CRM Software

The best CRM software should help businesses track and manage sales interactions in a single system of record. The CRM will record interactions between business, prospects, and existing customers. CRM solutions are gaining pace in the current enterprise ecosystem. With the boom of social media, enterprises are adopting social integration with top CRM software as well, thus making way for social CRM as a new channel nowadays.

Top 10 CRM Softwares 2022:

1. Salesforce.
2. Hubspot Inc.
3. Freshworks Inc.
4. Zoho Corporation.
5. Pipedrive.
6. Microsoft Corporation.
7. Pipelinedeals.
8. Nimble.
9. Zendesk Inc.
10. Bulbul (JungleWorks).

CRM Market Overview

Customer Relationship Management has become a vital part of various functions across global enterprises. Advancements in Social CRM have made it faster, reachable and have also brought in vital information on business analytics. Enterprises are adopting social CRM as an additional channel in the overall CRM software solutions. Social CRM refers to a social layer on top of traditional CRM software solutions; these solutions provide enterprises with several advantages including increased transparency, better communication of business ideas and information, flexibility and performance. The best CRM software should help companies to establish customer engagements and increase their brand presence among customers. Social CRM focuses on capturing the customer's needs and creating value for them in a transparent business environment.

Many top CRM Softwares are focussing on customer engagement, emerging SMEs, social platforms and the recognition of sharing ideas on a real-time basis. Enterprises are coming up with solutions for Social Monitoring, Social Listening, Social Middleware, Social Management and Social Measurement for providing the best in class customer experience to the customers. Today, the Customer Relationship Management market is not limited only to increasing sales and improving marketing activities but to bring in more customer engagement with the enterprises.

CRM software is now the biggest software market in the world and the growth isn’t slowing down. In fact, CRM is now expected to reach more than $80 billion in revenues by 2025. One of the key factors behind the growth of CRM is accessibility. Companies want access to customer data in real-time, with mobile and cloud solutions leading the way. From customer service and email marketing to personalization, companies now expect to be able to connect platforms and technologies with customer data, in order to provide a more personalized experience.

25 companies offering top CRM Software were analyzed, shortlisted and categorized on a quadrant under Visionary Leaders, Innovators, Dynamic Differentiators, and Emerging Companies to identified best CRM providers.

The competitive leadership mapping (Quadrant) showcased below provides information for 25 top CRM Software. Vendor evaluations are based on two broad categories: product offering and business strategy. Each category carries various criteria, based on which vendors have been evaluated. The evaluation criteria considered under product offerings include the breadth of offering, delivery (based on industries that the vendors cater to, deployment models, and subscriptions), features/functionality, delivery, product quality and reliability, and product differentiation. The evaluation criteria considered under business strategy include geographic footprint (on the basis of geographic presence), channel strategy and fit, vision alignment, and effectiveness of growth (on the basis of innovations, partnerships, collaborations, and acquisitions).

Vendors who fall into this category generally receive high scores for most of the evaluation criteria. They have a robust and established product portfolio and a very strong market presence. Moreover, these vendors also have strong business strategies. This category includes top CRM vendors such as Salesforce, Hubspot Inc, Freshworks, Zoho Corporation, Pipedrive Microsoft Corporation, Zendesk, Nimble, and Insightly.

The dynamic differentiator's category includes established vendors with very strong business strategies. However, they are low in the product portfolio. This category includes vendors such as Pipelinedeals, Pipelinersales, Nice Systems, Agile CRM, Nutshell and Zestia Ltd.

Innovators are vendors who have demonstrated substantial product innovations as compared to their competitors. They have a focused product portfolio. However, they do not have very strong growth strategies for their overall business. This category includes best CRM software vendors such as Kapture, Oracle Corporation, SAP SE, Bitrix24, Apptivo, and Pegasystems.

Emerging companies’ category comprises vendors with niche product offerings, who are starting to gain their position in the market. They do not have very strong business strategies as compared to other established vendors. They might be new entrants in the market and require some more time before getting significant traction. This category includes vendors such as Adobe Systems, QSOFT, Verint Systems, Norada Corporation, Infusion Software, and Vtiger CRM.

