Off-the-shelf CRM packages do not recognise the real sales flow of industry and export. We develop a custom CRM that talks to your ERP, modelling the long sales cycle, the sample-proforma-order chain, dealer management and quotation tracking around your own process.
Prepared by Pan Innovation House, a software company based in Gaziantep, Türkiye · Last reviewed:
A CRM is a system that gathers your customer relationships in one place; but most off-the-shelf CRMs are designed for businesses with short sales cycles and standard processes. In industry and export the work is different: a customer takes months to go from first conversation to first order, with sample requests, proforma invoice revisions, price negotiations, letters of credit and shipping terms along the way. Ready-made packages try to force this flow into their own template — and the teams abandon the tool and drift back to Excel and WhatsApp.
Custom CRM software fits the software to your process instead of fitting your sales process to the software. We model one-to-one the sample-proforma-order chain, quotation tracking designed around the export customer's language and documents, the dealer and distributor portal, and the stages your sales team actually follows. Which stage a quotation is waiting at, which sample went to whom and why a customer has gone quiet becomes a record, not a guess.
At Pan Innovation House we design the CRM not as an island on its own, but as a layer that talks to your existing ERP, e-invoicing, e-commerce and dealership systems. The source code we write and your data are handed over to you as defined in the contract; third-party and open-source components remain subject to their own licences. The architecture is API-first, development proceeds iteratively and every release goes through a review step before it goes live. After delivery, the maintenance scope and response times are defined in the contract.
In fields such as carpet, machinery, textiles and food, the journey from first contact to order takes months. Keeping sample, quotation and revision traffic in someone's head or in Excel lets quotations be forgotten and opportunities go cold. With a stage-based pipeline and reminders, no quotation is left without an owner.
Managing customers arriving from different countries, in different currencies and Incoterms, overflows a standard CRM. Multilingual customer cards, proforma and sample tracking and country-based price lists bring discipline to export sales.
Where dealers place orders by phone and message and price lists circulate by email, control is lost. A portal giving each dealer its own prices, account balance, order and quotation visibility puts both the dealer and you at ease.
If you cannot see how many quotations each rep opened, how many converted to orders and why an opportunity was lost, sales management runs on intuition. A custom CRM makes sales measurable, with reports built on your actual stages.
We model your real stages such as first contact, sample, quotation, proforma, order and shipment. Every opportunity sits at the right stage; waiting, cooling and won opportunities are visible on one screen and kept on track with automatic reminders.
Which sample went to which customer, which revision a quotation is on and which proforma is awaiting approval are tracked precisely. Quotation templates, price history and approval flows live inside the CRM; PDF and email output is produced in one click.
Multilingual customer cards, price lists by country and currency, Incoterms and payment-term fields, and contact history are designed in the language of export. An overseas customer's entire journey is gathered in a single record.
We build a role-based portal where dealers see their own account balance, prices, past orders and open quotations, and place orders and quotation requests online. It works on shared data with your existing B2B dealership system.
For customer account, stock, price and invoice data, it works with ERPs such as Logo and SAP through the routes their version supports (API, service layer or an approved import), and e-invoices flow through your private integrator. Orders created in the CRM flow to the ERP, and ERP balances flow to the CRM, one-way or two-way.
Meeting notes, call lists, quotation deadlines and follow-up tasks are organised per rep. Automatic reminders and email notifications at critical stages mean no step is forgotten.
We report metrics such as rep performance, conversion rates, win-loss reasons, opportunity value and forecast revenue against the stages you define. Dashboards are designed clean for management and practical for sales.
If your customer list lives in a spreadsheet and quote tracking runs through email, you do not always need a custom CRM. The tables below set out four common routes, what a CRM project covers and what it does not, what you receive at handover, and what drives time and cost. Where an off-the-shelf CRM will do, we say so plainly in the first call.
The choice mostly depends on how long the sales cycle is, how many steps a quote goes through, whether you sell through dealers and how often data must move to and from the ERP.
| Route | Enough when | Where it struggles | Cost structure |
|---|---|---|---|
| A customer list in a spreadsheet, phone and email | A few sales reps and a short sales cycle; quotes are few and each rep can follow up from their own list. | When a rep leaves, the customer history and open quotes leave too. Which quote is waiting at which stage is only known by asking, and management reports are compiled by hand. | No licence cost; the hidden cost is lost follow-ups and hand-built reports. |
| Off-the-shelf monthly cloud CRM (subscription) | Your sales flow is close to a standard funnel (lead, meeting, quote, order); the ERP link is simple or not needed; speed of rollout matters most. | When the sample, pro forma and order chain, multilingual export customers or dealer tiers do not fit the package, customisation, add-on and integration costs rise. Ask the vendor how, and how deeply, the package connects to your ERP. | Monthly or annual subscription per user, plus customisation and integration. |
| Your ERP's CRM or sales module (Logo, Mikro, Netsis, etc.) | Accounts, quotes and orders already live in the ERP; the sales team is small and mostly desk-based. | Visit logging, an opportunity funnel, reminders and mobile use vary by product and version, and every sales user may need an ERP licence. Ask your ERP vendor. | Add-on module and user licences on top of your current licence. |
| A custom CRM layer built for you | Your sales process is specific to you (samples, pro formas, export documents, dealer approval), the ERP stays, and data must flow regularly between the two systems. | Discovery and the data model take time, and the initial investment is usually higher than a package. A sales manager has to own the system. | A project fee and a maintenance agreement instead of per-user licences. |
The source code we write and your data are handed over to you as defined in the contract; third-party and open-source components remain subject to their own licences.
