Best CRM for Small Businesses: Top 11 Picks to Fuel Your Success in 2023

CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software is a powerful tool businesses use to manage and optimize their interactions with customers and prospects.

It centralizes and organizes customer data, including contact information, purchase history, communication logs, and preferences, providing a holistic view of each customer.

This software streamlines sales, marketing, and customer support processes, enhancing productivity and fostering personalized engagement. It can enable you to track leads, manage pipelines, and analyze sales performance.

Read More: What Is CRM- Uncovering the Basics & Benefits

How Does CRM Help Small Businesses- 6 Top Benefits

CRM can help small businesses in many ways, such as:

1. Centralized Contact Management

CRM provides small businesses with a centralized database that houses all customer information in one place. This includes contact details, communication history, purchase history, and preferences.

With easy access to comprehensive customer profiles, small businesses can better understand their clients, leading to personalized interactions and improved customer satisfaction.

2. Sales Pipeline Management

One of the core benefits of CRM for small businesses is its ability to streamline the sales pipeline. Sales representatives can track leads, opportunities, and deals through each stage of the sales process.

This real-time visibility into sales activities allows businesses to identify potential bottlenecks and nurture prospects effectively, resulting in improved conversion rates and increased revenue.

3. Task & Activity Tracking

CRM tools enable small businesses to prioritize tasks and activities effortlessly. From setting reminders for follow-ups to scheduling appointments and meetings, the CRM system ensures that no critical interactions slip through the cracks.

As a result, teams can work more efficiently, and customer relationships are nurtured with timely communication.

4. Data-Driven Insights

CRM can help small businesses generate comprehensive reports and analytics, offering valuable insights into sales performance, customer behavior, and overall business trends. By leveraging this data, small businesses can make informed decisions, identify areas for improvement, and develop effective strategies to boost productivity and revenue.

5. Marketing Automation

Integrated email marketing and sales capabilities within CRM software allow businesses to automate marketing campaigns, including drip emails, personalized communications, and targeted promotions. This not only saves time but also ensures consistent and engaging interactions with prospects and customers.

6. Collaboration and Team Coordination

CRM fosters seamless collaboration among team members by providing a shared platform for accessing customer information and updates. Everyone can be kept informed using notes, tags, and shared files.

Moreover, easy communication and coordination across departments lead to more cohesive and productive business operations.

Read More: Benefits of CRM for Small Businesses: Why CRM is Important for Your Business

What Are the Top 11 CRM for Small Businesses in 2023?

Here are our top 11 picks for the best CRM software for small businesses that can help you upsell your products and upscale your business in no time.

1. BIGContacts: Best For Contact Management & Email Marketing

BIGContacts CRM software is developed to help businesses manage everything related to their customers and prospects. From managing contacts and tracking the development in the sales pipeline to automating email campaigns, this tool has got you covered.

Its user-friendly interface is an add-on that lets you manage your tasks swiftly. Be it customer data management or your team’s collaboration, BIGContacts offers a helping hand like none other. The tools provide powerful reports and analytics to measure your efforts and make data-driven decisions.

Key Features:

• Manage contacts and activities with custom fields, roles, and permissions.
• Automate email campaigns and tasks based on sales pipeline stages and events.
• Import contacts from various sources and track all communication and interactions.
• Generate and export ready-to-use or custom reports on sales, marketing, contacts, or team activity.

Integrations:

• ActiveCampaign, Skype, QuickBooks, etc.

Pricing:

• Free Trial- 15 days
• Big- $5/user/month
• Bigger- $15/user/month
• Biggest- $25/user/month
• Enterprise- Custom pricing

What Makes BIGContacts the Best for Contact Management and Email Marketing?

BIGContacts stands out as the ultimate CRM software and simple contacts database for contact management and email marketing due to its comprehensive features. It efficiently captures and stores all communications with contacts, including notes, calls, meetings, tasks, files, etc.

