The CRM Zen Show – Episode 126 – Year in Review & The First Annual Zenmy’s

Here is a quick summary of Zoho’s 2020:

And as crazy as 2020 was,  Zoho still managed to push out 6 new products, and 2 new bundles.

Company growth has continued, with approximately 8000 employees and over 60 million users.

So here is a month by month review of the major stories that we discussed on the CRM Zen Show in 2020. 

January

• Zoho Analytics adds a new role, Organization Administrators, and Tyler was very happy.
• Zoho Backstage added a Conference Badge Creator called BadgeUp
• Catalyst Connect Zoho Client Portal Plugin for WordPress Launched
• The year’s first new product Zoho’s Lightweight CMR Bigin “Soft Launches” (Little did we know how well integrated it would become.)

February

• February started off with another new product Zoho Bookings, and while we still don’t judge the appointment scheduling software to be ready for primetime, it is getting close.  We hope to replace our internal use of Calendly with Bookings sometime in 2021.
• Zoho Sheets added “Race Charts” The First of Many Improvements to Roll out over the year that included:

• 9 New Zoho Sheets Functions, including the IMPORTRANGE Function 
• Picklists
• Zoho Sheets Print Enhancements

March

• Zoho’s Realtime Sales Metrics Dashboard Motivator had its End of Life (EOL) Announced, but it is STILL a Dead Man Walking. But it  – Still not a Dead Man Walking.  We are pretty sure it has received its last stay of execution.  If so, it will stop working on December 31, 2020.
• Zoho Forms Added Logic-Based Calculations, we were very happy with the continued improvements to Zoho Forms in 2020.  It really has become a best-in-class form builder.
• Zoho waited as long as they could, but in March they were forced to cancel their big user conference: Zoholics.  We still aren’t sure what will happen in 2021, but we look forward to getting together with the community as soon as it is safe. 
• They also rolled out the Small Business Emergency Subscription Assistance Program that paid for all Zoho Subscription Fees for those businesses that requested relief.
• And, in response to people working from home, Zoho Launched a new bundle – Remotely, which was FREE for most of the year.
• Zoho Desk got a much-needed integration with Zoho Inventory and Zoho Subscriptions
• And in response to Covid, Zoho Subscriptions added a Pause and Resume feature (it was a much-needed feature anyway).
• And to round out the month, Zoho Expense added Zoho Projects integration.

April

• April was a bit slower, but had two big product updates:
  • Zoho Books added a Vendor Portal. It had had a Client Portal for years, where customers could view invoices and more.  The Vendor Portal allows for a Vendor to login and review Purchase Orders.
  • Changes in the new UI of the record details page

May

• Perhaps the biggest Zoho News or the year, I launched Peloton Group #Zoho. It was a BIG hit and continues to have just 1 member – me. (I’m so lonely, I need a hug.)
• And in a big update for fans of Zoho’s WorkDrive, it added True Sync for Windows
• Bigin Officially launched, four months after the soft launch, and the integrations started coming fast and furious.
• Cliq added a Remote Work feature for bosses who really want to keep track of their remote employees. (An always-on camera to make sure you are AT YOUR DESK.)

June

• As we headed into Summer, Zoho Meeting gets a major facelift, but still didn’t fix some key elements. (See our 2021 Wishlist Below.)
• Zoho Forms just kept getting better.  This update allows for the Creation Dynamic Labels, based on form responses.
• And the Zoho Office suite just kept getting better. Zoho Writer 6.0 Released. (This is my favorite word processing application.)
• And SalesIQ added the ability to add a Chat link to your Email Signature
• And to round out the month Zoho Bookings Added a Custom Color Palette to spiff up your booking pages.

July

• And July kicked off with Zoho CRM Finally getting a New Logo. I say “Finally”, because the Logolinism Process Began in August 2019.  We are still waiting on new logos for Zoho Forms,  Page Sense, SaleIQ, and a few more.  Patience!
• And Cliq’s Remote Work Added Availability Reports to further keep tabs on remote employees.
• Improvements to Zoho Expense continued with Trip Management
• And a really big change to the Zoho CRM Portal  – Portal users got the ability to  edit records created by other users.

August

• August saw the release of THREE new products
  • New Product – Zoho TeamInbox – Shared Inbox Collaboration
  • New Product – Zoho BackToWork – An app to help make sure your company is following proper Covid Safety protocols.
  • New Product – Zoho ToolKit – The ultimate utility for eMail admins.
• And the Bigin integration train kept on rolling down the tracks with  Zoho Campaigns Integration.
• Ever wander if someone has read your Cliq messages? Well, wonder no more with Cliq Read Receipts – POLL REED or RED
• Zoho CRM Kanban Views got a face lift.
• August also saw the Zoho Marketplace Passes 1000 Extensions
• And Zoho Writer got a “True Offline” Mode
• And to round out the month, Zoho Launched a New Website Full-on Recruiter. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be getting a lot of updates.  Hopefully, they can restart that project.

