Best 7 CRMs for a small business
As you probably know, CRM Systems can additionally assist you in your sales efforts - organize contacts, automate and handle tasks, supervise social media, and also aid in controlling costs.
With so many different CRM softwares to choose from, finding the right solution for your company can be tricky. To help you find the ideal system for your company, we have evaluated numerous CRMs and shortlisted seven solutions that are suitable for small businesses.
What is a CRM System?
CRM is short for Customer Relationship Management. Essentially they are designed to help you with sales, marketing, and customer service. The system automatically gathers customer interactions over all channels in one place.
How you can benefit from using a CRM System
CRM Systems are not just for huge companies with large databases of customers. Smaller businesses can benefit from using CRM as well.
Here are a few reasons why it is a good idea to use a CRM.
- Centralized database for all of your leads, prospects, and customers
CRM Systems enable your whole sales organization to maintain all pieces of information in one place.
- Communicate with customers
All interaction, both internal (sales rep to sales rep) as well as external (talking to your potential customer), can be done inside a CRM System. This enables your sales team to keep track of all elements of the customer's experience, consisting of every communication, email, telephone call, and much more.
- Automate administrative tasks
CRM Systems automates a lot of administrative tasks such as data entry, documenting conversations, and saving contact info. - Follow up reminders to stay in the loop with potential customers
Help you to recognize when you should follow up with certain prospects. These reminders give you a better chance of converting more prospects into customers. - Segment customers with ease
CRM Systems enable you to filter leads by the information that you have accumulated about them over time. For instance, you can filter your potential customers by place, overall business size, offer phase, and much more. - Craft sales reports
CRM System will allow you to accumulate and organize information concerning contacts using built-in reporting features. These sales reports provide valuable insights about the performance of your sales efforts. According to HubSpot, you can get a 30% increase in sales by using CRM.
Best CRMs for you to consider
In quest of finding the best CRMs, we turned to major review and comparison websites such as Product Hunt and G2 Crowd. After some time of browsing through different options, we shortlisted seven popular and promising solutions.
Below we listed CRMs that are suitable for startups as well as small companies.
HubSpot
HubSpot CRM can be a perfect choice for small to midsize businesses because it is one of the few CRMs that offer a full free plan with unlimited users. HubSpot streamlines your contact lists, automatically logs interactions, and gathers information from the world wide web to populate info concerning your potential customers. In terms of improving and speeding up your sales process, this can be very helpful.
HubSpot CRM can cover your requirements for marketing, sales, or customer service processes. You can read more about the HubSpot service hub and live chat feature in our previous blog post.
They offer a basic CRM free of charge. In case you wish to, at some point, upgrade and open extra capabilities (be mindful, it can rapidly get pricey), they have it segmented into marketing, sales, and service hub. However, they charge a flat monthly fee, not dependent on the number of users, so the price does not accumulate as rapidly as with some of the other solutions.
Enlyft reports that HubSpot CRM is used by over 900 businesses mostly involved in computer software, marketing & advertising, and IT & services. HubSpot is used by brands like Atlassian, DoorDash, InVision, Wistia, and Vmware.
Free plan: Simply sign up free of charge and test it by yourself
Premium plans: Differs based upon which added attributes you wish to utilize. Starts from $50 to $800+ monthly.
Salesforce
Salesforce is one of the most popular CRM platforms. According to Enlyft, Salesforce is the most used CRM with a market share of 41%. This makes Salesforce a candidate for the best CRM. It is recommended for large and growing companies that require several advanced features. It is used by over 95,000 businesses, which mostly involve computer software, IT & services, and financial services.
Salesforce has an affordable starting fee. Their essential plan costs $25 per month for 10 users. However, your expenses will add up quickly if you wish to upgrade and enjoy the perks of the better plan. The CRM allows you to import data seamlessly from spreadsheets, Gmail, and so on.
Salesforce is used by famous brands like Unilever, Tmobile, Humu, Asana, and Philips.
Although it's certainly worth putting their solution to your wishlist, there is a huge chance that their fees do not fit your budget.
Free trial: thirty days
Pricing plans:
Essential - up to 10 users at $25/user/month,
Professional – unlimited users at $75/user/month,
Enterprise – unlimited users at $150/user/month,
Unlimited – unlimited users at $300/user/month
Active Campaign
ActiveCampaign makes our selection of the most effective CRM systems since its emphasis lies in both marketing and sales. To be more specific, it helps you utilize automation to simplify interactions with your prospects and customers. It is recommended for small businesses and B2I (Business to Individual) brands.
