for organizing all your business and client information in a well-structured, secure and logical way, where nothing gets lost in the depths of your desk drawer or the black hole of your inbox. With a client portal, you do not need a bunch of tools where each has only one purpose.

You can store financial, legal, and procedural details for each client separately, all in one place. You no longer need to browse through endless folders or email threads. At the same time, a client portal ensures your customers can get in touch with you or use self-service whenever they need it.

Promoting your brand

Once you realize what a client portal is and start using one, you can customize all points of your customers’ journeys. Each client receives personal treatment and becomes aware of the brand image you are working to promote.

Compare a client portal to a 5-star hotel where each guest has personalized service and, at the same time, notices the hotel’s logo, corporate colors, branded goods, and, more broadly, customer-oriented service. Keeping track of each client’s particular details and preferences, providing them with clear instructions intended personally for them, bringing to their attention only what might interest them, and giving them a tool to interact with you.

A branded and user-friendly company portal immediately sets you apart from the competition.

Providing client insights

To deliver a truly personalized experience, you need to understand your clients and constantly learn about their specific needs. How does Client Portal make this easier? The Portal’s analytics let you track customer activity, engagement, and behavior patterns. Also, by centralizing all feedback in one place, you can monitor and analyze client impressions, from positive reviews to constructive suggestions.

In this way, Client Portal provides you with valuable insights to identify problems and potential issues, understand preferences, and elevate client satisfaction.

Why You Should Use a Client Portal

A client portal can replace the entire combination of a database, legal and financial software, a chat, a calendar, and a resource library. It can become your and your client’s personal assistant, help desk, PR, and event manager, all in one – totally secure, never tired or unavailable. Client portals save time and money, eliminate or minimize repetitive tasks, consolidate information, and effortlessly extend your branding.

If you are still wondering what client portal software is and how it can help your business, try one in action. A client portal from FuseBase is your gateway to stress-free and highly efficient business operations.

• Analytic tools and built-in chats
• Well-structured lists and folders
• Easy data collection and feedback analysis
• A vast library of customization options and a white-label
• Role-based access control

These features of the cutting-edge software by FuseBase will bring the best customer communication and collaboration methods right to your fingertips.