With a personalized sales pipeline, it sends tailored emails based on the prospect’s stage in the cycle and adapts email campaigns to contact actions. By consolidating contacts, tasks, and calendars, it ensures streamlined organization and timely follow-ups.

Reasons to Buy BIGContacts:

If you are looking for a simple and affordable CRM that focuses on email marketing, BIGContacts might be a good option for you. It has a user-friendly interface and a flexible pricing plan that starts from $5 per user per month.

You can also try it for free for 15 days before making a decision.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.3/5

Thomas G. – Great value – easy to use

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Ritik P. – The sales figure is growing beyond our expectations

2. HubSpot: Best For Pipeline Management and Sales Automation

HubSpot’s CRM is a cutting-edge tool meticulously crafted to revolutionize customer relationship management for businesses. With this tool, you can easily track your sales pipeline, communicate with your prospects, and generate insights from your customer data. HubSpot CRM also integrates with other HubSpot products for marketing, service, content, and operations.

Its user-friendly interface ensures smooth task management, allowing you to navigate your workflows with ease. With HubSpot, you can experience unparalleled collaboration among your team members, empowering you to achieve collective success.

Key Features:

• Integration and customization fields for contact management.
• Automate email campaigns and task management based on sales pipeline stages and events.
• Track and log communication and interactions with contacts from various sources.
• Generate ready-to-use or custom reports on sales, marketing, contacts, and team activity.

Integrations:

• Gmail, Outlook, Google Contacts, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $0 (with limited features).

What Makes HubSpot the Best for Pipeline Management and Sales Automation?

Hubspot is one of the best customer relationship management software for small businesses. It offers a comprehensive solution for effectively handling your sales cycle. Users can conveniently access and modify their contacts and deals displayed in an intuitive pipeline format.

The platform also provides a detailed activity history of interactions with contacts, facilitating timely follow-ups. Additionally, HubSpot enables automated outreach using pre-designed email templates, a meeting scheduler, and live chat functionality.

Reasons to Buy Hubspot:

If you are looking for a CRM that can do it all for your small business, Hubspot might be the best choice for you. It has a robust and scalable platform that can grow your business and help you achieve your goals. You can also start with the free plan and upgrade as you need more features.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.3/5

Jerica G. – Excellent platform for business growth and success

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Winston A. – A great CRM for our team and it is easy to use.

3. Bigin by Zoho CRM: Best for Lead Scoring

Bigin CRM is a simple and affordable solution for small businesses that want to manage their customers better. With Bigin, you can easily track your sales deals, support tickets, customer onboarding, order delivery, and more in one platform.

You can customize your CRM in minutes, access it from any device, and integrate it with your favorite apps. Bigin helps you streamline your customer operations and grow your business without breaking the bank.

Key Features:

• Centralize customer operations and improve efficiency with streamlined workflows.
• Personalize your CRM effortlessly with customizable templates or build from scratch.
• Engage customers seamlessly through multiple channels.
• Access your CRM data anytime, anywhere, with a fully mobile interface.

Integrations:

• Shopify, Twilio, Slack, etc.

Pricing:

• Free plan available (limited to a single user). Paid plans start from $5/user/month.

What Makes Bigin by Zoho CRM the Best for Lead Scoring?

Bigin offers the capability to establish lead scoring systems using predefined criteria, such as demographics, engagement levels, and behaviors. Doing so enables the prioritization of leads and facilitates their allocation to the most suitable sales representatives, ensuring personalized follow-up.

Reasons to Buy Bigin by Zoho CRM:

If you are looking for a CRM that is simple and affordable but still effective for your small business needs, Bigin by Zoho CRM might be the right fit for you. It has a fast, easy setup process and a reliable customer support team. You can also try it for free for 15 days before buying it.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.6/5

Priyansh K. -The solution that changed my business game!

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Priyam V. – Simplified CRM solution for SMBs

4. Insightly: Best For Project Management

Insightly is a powerful and easy-to-use platform that helps you streamline your sales pipeline, sell smarter, and build lasting customer relationships. With Insightly CRM, you can manage your contacts, leads, opportunities, and projects in one place and access actionable insights to grow your business.

