World's first diamond commodities producer chooses Zoho CRM to scale expeditiously

The company

Imagine a company that has taken the world's most precious and sought-after material—diamonds—and transformed them into a cutting-edge asset that is set to revolutionize the way we invest in commodities. Diamond Standard has developed a groundbreaking diamond commodity standard that promises to be the most transparent, efficient, and reliable investment opportunity yet.

Their unique approach involves grading natural diamonds according to size, color, and clarity, and then combining them into baskets of standardized weight and value. These baskets are tokenized into digital assets that can be traded on the blockchain, providing investors with an easy and transparent way to invest in diamonds.

By creating a standardized diamond commodity, the company is driving positive change in the diamond industry. Supporting more transparent and accountable practices has enabled Diamond Standard to build a more equitable and responsible diamond market, which is sure to make a lasting impact on the world.

The challenge

Before the company began its public operations in 2020, Anila Daci, Director of Quality Assurance at Diamond Standard, looked for a solution that could integrate with Diamond Standard's complex internal software. As the company is involved with the processing of confidential data, privacy was a key factor that Anila did not want to compromise on.

The solution

Collaborating with Zoho's partner network

Anila reached out to Dmitry Skylark of United Parts of Chicago, an Authorized Zoho Partner, to help Diamond Standard customize Zoho CRM according to their unique requirements and build an API integration. Together, they worked to implement the system in the most efficient way possible so that the sales team could easily adopt it.

As Anila and Dmitry continued their efforts to develop this solution, Chris Dessi, Chief Revenue Officer at Diamond Standard, joined Diamond Standard and set out to build sales, marketing, and communication teams. With decades of experience in this field, Chris suggested that the company use Salesforce for their CRM needs and HubSpot for marketing.

But not only did Anila not want her and Dmitry's hard work to be in vain, but she was also positive that Zoho was the right choice to help Diamond Standard scale their business, and she was certain that if she could demonstrate for Chris what she had built with Dmitry, he would be on board with Zoho. As Anila expected, after seeing Zoho CRM's powerful capabilities, Chris also became highly involved in the implementation thereafter.

Diamond Standard wholeheartedly recommends Dmitry to anyone looking for a reliable and competent partner.

Efficient lead management with integrations

Diamond Standard utilizes many lead intake channels including email campaigns, TV advertising, webinars, and professional in-person events.The majority of the company's leads derive from their website, and are captured in Zoho CRM through a custom-tailored API integration. This integration enables the sales team to handle orders using the Contacts, Accounts, and Deals modules.

The company has also integrated Zoho CRM with Zoho Campaigns, which the marketing team uses to nurture leads captured from the website. The integration with Zoho Desk serves as the technical support aggregator for existing customers. Diamond Standard also uses Zoho Forms in a variety of CRM-based workflows, where the customers and potentials can enter additional data.

Zoho Flow serves as the platform's primary integration hub, handling some specialized workflows, like refund notifications and individual email invites. But the most important function is that Zoho Flow connects Diamond Standard's Microsoft Dynamics transactional backend with Zoho CRM through a custom API integration, which allows the CRM system to track customer status in Microsoft Dynamics and provide the details to the sales team, who operate in the CRM Deals module, where a deal is the equivalent of a real order at the backend.

Within the Zoho One suite, the company has also integrated Zoho Webinar, Zoho Backstage, Zoho Meeting, Zoho Projects, Zoho Survey, Zoho Cliq, Zoho Writer, Zoho Bookings, Zoho Analytics, and Zoho SalesIQ with Zoho CRM to suit their unique business needs.

Streamlining supply chain management

Diamond Standard also utilizes Zoho CRM to manage their vendors' onboarding, which is made possible by customizing the Vendors module in CRM to suit their business requirements. Through the integration between Zoho CRM and the Diamond Standard Exchange platform, end-users can directly access vendors' data in Zoho CRM at their convenience.

Unlocking insights and opportunities with analytics

Zoho CRM has not only streamlined the sales process at Diamond Standard, but also offers real-time insights and metrics based on the company's sales data through customized dashboards and reports. These reports enable the organization to create more opportunities, implement strategies, and make informed, data-driven business decisions.