Types of CRM Software

Operational CRM:

An operational CRM supports businesses in managing their daily activities such as marketing, sales and customer support operations. Operational CRM’s are the most commonly used and are popular amongst businesses across various industries. Operational CRM allows three different types of automation:

• The marketing automation tool allows the user to automate the marketing aspects in order to target the right customers at various levels of the sales cycle.
• Sales automation is the major part of any top CRM software as it allows the user to manage the pipeline, create and manage leads, acquisition of new clients and onboarding of clients with ease
• Service automation is designed to provide professional customer support. A CRM with such kind of support can provide crucial information through email, text or a helpline phone number. This process enhances the level of customer support and allows employees to focus on other important tasks.

Analytical CRM:

Analytical CRM’s are an ideal solution for analyzing large amounts of data. It makes it easier for businesses to manage the processes of acquiring customer and retention. It also helps in keeping track of customer details. The three important functions of an analytical CRM are:

• Customer Acquisition: Turning leads into customers and upselling other products and services where possible.
• Customer Retention: To keep current customers happy and satisfied with the best level of support and services.
• Managing Data: Tracing customer relations and other data that can enhance the bottom line.

Collaborative CRM:

A collaborative CRM system is intended to improve the customer experience. Collaborative CRM features make more efficient communication for all groups - both between the customer and business and between various divisions and shareholders. These CRMs enable firms to track and share customer data with everyone from vendors and suppliers to tech support and marketing managers. This kind of CRM software allows you to provide a flawless multi-channel customer experience across all points of contact.

Why should you use  CRM Software?

Every sales organization runs into the problem of taking more time logging into different tools that run the business instead of actually running the business. To avoid this situation or problem, the best CRM software is required.

The ultimate goal of CRM is to reduce the time take in doing the manual tasks included in day to day activities. Hence the best CRM software helps sales reps to get data such as last contacted lead, send thank you emails to the last customer, reports on performance figures and much more in a single click.

CRM tools help to recognize the engagement patterns with the clients. The CRM software allows the business to manage contacts very easily and effectively and makes it possible to juggle a number of recurring customers with the help of AI and digitization.

At the start of business, small companies tend to avoid buying CRM as their client base is small and the use of excel sheets helps them keep track of activities and tasks. As the business develops, and the customer database increases, the best CRM software becomes a necessity and not a luxury.

CRM Software is primarily a sales tool but can also be looked like a central database where all the information can be shared with each department of the business.

Who uses CRM Systems?

Sales companies cannot think of growing without a customer relationship management (CRM). The amount of customer data available online can help any organization to gain insights and develop strategies to target the customers.

SMB’s, as well as enterprises, need well-managed customer data to achieve the targets and produce better results. This is where the use of the best CRM software plays an important role.

CRM automates and oversees the client's life cycle of business from each and every end of the business. Sales and marketing teams utilize CRM tools to respond effectively to the real-time needs of their clients and customers and to foster closer relations with them.

CRM is an important tool as it allows the business to give its clients what they want and whenever they want. Everyone in an organization from the sales team to top-level management should have visibility into the best CRM software.

Choosing the best CRM Software

Choosing the best CRM software for the business is a tough and time-consuming task for the top management as it includes perspectives of different departments of the business. Generally, while choosing the best CRM software, the following points need to be taken into consideration  from the business point of view:

• Price: Organisation cannot overlook price as it is a major factor that affects the revenue of the company. A CRM in terms of cost can be a White Elephant if the organization does not plan better while buying. Buying a cheaper CRM is not a solution for better sales management.
• Integrations and APIs: While assessing the best CRM software for business, look out for how a potential CRM will integrate with the current systems. This is a crucial part of the considerations because if we opt to use full suite CRM, then the current systems will be of no use and will impact the revenues as we have already paid for those systems.
• Ease of Use: It’s no good for a business to adopt CRM systems which the sales reps and other employees do not know how to use it. This is when the importance of demos and training (before and after buying) provided by the software vendor is crucial.
• Customization: Different businesses require different kinds of reports and dashboards. There will always be something that the user wants to add in the report generated. Customization should be done before buying the software as it will be developed by a software provider.
• Reporting: Whether data can be created into dashboards inside the software itself or exported into BigQuery, Power BI, Tableau or more — it's of no use unless presented in a clear way. Make sure the CRM software reports on the correct data and it matches the business goals and needs of employees from top to bottom.

Trending Features

Every top CRM software is equipped with a different set of features. The requirement depends on the organizations as to which features are required to run the business smoothly. Here is a list of some generic features which are embedded with top CRM Software.