Whether you need to collaborate with your team, automate your workflows, or integrate with other applications, Insightly CRM has you covered.

Key Features:

• Track your sales pipeline and revenue with customizable dashboards and reports.
• Automate your workflows and tasks with Insightly’s intuitive automation engine.
• Collaborate with your team and clients using built-in communication and collaboration features.
• Integrate with your favorite apps and tools using its robust API and integrations.

Integrations:

• Quote Roller, PandaDoc, Zapier, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $29/user/month.

What Makes Insightly the Best for Project Management?

Insightly is a CRM that can help small businesses manage their projects and deliverables along with their customers and sales. It allows users to create and track projects, tasks, milestones, and dependencies.

Users can assign roles and permissions, collaborate with team members, and monitor the progress and status of their projects. Insightly also provides reports on the performance and profitability of the projects.

Reasons to Buy Insightly:

If you are looking for a CRM that can help you seamlessly manage your projects and customers, Insightly might be a good option for you. It has a powerful and flexible platform that can adapt to your business needs and processes. You can also try it for free for 14 days before purchasing it.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.0/5

Susan A. – A reliable and completely user-friendly tool with immense productivity.

G2 Rating: 4.2/5

Dave M. – Solid CRM and marketing tool for my new business venture objectives

5. Pipedrive: Best For Sales Pipeline Management

Pipedrive revolutionizes sales and management processes by offering an intuitive cloud-based CRM solution. It helps you manage your sales pipeline, track leads, automate tasks, and close more deals.

With Pipedrive, you can see your entire sales process at a glance, get alerts and reminders, collaborate with your team, generate quality leads, and forecast revenue. Pipedrive is easy to use, customizable, and scalable for any business size.

Key Features:

• Manage leads efficiently with visual and intuitive sales pipelines.
• Enhance lead management by filtering, sorting, and qualifying leads effectively.
• Capture high-quality leads by tracking visitors’ web activity using the sales prospector.
• Automate tasks and save time with intelligent workflow automation.

Integrations:

• Asana, Trello, Xero, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $9.90/user/month.

What Makes Pipedrive the Best for Sales Pipeline Management?

Pipedrive is a CRM designed to help small businesses optimize their sales processes and increase conversion rates. It allows users to create and customize their sales pipelines, add and update deals, schedule and track activities, send and receive emails, and follow up with prospects.

This tool also provides insights and reports on the performance and health of the sales pipelines.

Reasons to Buy Pipedrive:

If you are looking for a CRM dedicated to improving your sales pipeline management and boosting your sales results, Pipedrive might be the best choice. It has a simple visual interface that is easy to use and understand. It also has a 14-day free trial to help you get accustomed to the tool.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.5/5

Erick M. – Pipedrive: Empowering Sales Success with Streamlined CRM and Powerful Insights

G2 Rating: 4.2/5

Shivam K. – Pipedrive Streamline Sales Process with Ease

6. Agile CRM: Best For Marketing Automation

Agile CRM is a comprehensive and affordable CRM solution. Along with being easy to implement, it also offers consistent performance. You can use it for project management, ticketing, and a variety of other processes.

The tool offers mobile access to essential information, helps you track the performance of your team, and allows you to close more deals by optimizing every interaction according to the customer’s likes and dislikes.

Key Features:

• Deliver tailored customer experiences through targeted messaging and customized campaigns.
• Foster team collaboration with shared calendars, tasks, and real-time updates.
• Seamlessly integrate with popular tools and platforms to enhance productivity and data synchronization.
• Streamline customer interactions with automated workflows.

Integrations:

• ClickDesk, UserVoice, Zendesk, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $0 (limited to 10 users).

What Makes Agile CRM the Best for Marketing Automation?

Agile CRM can help small businesses create and execute effective marketing campaigns to attract, nurture, and convert leads. It allows users to segment their contacts based on various criteria, such as behavior, interests, location, and custom fields.

