A CRM for private equity gets chosen the way most software gets chosen, on a feature matrix, and that is why so many of them end up half-used. The features are broadly similar across the category. What differs is how the tool behaves when the firm is busy, when somebody leaves, and when a partner wants an answer that the record was never designed to give. This page is six questions to ask a vendor, in the order that actually separates them.
What happens to the network when a partner leaves?
This is the question that matters most and it is almost never asked in a demo. If the relationships live in one person's inbox and their memory, the firm loses them on the day of the resignation. If they live in the record, with who introduced whom and when anybody last spoke, the firm keeps them. Ask the vendor to show you that view specifically.
How long does it take an associate to log a call?
Time it in the demo, on a real example, with a real note. If it takes more than about fifteen seconds it will not happen consistently, and a record maintained inconsistently is worse than no record because it looks complete. This single measurement predicts adoption better than any feature comparison.
Can we see conversion by source without exporting?
Proprietary against banked, and how each converts. If the answer requires a CSV and a spreadsheet, it will be produced once a year for an offsite instead of read every month. The value of the number is in its frequency.
What does it do with the deals we pass on?
Most of what a fund sees, it passes. A tool that treats a pass as a deletion loses the most reusable asset in the pipeline, because a pass with a dated reason is next year's proprietary approach. Ask what a passed deal looks like eighteen months later.
What is the price when the team doubles?
Per-seat pricing is fine at six people and punishing at twenty, and it charges most for the associates who do most of the recording, which is the opposite of the incentive you want. Ask for the number at your headcount in three years, not today's.
Questions people ask about crm for private equity
What is the single best question to ask?
What happens to the relationships when a partner leaves. Everything else is recoverable; that is not.
Should we buy the expensive relationship intelligence tools?
If the network is too large to hold in the team's heads, yes. If your flow comes from a few dozen known sources, it solves a problem you do not have.
How is this priced?
$69 a month for the whole desk here rather than per seat, so adding the person who does the recording costs nothing.