• Contact Management: Contact management is a core part of CRM features. This allows operators to divide contacts into classes to organize and better cater to them. Users are able to collect essential customer data and boost marketing plans when launching new products. It also improves the personalization of all contacts with customers, making them feel important.
• Opportunity Management: Measuring the opportunities that the sales team has with customers is a comparatively basic feature of the best CRM software. This helps streamline sales/marketing teams, enhance efficiency and improve deals process.
• Lead Management: Lead Managing feature allows a business to find out the best customers to follow up based upon demographic and psychographic considerations. Like lead scoring, it improves the efficiency and productivity of the sales team by helping them focus on the right leads at the right time.
• Reports and Dashboards: BI, reporting, and dashboards have become some of the top CRM features. Operators can view data in a highly graphic, engaging viewpoint using customized reports and dashboards by studying real-time data updates. The organization can use these reports to make data-driven.
• Email Marketing Integration: Some business requires their email marketing systems to be integrated with the new CRM systems. This feature allows users to integrate their existing email marketing system with the CRM to import data automatically which reduces the human effort and error.
• Social Media Integration: Integrate management platforms like Oktopost, Hootsuite and other SMM platforms to streamline social media management and allow multiple team members to work together from different access points.
• Customization Options: Customization is one of the more basic CRM software features, but it has far-reaching consequences. The more customization, the more flexible the CRM. It’s crucial to know the needs when it comes to customization before making a purchase.
• Sales Forecasting: A large part of customer relationship management is determining a metric for success. Forecasting allows creating a benchmark by which one can determine whether results are actually on par with efforts. This data can be used to direct future efforts.

Benefits of CRM Systems

Benefits of CRM can be bifurcated into two broad categories i.e. benefits of onsite CRM and benefits of mobile CRM.

Benefits of onsite CRM

CRM can help you:

• Raise customer satisfaction.
• Increase customer retention and reduce marketing expenses.
• Anticipate customer needs and preferences.
• Increase operating efficiencies.
• Improve targeted marketing efforts of customers and prospects.
• Quick Service to Customers.

Benefits of Mobile CRM

Most of the organizations have adopted BYOD strategy, and each CRM user can work from a mobile device.

• Salespeople can benefit from making audio and video calls from CRM without coming into the workplace
• Receive electronic signatures at the client’s place
• Customer support can be empowered with services such as clicking product photo from mobile camera and resolving the issue
• GPS location tracking to analyze the time and the place of each case being managed.

Applications of CRM Systems

On the basis of applications, CRM software is segmented into Customer Service, Distribution, Manufacturing, Marketing, Sales, Social Networking, Supply Chain, and Vertical Industries. The industries where CRM is used are:

Academia and Government

The scope of Social CRM software usage within government organizations is much broader as compared to private firms, due to their commitment to providing a high level of service and receptiveness to its customers, keeping profit motive aside.

Automotive, Transportation and Logistics

Automotive, Transportation and Logistics vertical is among the most dynamic and fast-growing vertical today. The best CRM Software solutions cut down the operating costs of processes by optimizing business processes, effectively planning services and controlling quality. It manages the various documents associated with transport activities, executes the transport requests and assesses the vehicle amortization.

Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI)

BFSI companies are trying to connect to young and tech-savvy customers through social networking sites for better social CRM processes. ICICI bank has started a Facebook application which lets its customers to directly perform any banking transaction. CRM software enables the structural classification of information for providing configuration with business workflows.

Consumer Goods and Retail

Social CRM helps Consumer Goods and Retail industries to analyze market data, assess and monitor consumer social behavior, and offer direct engagement with customers. This enables enterprises to promote a positive brand image. It also helps enterprises to resolve concerns pertaining to Goods and Retail industries such as increased need for customer involvement, compliance and safety issues with the increased demand for environment-friendly products and facilities, extensively distributed workforces and partners, and the need for better supply chain efficiency.

Energy, Power, and Utilities

CRM and social CRM software reduce overhead costs and delay in marketing, as well as support and service, by simplifying and automating processes. It also helps in collaborating social interface with the customers in the Energy, Power and Utility sector.