Users can also create personalized and responsive email campaigns using the drag-and-drop editor or choose from the pre-built templates. Agile CRM also provides detailed reports and analytics on the performance of the marketing campaigns, such as open rates, click-through rates, conversions, and revenue.

Reasons to Buy Agile CRM:

Agile CRM might be a good option for you if you are looking for a tool that can help you automate your marketing efforts and generate more leads for your small business. It has a comprehensive and powerful platform that can help you grow your business faster. You can also try it for free for 30 days before buying it.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.1/5

Erike R. – Agile CRM is a Great First Step into the CRM World

G2 Rating: 4.0/5

Lisa F. – A Cost-Effective CRM Solution That Works Best for Our Company

7. Engagebay: Best for Sales, Marketing & Support Collaboration

Engagebay is a cloud-based platform that offers everything you need to attract, engage, and delight your customers. You can easily manage your contacts, segment your audience, design and send personalized emails, track and optimize your campaigns, and more. It offers email marketing, live chat, helpdesk, and automation capabilities, all in one integrated solution.

This software helps you effectively manage your leads, nurture customer relationships, and drive sales growth. Plus, you can enjoy EngageBay’s responsive customer support and flexible pricing plans.

Key Features:

• Streamline sales and marketing workflows to maximize efficiency and save time.
• Generate personalized emails, landing pages, and proposals with integrated analytics and tracking capabilities.
• Optimize scheduling by syncing appointments, calls, and tasks with your calendar and setting up reminders.
• Enhance customer engagement through live chat, helpdesk support, ticketing systems, and telephony features.

Integrations:

• Mailgun, SendGrid, Shopify, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $0 (limited to 250 contacts).

What Makes EngageBay the Sales, Marketing & Support Collaboration?

EngageBay is the top CRM for small businesses, enabling faster sales, better marketing, and smarter support. It captures and nurtures leads from various sources, automates repetitive tasks, tracks deals visually, and offers analytics for optimization.

Reasons to Buy EngageBay:

• It is an all-in-one CRM that covers all your marketing, sales, and support needs.
• This tool is affordable and flexible, with no mandatory annual contracts or hidden fees.
• It has rich functionality and features that help you grow your business.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.7/5

Azizah A. -Complete package for marketing tool

G2 Rating: 4.6/5

Nadeem A. – Engage Bay All-in-One Suite: A Comprehensive Tool for Managing Sales and Customer Interactions

8. Apptivo: Best For Lead Management

Apptivo helps businesses generate and manage leads efficiently. This CRM can increase conversions by strengthening your workflow and helping you make the most out of every opportunity. You can use it to capture leads, manage sales processes, and improve your marketing efforts.

Apptivo allows you to store data in custom fields, track leads, and collaborate with other team members. You can also make advanced searches to sort through your contact data with ease.

Key Features:

• Automate sales tasks, boost email outreach, and close deals effortlessly.
• Visualize and analyze your sales progress using the sales funnel builder.
• Track sales team performance, measure projections, and forecast opportunities with a performance analysis tool.
• Customize your CRM software with drag-and-drop functionalities and toggles.

Integrations:

• Zipmark, Quickbooks, Stripe, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $10/user/month.

What Makes Apptivo the Best for Lead Management?

Apptivo stands out as the ultimate solution for lead management due to its exceptional focus on key aspects such as lead nurturing, seamless sales pipeline tracking, and insightful forecasting capabilities.

This comprehensive suite empowers sales teams to manage leads efficiently and gain valuable insights to prioritize activities and anticipate revenue opportunities.

Reasons to Buy Apptivo:

If you are looking for CRM software that offers a high level of customization and flexibility at an affordable price, Apptivo may be a good choice. Apptivo can help you manage your business operations in one platform and grow customer relationships.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.4/5

Shamima A. – Easy to use with attractive features.

