Best CRM software in 2024: Buyer’s guide

Business has always been built on good customer relationships, from the smallest local shop to a high-flying multinational. Today, companies manage relationships with their customers using comprehensive customer relationship management (CRM) systems that juggle customer needs with business aims across every step of the customer lifecycle.

Good CRM software tracks customer activity, day-to-day revenue, and potential opportunities for more business. For sales teams, a robust CRM manages the sales pipeline, highlights prospects and analyses all this data for reporting and forecasting.

Today’s CRM software goes much further with AI capabilities that understand customer motivations and predict potential future needs, for agile and profitable customer relationships with endless possibilities.

• What is CRM software?
• Does your business need a CRM?
• What are the benefits of CRM?
• An overview of the top CRM software
• How to choose the best CRM management software
• Frequently asked questions
• What is help desk Give CRM software a try

CRM software is the central hub in any customer-facing organisation. It’s a digital space where all the information about a customer is kept, easily accessible for customer service teams to use to assist, advise, and sell to their customers.

Great question! It’s never one-size-fits-all as each business has unique needs and ways of working.

Smaller businesses can start simple with basic CRM tools that offer a customer service framework to get the ball rolling. The best CRM software for small businesses is agile and intuitive and doesn’t call for any digital heavy-lifting or bags of know-how from agents to get going.

On the bigger end of the scale, CRM systems can be adapted to a client’s needs. Exploring custom CRM software allows companies to hyperfocus on what’s important to them and their industry, whether that’s tailored applications and add-ons or working with their CRM software provider to build a tech stack bespoke to them.

1. It’s a brilliant equaliser

Integrating new CRM software can be a daunting prospect, especially if your data is siloed in different departments. Fortunately, the best CRM systems can bring consistency and efficiency to your organisation. They offer a shared and accessible space where departments can communicate and coordinate with each other—all under one big CRM umbrella. With today’s cloud CRMs, this inclusive approach can still work seamlessly, wherever people are on the globe.

2. It’s efficiency in action

The best CRM software automates and streamlines key customer service processes. Smart automations can help you tweak or even overhaul how customers interact with your company while contact management software can make the customer journey more intuitive. For example, you can leverage AI-powered chatbots, self-service, and knowledge base capabilities to help customers help themselves.

3. It’s all about the customer

Good CRM solutions improve customer satisfaction because your agents have all the right info at their fingertips to provide more answers, faster. This means less time wasted and higher CSAT scores. Plus, it frees up agents to focus on upselling, cross-selling, and more complicated white-glove services—making customer service into a dynamic profit centre.

1. Zendesk Sell
2. HubSpot
3. Less Annoying
4. Sales Creatio
5. Apptivo
6. Insightly
7. Salesforce
8. Copper
9. Zoho

Zendesk Sell

Let’s kick off with Zendesk Sell—modern sales CRM that frees you to maximise productivity, maintain pipeline visibility, and grow revenue.

Sell is user-friendly and accessible for both your sales reps and customer prospects, made for at the desk and on the go with the handy Sell mobile app. Built on intuitive AI-powered, cloud-backed CRM innovation, Zendesk Sell is made for increased team productivity, easy lead generation, and increased customer experience. Salespeople can find even more customers with sales prospecting tools that tap into 200 million professionals to create targeted lists that are verified, up-to-date, and full of potential. The voice automated power dialler makes calling a breeze, backed by to-hand scripts, notes, and analytics to keep track of time spent and effectiveness, alongside the email intelligence tool, which automates, tracks, and reports in real-time for a seamless flow.

Features:

• Email tracking and automation
• Activity reporting and analytics
• Customisable sales dashboard
• CRM mobile app
• Out-of-the-box integrations
• Contact and deal management
• Centralised platform

Pricing: Plans start at £15 per agent/month. 14-day free trial available.

Explore more Zendesk pricing plans.

HubSpot

Hubspot is a decent starter CRM that’s broken down into distinct process areas called ‘Hubs’, which include Marketing, Sales, Service, Content, Operations, and Commerce.

HubSpot includes a centralised dashboard, email tracking, and some newer conversational AI capabilities. Like most examples of CRM systems, HubSpot offers a bit of customisation and scalability, however it tends to focus on smaller businesses.

Features:

• Unified dashboard
• AI content creation
• Content management
• Leads conversion database
• Pipeline generation
• Automated payments

Pricing: Plans start at £14 per month. Free HubSpot CRM and a 14-day free trial are available.

Recommended reading: Learn how HubSpot integrates with Zendesk and how Zendesk vs. HubSpot compare.

