Compare the Top CRM Software as of September 2024

What is CRM Software?

CRM software is a type of software that businesses use to manage and analyze customer interactions and data. It helps businesses improve customer service by tracking customer information, analyzing trends, and providing customized communications for customers. CRM software also helps organizations to manage sales leads, track contacts, and automate certain customer-facing activities. Many CRM solutions offer automated workflows that streamline processes such as marketing campaigns and customer onboarding. Compare and read user reviews of the best CRM software currently available using the table below. This list is updated regularly.

  • 1
     monday sales CRM
    Built on top of monday.com Work OS, monday sales CRM empowers business owners and sales teams to manage all aspects of their sales cycle and customer data, streamlined in one centralized place. They can capture leads from any source, easily manage their contacts’ information, and track every deal's status so that no opportunities slip through the cracks. monday sales CRM lets you create no-code automations, eliminating hours of repetitive processes, and seamlessly integrates with the tools sales teams already use ensuring maximum efficiency. Without the need for an IT professional, build customizable dashboards to get the full overview of your sales cycle to confidently analyze data and optimize your sales processes. Manage your post-sales activities such as client onboarding and their projects to nurture stronger customer relationships. Best of all, it’s extremely user-friendly, standing out from traditional platforms, making it a CRM your sales team would actually want to use.
    Starting Price: $10 seat / month
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  • 2
    HubSpot CRM
    HubSpot brings your marketing, sales, and service teams together on the same AI-powered customer platform. HubSpot CRM is not just a tool; it's the heartbeat of your business. Designed with passion and precision, our CRM stands out as the ultimate solution for empowering your team to build deeper customer relationships. It transforms the way you engage with your clients by offering a seamlessly integrated, all-in-one platform for sales, marketing, and customer service. With HubSpot CRM, you gain unparalleled insights into your customer interactions, all organized in an intuitive, easy-to-navigate dashboard that promises to skyrocket your team's efficiency. Our platform is engineered to grow with you, offering scalable solutions that adapt to your evolving business needs. What's more, HubSpot CRM includes a robust free version, packed with essential features, making it the perfect choice for ambitious businesses of all sizes.
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    Starting Price: Free
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  • 3
    C2CRM

    C2CRM

    Clear C2

    At Clear C2, we understand that different companies have different business requirements. We designed C2CRM to allow you to choose only the functions you need. Our CRM system is a cost-effective solution that will grow with your business. C2CRM consists of four modules that integrate to provide a comprehensive CRM solution: Relationship Management, Sales Automation, Marketing Automation, and Customer Service. Only buy what each user needs. The C2CRM Relationship Management module is the core of our solution. It consists of all the logic you need to manage your business relationships effectively and a mobile app to keep your sales team informed while on the road. Get a 360-degree view of your accounts, contacts, and activity with built-in dashboards, workflow automation, and reports.
    Starting Price: $37 per user per month
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  • 4
    Planfix

    Planfix

    Planfix

    The Planfix platform allows organizations to manage their entire business online. Regardless of company size and industry, Planfix has something to offer as an excellent project and work management tool. With Planfix, your company gets a fully customizable management system, from process design to appearance. The integrated Planfix platform allows users to manage tasks and projects, CRM, sales, marketing, production, logistics, support services, finance, and human resources all at once. Data transfer between teams is seamless — for example, transactions during the implementation stage become projects, which are then transferred to support. We believe that Planfix is suitable for private businesses, nonprofits, public organizations, and any other group working towards a common goal. More than 68,000 users use Planfix to automate business workflows in over 7,000 companies.
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    Starting Price: $0 per user per month
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  • 5
    SuiteMaster

    SuiteMaster

    LeadMaster Solutions Group

    SuiteMaster - An Open-Source ERP & Implementation Solution * SuiteMaster is an affordable, fully integrated ERP business platform. Clients can select from thousands of core business applications, including CRM, Marketing Automation, Case Management, HR, Operations, Accounting, e-commerce, Inventory, and more. The apps easily "snap" into SuiteMaster's core ERP platform. SuiteMaster provides enterprise-class ERP/CRM at an attractive price point. SuiteMaster can be fully white-labeled, allowing you to bundle it with your organization's value-added services. We are also an Odoo-authorized Premier Partner. We provide consulting and implementation services to support Odoo's award-winning ERP solution. Companies of all sizes rely on us to deploy Odoo ERP successfully. With over 50,000 successful deployments, Odoo ERP has become a top ERP provider. Companies rely on LeadMaster Solutions Group to ensure cost-effective implementations with high adoption rates.
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  • 6
    Virtuous

    Virtuous

    Virtuous

    Virtuous is much more than a CRM - it is the only responsive fundraising platform designed to help nonprofit teams build better donor relationships and grow generosity. The world of fundraising has changed. Virtuous is your growth partner for the new normal ⏤ unifying fundraising, marketing, and donor development activities, ridding teams of redundant back-office tasks, and surfacing the insights and signals needed to deliver dynamic donor experiences at scale. Giving is deeply personal. We believe fundraising should be too. Virtuous is everything you’d expect from a robust CRM, plus data insights to help you build deeper donor relationships: email marketing, mail segmentation, campaign tools, and more, designed to increase engagement. Data-driven donor insights powered by wealth, social media, engagement, location, and other data to help you listen to constituents at scale. See how Virtuous can unify and empower your teams to exceed your goals.
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  • 7
    Act!

