Customer relationship management (CRM) is a process in which a business or other organization administers its interactions with customers, typically using data analysis to study large amounts of information.
CRM systems compile data from a range of different communication channels, including a company's website, telephone (many CRM platforms come with a softphone), email, live chat, marketing materials and more recently, social media. They allow businesses to learn more about their target audiences and how to best cater to their needs, thus retaining customers and driving sales growth. CRM may be used with past, present, or potential customers. The concepts, procedures, and rules that a corporation follows when communicating with its consumers are referred to as CRM. This complete connection covers direct contact with customers, such as sales and service-related operations, forecasting, and the analysis of consumer patterns and behaviors, from the perspective of the company.
Choosing a CRM platform requires balancing business needs with the feature sets’ associated costs. In preparing this report, we’ve identified three CRM platforms well-suited to a small business engaged in any kind of sales. They have been selected because they provide a comprehensive set of features at a competitive price point. Specifically, all of the platforms described below cost 45% to 60% the monthly price of Saleforce’s “Sales Cloud” platform.
We used the following feature set to determine platform suitability:
- Lead Management Capabilities
- Project Management Capabilities
- Team Collaboration
- Calendaring/Scheduling/Task Management
- Integration with Quickbooks
- Integration with Google Workspace
- Extensibility (Zapier integration)
- Analytics
- Mobile Apps
To this end, we’ve identified the following three platforms (in order of suggestion): Capsule, Nutshell, and Method. More information on each can be found below.
Our primary recommendation is Capsule. In addition to being the least expensive of the three platforms selected, it’s also the only one with built-in project management capabilities. Its integration with your existing accounting and productivity suites makes it a good fit and its built-in analytics can help you keep up to date on your sales metrics. Zapier extensibility may prove useful in extending the platform by adding additional integrations as needed. Some of these Zapier plugins are free, but others may have additional one-time or recurring costs. Mobile apps make it easy for your team to stay connected no matter where they are.
| Feature | Present? |
|---|---|
| Lead Management | Built-in |
| Project Management | Built-in |
| Calendaring/Scheduling/Task Management | Yes |
| Integrates with Quickbooks | Yes |
| Integrates with Google Workspace | Yes |
| Extensibility (Zapier integration) | Yes |
| Analytics | Built-in |
| Mobile Apps | Yes |
| Price/User/Month | $36 |
| Monthly fee for 6 users | $216 |
| Annual fee for 6 users | $2,592 |
Our second recommendation is Nutshell. We believe its price point is competitive and its feature set is, in some ways, fuller than Capsule’s. If it had built-in project management, we would have selected Nutshell for our primary recommendation. It can integrate with a third-party project management system (Asana) via Zapier . Its integration with your existing accounting and productivity suites makes it a good fit and its built-in analytics can help you keep up to date on your sales metrics. Zapier extensibility may prove useful in extending the platform by adding additional integrations as needed. Some of these Zapier plugins are free, but others may have additional one-time or recurring costs. Mobile apps make it easy for your team to stay connected no matter where they are.
| Feature | Present? |
|---|---|
| Lead Management | Built-in |
| Project Management | Plug-in (Zapier app) |
| Calendaring/Scheduling/Task Management | Yes |
| Integrate with Quickbooks | Yes |
| Integrate with Google Workspace | Yes |
| Extensibility (Zapier integration) | Yes |
| Analytics | Built-in |
| Mobile Apps | Yes |
| Price/User/Month | $42 |
| Monthly fee for 6 users | $252 |
| Annual fee for 6 users | $3,024 |
Method CRM is our final recommendation. While its price point is still competitive (compared to Salesforce), it is the most expensive CRM platform of the three we identified as being a good fit for your company. It has partial project management capabilities built-in (work orders, job scheduling, and routing), but any fuller project management will require the use of a Zapier integration (may incur additional fees). Its integration with your existing accounting and productivity suites makes it a good fit and its built-in analytics can help you keep up to date on your sales metrics. Zapier extensibility may prove useful in extending the platform by adding additional integrations as needed. Mobile apps make it easy for your team to stay connected no matter where they are.
| Feature | Present? |
|---|---|
| Lead Management | Built-in |
| Project Management | Partial. Also, third-party service (via Zapier) |
| Calendaring/Scheduling/Task Management | Yes |
| Integrate with Quickbooks | Yes |
| Integrate with Google Workspace | Yes |
| Extensibility (Zapier integration) | Yes |
| Analytics | Plugins (Zapier) |
| Mobile Apps | Yes |
| Price/User/Month | $44 |
| Monthly fee for 6 users | $264 |
| Annual fee for 6 users | $3,168 |