Less Annoying

Less Annoying offers CRM software with a simple setup and basic tools with a single pricing structure.

Based on its name alone, it’s clear Less Annoying’s key selling feature is its simplicity, so it lacks the long list of CRM tools that an evolving company might need. However, it does include go-to CRM management software tools like email management, meeting scheduling, and work-from-anywhere capabilities.

Features:

• Content management
• Calendar and task syncing
• Pipeline management
• Customised fields
• Reporting and analytics
• Cloud and cross-device access

Pricing: Plans are £14 per person, per month. A 30-day free trial is available.

Recommended reading:

Sales Creatio

Built for midsized to large corporations, Sales Creatio is a no-code platform aiming to automate workflow and CRM.

Sales Creatio offers different applications in a modular way within its Studio interface, akin to Adobe Suite. Like most popular CRM software, it offers distinct Marketing, Sales, and Service products. Customer-wise, it focuses on banking, credit, insurance, and telecommunications industries.

Features:

• Unified CRM
• 360-degree customer view
• No-code customisation
• Workflow automation
• Real-time analytics
• Reporting

Pricing: Plans start at £20 per month. A 14-day free trial is available.

Apptivo

Apptivo is specifically billed as an online CRM system that can be accessed on any device or browser.

Apptivo has a smaller number of features than many other examples of CRM software, as it only has around 65+ integrated applications. But it does have a sturdy sales pipeline management system, so it may work better for direct sales and prospect-driven teams.

Features:

• Workflow automation
• Multiple sales cycles
• Intelligent sales dashboard
• Customised and scheduled reports
• User-level data security
• API integrations with webforms

Pricing: Plans start at £16 per month. A 30-day free trial is available.

Insightly

Insightly is a Google-integrated CRM system, so it’s useful for people who regularly work with G-Suite products.

It’s pretty basic compared to other CRM software examples but does have various features for sales pipeline areas. If you do end up with questions, however, you may find Insightly’s lack of 24/7 support frustrating—especially if your team is spread out across multiple time zones.

Features:

• Pipeline management
• Lead tracking
• Opportunity management
• Workflow automation
• Product generation
• Project management

Pricing: Plans start at £23 per month. A 14-day free trial is available.

Salesforce

Salesforce is an established CRM platform that has hard-shifted towards AI in recent years.

Salesforce uses AI and automation as part of its CRM solutions for workflow and efficiency. It has a large range of products which can be overwhelming for many teams, with more bells and whistles than a small business needs.

Features:

• Customer 360
• AI-powered Einstein 1
• Internal knowledge base
• Unified marketing platform
• Service cloud
• Small business suite

Pricing: Plans start at £20 per month. A 30-day free trial is available.

Recommended reading: Learn how Salesforce integrates with Zendesk and how Zendesk vs. Salesforce compare.

Copper

Like Insightly, Copper was built with Google users in mind.

Copper has a solid range of G-Suite integrations for your sales pipeline, but its features aren’t necessarily unique. Under CRM management tools, it has a mobile app so this, along with Google App features, may work best for individual or small companies over large organisations.

Features:

• Google Workspace CRM
• Track deals
• Workflow management
• Mobile app
• Task automation
• Contact organisation

Pricing: Plans start at £7 per month. A 14-day free trial is available.

Zoho

Zoho is a CRM system that utilises AI in the customer journey.

With a focus on growing companies, rather than just small or big, Zoho has its own CRM product called Bigin. It has most of the features you’d expect like pipeline management, automation, and a mobile presence. It also has its own AI companion called Zia to assist agents and customers.

Features:

• AI companion, Zia
• Pipeline management
• Customer management
• Automation
• Analytics
• Mobile applications

Pricing: Plans start at £5 per month. A free plan and a 15-day free trial are available.

Recommended reading: Learn how Zoho integrates with Zendesk and how Zendesk vs. Zoho.

As you can see from this small sample of CRM systems, there are plenty of options to choose from. So, where to start? Knowing yourself is the best way to know what you need. Take an honest stocktake of where your business is at now—what areas require some work and where the right CRM software can be put to the best use.

The needs of a large tech firm are wildly different to those of a small boutique shop, so look into CRM systems that are tailored to your industry, size, and technical capacity. It’s no use having the keys to a Jaguar, if no one can drive it. So, look for CRM systems that are easy-to-use, clear, and intuitive.

Cost is also a key consideration. Set a budget and understand how any scaling-up pricing structure works, along with any CRM implementation fees and add-ons. The big players in CRM software have got where they are with good reason and there’s plenty of peer reviewing, feedback, and ratings to go by to help you compare.

It’s about your business and your customers’ needs, so never lose sight of that.