Setting up a CRM for a factory: the fields that matter

The drawing is in the estimator's email, the quantity is in a WhatsApp chat, and the quote sits in an Excel file called "final rev2". The CRM holds the buyer's name and a stage called "Proposal". A CRM earns its place in a factory only when one record holds what an enquiry is made of. That means the part and its drawing revision, the material, the quantities, the two dates that matter, and the quote with its costing basis. Build those fields first. Leave the rest out.

Why the default set-up gets abandoned

Many CRMs arrive set up for selling a service or a product off a price list: a contact, a deal value, a stage, a close date. A job shop does not sell that way. One buyer sends twelve part numbers in one RFQ. Each part has its own drawing, material and volume, and the deal value depends on all of them.

When the CRM cannot hold a part, the estimator keeps a private Excel. The CRM becomes a list of names that sales updates for the owner's sake. Our note on why employees do not use the CRM covers the wider reasons. In a factory, this is the main one.

So before you choose, check one thing. Can the CRM hold line items under a deal, and can you add your own fields to those lines? If it cannot, it will struggle in a factory, however good the demo looked.

The fields on each part line

This is where the factory's knowledge lives. One line per part per RFQ.

Buyer's part number and drawing number, with revision. A quote against revision B when the buyer is on C is a quote for a different part.

Material grade, and who supplies it. Your own stock, or free-issue material from the buyer. It changes the price, and it changes who carries the scrap.

Lot size and annual volume. Set-up cost is spread over the lot. The buyer thinks in annual figures. Record both, exactly as the buyer stated them.

Critical requirements. The tolerance that decides which machine runs it, then finish, heat treatment and plating. Add the inspection papers asked for, such as a first-article report or material test certificates.

Quote due date and parts-required date. Two dates, two different promises. The first is to purchase. The second is to the buyer's production line.

Costing basis. Machine and cycle time assumed, material rate and the date of that rate, and a link to the costing sheet. Nobody misses this field until a buyer comes back.

Target price. Only if the buyer gave one. Otherwise leave it blank; a guessed target poisons every later report.

On the enquiry and the account

Above the part lines, keep the record light. The RFQ number and the date it arrived. Where it came from: an existing buyer, a directory, a referral, the website. Our note on tracking lead source covers how to keep that field clean.

Record the product or programme the parts go into, if the buyer will say: a new compressor model, a tractor line, a replacement for an imported part. It tells you how long the business may last. Add the people by role: who sent the RFQ in purchase, which development engineer owns the drawing, who in quality will judge the samples.

Then a lost-reason list written for a job shop: price, lead time, capacity, tolerance not feasible, drawing changed, project dropped, no reply. No "Other".

Stages that match how a part is won

1. RFQ received, with drawings attached.
2. Feasibility checked: can we make it, and on which machine. A "no" here is a decision, not a loss.
3. Quote sent, with its revision number.
4. Samples or first-off parts sent.
5. Samples approved, in writing. An approval is not an order, as our note on sample approved, no order explains.
6. Purchase order or delivery schedule received.
7. On regular schedule, handed to whoever manages the account.

"Negotiation" is missing on purpose. In a job shop a negotiation is a requote, so it becomes a new quote revision on the same part line, with the old one kept.

For example: a machine shop in Ambattur and the requote

Imagine a CNC machine shop in Ambattur, Chennai, turning and milling shafts, flanges and housings for pump and compressor makers. The details are illustrative.

The shop had a CRM, set up by its vendor with default stages. The estimator did not use it. RFQs lived in an inbox and costings in Excel files on a laptop.

Then a compressor maker came back with a flange quoted eight months earlier, now needed at a higher annual volume. Nobody could find the earlier costing, because that estimator had left. The new one costed it from scratch on a slower machine at a newer material rate. The buyer asked why the price had risen when the volume had grown. Nobody could answer, and the order went elsewhere.

The shop rebuilt its records around the part line above, costing basis included, and added one rule. No quote leaves the shop until the drawing revision, material rate and cycle time are filled in. The rule slowed quoting by about twenty minutes a part. The next requote started from the recorded basis, though, and every change in price could be explained line by line.

Fields to leave out, and when you need no CRM

Every extra field is a reason for the estimator to skip the record. Leave out industry codes, because the part line already says what you make for whom. Leave out company size, which the estimator cannot verify and never uses to price. Leave out lead scores, which a job shop's long, repeat-driven buying cycle makes meaningless. Leave out social profiles, which no one will keep current. If a field is blank on most records after a quarter, delete it.

Some factories do not need a CRM at all. A unit with four buyers on annual schedules runs better on a well-kept sheet and the ERP it already has. Our note on an enquiry register for a manufacturer lays one out. A CRM pays when RFQs come from many buyers, more than one person quotes, and requotes are common. If your ERP holds the part master, use the same part numbers in the CRM rather than keeping two lists that drift apart.

Before you configure anything

Sit with your estimator while the next RFQ is priced. Write down every fact looked up, and where it is found: the drawing, a chat, an old costing file. Those are your fields. Anything else waits. The manufacturing hub has more posts for factory sales teams. If you want your RFQ records built this way, with CRM implementation behind it, tell us what you need.