    Act!

    Act!

    Act! Premium is perfect for small and midsize businesses looking to market better, sell more, and create customers for life. With unparalleled flexibility and freedom of choice, Act! Premium accommodates the unique ways you do business, whether it’s on-premises (Act! Premium Desktop), in the cloud (Act! Premium Cloud), or, you can leverage a hybrid deployment for maximum flexibility! Act! also offers customizations to fit your specific business or industry processes or your preferences for deployment and access, the possibilities with Act! Premium are limitless. Act! Premium includes powerful CRM and Marketing Automation tools in one platform, making it easy for you to up your sales and marketing game – and ultimately create customers for life.
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    Starting Price: $30.00/month/user
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  • 8
    Shape Software

    Shape Software

    Shape Software

    Shape is purpose-built sales and marketing automation software that comes with pre-built features that can be configured for any business. The easy-to-use interface empowers your teams and consolidates all aspects of your business in one AI platform. Shape provides a collaborative space for your teams to stay aligned and efficient in everything they do, whether it's streamlining your sales pipeline, engaging more prospects with marketing sequences and digital ads, nurturing customer relationships, communicating seamlessly, or tracking projects. Start growing your revenue with Shape's suite of services today.
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    Starting Price: $119
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  • 9
    Pipedrive

    Pipedrive

    Pipedrive

    Pipedrive is a sales-focused customer relationship management tool that teams of all sizes love. With over 100,000 companies spread across 179 countries, sales teams are drawn in by an easy-to-use CRM with a simple yet powerful design that prioritizes ease of use above all else. When using Pipedrive, nothing falls through the cracks, allowing your team to spend less time filing and more time selling with a CRM software that is both agile and powerful. Some Pipedrive top features: · Visual sales pipeline: See your entire sales process at a glance. Update deals by dragging and dropping them into place. Customize it to match your sales cycle. · Team collaboration: Collaborate on deals and activities with colleagues. Share updates on sales operations and wins. · Reporting and dashboards: Get detailed reporting on sales and key activities. Track progress against goals in your dashboard. · Activity reminders: Schedule reminders for all your sales activities. Stay on top of all y
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    Starting Price: $14/month (billed annually)
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  • 10
    Odoo

    Odoo

    Odoo

    Odoo is a fully integrated, customizable, open-source software packed with hundreds of expertly designed business applications. Odoo’s intuitive database is able to meet a majority of business needs, such as: CRM, Sales, Project, Manufacturing, Inventory, and Accounting, just to name a few. Odoo is an all-in-one software solution designed to meet the needs of companies, regardless of their size (or budget). The unbeatable, seamless nature of Odoo helps businesses become more efficient by reducing redundant manual processes, which helps companies save countless hours of labor. Every module is interconnected to provide a fully-integrated experience from app to app, and users can automate many processes that would’ve otherwise required manual inputs into multiple applications. Odoo keeps all business functions in one place, allowing teams to collaborate with other departments from one unified platform in the most efficient way possible.
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    Starting Price: $25.00/month/user
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    Repfabric

    Repfabric

    Repfabric

    Repfabric is a customer relationship management (CRM) software designed specifically for multi-line sales teams (i.e. reps, distributors, wholesalers, dealers, and manufacturers). It streamlines and simplifies the sales process by providing deep integration with email, contacts, calendars, and deal tracking. The platform enables users to track commissions from CRM to sale, make updates directly from mobile devices, and document sales calls using voice-to-text features. In addition to these core functionalities, Repfabric offers features such as account activity and opportunity reviews, sales numbers and trend analysis by manufacturer, and a Nearby feature to find the closest client when a sales call is canceled. The platform is supported by a full-service customer care team and an experienced data team, ensuring a smooth transition for businesses and allowing you to focus on growing your business.
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  • 12
    HoneyBook

    HoneyBook

    HoneyBook

    HoneyBook helps creative entrepreneurs and freelancers book more clients, manage projects and get paid all in one place. With their business management software, you can automate your busy work and stay on top of all your to-dos, saving time and money so you can grow your business. Its like your own personal assistant. This all-in-one management platform streamlines business processes, from first inquiry to final payment, so business owners can spend less time on administrative work and more time focusing on what got them passionate about their business in the first place. With their proposals, invoices, contracts, payments, and scheduling at your fingertips, HoneyBook gives you everything you need to give clients an unforgettable experience.
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    Starting Price: $19 monthly ($16 annually)
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  • 13
    DirectLync

    DirectLync

    DirectLync

    Marketing technology should never be a pain, but a tool that helps you achieve your goals. DirectLync is a consolidated platform for small businesses looking for sales and marketing tools. It is an all in one, easy-to-use platform.
    Starting Price: $20.00 per month
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  • 14
    Pipeliner CRM

    Pipeliner CRM

    Pipelinersales Corp.