Scope is written down for every project during discovery. The split below shows the boundaries that most often get blurred in CRM projects.
| Area | In the CRM project | Out of scope or agreed separately |
|---|---|---|
| Customers, opportunities and quotes | Customer records, call and visit logs, opportunity stages, quote and pro forma tracking, reminders. | Sales strategy, pricing and discount policy are your decisions; the system applies the rules you define. |
| ERP and e-documents | Moving account, product, price and order data to and from the ERP in the direction and at the frequency set during discovery. | Turkish e-invoices and e-archive invoices are issued through your chosen e-document service provider (özel entegratör); that service is a separate contract. |
| Marketing communication | Keeping customer segments and lists in the CRM. | Bulk email, SMS and campaign automation are a separate piece of work and are scoped separately if needed. |
| Phone and calls | Recording the note and outcome of a call on the customer record. | The phone system, call-centre software and call recording are out of scope; if your existing phone system can be integrated, that is assessed separately. |
| Old records | Importing customers and open quotes from spreadsheets and older systems. | Duplicates and incomplete records are cleaned together with your team; the accuracy of the source data rests with its owner. |
Handover covers the working system and the pieces you need to keep it running.
| Deliverable | What it is for |
|---|---|
| A working CRM with defined roles and permissions | Sales reps, managers and, where relevant, dealers see and change only what their role allows. |
| Sales funnel and reports | Which quote is waiting at which stage, and results per rep, on one screen. |
| ERP link and transfer logs | You can see which data moved when and in which direction, and which records failed. |
| Training and a user guide | A new rep can learn the system from the guide, so knowledge does not sit with one person. |
A firm figure is given in writing after discovery. These factors move the quote most.
| Factor | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Number of sales stages and approvals | Every stage and approval means another screen, rule and test. |
| A dealer portal | Letting dealers see their own balance, prices and orders adds a separate user group and permission model. |
| Direction of the ERP and e-document link | Read-only transfer and frequent two-way sync are very different workloads. |
| Number of languages and currencies | Multilingual quote templates and exchange-rate handling for export customers are extra work. |
| Mobile use in the field | If reps log data without a connection, offline working and sync are added. |
If these are ready, the first call is concrete; we can fill any gaps together during discovery. The first 30-minute call is free; the scope of an on-site discovery, and its fee if any, is agreed in writing during that call.
We sit down with your sales team, your dealer structure and your existing systems and map the real sales flow. The sample-proforma-order chain, stages, roles and integration points are pinned down at this stage; scope and prioritisation grow out of it.
We model customer, opportunity, quotation, dealer and account data, and plan the data flows on the ERP, e-invoicing and any e-commerce side with API contracts. Whether they run one-way or two-way is decided at the start.
We start from core modules such as the pipeline and quotation tracking, build piece by piece and show you every release live. We correct course with your feedback; every release goes through a review step before it goes live.
We test the ERP and e-invoicing integrations with real data and run a pilot with the sales team and dealers. Training and documentation soften the transition, and we migrate your old Excel files and records into the system.
After go-live we provide maintenance, bug fixing and development for new needs under the maintenance scope defined in the contract. Because the source code is handed over to you, what is built is a sustainable partnership, not a dependency.
Giving a single figure would be wrong, because cost and duration are tied directly to scope: how many stages the sales process has, whether a dealer portal is needed, and how deep the ERP and e-invoicing integration goes are the deciding factors. After a discovery call we produce a clear scope, timeline and price. We talk in terms of your process, not made-up figures.
Yes. The source code we write and your data are handed over to you as defined in the contract; third-party and open-source components remain subject to their own licences. We do not tie you to us or to a closed licence; delivery and documentation are done so that you could continue with another team in future if you wish.
Because we design the architecture API-first, ERP and e-invoicing integration is a core part. Connecting to ERPs such as Logo (a widely used Turkish ERP) and SAP is usually possible; the route depends on the version and the access you are given, and is established during discovery. E-invoices go through your private integrator's API, or through direct GİB integration where you are authorised for it. Depending on the API or data-access method the system in question offers, we set up the customer account, stock, price and invoice flows one-way or two-way.
Off-the-shelf CRM is good for short, standard sales processes. But needs such as the sample-proforma-order chain, multilingual export customers and dealer management are either absent from ready-made packages or limp along on forced add-ons. Custom development fits the software to your process — and stops the team abandoning the system and going back to Excel.
Yes. We build a role-based portal for dealers and distributors: they see their own account balances, prices, past orders and open quotations, and can place orders or quotation requests online. If you have an existing B2B dealership system, this portal works on shared data with it.
Yes. After go-live we provide maintenance, bug fixing and development for new needs under the maintenance scope defined in the contract. As the system grows we can add new modules and update reports; because the source code is handed over to you, this partnership runs flexibly and transparently.
CRM (customer relationship management) is software that brings together information about customers, such as meetings, quotations, orders and follow-ups, in one system and makes the sales process traceable. That way, which stage a quotation is waiting at, or why a customer has gone quiet, becomes a matter of record rather than guesswork. We build it around the long sales cycle of industry and export, adapting the sample, proforma and dealer flow to your own process.
Not exactly. Customer tracking software is usually limited to a customer card and a call log, whereas a CRM is a broader system that also covers the sales pipeline, quotations, tasks and reports. Which one is enough depends on how long your sales process is and how many stages it goes through. We model exactly the stages your sales team actually tracks, and add new modules as the system grows.
We listen to what you need and tell you whether custom development or an off-the-shelf product fits better. The first 30-minute call is free; the scope of an on-site discovery, and its fee if any, is agreed in writing during that call.
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