The Great CRM debate of 2017!
Mandhir Singh Sidhu
Director | Occupier Client Solutions | Business Growth Specialist | Real Estate
I'm trying to help several clients with this issue, and as I'm in the same boat, its the opportune moment to bring up the infamous #CRM discussion!
Hoping this post, with the debate thats generated, could help business of all sizes, from start ups with from a sole trader to larger organisations.
(Personally I'm looking for 1 to 9 users assistance)
Searching for a CRM database that does as much of this as possible:
- Record all contact and touch points with clients, easily (emails, phone calls, meetings)
- Record all necessary contact information, by accounts, multiple locations, contacts etc
- Customisable tabs, so the CRM fields are kept relevant and bespoke as much as possible within the standard design
- Sales Navigator for LinkedIn capability, or similar
- Emails, social media capacity to write back to the CRM
- Financial forecasting for placing orders, Profit & Loss, Invoicing, VAT etc...
- Be online !! Just bought a Mac, use iPad heavily. Not adverse to going back to Windows though, but dual functionality would be nice.
- Easy migration of data. Have some 30,000+ contacts
- Don't want to spend ￡1000's on customisation
In the past I have used and set up CRM's for relatives large firms where budgets were not an issue. Experience of #SalesForce #Microsoft and more structured databases in the past using #SAP etc.
I apprecie that MS #Dynamics 365 does all the above, but at ￡87.50 pm for Enterprise, its too much!
I'm doing a trial right now of MSD365 Business Ed ￡32.50 pm per user, but it defeats the object as I can't customise the tabs! If I had full version I could, but I'm not prepared to buy a system that I can't make sure is 90% right for what I need.
#6 (Financial database) may require a completely different system if a more sales only one is pursued. Ideally want it to plug-in!
However ideally would like tools to make life easier, spending time on making the data work for success, rather than just inputting all the time. Joined up is ideal.
What draws me to MSD365 is its all one portal, emails & MS #Office365 with CRM all talks to each other and you don't have to leave the Outlook or CRM screens to get it all integrated with information all smart linked.
I've heard good things about all the CRM's #Pipedrive @#Zoho #HubSpot #MarketCircle #DayLite #Insightly #ReallySimpleSystems. Its the sheer volume of data that I have, and always working with that is a critical factor to consider.
Some of these systems are free databases, that tier pricing dependent on usage. When you're using the system full-on, all day everyday to its maximum use, this will all start to add up. So personally I'd rather use a system that I won't have to completely change in a couple of years.
What do you recommend and why? Please also state what size of business you are, especially interested to hear from SME's!
There is no substitute for working smarter.
Car Subscription | Short-Term Car Lease | Contract Hire & Leasing | Web Developer
6 年I've used Insightly for a while but now at the limits of the storage. I have to pay a lot more money to upgrade this and I personally don't think its worth it.
Director | Occupier Client Solutions | Business Growth Specialist | Real Estate
6 年I'm thinking of going with HubSpot and run it in sync with FreshBooks so the CRM and the Accounting talk to each other. I've analysed this at length... the god thing is #Hubspot is a free CRM to start with. However when I add my 30,000+ contacts things could get rather expensive! https://www.hubspot.com/pricing/crm ...so after pasting the link as above, a nice pop up chat screen came up and I went through various scenarios with the helpful advisor, Chris (who wanted to stay anonymous for LinkedIn). You only pay for Hubspot when it's selling for you. All your own selling and client engagement is via the CRM, which is free. So if I have 45,000 contacts on the CRM, its free. This is fully customisable, so I've been told, and you can track all leads and activity management. It's ￡0.00. Sales and Marketing Hubs are the ones that cost you, because they are 'inside sales', they push leads and contacts to you from your social media and web presence. So if you're getting leads that you're not actively generating from your own hard manual work, they should pay for the uplift in what it costs. Marketing Hub can cost anything up to ￡5.9k pm! But thats when you have 500,000 clients to keep happy and engaged. Chris says "The Sales Hub helps you close deals faster and more efficiently while the Marketing Hub helps you attract visitors to your site, collect their information and help you nurture them down the pipeline in order to turn them into customers". Sales Hub has free options to start with, then upgrades to ￡42 pm, for adding Prospects, Email Sequences, and live support from Hubspot. Various 'Add-On's are also available, like real time sales dashboard reports and API call volume increases. 5 users is ￡330 pm, and upgrades to the next tier of Professional user, and yet more #SalesAutomation tools. I'm finally sold. I'm signing up and I'll post back with further feedback! p.s. HubSpot is also the #1 RANKED CRM software on all the comparison sites, take a look... https://crm.financesonline.com (9.8/10 rated, with 99% user satisfaction - Winner of our 2017 Expert's Choice Award) FreshBooks was mentioned in here as being compatible and equally as easy to use. https://www.softwareadvice.com/uk/crm/ Shows Freshbooks (1101 reviews 4.5/5) with 86% user satisfaction vs Xero (728 reviews 4/5) at 55% https://www.g2crowd.com/categories/crm https://www.capterra.com/customer-relationship-management-software/ p.p.s. Thank you to Chris @ Hubspot for all answering all my dummy questions like a saint. I don't work for Hubspot, but I wish they would pay me now. I like promoting #BestPractice.
CEO at MILIEU
7 年If you run Gmail, check out ProsperWorks super interface and value.