    Pipeliner has revolutionized CRM with our unique visual interface, no-code workflow automation engine, and instant, dynamic insights and reporting. There is no other CRM that provides both salespeople and sales management with so many ways of displaying and analyzing sales data while also delivering intelligent, system-generated insights. Plus, thanks to our automation engine and ease of integration with other systems (such as email, ERP, Marketing), Pipeliner eliminates many of the manual and routine tasks that other systems force on both salespeople and sales managers. The Pipeliner CRM experience is so different from traditional CRM which is why we drive the highest adoption rates, lower Total Cost of Ownership, and rapid Return On Investment. Plus with fast onboarding and how easy it is to learn to use and/or administer the system, there is little to no business interruption when deploying.
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    Starting Price: $25
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  • 15
    EngageBay

    EngageBay

    EngageBay

    EngageBay is a simple, affordable, integrated, all-in-one marketing, sales and service automation platform with free CRM, built to grow small businesses and startups. The marketing automation suite helps you save time, nurture your audience and automate routine, manual tasks. With the free CRM and sales automation, you can organize all your email contacts, track deals, and the sales pipeline to grow your sales. Further, you can build meaningful customer relationships that stay for life. And finally, with the free live chat and helpdesk features, provide real-time assistance to convert visitors to happy customers. Track, prioritize, and solve customer support tickets in minutes.
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    Starting Price: $10.79/user/month (biennially)
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  • 16
    InfoFlo

    InfoFlo

    InfoFlo Solutions Inc

    Case Management software made simple so you can focus on your non profit. 360 degree views of your cases all from a single dashboard. Get rid of those excel documents and start accessing your data from any anywhere on any device. With InfoFlo you will get a fully customized system to fit your needs all at an affordable price.
    Starting Price: $199.00/month
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  • 17
    monday.com

    monday.com

    monday.com

    Simplify the way your team works with monday.com, a cloud-based project management platform that provides customizable no-code solutions for a wide range of use-cases such as marketing, sales, operations, IT, HR, and more. monday.com allows businesses of all sizes to work in an efficient environment where every team member can assign tasks, automate repetitive work, collaborate in real-time, and share files. With this platform, you can manage everything from simple to complex projects and ensure seamless communication between team members. Customizable dashboards give quick high-level overviews of every project, visual boards help organize tasks, and thanks to integrations with third-party applications such as Outlook, Zoom, Gmail, Google Drive, Dropbox, Excel you can continue working with all your existing tools within the platform. monday.com also offers dedicated solutions, such as monday dev and monday sales CRM, designed to answer the needs of specific industries and verticals.
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    Starting Price: $39/month for 5 users
  • 18
    AddSearch

    AddSearch

    AddSearch

    AddSearch provides a lightning-fast, effortless, and customizable site search and recommendation tool for any website or e-commerce site. It works with any CMS and provides an Enterprise level tools to manage search results. With nearly 2000 customers globally, in Media, Telecommunications, Government, Education, eCommerce and many more, AddSearch is a proven best-of-breed site search solution. AddSearch has all the Enterprise-level features that you need: - Autocomplete - Smart results ranking - Including / Excluding content - Advanced search analytics with 1 year retention - Filters and facets - Search personalization - Custom SSO - Audit logs - Recommendation Engine - Automated synonyms suggestions - Organizational User Management - Works with any CMS - Implementations with a crawler or API - SLA up to 99.999% - Fast turnaround time Prices start from $99/month when implementing the search yourself. Full setup service included in plans from $499/month.
    Starting Price: $99.00/month
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  • 19
    Vivantio

    Vivantio

    Vivantio

    Vivantio is a leading provider of service management software for both internal- and external-facing teams. Centralize your service operations across B2B Customer Support, IT, HR, Facilities, Finance, and Legal. By combining enterprise-level functionality with the flexibility of a modern cloud-based solution, Vivantio provides an intuitive, scalable, and fully configurable platform that empowers businesses to achieve service excellence. The platform scales to meet the complex business needs of large, multi-site organizations, especially during periods of high growth. Vivantio is a trusted partner offering cost-effective solutions through flexible licensing.
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    Starting Price: $59.00/month/user
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  • 20
    Scoro

