How many of you agree that customer relationships are the key to success for all businesses? No matter how big or small your enterprise is, building a robust customer-business relationship and enhancing customer experiences help businesses acquire greater heights. Hence, the introduction of customer relationship management (CRM) software to a business process.

Table of contents

• What is CRM software?
• What are the benefits of CRM?
• Types of CRM software
• How to choose the best CRM software?
• Top 7 affordable CRM software you can opt for your small business

As per a recent survey by Statista, the global customer relationship management software market is about to reach 49.6 billion USD by 2025 with a CAGR of 1.7%.https://iframely.net/czmbDVw

This shows the increasing demand for CRM software in business. But the question is – what makes CRM software effective for business growth? Keep reading to unfold the benefits and find the best CRM software for your startup at an affordable price.

What is CRM software? 

CRM software is a system that enables businesses to collect, organize, and manage customer-related information. It acts as a centralized platform for a sales team to manage customer interactions and simultaneously smoothen customer journeys for peerless customer experiences. No matter what industry your business belongs to, in order to deal with your customers in a better way integrating CRM software is always the best approach.

What are the benefits of CRM?

A few compelling benefits of using CRM software include –

1) Improved customer service:

CRM software is primarily used to improve business-customer relationships. This happens as a CRM can manage contacts, collect all customer-related information like – purchase history, demographics, etc, and make them accessible to all the team members. This helps employees serve all customers without any hassle, thereby delivering a top-notch customer experience. Enhanced customer experience exceeds customer satisfaction, which in turn leads to high customer retention rates.

2) Aligned sales and marketing teams:

A CRM software creates an alignment between sales and marketing teams by offering multiple features like sales management, email marketing, campaign management, etc. All such tools and integrations help the internal team to streamline every juncture of a buyer’s journey. Undoubtedly, it offers an end-to-end customer experience.

3) Sync and share data:

CRMs ease out many routines and time-consuming jobs with data syncing and data sharing features. Instead of manually updating contact records, you can use the software to sync the contact information automatically. This will give you access to accurate records instead of creating any manual errors.

4) Automated operations:

CRMs are well-known for automating tasks. Thanks to the introduction of artificial intelligence and automation technology for speeding up all time-consuming and complex procedures. CRM automation is not just confined to contact record updates. Rather it also includes – chatbot conversations, follow-up communication, email sequences, sales workflows, lead nurturing campaigns, etc.

5) Seamless customer interactions:

CRM allows users to capture leads and engage existing customers via several communication channels. For example, live chat, email, video call, social media, etc. In many software, you can access several features like call tracking, video integrations, social media management tools, chatbots, etc. to deliver seamless customer interactions. The better you know your customers, the better you can interact. And most of the credit goes to CRM which helps facilitate the process.

Want to build custom CRM Software for your business?

Types of CRM software:

CRM software can be customized as per your business requirements. You can certainly reach us to get a custom CRM software development based on your business niche. But before that, you must understand its versatile categories.

• Operational CRM system:

This particular CRM software is used to offer enhanced business operations by managing customer data and streamlining communications.

• Analytical CRM system:

This CRM system is used to get better insights into customer data, their interactions with business representatives, and the possibilities.

• Collaborative CRM system:

This is a centralized CRM easily accessible by the sales team, marketing team, customer support team, and others to ensure seamless interactions.

How to choose the best CRM software?

Since you are well aware of the best CRM systems, it’s time to make the right choice. Now, choosing a CRM system is not like shopping from a convenience store. It seriously requires basic knowledge about its features and characteristics to get the best solution for your business.

Need the best CRM software for small businesses? Note down the tips mentioned below.

1. Know your business requirements
2. Make a list of features you want
3. Consider the cost
4. Examine system integrations
5. Check for customization
6. Take the CRM software for a test drive

Top 7 affordable CRM software you can opt for your small business:

CRM systems are incredibly powerful. Let’s check out the 7 best CRM systems that you can easily opt for without breaking the bank.

1) Pipedrive:

Modern businesses always look for modern software applications. Isn’t that what you are looking for? In that case, Pipedrive will be the best option. Unlike traditional CRM, Pipedrive allows businesses to monitor the customer journey and manage the prospects at every stage. Such a characteristic attracts businesses that do not have any intelligent database management system and need to rely on CMS completely.

Some incredible features of Pipedrive include –

• Funnel management
• Lead and deal management
• Feedback management
• Campaign management
• Appointment scheduling and management
• Real-time notifications and reminders
• Custom fields
• Email integration
• Sales automation
• Android & iOS compatibility
• Visual dashboards
• Two-factor authentication
• Data import/export
• Security dashboard
• Contact and calendar sync with Google and Microsoft

Besides its exclusive business pipeline management, Pipedrive is well known for its cheapest plan. However, you can certainly upgrade to the premium plans to avail of some additional features. LeadBooster and Web Visitors are the two optional add-ons that you can use to access advanced features.

• G2 Rating: 4.2/5
• Price:
  • 14days free trial
  • Starts from $11.90/per month

2) Salesforce:

Salesforce has a separate corner in the CRM software market. A wide portion of the market is dominated by this particular software, all because of its capability in offering solutions to both small businesses and large enterprises. 

Being a cloud-based CRM software, Salesforce can be leveraged in various sectors. These include – automotive, non-profit groups, media, retail, communications, higher education, healthcare, life sciences, and financial services. This shows that Salesforce CRM has stepped into almost every industry.   

Now the question is – what makes Salesforce so attractive? Probably, the two critical features are – multi-factor authentication and data-at-rest encryption.