G2 Rating: 4.3/5

Bill L. – Platform is intuitive, easy to use and the support team is awesome.

9. Keap: Best For Automating Workflows

If you are on the lookout for the best CRM software for startups with sales and marketing automation, Keap is the answer. This CRM brings together multiple powerful features that can help your business grow. Using Keap, you can easily capture and track leads.

It also allows you to automate and personalize follow-ups, to help you close more deals. All the emails, messages, files, invoices, etc., get stored in one place, enabling you to run your business more efficiently.

Key Features:

• Manage your contacts and leads with this powerful CRM.
• Collect new leads with minimal effort using simple, consistent, and repeatable processes.
• Test and optimize your campaigns with Keap’s A/B testing and analytics features.
• Schedule appointments and meetings with your clients using Keap’s appointment feature.

Integrations:

• Graphly, Jotform, Leadpages, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts at $159/month.

What Makes Keap the Best for Automating Workflows?

Keap excels at automation because it allows you to create and execute complex, customized workflows that match your business goals. You can use Keap’s drag-and-drop campaign builder to design and launch automated email, text, and voice messages that trigger based on your contacts’ actions and behaviors.

You can also use Keap’s workflows to automate tasks such as sending invoices, reminders, follow-ups, and more.

Reasons to Buy Keap:

If you are looking for CRM software that can help you automate your marketing, sales, and service processes and boost your productivity and revenue, Keap may be a good choice for you. Keap can help you attract, engage, and retain more customers with less effort.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.1/5

Sarah H. – It is easy to use and effective for automating campaigns

G2 Rating: 4.2/5

Ross (Apazo) M. -Securely store customer data and simplify operations

10. Salesforce: Best For Scalability

Salesforce is a robust cloud-based Customer Relationship Management platform that helps you manage leads, sales, and customer interactions. The extensibility of this tool is unmatchable. The detailed analytics, powerful integrations, and AI-enabled features make Salesforce one of the top-rated CRM tools in the market.

With its user-friendly interface and extensive customization options, Salesforce CRM empowers organizations to build strong customer relationships.

Key Features:

• Send targeted and personalized messages to your prospects across different channels.
• Improve your sales performance with real-time reports and dashboards.
• Automate tasks and workflows, such as lead generation, opportunity management, process approval, and more.
• Tailor customer interactions and experiences with personalized engagement and recommendations.

Integrations:

• MuleSoft, Outlook, Zapier, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $25/user/month.

What Makes Salesforce the Best for Scalability?

Salesforce stands out from other CRM software for its scalability and flexibility. You can easily add or remove users, features, apps, and data as your business grows or changes. You can also customize Salesforce to fit your specific business requirements and preferences.

With Salesforce, you can grow your business without worrying about the limitations of your CRM system.

Reasons to Buy Salesforce:

If you are looking for CRM software that can help you scale your growth and leverage the power of cloud computing, Salesforce may be a good choice. Salesforce can help you manage customer relationships across every touchpoint and deliver exceptional customer experiences.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.4/5

Shari S. – Sales Cloud helps us to build our business

G2 Rating: 4.3/5

Poonam B. – Simple and Highly adaptable

11. Nimble: Best for Integration With Social Media Platforms

Nimble is a powerful CRM that brings together contact management and marketing automation. This easy-to-use CRM can help you optimize your sales process and keep track of what your customers are up to, all from a single and accessible dashboard.

You can rely on Nimble to manage and enhance your entire sales process. The tool also allows you to routinely monitor your progress and make relevant adjustments to your strategy.

Key Features:

• Edit and enrich your contacts with relevant information from anywhere on the web.
• Manage your business workflows and deal with customizable templates and reports.
• Track your email opens, clicks, and responses with scale-based one-on-one messaging.
• Sync your emails, contacts, and calendars with Microsoft 365 products.

Integrations:

• HubSpot, ZapUp, Integrately, etc.

Pricing:

• Starts from $24.9/user/month.

What Makes Nimble the Best for Integration With Social Media Platforms?