With Active Campaign, you can segment your prospects and customers based on their behavior data. It helps you simplify the process of sending the right emails to the right people. ActiveCampaign has over 280 available integrations and is used by over 9,000 businesses and most of which are involved in computer software, IT & services, and hospital & healthcare.
ActiveCampaign is used by brands like Thrive Themes, Chicago Food Planet, Hipcooks, and Platinum Skin Care.
Free Trial: two weeks
Pricing Plans: The number of your contacts determines the price.
Up to 500 contacts:
Lite Plan - $9/user/month
Plus Plan - $49/user/month
Pro Plan - $129/user/month
Enterprise Plan - $229/user/month
Zoho
Zoho provides the right mix of features and competitive prices. It is another CRM software that offers a free plan, although limited for up to three users. Hence, if you are just starting and you are not ready to make a financial investment, Zoho is a great choice.
Zoho has an exciting feature called Zia AI. Zia utilizes Artificial Intelligence to answer almost any question your sales team throws at it. The feature only comes with Zoho's Enterprise plan, which costs $35 a month per user. It gives Zoho an edge over some other CRMs. However, this feature still needs some improvements.
Zoho is used by popular brands like Netflix, Ducati, Suzuki, Amazon.in, and Bose.
Free plan: For up to three users
Premium Plans:
Standard Plan - $12/user/month
Professional Plan - $20/user/month
Enterprise Plan - $35/user/month
Ultimate Plan - $100/user/month
Pipedrive
One of the most significant advantages of Pipedrive is the ease of use. Their user interface is very intuitive, and you'll be able to set it up in no time. This solution can be especially interesting for people who are encountering the world of CRMs for the very first time.
Without a doubt, Pipedrive can improve your customer relationship management. Yet, it's worth a mention that some other platforms on this list offer similar features at a lower price. Pipedrive is used by more than 2,000 businesses, mostly involved in computer software, IT & services, and marketing & advertising.
Pipedrive is used by brands like Vimeo, TNW, Amazon.com, and Skyscanner.
Free Trial: Two weeks
Pricing Plans:
Essential Plan - $12.50/user/month
Advanced Plan - $24.90/user/month
Professional Plan - $49.90/user/month
Enterprise Plan - $99/user/month
Salesflare
Salesflare is designed to simplify and streamline the salespeople's work, so they just know what to do and when to do it.
This platform makes it possible to put all the repetitive tasks on auto-pilot. Just by synchronizing Salesflare with your email, calendar, phone, and social media, it will automatically pull the information and organize this data by itself into your contact database. Their mobile app is made pretty smart, enabling you to work from anywhere and anytime.
Packed with all the necessary functionalities, it is an excellent tool for managing customer relationships. The only downside is that it has just one pricing plan, offering a narrow range of options. According to Enlyft, It is used by over 150 companies, and most of them are involved in marketing & advertising, IT, and computer services.
Free trial: Two weeks
Pricing plan: $30/user/month (annually)
Close.io
Close aims to decrease all the tedious tasks like data entry and updating contact fields. It enables your team to focus their time on closing more deals. What takes eight mouse clicks to perform in a bulkier CRM System like Salesforce, requires merely two with Close.
Whenever you have to keep your leads on track, while also taking time to handle at least a few of the deals on your own, Close is a great choice. It has inbuilt calling, SMS, and email to help your team communicate well with prospects and customers. Close is used by over 60 companies, mostly comprising computer software companies.
Close CRM is trusted by brands like Zapier, 500 Startups, Domo, and NatureBox.
Free Trial: Two weeks
Pricing Plans:
Starter Plan - $21.5/user/month
Professional Plan - $55.25/user/month
Basic Plan - $80.75/user/month
Conclusion
We know there are many options to choose from, but let's see if we can narrow it down to a quick decision for you.
Salesflare is great if you want to get started quickly with everything automated, from conversations to filling out account fields.
If you want a solution that works great across marketing, support, and sales, and allows for an affordable start, go for HubSpot.
Salesforce is a great pick if you are very ambitious about your setup and want a pro solution that scales to a large corporation. But be ready to pay a premium for it!
We hope this article will help you decide on what CRM software you can employ to perform your tasks. If you need any help with setting up your CRM for your business or you're looking for a way to integrate it with your favorite apps, feel free to reach out to us. We would be happy to help so you and your team can get the most out of it.