    Scoro

    Scoro

    Scoro is work management software specifically designed for service businesses that have grown weary of dealing with disjointed systems, unpredictable workloads, and shrinking profit margins. With its powerful features and intuitive interface, Scoro streamlines and optimizes the entire workflow of agencies, consultancies and other professional service businesses, providing them with a unified platform to manage all aspects of their operations. By consolidating essential functions such as project management, time tracking, collaboration, invoicing, and reporting, Scoro eliminates the hassle of switching between different tools and brings coherence to the work process. It enables businesses to gain better control over their projects, allocate resources efficiently, and monitor progress in real-time. Scoro's data-driven insights and analytics empower businesses to make informed decisions, identify areas for improvement, and drive overall growth and profitability.
    Starting Price: $26.00/month/user
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    Local Measure Engage
    Engage is a pre-built, intelligent, cloud contact center platform that transforms customer service. Built for for Amazon Connect and powered by AWS, Engage combines voice and digital communication channels to improve operational efficiency and deliver valuable insights, Engage uses Generative AI to enhance customer service interactions and create personalized experiences that cater to the changing needs of businesses and their customers. Engage is a Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS), meaning we take care of all updates and improvements with no hardware or expensive agent licenses. Our consumption-based pricing caters to businesses of all sizes. Engage includes Voice, Email, SMS and Facebook Messenger, Instagram DM (Direct Message), Twitter DM (Direct Message), WhatsApp, WeChat LINE, and Web Chat.
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    Sage Intacct

    Sage Intacct

    Sage Intacct

    Sage Intacct is a premier cloud-based financial management software designed for growing businesses. It offers comprehensive features including core financials, accounts payable and receivable, cash management, and multi-entity consolidations. Sage Intacct's advanced modules cater to complex financial needs, ensuring scalability as your business grows. The software integrates seamlessly with other business applications, providing real-time financial and operational insights. Its user-friendly interface and customizable dashboards empower your team to adapt quickly and make data-driven decisions. Sage Intacct's robust reporting capabilities and automation of key financial processes help improve accuracy, efficiency, and compliance. Trusted by thousands of organizations, Sage Intacct streamlines financial operations, enhances visibility, and drives business growth. With award-winning customer support and continuous innovation, Sage Intacct is your partner.
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    Twilio Flex
    Everything you need to deliver personalized customer experiences, all on one powerful platform. Twilio Flex is the programmable cloud contact center platform that gives your company complete control over how, when and what you deploy to deliver digital-first engagement with the widest breadth of communication channels. Unlock hyper-personalization by gathering relevant, contextual information at your agents' fingertips, integrating data from CRM, payment systems, service ticketing, and more. Flex customers have reported lower handle times by up to 38% after giving agents personalized access to information from multiple backend applications. Twilio Flex powers over half a million agents today and is accelerating digital transformation by freeing companies from the limitations of legacy call centers. Find the documentation, sample code, and developer tools needed to tailor your contact center to your business’s unique needs.
    Starting Price: $1.00/user
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    Twilio

    Twilio

    Twilio

    Design and deploy your ideal customer engagement experience. Twilio is a single fully-programmable platform with flexible APIs for any channel and over 400+ integrations, backed by a community of over 9 million developers. Build accurate and personalized experiences for your customers, easily and at scale, using SMS and WhatsApp messaging, voice, video, email, and more. Browse documentation and SDKs in multiple coding languages, including Ruby, Python, PHP, Node.js, java, and C#, or jumpstart your first project with our open source code templates to quickly build production-ready communications apps. Sign up and start building today.
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    Starting Price: $0.0085 per min
  • 25
    Eurekos

    Eurekos

    Eurekos

    Learning management systems are good for training employees but often fail to address the unique needs of training customers & partners as well as customers' customers & partners. Eurekos is a leading European customer education specialist, offering innovative training software solutions for businesses and non-profit organizations with a need for external training, certification or accreditation. Eurekos offers a complete set of tools to create and deliver training that cover the entire customer journey: before the sale, during onboarding and ongoing. Eurekos has everything for rapid onboarding, advanced certification, eCommerce, unlimited brand portals, complex organization structures and integrated content development all under the highest privacy & security standards (ISO7IEC 27001 & 27701). We are constantly reinvesting into our software to bring our clients the latest, most current technical features available on the LMS market.
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    Starting Price: $425 usd/month
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  • 26
    Houzz Pro
    Houzz Pro is the #1 construction management solution for residential contractors and designers. Get an all-in-one solution that spans the full customer lifecycle, including marketing, CRM, estimates, takeoffs, 3D floor plans, project management, selections, online invoicing & payments, QuickBooks integration, and a client portal. Start a free trial today to see why thousands of Pros trust Houzz Pro to grow & manage their business. Plans are available for all business sizes starting at $85/month.
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    Starting Price: $85 per month
  • 27
    Epicor Vision
    Epicor® Vision® is a leading distribution ERP solution specially built for aftermarket parts distributors that connects your people and systems to fuel faster, more profitable growth. Epicor Vision enables your business to deliver superior customer service, whether it’s a single-location shop, a national service chain, or a large corporate or government account. Leverage extensive back-office automation, data-driven inventory planning, and advanced pricing strategies. Get ahead of competitors by automating processes such as transmission and receipt of POs, ASNs, e-invoices, and other documents. Conduct seamless peer-to-peer transactions and streamline special orders. Epicor Vision can help you optimize purchasing and inventory control to eliminate underperforming stock. Utilize leading-edge Epicor parts demand intelligence to fine-tune inventories at every location. Streamline purchasing and A/P operations with the Vision solution’s comprehensive three-way match feature.
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    Contractor Foreman

