Customer relationship management (CRM) software is one of the most effective tools for any company, big or small. It helps track and monitor customer activity, shares relevant information between departments and allows account managers to understand customer behaviour. Even a small company can benefit from using these tools, because it automates a lot of your work related to managing your customer base and gives you useful insights to help you create effective sales campaigns and loyalty programmes. So let us discover the best CRM software for small businesses.
How Do You Choose the Best CRM Software for Your Needs?
There are many CRM solutions on the market. Some of them are really complex and designed for very large companies, with operations across the entire world and a large range of products and services.
There are also simpler CRM software suites, containing only core functionalities. These are less expensive, easier to use, and cover all the needs of small and medium sized businesses. Let us look at these core functionalities:
1. Lead Management
The best CRM software will help automate lead generation and nurturing efforts. This functionality includes:
- Collecting contact information from various touch points: phone calls, email, online form, social media etc.
- Sending lead nurturing messages according to a preset schedule
- Tracking lead and customer engagement across various channels.
2. Email Marketing
Choosing the best CRM software with email marketing capabilities will save you both time and money. You don’t have to purchase a separate email marketing solution and you won’t have to perform this task manually.
The CRM software will cover all the essential tasks:
- Creating email newsletters and promotions
- Segmenting your emailing list according to each phase of the sales funnel
- Tracking email open rates and other relevant metrics
- Monitoring buyer engagement and behaviour.
3. API Integration
The best CRM software must be able to connect to other business tools and your social media pages to collect contact data and analytical data. The most important integrations you need are:
- With your email client
- With the sales and accounting software
- With cloud storage services
- With collaborative tools.
In this way, the CRM will automatically collect and sync data, so that every member of your team, from any department, has access to complete and up to date information.
4. Customer Service
CRM software should also help you manage customer service activities with ease. This includes:
- Helping customers submit a complaint or request for technical assistance through a ticketing system
- Automatically sending acknowledgment messages to customers until an employee can handle their request
- Creating customised email templates including the client’s first and last name
- Maintaining an accurate log of all customer purchases.
These Are the Best CRM Software to Choose from for Your Small Business
Based on the details above, we selected CRM software solutions whose pricing plans and functionalities are the right fit for a small and medium sized business.
These are:
1. Zoho CRM
Zoho CRM can be used on any device: computer, Android and iOS mobile phone. This allows you to be constantly up to date with your sales, lead management and customer loyalty programmes.
You can try Zoho CRM for free for 15 days without being required to register a credit card. The Standard plan costs just US$20 per month and includes:
- Basic modules to manage the entire sales cycle
- Multiple sales pipelines
- Sales forecasting
- Email insights
- Tasks, calls and events.
The only downside to this CRM software is the interface that needs a little time to learn how to use.
2. Insightly
If you want the best CRM software in terms of functionality and ease of use, Insightly is your best bet. It is easy to use and customise. Also, you can scale it to match the growth of your company and its client base.
Insightly also allows you to integrate the most frequently used apps and tools, such as:
- All Google apps
- QuickBooks account software
- Slack
- Dropbox
- MailChimp
- Evernote
- Facebook Lead Ads.
The pricing starts ate US$29 per month per user and it includes the core modules, such as lead management, automated customised emails and web-to-lead capture.
3. Less Annoying CRM
As its name says, this CRM solution is for business owners who don’t want to feel frustrated as they learn how to use a CRM tool. It features a clean and simple interface and one of the longest free trial periods – 30 days.
If you like it, you can choose the unique plan priced at US$15 per month, which includes all the necessary tools for the best CRM for your business:
- Contact management
- Leads and pipelines
- Task management
- Lead reports
- User permissions to facilitate collaboration between departments.
4. Freshsales
Freshsales is one of the first AI-powered CRM software solutions. Using the AI FREDDY, this solution is one of the most powerful CRMs at a really affordable price.
For just US$15 per month (billed annually), you get:
- Contact, account and deal management
- Connecting with customers from within the CRM through chat, email and phone
- AI-powered contact scoring
- Sales sequences
- Up to 2,000 interactions per month with the FREDDY bot.
Also, Freshsales integrates with an impressive range of business and collaborative tools, such as:
- QuickBooks
- Mailchimp
- Trello
- Asana
- Google Calentar
- Office 365
- Google Analytics.
5. Capsule
We end our list of the best CRM software for small businesses with Capsules – an all-in-one CRM and project management tool. Starting at US $18 per user per month, the basic plan includes:
- Up to 50,000 contacts
- Sales pipeline
- Integration with all Microsoft, all Google, Mailchimp, QuickBooks and more
- Project management
- Automated email sending
- 5 email templates
- Activity reports
- 10 AI content assists.
If you want simplicity, you will love Capsule CRM. It has a clean and easy to use interface with zero unnecessary clutter. You can see the big picture and take smart decisions to capture all potential leads and nurture them to their first purchase.
Conclusion
Using the best CRM software helps you work smarter, not harder to capture and nurture leads and keep your customers loyal. The many integrations and the power of AI will do the heavy lifting, while you make strategic decisions based on data you can trust.
Also, as we have shown for each item, CRM software is extremely affordable, even for a newly formed company. With a small investment, you can make the most of every lead interaction and get more sales. This is the smart way of growing a business!