For your business to function efficiently, using a customer relationship management (CRM) system is essential. A CRM helps you to manage your business, ensuring that no lead falls through the cracks. It automates and streamlines processes, allowing your team to focus on what they do best — close deals. But it can be challenging to know which CRM to choose. There are over a hundred on the market, ranging from simple software programs to customizable systems that can manage your entire business, from sales to delivery to customer service.
Salesforce is one of the best-known solutions in the CRM space and is the leader, with 16% of the market share in early 2019. However, if your business has specific needs, the out-of-the-box version probably won’t suffice. Customization is time-consuming and complex, requiring a developer with Salesforce-specific knowledge. And the resulting software is often difficult to use, meaning extra training for employees.
Find a CRM to Match Your Company’s Needs
But there are solid, affordable solutions to Salesforce. In this post, we’ll examine five alternative CRMs that are ideal for many small businesses, and we’ll share the pros and cons of each.
Before we dive in, consider the needs of your business in detail. Create a comprehensive list of needs and wants. What processes do you want the CRM to help you manage? How much automation do you want? Who will be using the CRM? Where will they be using it?
Be sure to evaluate the needs of the business itself and the needs of the users, since low user adoption will compromise success. Once you’ve determined your needs and wants, it’s time to prioritize them. Making these decisions in advance will help you to evaluate your CRM options more effectively.
Alternate Affordable CRMs for Small Businesses
Microsoft Dynamics
Based on market share, Microsoft Dynamics is the second-place CRM, with over 4 million users. For those using other Microsoft products, Dynamics is attractive. It can be complex to use, however, and may be best for midsize and larger companies that have in-house support.
- Usability: Complex to use, lacking an intuitive design and structure.
- Price: Plans range from $115 – $210/user/month.
- Integrations: Available for many applications, including email, social apps, and other Microsoft products.
- Mobility: Compatible with Android, Apple iOS, and Windows devices.
- Customizations: Offers customization capability — however complex to implement, often requiring Microsoft support or in-house expertise.
HubSpot
HubSpot offers a “freemium” CRM with basic functionality and charges for additional integrations and services. With this model, Hubspot is a very affordable CRM for small businesses. While the free version is competitive among other free CRM offerings, most businesses will want additional features, which require a monthly subscription. The biggest downside to HubSpot is that it can’t be customized beyond fields and reporting.
- Usability: The product is intuitive and easy-to-use, and the free version includes essential features.
- Price: Plans range from free to $1,200/user/month.
- Integrations: Available for many applications, including email, social apps, and others.
- Mobility: Compatible with Android and Apple iOS.
- Customizations: Available for fields and reporting only — no functionality customization is possible.
Insightly
Insightly may be a good option for small to midsize companies that offer simple, project-based services, due to the project management functionality included in the product. However, like HubSpot, Insightly is extremely limited when it comes to customization.
- Usability: The offering is intuitive and easy-to-use.
- Price: Plans range from $29 to $99/user/month.
- Integrations: Outlook and Microsoft Office, MailChimp, Google Apps, with project management functionality.
- Mobility: Compatible with Android and Apple iOS .
- Customizations: Available for fields and reporting only — no functionality customization is possible.
Zoho
Zoho is another good option for companies that don’t need customization. Zoho’s unique strength is that it integrates so easily with social media lead generation. If your company operates in multiple countries, an added feature offering is support for 20 languages.
- Usability: Easy-to-use features with intuitive design.
- Price: Plans range from $22 to $445/user/month. A very limited free option is also available.
- Integrations: Options are available for integration with Google G-Suite tools at higher-cost service levels, and email marketing tools are available.
- Mobility: Compatible with Android and Apple iOS.
- Customizations: Offers customizations for fields and reporting only.
Jarvis
The easiest to use and most customizable CRM in this list, Jarvis is an excellent CRM for small businesses that want the ability to tailor the tool to their specific business needs at a competitive cost. Jarvis is based on the low-code FileMaker platform, meaning that customizations are simple and much faster than traditional development.
- Usability: Intuitive design with easy-to-use features.
- Price: $290/user/month.
- Integrations: Good selection of native integrations, offers integration via API with nearly any other system.
- Mobility: Web app is compatible via Apple iOS, Android, and Windows, but the mobile app is available for Apple iOS only.
- Customizations: Low code offers flexibility and makes modifications simple for in-house staff familiar with FileMaker configuration. Outsourced customization is less expensive for the same reason.
Any of these options could be the right one for your company, depending on the complexity of your business and which processes you want to automate. Knowing your priorities is the first step, and evaluating the pros and cons of each option will help you make the right choice.
Want to learn more about Jarvis? See how an insurance agency is using Jarvis to become more productive and more profitable.