    Contractor Foreman

    Contractor Foreman

    Starting at $49/m for the WHOLE company, Contractor Foreman is the most affordable all-in-one construction management system for contractors. Our customers in 75+ countries and industry awards back it up. And it's all backed by a 100 day guarantee. Stop wasting time and money on overpriced software. Quickly build estimates, generate invoices, and get paid online. Our QuickBooks integration reduces the need for double entry. Contractor Foreman makes it easy for you and your crew to track your time, expenses, Daily Logs, and much more. Best Price + Best Features = Best Choice Tired of wasting time and money on overpriced construction management software that is difficult to use and doesn't provide the features you need? Look no further than Contractor Foreman. Come and grow with us.
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    Starting Price: $49.00/month
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    Birdeye

    Birdeye

    Birdeye

    Birdeye is the leading reputation, social media, and customer experience platform for local businesses and brands. Over 150,000 businesses use Birdeye’s all-in-one platform to effortlessly manage online reputation, connect with prospects through digital channels, and gain customer experience insights to grow sales and thrive. Founded in 2012 and headquartered in Palo Alto, Birdeye is led by a team of innovators from Google, Amazon, Salesforce, and Yahoo and is backed by the who’s who of Silicon Valley, including Salesforce founder Marc Benioff, Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, Trinity Ventures, World Innovation Lab, and Accel-KKR. Learn more at birdeye.com.
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    Starting Price: $250/month
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    Zadarma

    Zadarma

    Zadarma

    Business Phone system without heavy hardware and wiring. Zadarma offers VoIP, Cloud PBX, CRM, speech analytics, call tracking, eSIM, website widgets, integration with top CRM systems, and much more. Take advantage of our free Cloud PBX offer to create a versatile business phone system in a matter of minutes. The PBX supports Interactive Voice Response (IVR), Conditional and Unconditional Call Forwarding, Call recording and statistics, speech analytics, and many other powerful features. With an intuitive software wizard and our clear instructions, even the most non-technical individuals can easily set up the system. Establish your local or international presence with virtual phone numbers from 100 countries around the world starting from just $2 a month.
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    Starting Price: $2/month
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CRM Software Guide

What is CRM?

Today’s technology is enabling small to midsize businesses to operate more efficiently, thereby saving on expenses and time. Among the most beneficial of these new developments is customer relationship management (CRM) software. CRM software enables businesses to manage existing customers, potential clients, sales opportunities, and contacts from a single solution. CRM software can organize and analyze vast amounts of data with lightning speed, improve workflow, and boost customer relationships to new levels. It all adds up to more streamlined business management and effective customer relationships.

Handling relationships with customers and contacts in these ways was unachievable before these advances in technology without preparing extensive spreadsheets and devoting considerable time, energy and staff resources to do so.

A key to the effectiveness of CRM software is in gathering extensive and detailed information about customers and potential clients, followed by organizing, recording and effectively using that information. CRM software retains information not just on customers’ basic details, but also on each contact or lead that a company maintains, whether by telephone or email. It monitors their interests and their purchasing habits. It provides the tools for following up, cross selling, developing marketing campaigns and strategies, and tracking invoices more effectively. Some CRM solutions can even go so far as to prompt sales reps to email or telephone customers at around the time at which they have called the company.

The applications also can scan web traffic and social media to identify potential clients based on such aspects as their interests and hobbies. Instead of an employee trying to remember details on customers or searching for it in randomly gathered papers scattered on an office desk or hidden in computer folders with meaningless names, the software retains this information in a central place. Not only is it retained, but it is well ordered in an efficient and logical way. So, for example, the software will automatically send a gift card or message to customers or contacts on their birthdays. New or improved products or services can be broadcast immediately on their release.

CRM software goes even further than organizing information on customers and contacts and maintaining relationships with them. It provides the ability to aim messages to specific demographic groups, such as millennials and seniors. Information also can be directed to specific geographic areas, such as a city, county or state, quickly and efficiently without having to develop spreadsheets to do so or having an employee going through the information and select those who should be served with the information. In addition, CRM software enables employees to set and measure sales targets, track customer interactions, develop effective marketing techniques, and even to scan internet traffic and social media for potential leads.

As a result, staff can be freed up to concentrate on the more personal face-to-face aspects of marketing and sales without having to spend their time on inputting vast amounts of information, assessing results, and maintaining regular communications with customers. The result is enhanced sales ability, greater productivity, and more satisfied customers.