Healthcare

CRM and social CRM software facilitate effective customer care service in the healthcare vertical by providing an intuitive and modular framework to the enterprises. It includes channels such as email, chat and social media. Customer care executive can act in response to customer’s requests by accessing a centralized database which contains articles and information from online sources.

Oil and Gas

The Oil and Gas vertical has a huge requirement of proper communication channels amongst owners, operators, and vendors. They also have requirements across various functions such as marketing, sales, and support. CRM and social CRM software serve this basic purpose along with the added advantages of managing unstructured information of these massive lifecycle processes and offering secure and speedier search options to track data.

Telecom and IT

Telecom companies continue to deal with unbending revenue targets spread across the vast number of departments, systems, and regions. CRM & Social CRM helps telecom companies capitalize on account potential, increase overall customer satisfaction and improve revenues, by restructuring processes and consolidating customer data on a technology platform.

Use Cases

Use Case #1. CRM for improved sales administration

CRM tools allow automating sales workflows so as to add stability and speed up sales activities. Additionally, a CRM system can be used by sales managers to set sales goals and track their fulfillment, as well as to visualize progress for assignees to keep them motivated. CRM data can help sales managers to:

• Indicate top and weak performers
• Spot specific sales performance problems and their reasons
• Identify poor and strong strategies across the sales cycle

Use Case #2. CRM Systems for a shield against rivals

Customer loyalty is put to the test every time a competitor launches an aggressive marketing campaign. Strong customer relationships are the best shield against attacks on a company’s market share. According to Rockefeller, 82% of customers switch brands because they don’t feel care. Consequently, customized communication with customers today can be a source of a future competitive advantage.

With the best CRM software, such personalization takes reasonable efforts. CRM consultants suggest starting the journey by prioritizing 360-degree customer profiles. Those should accumulate data from the sales force and customer service reps at all touchpoints, as well as analytical insights based on customers’ purchase and browsing history and social network activities.

Knowing the customer well allows a company not only to exclude irrelevant communication (duplicate emails, irritating surveys) but also to provide exceptional service at every stage of the customer journey. For example, a service assistant instantly learns the details of the customer’s purchase via CRM, or a salesperson shows the care with a customer call after an issue is fixed by the support center.

Use Case #3. CRM Systems for strategic marketing

Abundant CRM data makes it helpful at the pre-sales and post-sales stages as well. Customer sentiment gathered by salespeople and via surveys can hint the marketing department at the market opportunities (like the idea of a new or complementary product/service, improvements to the current offering). Automated to some extent, CRM data analysis will help to timely identify market trends and levels of interest in the company’s products. Subsequently, marketers can use these insights to adjust their marketing strategies.

Also, in-CRM analysis of customer data can be used to narrow down customer segments and target them with more precise messages. And finally, with certain analytical factors introduced to the system by CRM consultants, marketers will be aware of the results of their marketing efforts in terms of revenue and pipeline activity. Fact-based analysis of marketing campaigns, identification of the best performing channels and even ad messages – that’s the basis for future marketing improvements.

Use Case #4. CRM Systems for proactive strategic management

Whether it’s about entering a geographic market, launching a product, or surviving competition, the best CRM software enables the executives to detect problems early, before a company loses money and customers. Changes in lead generation and their pipeline movement, a slowdown in loyal customers’ response – these are signs to launch a dynamic in-CRM analysis to find out the reasons for dwindling results. With custom dashboards tailored to executive roles, CEO, CFO, CMO, VP of Marketing, or VP of Sales will be able to monitor key indicators they need so as to make more informed decisions.

Use Case #5. CRM Systems for increasing profitability

In-CRM customer data analysis lets a company know more about their most lucrative customers so as to maintain relationships with them. Monitoring of the high-LTV customers’ purchase history and responses to sales and marketing activities will help to timely react to negative signs and as a result, better retain such key customers.

Company executives, in their turn, can use CRM data to forecast revenue and manage profitability. Broader goals for increasing revenue and decreasing costs can be split into smaller ones and monitored in the CRM system. For example, to increase cash inflow, a company can set cross-selling and upselling targets. At the sales agents’ level, best practices visible for weaker performers in a CRM will let them convert more leads, while automated nurturing notifications will save all sales agents’ time, allow processing of more leads per quarter, and as a result raise returns on the employment costs.