Besides, there are many other features to explore as well. These include –

• Workflow organization
• Account and contact management
• Quote management
• Lead management
• Opportunity management
• Pipeline management
• Custom reports and dynamic dashboards
• Forecasting
• Sales collaboration
• Process automation
• Activity management
• Territory management
• Mobile device compatibility
• Files sync and share
• Email integration

• G2 Rating: 4.2/5
• Price:
  • 14days free trial
  • Starts from $25/per month

3) Hubspot

HubSpot is considered a one-stop solution for enterprises and startups. It started its journey being a marketing automation platform and later on has turned into an enterprise solution. The best thing about this CRM platform is it offers a free solution for unlimited contacts along with several tools that can drive success for a business. Though being a free CRM software, you can certainly avail of its paid software plans to upgrade your CRM features as per the requirement.

Some key features of Hubspot CRM are –

• Unlimited contacts management
• Website activity – page views, form submissions, sales activity, etc.
• Email marketing
• Meeting scheduler
• Live chat
• Customizable deals dashboard
• Prospect tracking
• Ad management
• Gmail and Outlook integration
• Automated logging and updating of customer deals and sales activities
• Storage up to 1 million contacts and company records
• Record customer-agent interactions, send emails, & schedule tasks

• G2 Rating: 4.4/5
• Price:
  • Free
  • Starts from $45/per month

4) Zoho:

Zoho is another CRM platform that seeks attention when you are looking for a budget-friendly option. Like Hubspot, Zoho also allows free CRM but it is limited to up to three users. This implies that only three of your users can generate, organize, and manage leads online, automate business workflow, create real-time reports, and streamline marketing. In this free plan, you can use 1GB of cloud space to store data. 

One major drawback of this CRM platform is that it is best suited for small-scale businesses only. This implies that your free plan doesn’t work for large enterprises and you need to choose paid plans to fix the issue. Well, that, of course, is not a problem for a startup or small business.

Some popular features of Zoho include – 

• Multipurpose contact book
• Email marketing
• Lead generation and management
• Contact management
• Process management
• Real-time reporting and dashboard creation
• Workflow automation
• Deal management
• Omnichannel communication
• Team collaboration
• Forecasting and performance management
• Territory management
• Lead and deal prediction
• Google Ads integration
• Event management
• Team collaborations

• G2 Rating: 4.0/5
• Price:
  • 15 days free trial
  • Start with $20/per month

Getting confused about which one to choose? Keep reading to know how to find the best CRM software.

5) Salesmate:

Another most affordable and best CRM software for small businesses is Salesmate. Unlike Hubspot and Zoho, Salesmate doesn’t offer any free plan. But it does offer an affordable package with a pack of powerful features that can encourage your business growth.

Salesmate brings email marketing, workflow automation, and sales tools under one roof. It makes a significant difference both in terms of its compelling features and software design.

Some of its key features that make Salesmate an ideal choice are – 

• Contact management
• Store and manage unlimited records
• Sales and marketing automation
• Multiple pipeline management
• Email tracking and marketing
• Reports and dashboard
• Automated smart queue
• Email sequences and activity reminders
• Chrome extension
• Customizations – custom views, custom activity types, custom fields
• Native iOS and Android compatibility
• Integrations – Google calendar, Gmail/Outlook, QuickBooks Online, PieSync, etc.
• Call recording, power dialer, conversation history, text messaging
• Sales activity reports
• Custom web forms
• Messenger
• Meeting scheduler

• G2 Rating: 4.6/5
• Price:
  • Free
  • Start with $15/per month

6) Insightly:

Insightly is not just a CRM software. It is also considered a project management software that helps small-scale businesses manage their projects and customers simultaneously. If you are looking forward to aligning your teams and elevating the customer experience, Insightly is always the right choice.

Unlike other CRM software applications, Insightly’s job doesn’t end with closing a deal with a customer. Instead, it gives a new start to a healthy relationship. With this software, you can convert closed opportunities to successful projects and set milestones for businesses. From clarifying order details to checking inventories and assigning tasks, the delivery team can easily access all data whenever required.

Some amazing features of CRM combined project management software are –

• Sales force automation
• Marketing automation
• Customer support portal
• Reporting and dashboards
• Forecasting
• File sharing
• Chrome extension
• Mass email contacts with MailChimp integration
• Custom fields and filters
• 128-bit SSL security
• Opportunity reports
• Pipeline activity sets
• Insightly notes, Evernote, and comments
• Flexible calendaring and events
• Microsoft and Google calendar integration
• Automatic address book
• Project management
• Native android and iOS device compatibility

• G2 Rating: 4.2/5
• Price: 
  • Free for 2 users,
  • paid plans start at $29/per month

7) Nutshell:

Nutshell is considered the simplest CRM platform that allows B2B startups to close more deals. As the name suggests, it offers seamless contact management, pipeline management, sales automation, email follow-ups, real-time reporting and analytics, email marketing, and much more in one single platform. The user-friendly CRM software is again an affordable CRM software that you can opt for to enhance your business process.

Some common yet effective features of Nutshell are – 

• Contact management
• Automated sales process and deal management
• Add-on automation
• Batch processing
• Customizable reports
• Calendar/Reminder system
• Real-time data and analytics
• Search filter
• Tagging
• Template Management
• Email marketing
• Lead collection
• Spam blocker
• Referral tracking
• Projections
• Opportunity management
• Drip campaigns
• Team collaboration
• Create custom audiences
• Case management
• Activity management

• G2 Rating:  4.2/5
• Price:
  • 14 days free trial
  • Start with $16/per month

Read More:

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Final Thoughts:

Every business looks for a best-in-class CRM system to upgrade its business operations and strengthen its customer relationships. Isn’t that what you need? Undoubtedly, any of these CRM software options mentioned above have the potential to scale up your business, especially if it’s a new startup. 

If you agree to this, you can feel free to get in touch with our CRM software development experts and share your requirements and priorities. We promise to deliver the best custom CRM solution at a fair price.