Many CRM systems have been developed and a large number are available. Sorting through the various CRM software can run up costs and eat up time. But it is essential that the programs chosen are the most appropriate to a company’s needs. Here are guidelines to help a business make the right selection.

CRM Costs and Features

CRM Cost and Features

Clearly small and mid-sized companies will want to take into account the cost of CRM software. But there is more to the software than the cost itself. The price needs to be balanced against the benefits of the features that are incorporated in the software. The features required by a company depend on the nature of the business that it conducts. Some features will be of little or no use to a particular company, while others will be of significant advantage to it.

In addition to checking out the benefits, a company might want to consider some of the newer CRM software that offer affordable entry points. As the company grows and it becomes acquainted with the software, more features can be added. A company can choose whether the new features are worth the additional costs in terms of the returns it might receive from them. A company will also want to take into account hidden costs, such as the degree of training that is required to ensure that staff are using the software effectively. More complex software might mean spending considerable time on teaching staff to use it more efficiently. Ideally, the time taken to becoming fully acquainted with the software should be as short as possible and should be measured in days rather than weeks. Clearly a smaller business simply cannot afford to have staff spend large amounts of time becoming acquainted with the new CRM system.

To help answer these questions, it might be advisable to check the support documentation with the application. Just how complex a program is it? What kinds of problems will employees face as they implement it? Another method to determining a software’s cost effectiveness is to try out the application to determine just how long it will take for your staff to be up and running on it. Most customer relationship management software suites come with a free evaluation period. Use this time to import information into the CRM system, including accounts, and assign tasks to employees. Evaluate whether the software is effective for your company’s needs or whether it actually creates more work. You might also record how extensively you need to pore over the documentation that comes with it or how many times you need to call support for help. If one application fails the test, try another until you are satisfied with the return on investment it brings with it.

Another factor in evaluating software is whether the new CRM software will integrate with the systems that are currently being used by your company. Will it be necessary to buy new hardware or switch to new operating systems? Also, effective use of the software might require new smart phones or tablets, incurring additional costs. Even though CRM software is relatively new on the market, the rapid advancement of today’s technology has meant that the applications have become more varied and bring with them more options in addition to the basic benefits. Newer versions enable the software to be implemented in a Software-as-a-service (SaaS) model. Others offer the choice of storing information on the cloud rather than on your own computers or servers. Such a choice can save on costs, lessen complexity, and provide additional security. Another consideration is integrating the CRM software with your telephone system, enabling you to gather information from calls and conversations.

Here’s another aspect to consider. Industry-leading CRM software suites tend to integrate with third-party providers. Those providers operate many of the tools that you will be using. This adds to the costs of the overall application. It also means you might find yourself dealing with different support systems and you cannot always be sure that the varied applications work effectively alongside each other. Careful evaluation of each CRM will pay dividends in the long run. Rather than simply buying a CRM system that provides you with all the bells and whistles that today’s systems provide, it is wise to check carefully into the individual benefit of each, using the factors outlined here as a guide.

Additional Features

  • Contact Management – CRM software includes contact management features, which allow organizations to store and manage customer and prospect contact information, such as name, address, phone number, and email address.
  • Lead Tracking – CRM software includes lead tracking and lead management capabilities, which allow organizations to monitor the progress of leads through their sales pipeline. This helps organizations identify where leads are in the sales process, as well as which leads are most likely to convert into customers.
  • Sales Automation – CRM software includes sales automation features, which allow organizations to automate and streamline their sales processes. This can include features such as automated lead scoring, lead routing, and automated follow-up emails.
  • Reporting and Analytics – CRM software includes reporting and analytics capabilities, which allow organizations to gain insights into their sales performance. This can include reporting on leads, sales opportunities, and customer data.
  • Customer Service – CRM software includes customer service features, which allow organizations to provide better service to their customers. This can include features such as ticket tracking, issue management, and customer self-service.

Ease of Use of CRM Systems

Ease of Use of CRM Systems

In addition to the cost and the features, a major consideration when selecting CRM software is to ensure that it is going to be relatively uncomplicated for you and your employees to use. Ideally, after an initial learning phase, staff should find it reasonably intuitive. To test a program’s usability, make sure you consult your employees on it. After all, they are the ones who will be tasked with using it. What might look simple on an initial examination of the program might prove difficult when it comes to actually using the program itself. The way the program works might take an inordinate time to learn.

Employees might find that menus are difficult to find or to use, are too many to go through for relatively simple tasks, or are far from intuitive. They might even find that gaining the information they need involves going through so many hoops that it takes more time than if they had done it themselves without using the program. Having discovered how one aspect of the program works they should be able to apply those basic principles to other aspects of the program. They might be frustrated to find that, for example, the menus work in one way on one aspect of the program, but work in another way on a different aspect.

