7 Min. Read

5 Best CRM Systems for Small Business

March 12, 2024

Customers are a business’s lifeblood.

Without loyal, paying customers no business would be able to survive. That’s why maintaining a good relationship with your consumers is a vital aspect of running your business.

As a business owner, this is even more important when you are just starting out or you are a small business.

Word travels fast, and a reputation is much harder to fix than it is to build. That’s why so many small businesses will make use of CRM software. But what exactly is CRM and how can it help your business?

We’ll take a look at this, and the 5 best CRM software for small businesses.

Here’s What We’ll Cover:

What Is CRM?

Why Is CRM Important?

What Are the Benefits of CRM?

The 5 Best CRM Systems for Small Business

Key Takeaways

What Is CRM?

A customer relationship management platform, or CRM, is a technology utilised by businesses across the globe. They are used to manage interactions with customers and potential customers.

Whenever people talk about CRM, they are usually referring to a CRM system. This tool is used for contact management, sales management, agent productivity among many other things.

They enable business’ sales teams to be both informed and efficient when it comes to communication with customers. Both of these aspects are vital, no matter what size your business is.

A CRM system will help organisations build customer relationships and streamline business processes. This is with the aim to increase sales and improve customer service which will in turn increase profitability.

Why Is CRM Important?

CRM enables a business to strengthen its relationships. This is with not only customers but with service users, colleagues, partners and even suppliers.

Being able to forge good relationships and keeping track of potential prospects and customers is crucial for a number of reasons. The main thing it can help with is customer acquisition and retention – which is the heart of most businesses. But let’s take a closer look at some other advantages of CRM.

What Are the Benefits of CRM?

As we just mentioned, CRM offers many benefits and advantages to a business. These can include:

Enhancing Contact Management: Every interaction with customers and clients are recorded. These are then accessible to your entire team. This is through having a centralised contact management system.
Cross-Team Collaboration: A CRM system will enable people from different parts of your business to work together. For example, a sales team can collaborate with a product team. This can help to produce a more efficient marketing campaign based on customer interactions.
Increased Productivity: With a centralised system, you can cut out time-consuming meetings. You can also cut out other administrative tasks. A CRM allows repetitive tasks to be auto-generated and tested for effectiveness.
Reliable Reporting: When it comes to fixing potential issues, it’s infinitely helpful to glance at a series of data-backed reports. These will help you to preempt problems.
Increased Customer Satisfaction & Retention: A CRM gives you the ability to store all of your customer records and interactions. This makes it easier to anticipate any customer issues and deal with complaints. This, therefore, creates a far more positive experience for your customers.

The 5 Best CRM Systems for Small Business

1. FreshBooks

FreshBooks’ services are perfectly tailored for small business owners. It allows you to manage your clients in one integrated platform.

FreshBooks is accounting software that provides accounting solutions for business owners. With all client estimates, invoices, payments, credits, and other financial info in one place, it’s easy to keep track of clients.

They offer simple pricing, the software is easy to use and there are no hidden costs.

Their client collaboration feature makes it easy for you clients to give you feedback every step of the way. Plus, every update is automatically stored in the cloud for easy access for the whole team.

FreshBooks also has the benefit of offering a free trial. This means you can try it out to see if it fits your business before putting any money down.

Once your trial is up, FreshBooks’ basic option offers its ‘lite’ services for just £15.00 per month. You also have the option to choose their custom pricing offer. This gives you access to unlimited users and billable clients, as well as specialized features.

2. Salesforce

Salesforce is a CRM that is tailored to the unique needs of a small business owner. They allow you to transform your business with customisable CRM and marketing tools that grow alongside you.

You can focus your team on selling more by automating your sales process and cutting out admin work. It also enables you to keep your customers happy with a relationship-building help desk solution.

Their small business CRM starts from £20 per user per month when billed annually. But if you want to try out their service before putting money down then they offer a free trial.

3. Copper

Copper is an easy-to-use CRM that’s specially designed for and recommended by Google.

Their CRM solution is suitable for all sized businesses and has a wide range of features designed to fit your needs. From marketing automation and nurturing, to lead management and customer relationship management.

Copper offers a free 14-day trial with no credit card information required. If you decide to go with their service then their basic plan costs $25 per user per month when billed annually. This scales up to their business plan which will set you back $119 per user per month.

4. HubSpot CRM

HubSpot has everything that you will need to organise, track and build relationships with your sales leads and customers.

You can manage your pipeline with total visibility and log sales activity automatically. You can also see everything about a lead in one integrated place.

HubSpot offers a free service that requires no credit card details. Whilst the free version has limited features, it is still a good choice.

If you want access to more of its premium features, then their starter package works out at £38 per month. This can be scaled up to £655 per month for their professional package and even further up to £2,624 per month for their enterprise package.

5. Pipedrive

Pipedrive is an online customer relationship management tool that is suitable for teams of all sizes.

They currently have 95,000+ paying customers spanning across 179 countries. They offer a cloud-based CRM with a simple yet powerful design that prioritises usability.

Pipedrive allows your team to spend less time filing and more time selling with a CRM that is both powerful and agile.

They offer a free trial to test their product, then their basic plan starts at £12.50 per user per month when billed annually. They offer a number of additional features that will increase the price of your monthly subscription.

Key Takeaways

Choosing a CRM that is right for you and your business can be difficult, so it’s important to be patient and make sure you’re making the right choice.

The best advice is to put time into researching exactly what your business needs and would benefit most from. This allows you to then choose a service that fits these needs.

Are you looking for more business advice on everything from starting a new business to new business practices?

Then check out the FreshBooks Resource Hub.