Trends and Facts

• CRM is a competitive, growing space. Everyone talks about providing best-in-class customer experiences, about CRM strategies and solutions, and about the vital role, CRM plays in catapulting companies forward as marketplace demands intensify.
• Business revolves around the customer today more than ever. So, it’s no surprise customer experience is predicted to become the top brand differentiator by 2021.
• 84% of consumers value the experience they have as much as the product or service a company offers. CRM adoption will grow at 13.5% CAGR over the next three years
• AI is not only here, but it’s also on the path to major growth, according to Salesforce research. AI use cases would go up 257% over the next two years.
• Mobility has long been a central component of sales activities. But that doesn’t mean mobility is a bygone trend. If anything, as processes, become more involved, the workforce becomes more scattered and buyer demands place more pressure on sales reps to perform, putting the power of CRM into the palm of your workforce’s hand will only serve to propel your brand further down the road to success.
• As the customer experience bar raises to new heights, social media has become a focal point. Positive social media interactions make people 7x more likely to purchase. Social channels allow companies to connect with their audience in real-time and build brand equity where prospects and customers are already spending time. It also enables one-to-one marketing and the personal attention of customers crave.
• The internet of things (IoT) also presents substantial integration possibilities. The number of IoT connected devices is projected to climb from 22 billion in 2018 to 39 billion by 2025. Furthermore, the top CRM software systems are beginning to incorporate connections to IoT feeds. IoT/CRM integration will allow companies to take advantage of feeding more data into the system for deeper insight that leads to more strategic marketing efforts.
• The relatively recent development is the biggest opportunity moving forward for CRM users and vendors is that the CRM will be really helpful in organizing and planning the internal department activities. And it applies not to how CRMs can aid customers but to how they can streamline internal activities.
• CRM trends are like ocean breezes — the companies that stay aware of which way the wind is blowing can maneuver so they’re better positioned to sail toward success. Marketing organizations are expected to use data from 15 sources in 2019

Upcoming trends in CRM Software

CRM is rapidly evolving and the transitions from one state to another are happening frequently. In the coming years, the market can expect significant changes in CRM software and how do businesses utilize these changes. It’s beneficial to look ahead and predict these changes in order to stay ahead of the competition. Here are some of the changes which are expected in the future.

• Insights into customer engagement and data-driven decisions will drive better customer relationships
• CRM will accelerate the alignment of sales, marketing, and customer service together in one platform
• Customer engagement and retention initiatives will be the key for better customer relationships
• Fostering brand supporters will become gradually more important
• CRM software will go on to become more insightful and user-responsive software
• All-in-one CRMs will continue to gain market share as all the software such as sales, marketing, and customer support are included in one platform
• Integrations with the current systems will allow companies to do even more in the same environment
• Every customer is unique and expects a different response from a business. This will enhance personalization which will become more important and easier
• Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are trending topics these days. Integrating AI and ML with CRM Systems will be of great importance and this will change the face of the CRM software market. Artificial intelligence and machine learning will become an integral part of CRM.
• In the age of social media, Social CRM which has integrations with social media platforms will continue to grow at a higher pace.

Recent Developments

In February 2020, Salesforce Buys Evergage to Enhance Customer Data. The acquisition will accelerate the company’s efforts to offer enhanced personalization solutions to its thousands of customers.

In August 2019, Salesforce bought ClickSoftware for approx. $1.35 Billion. The addition of ClickSoftware will enhance Salesforce Service Cloud’s leadership as a service platform, allowing every service employee from the contact center to the field to deliver connected, intelligent customer service.

In May 2019, SugarCRM acquired Atlanta-based Salesfusion to help build out the marketing automation side of its business. Salesfusion has a diverse customer base and a unique onboarding process that attracted SugarCRM to buy Salesfusion.

In April 2019, Salesforce acquires MapAnything for its location-based intelligence products to extend the power of Sales Cloud and Service Cloud post-closing to deliver market-leading location-based intelligence solutions that improve field sales and service employee productivity and deliver customer success.

In September 2018, ForceManager, a Barcelona, Spain-based provider of a sales management software solutions, acquired Self, a Roncade, Treviso, Italy-based CRM Mobile start-up to create an innovative personal sales assistant which integrates Sellf’s gamification features – like sales campaigns, badges, and advanced goal management – with ForceManager’s AI capabilities.

In July 2018, Salesforce acquired Datorama for $800 million to continue investing in AI technology for better customer experience.