Make sure, too, that the employees try out the CRM software in a variety of situations. In some cases, the tasks they are called upon to employ using the software might actually make their jobs harder. They might find, too, that they never use many of the features for which you are paying. CRM software also should be able to alert a user to any major errors, such as entering data in the wrong place. One way to determine usability is to learn the application yourself and then to teach someone how to operate it. Read the support documentation, scan through the FAQs, if any are available, as well as any user blogs you might come across. If — on completing all these tasks — you find it painstaking or even frustrating to teach someone the system, or if you find you cannot understand the system well enough yourself to teach someone to use it, alarm bells should sound.

Even if you find the CRM software relatively straightforward to use, it is nevertheless likely that at some point in the future you might need to call the support line for help. While evaluating the application, therefore, it is a good idea to call the support line when you get even slightly stuck to check out how valuable it is. Check out how long the wait time is, which hours they are available in your time zone, and ask numerous questions.

Not only will this enable you to become more familiar with the program, but you will be able to check out the availability and quality of the support that is provided.

CRM Marketing and Communications Features

CRM Marketing and Communications Features

Concentrate on those features of the CRM software that you will use and drill down on their practical use for your company. Try not to be blindsided by social media apps that are fashionable and said to be catching on. Chances are that email will continue to remain for the foreseeable future the best way you can communicate with your customers. Almost everyone has email on their desktop, laptop, tablet or phone, which they check regularly. Many of the new social media applications, however, are unavailable on desktops and laptops.

Another benefit of email is that it can convey information, including logos, graphics and pictures more effectively than apps such as Twitter or even Facebook. A well designed email can be appealing and inviting in a way that other apps are not. In short, you should understand the way in which the CRM software you choose will interact with customers and contacts over email. The application you choose should ensure that information contained in email messages is automatically captured and does not have to be manually gathered. Of course, this does not mean you should ignore mobile apps. They are a vital part of communicating today, but they are quite different than those applications that operate on desktops and laptops. So you should evaluate them as a separate entity.

Viewed from a different perspective, an important new feature that is being added to CRM software today is the ability for an employee to communicate on a mobile device with the data that is stored centrally, either on your servers or on the cloud. This ability should be as effective as if the employee were sitting in the office working on a desktop.

These applications mean that, by using a remote mobile device, such as a smart phone or tablet, staff will be able access all the CRM tools wherever they are in the world as long as they have access to the Internet and whenever they want to do so, even outside regular business hours. Sometimes the communication methods are different when working from a mobile device than they are when using a desktop computer. Switching from one to another can be a learning experience for employees. But for some companies, depending on the nature of their business, it is important that their employees need to be able to communicate in this way. For many, specially those who are constantly on the road, such communication is vital to them. If this is the case with your company, therefore, make sure that they have the ability to plug in to your CRM software from wherever they are using their mobile devices.

Using a CRM for Sales Engagement and Marketing

One of the advantages that CRM software is bringing with it is the ability to introduce automation to relationships with customers. In the past, sales representatives, or anyone who had a direct relationship with customers, needed carefully to record tasks to be performed. Examples would be following up a set time after a sales negotiation or at the ending of a trial test of a product or service. Questions might need to be answered, too.

Not only that, but emails would have to be written to each client, ensuring that they are provided with the correct information. Now CRM software performs many of these tasks automatically. In doing so it sharply lessens the prospect of contacts falling through the cracks as a result of neglecting to follow up in time or overlooking to keep track of them in a timely manner. It also can produce customized email templates for each situation or for special offers, making it unnecessary to write each email individually.

Such features are valuable when following up on leads. The reason: In many businesses, potential customers fail to respond to an initial sales attempt. They might set it aside with the intent to decide later. Following up becomes as important to closing the sale as the first lead generation was.

In some cases, potential clients ask questions about a product. Should they fail to receive an answer in a reasonable amount of time, they will move on and consider other products. Using CRM software, particularly when it is linked to a mobile app, staff will be prompted to respond quickly to questions. In the case of existing customers, too, it is often vital to respond as quickly as possible to problems or questions users might have.

Another example would be in the case of, say, a webinar that a company is planning to hold. CRM software can automatically remind those who have signed up for the webinar, delete those who might cancel before it is held, and follow up on those who took part to determine their feedback. Should a client cancel an account, CRM software will automatically try to assess the reason for the cancellation and gather feedback that the disillusioned customer might have. Customer experience can be tracked via CRM. Such applications could also try to persuade customers to return should the problem they faced be resolved. In all cases, speed is of the essence. Here, the fast reaction time provided by CRM software can play a significant role.

CRM Integrations

These tasks can be undertaken by some CRM software using advanced methods of artificial intelligence, saving time and boosting productivity. A number of CRM applications include the ability to synchronize various email accounts into a central portal. They also can initiate email marketing campaigns and can include the ability to conduct chat sessions.

Third-party Integrations

An essential element in selecting CRM software is to separate the features that will be provided by the software itself and those that will be delivered through a third-party provider. In doing so, you will need to determine the degree to which these add-ons will operate within the parameters of the system you already are using.