September

• September kicked off with a really nice integration between Zoho Sign and Zoho Finance.  The ability to sign an estimate without having to log into a portal.
• And the biggest update to Bigin was released: Two Way Synchronization between Zoho CRM and Bigin
• And we saw our only New Product Bundle –Zoho Workplace Officially Rolled Out – Think Microsoft Office or Google Workplace on steroids. (That is the Zoho Way!)
• And the Cliq team kept on pushing new updates.  This one was pretty big, Widgets
• And ending September on a high note, Zoho Mail can now be used as an IMAP Client
  

October

• And October started of with the new release of Zoho CRM Blueprint 3.0
• And this one was a big surprise, and a very nice one as well, the Zoho Mail Admin Console Got a Much Needed Overhaul
• Zoho also rolled out its new Font: Puvi
• Zoho kept it going in Q4 with the release of Zoho Projects 7. The reviews have been very positive.
• Zoho CRM added a long requested feature: Many To Many Record Associations Be Records In The Same Module
• And to finish the month Zoho People Introduced “Office Readiness”, this was basically Zoho BackToWork added directly into Zoho People.

November

• And El Noviembre kicked off with  Zoho’s version of Grammarly, Zia in Zoho Writer, adding support for Spanish.  Mucho Gusto Zia.
• Zoho Forms and Bigin integration happened. 
• Gamescope was added to Zoho Desk – Gamescope has been in CRM for a very long time, and this is a nice addition to Desk.  We think, (just pure speculation here), that this is perhaps going to be how Zoho Motivator is replaced.
• And the month rounded out with the last New Product of the year – TransMail, This application handles the routing of Transactional emails. Talk about a throwback, we first talked about this product on Episode 1 of the CRM Zen Show on July 11, 2018.

December

• And rounding out the year, in December we saw an update to Zoho Forms that allows for Co-Editors – Everybody say Hallelujah!
• Finishing off the year, we got news of Zoho Recruit Adding A Chatbot feature to the Recruitment Portal. 

And now on to our Wish List for 2021, but before we do that, we had a wish list in 2020.  Here is how it turned out:

2020 Scorecard

• 0 Wishes Granted
• 2 Wishes Getting Closer
• 12 Wishes Denied
• (Red=NO, Green = Almost, Blue = Yes)
  

• Applications – Because we can’t recommend these to clients until they are fixed, please focus on Fixing the Following Applications
  • MarketingHub
  • Bookings
  • Meetings
  • Calendar
• Things we’d really like to see happen in 2020
  • Deploy the new Tasking Engine in Connect to CRM, Projects, Sprints, and Desk.
  • CRM Layout Customization discussed in April
  • Launch LMS Platform
  • Zoho Flow
    • Lookup tables
  • CRM Subforms 
    • Syncing into Analytics
    • Mail merge into CRM email templates
    • Workflow trigger on new subform line
  • Filtered lookup fields in the CRM
  • Unified time tracking across all applications
  • Books-Inventory – enable edits to inventory tracking settings after transactions recorded for the item

Our 2021 Wish List

• Applications – Because we can’t recommend these to clients until they are fixed, please focus on Fixing the Following Applications
  • MarketingHub
  • Bookings
  • Meetings (Waiting Room,  Recording Engine, Better Calendering)
  • Showtime (Recording Engine)
  • Calendar
• Other things we’d really like to see happen in 2021:
  • All the things we asked for in 2020:
    • Integrated Tasking Engine.
    • Full Launch of CRM Canvas View for Records
    • Launch LMS Platform
    • CRM Subforms 
      • Syncing into Analytics
      • Mail merge into CRM email templates
      • Workflow trigger on new subform line
    • Filtered lookup fields in the CRM
    • Unified time tracking across all applications
    • Books-Inventory – enable edits to inventory tracking settings after transactions recorded for the item
  • And a few new things:
    • Standardized Interface in Zoho One for ALL applications
      • Settings
      • App Launchers
      • Anything that can be standardized, should be.
    • Unified Zoho One Dashboard

So that is our 2020 Zoho year in review.  Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter, and we look forward to a great new year.

And here is the list of winners in our First Annual Zenmy Awards

• Best Sales & Marketing Application
  • Zoho CRM
• Best Human Resources Application
  • Zoho People
• Best Custom Solutions Application
  • Zoho Analytics
• Best Office Suite Application
  • Zoho Writer & Zoho Workdrive (Tie)
• Best Collaboration Application
  • Zoho Cliq
• Best Finance Application
  • Zoho Books
• Best New Application
  • Bigin
• Favorite Telephony Solution
  • Twilio
• Favorite MarketPlace Application
  • Zoho Unified Client Portal by Catalyst Connect
• Best Zoho Application
  • Zoho CRM

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