Nimble stands out from other CRM software for its social media integration and collaboration features. You can use Nimble to discover new prospects, monitor social conversations, engage with your audience, and build trust and rapport with your contacts.

You can also use Nimble’s live profiles feature to access actionable information about your contacts from their social media accounts.

Reasons to Buy Nimble:

If you are looking for CRM software to help you build and nurture relationships with your customers and prospects using social media, Nimble may be a good choice. Nimble can help you leverage social media to grow your network and influence.

Ratings & Reviews:

Capterra: 4.4/5

David M. – Simple & Efficient

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Kevin M. – Nimble is real commitment to marketing

How We Evaluated the Best CRM for Small Business?

To help you choose the best CRM, we have compared multiple software options and compiled a list of the most worthwhile solutions. The criteria that we used to make this selection include the following:

Features: We have taken into consideration the unique proposition that CRM offers. This includes its features, including integrations, built-in analytics, drag & drop UI, etc.

Pricing: We have taken into account the pricing plans of the software and selected ones that offer high value for money.

Reviews: We have considered user reviews from trusted sources like G2, Getapp, and Capterra to get a clear picture of the performance and usability of the software.

Ratings: Ratings of the tools from credible sources like G2 have also been considered.

Comparison of the Best CRM Software for Small Businesses- at a Glance

Read More: Free CRM Comparison Spreadsheet (+ How to Choose a CRM)

How to Choose the Best CRM for Small Businesses in 2023?

When searching for the best CRM software, you will come across multiple options offering various features. So how do you pick one out of these?

The answer is straightforward-

Choose a CRM that seamlessly integrates with your existing business operations and helps it grow with time.

The CRM that you choose should be easy to use. It should offer valuable features at affordable prices. There are several other factors for you to consider when browsing through CRM options, including:

• Pricing options
• Storage capability
• Scalability and extent of automation
• Simplicity of usage
• Third-party integrations
• Flexibility for customization

Read More: How to Choose CRM for Small Business

Master Customer Relationships With the Ultimate CRM Solution!

Powerful customer relationship management is a prerequisite for business expansion.

Choosing the best CRM software may not be easy, but it is a decision that will impact your sales and productivity. This is why you need to take some time to analyze your requirements and compare various software before making the final purchase.

You can opt for a free trial of these CRM tools to get a clear picture of how they function and then buy the paid version.

[box] Our Top Pick: The best CRM and email marketing software is BIGContacts owing to its unique functionalities and reliable performance.[/box]

You can go through the detailed comparison mentioned above to gain a better understanding of what features your business is likely to benefit from. Then, pick a CRM that offers the features you require at the most reasonable price.

Best Small Business CRM FAQ

1. Do Small Businesses Really Need A CRM?

Yes, small businesses can benefit from using a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. It helps manage customer data, track interactions, and improve customer relationships.

By centralizing information and streamlining processes, a CRM can enhance sales, marketing, and customer service efforts, ultimately leading to business growth.

2. What Features Should You Look for in Small Business CRM Software?

CRM tools today are capable of doing a lot more than just maintaining customer relationships.

Here are some of the features that top-rated CRM software for Small Business offers:

• Marketing automation and intelligence with predesigned templates
• Helpdesk integration
• Customization of the sales pipeline, user roles, etc.
• Add-ons and integrations
• Easy UI
• Automation of key tasks
• Cloud-based solution
• Alerts and notifications
• Reports and analytics
• Powerful dashboard
• Social Media tracking

3. Which Is The Easiest CRM to Use?

BIGContacts stands out as the most user-friendly CRM option available. Its intuitive dashboard simplifies contact management, sales pipeline tracking, and performance monitoring.

Users can easily navigate the platform without getting overwhelmed by complicated procedures.

4. Does CRM Require A Large IT Investment?

No, CRM implementation doesn’t always require a large IT investment. Some CRM solutions like BIGContacts offer affordable pricing plans for small and medium-sized businesses.