You almost certainly will want to connect email services provided by the application itself or add ons with the existing email apps you are using. If they will not do so, are you ready to switch to an app they will support? The same is true of a calendar or possibly newsletter management software. In some cases the application might indicate that it is compatible with apps you already use. They might describe this as “native integration,” meaning that the company has an application that you can select, download and use. Problem solved. But if the company does not provide such integration, you will have to do some detective work yourself.

A possibility is to have your IT staff (if you have such) investigate and see whether they can build integration with the software for you. You might decide that the software itself will be compatible with what you have, but you need to follow this up with assessing each of the third-party providers — if such exist — individually.

CRM Reporting and Analytics

A critical aspect of CRM software is its ability to provide you with reports and analyses. They will help you not only to determine the results of what you have been able to achieve using the software, but will enable you better to determine how you should proceed in the future. To assess an application’s reporting ability, check on features that can be customized according to your business. In this way you can assess how your workers have been performing and how customers have been responding. You should be able to produce reports on net sales, demographics on your customers, and track profits in real time.

Ideally, these reports should be exportable. You should be able to save them and print them out if necessary. In addition, using any tool you prefer, you should be able to convert the data into graphic displays of various sorts, such as charts and dashboards. You can then present them to shareholders, partners or others interested in some way in the running of your company. The data will come alive and be more meaningful. An additional benefit will be to combine statistics so that the ratio of, say, email messages to actual sales can be determined.

Security Considerations

In today’s world of hackers and loopholes in systems, security has become a paramount concern to most consumers. Failure adequately to protect customers information can be damaging to your reputation. It becomes essential, therefore, to asses a CRM software on its security. A relatively new aspect of security is the storing of data on the cloud. At one level, such storage is considerably more secure than anything saved on your hard drives, where it is vulnerable to theft, fire and other damage. But you need to feel satisfied with the security being provided by the program you are using, particularly where almost all the data is being stored in that way. After all, you are recording information on customers, some of which might be sensitive.

You can test the level of security provided by a CRM software provider in several ways.

One is to research the company providing the software. Check whether it has fallen foul to security failures and how they responded to them, if there were any. Another is to find out where your data will reside, who is ultimately responsible for its security, and what will happen if there is a problem. Among other ways to test the security is to check whether your CRM software fails to adequately record when users change their passwords. Another is to find out whether you can specify each user’s access controls. You can also check on how well the CRM software relates to your existing IT security software.

Trends Related to CRM Software

  1. Automation of key processes: Automation of customer outreach, marketing campaigns, lead capture, customer segmentation, and customer journey mapping are becoming increasingly popular.
  2. AI-powered analytics: AI-powered analytics are being used to help detect customer trends, identify opportunities, and make customer-facing decisions.
  3. Cloud-based deployment: Cloud-based deployment is becoming increasingly popular due to its cost-effectiveness and scalability.
  4. Integration with other systems: CRM software tools are increasingly being integrated with other systems such as e-commerce platforms, customer service tools, and accounting software.
  5. Mobile-friendly interfaces: Mobile-friendly interfaces are becoming increasingly popular as businesses seek to provide a better user experience on mobile devices.
  6. Social media integration: Social media integration is also becoming increasingly popular as businesses seek to engage customers on social media platforms.

How Much Does CRM Software Cost?

The cost of CRM software varies depending on the type of software and the features included. Generally, basic CRM software packages start at around $20 per user per month, while more complex CRM software packages can cost up to $150 per user per month.

What's the Best CRM Software?

Check on how others have evaluated and tested CRM software. Some will rate the best applications available, whereas others will evaluate them based on the features that they provide and yet others will examine them on cost. Go through the assessments carefully, checking those that crop up regularly on top-10 lists.

For example, some will provide a list of free CRM software, such as Hubspot CRM, Insightly, Zoho and Freshsales. Others will rate online CRM apps, such as OnePage, Airtable, SugarCRM, and Act! CRM. Yet others will provide a list of CRM software for small businesses, such as Pipeline, Keap, Salesforce, and AgileCRM.

Then there are categories of CRM software for real estate agents, for corporations, for sales people, for insurance agents…. you name it.

It is important to remember, however, that, even in select categories, each CRM has its own strengths and its own weaknesses. Some might specialize in outstanding email services, but if your business uses little email, the CRM might not be for you. Others are great for sales people, but if you have only a limited number of clients, you might need a different kind of CRM application.

Some might be free up to a certain level. If your business expands, you might need to start paying for the software and it’s best to check out what that might be.

Use the criteria outlined above to find the CRM software that will work best for you. Having looked into the pros and cons, try one out if possible before committing to it.

Once you have selected a CRM application and it works for you, chances are you will be opened to a whole new world of managing customer relationships. You will be left wondering why you had not jumped on board much earlier. But then, of course, a lot of this technology is new and was not available until a few years ago.

If commercial CRM software isn't what you're looking for, be sure to check out the free open source CRM software section.