CRM enables business owners and salespersons by helping them streamline their sales process by improving inter-departmental collaboration, and maintaining business relationships with customers.

Customer Relationship Management (or CRM) is often referred to as a system, or software/technology that enables organizations to manage relationships with their customers, vendors, and/or suppliers.

And to be frank, every CRM provider has its own USP and thus they differ in a way or two. But on an whole they all serve the same wholistic service combining each and every angle of “Client – Business relationship”.

It enables both the customer as well as the service/product provider to understand each other’s needs well resulting into better deal.

There are several types of CRMs available in the market, out of which we have to compare them with our business needs first.

Broadly, CRMs are of two types:

1. On Site / On Premise
2. Cloud based

As the name suggests, “On-site CRMs” are installed, managed and handled on site and under the same premises.

On the other hand, Cloud based CRMs are installed, run and hosted on Cloud and are mostly handled by the CRM providers.

5 Best CRM for Small Businesses :

1. Zoho CRM
2. Salesforce
3. Hubspot
4. Bitrix24
5. Pipedrive

ZOHO CRM –

Zoho CRM is one of the most widely used CRM by SMBs and also by some big businesses.

Benefits:

• Zoho CRM caters to SMBs as well as big corporations with its easy to use interface, customizable modules, social media features and automation.
• This CRM platform lets you define workflows and rationalize your everyday tasks, manage leads, and automate processes.
• It can also be integrated with Twitter and Facebook and allows you to reach out and engage with leads quick and easy, at just the right time.
• If you’re looking for a free CRM, it’s available for up to 3 users, although it is also limited feature-wise.
• Customization is limited, but users can send 50 individuals mails per day and have access to 10 email templates.
• The paid Standard edition of Zoho upgrades the usability factor with robust sales forecasting and KPI tracking.
• The Enterprise edition adds even more sophisticated tools, such as stage-by-stage sales funnel tracking and customizable data comparisons across teams, users, regions, and more.
• Zoho’s advanced features can be accessed with the Ultimate edition, which comes with an exclusive 30-day free trial.

Drawbacks:

Zoho is popular among small businesses. They have been able to achieve this by staying boot-strapped and free of exit-oriented investors. Zoho CRM is a value-centric offering for businesses of all sizes and types.

They are good for small businesses, in terms of value for money.

Pricing:

A free version is available for up to 3 users. 15-day free trial for paid versions.
Standard edition is $14 per user/month, billed annually.
Professional edition is $23 per user/month, billed annually.
Enterprise edition is $40 per user/month, billed annually.
Ultimate edition is $52 per user/month, billed annually. Exclusive 30-day free trial.

Salesforce –

Benefits:

• Salesforce offers a customizable CRM app with deep, well-developed tools for sales processes and team collaboration and many integrations.
• This is a robust system, allowing Sales managers and sales teams to build up very complex task management systems. Salesforce automates many tedious tasks and decision-making processes out of the workday.

Drawbacks:

• No offline functionality.
• Salesforce is an absolute behemoth of a company, and their scale appears to have had some negative repercussions on support, ie. the CRM’s help desk is not always super responsive.
• Support staff turnover makes it hard to build long-term, working relationships with specific support team members who know your company.

Pricing:

• Essentials plan for all-in-one sales and support is $25 per user/per month, billed annually.
• Professional plan offering complete CRM for any size team is $75 per user/per month, billed annually.
• Enteprise plan offering deeply customizable sales CRM for your business is $150 per user/per month, billed annually.
• Unlimited plan for “unlimited CRM power and support” is $300 per user/per month, billed annually.
• A 14-day free trial is available for all plans.

Hubspot –

Benefits:

• HubSpot is a big name in the CRM market and offers basic features for free. It handles the basics of the sales process, with lead management and cross-channel tracking of customer interactions.
• Zapier integration allows you to share information across apps like Slack and Google Sheets.
• The paid version has Sales Hub add-on, with AI assistance, deeper prospect insights, and high-end automation.

Drawbacks:

HubSpot CRM’s customization options are limited, which are not going to be good if your organization have specific requirements.

Pricing:

• HubSpot CRM is free, and the number of users is unlimited.
• Marketing Hub, Sales Hub, and Service Hub add-on packages are $50 each per user/per month, billed monthly.
• HubSpot CMS starts at $300 per month, billed monthly.
• All-inclusive Starter Growth Suite starts at $113 per user/per month, billed monthly.

Bitrix24 –

Bitrix24 is a local-hosted or cloud-based social intranet and project management platform from the the company of the same name that also contains core HR (HRMS) and CRM features as well.

It features live activity streaming, a layout similar to a social networking site’s, “Like!”-ing, document storing and sharing, chat and video conferencing, time tracking and a calendar, a Gantt chart, and a messaging system.

It possesses CRM features (CRM database with invoices, sales reports, and customer outreach) focused on client interaction, and an HRMS with an employee directory, a company structure, and a self-service portal.

Pricing varies:

The self or local hosted version can be obtained for about $3300 or $9900 with a one-time license purchase, depending on needs (the higher priced tier is very similar but contains multiple intranets for various departments).

A free cloud based version 12 users; no external users are allowed however, with overall 5GB space allotted.

The Standard cloud pack can be obtained for $99 per month and supports unlimited employees and external users, with 100GB of space.

The Professional package comes for $199 and supports unlimited usage and storage, along with all of that in lower plan plus workflow / approval processes, expense management, work reports, and a company’s own domain name.

Pipedrive –

Benefits:

A visual, easy-to-use tool focused on the sales process and tracking contacts. Lets you build multiple sales pipelines and customize stages for niche product and service contexts. Syncs cross-channel information and eliminates repetitive admin tasks.

Users of Pipedrive’s Essential plan can use Smart Email BCC to sync emails to Pipedrive. Users of the Advanced, Professional, and Enterprise plans will gain access to an in-app inbox, and more sophisticated, automatic email sync compatible with everything from Gmail to QQ Mail.

A Chrome extension allows you to use it as a full-fledged Gmail CRM. With its customer, resource and timeline filters and overview capabilities, it can also be used as a project management tool.

Drawbacks:

The Zapier integration is a bit complicated to get up and running.

Pricing:

Pipedrive is available at four feature levels.

The Essential plan is $14.90 per user/per month billed annually, and $15 billed monthly.
The Advanced plan is $24.90 per user/per month billed annually, and $29 billed monthly.
The Professional plan is $49.90 per user/per month billed annually, and $59 billed monthly.
The Enterprise plan is $99 per user/per month, billed annually.
A 14-day free trial is available for the Essential, Advanced, and Professional plans.

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