Free vs Paid CRM Tools: 5 Top Features You Should Look For

Creating and maintaining relationships with customers lies at the core of a CRM. The relation or bond between the customer and the business is what drives companies to the next level. It is assumed that the stronger and more profitable the company is, the more advanced techniques involved in the implementation of customer relations. Many companies have dedicated world-class software to keep CRM systems at work. Batchbook, HubSpot, Salesforce, Buzzstream, Sugar CRM, etc. are among the most powerful and renowned CRMs used by organizations worldwide.

While there is a sheer number of options to choose from, should businesses go for free CRMs or the paid ones? Surely, CRMs helps to do the most important job of all; build robust relation with customer. So, the better investment, the better the return on investment should be, right? That isn’t true entirely. Therefore, before diving into the best features, let’s differentiate between free and paid CRM.

Free Vs Paid CRM Tools

Free CRM systems typically apply to systems, which are free to use but which place certain restrictions on the user. Most of these products enable you to have access to the critical functions of contact management, integration of social media, account management, monitoring, etc.

However, they have a storage base limit, and the number of users leveraging the platform.

The basic features of free CRM systems are included in the Paid CRM systems, but with special support and additional addons. Paid CRM systems can also be modified and integrated to your requirements.
For example, the free HubSpot CRM offers all the functionality that you need at its advertised price and pay only for sales seats that produce additional profits. For team members who need to see the organization, such as reporting without any of the regular functions of sales software, free seats are available.
While for each user Salesforce charges and allows paid add-ons for essential features. It would be an extra cost for managers to coordinate their marketing and sales team, give visibility to their reports or allow their members to work in a shared inbox.

All CRM systems offer unique advantages and features. However, it is best to think about the things that best serve your company when it comes to selecting the right CRM program. Investing in a paid CRM solution benefits you on a long-term basis, especially if you run a larger business with a larger client base.

Top 5 Features

Contact Management

Contact management is the process of arranging and storing contact data in order to make it convenient for everyone in the business to access. In addition to in-depth data, including email, interaction history, and data on how each customer communicates with the company, you can store customer information such as names, companies, and contact details. Intelligent integrations also allow you to gather and organize software information from tools like social networks, email, and e-commerce apps, making it easy to access.

CRM Tasks and Calendar

This feature lets you create reminders that match with your calendar on your customer accounts. You may set your own tasks or delegate them to a team and give us an e-mail recall.

Any exchanges with your contacts can be registered and your correspondence history is therefore complete. Calls, meetings, e-mails, and other communications can be documented in detail. You store your notes, emails, and completed tasks in your account activity calendar, which offers a chronological record to be accessed by your team.

Leads & Pipeline Management

The management of the leads and clients in a pipeline view gives the full sales funnel a simple overview. Customers can be seen identified by color and tags for thorough filtering in different sales phases. The pipeline is also useful for successful lead management. You can drag and drop leads from one stage of sales to another, seeing the prospects of becoming paying consumers.

Web Analytics

Integration of web analytics not only helps you to gather data on who visits your website. It evaluates raw data, finds problem areas, provides information into how your user base communicates with your website and how they are being enhanced. CRM systems have intuitive ways in which these statistics can be obtained and viewed in your UI. These analytics are further used for tasks and leads & pipelines.

Mobile CRM

A report by Nucleus Research showed that 65 percent achieve sales targets for firms using mobile CRM. Although the goals have been achieved by just 22 percent who use non-mobile CRM. Forester figures have shown that 50% of teams have increased productivity with mobile CRM.

Your sales team will be more comfortable in following leads and closing deals with reports and insights on demand. Your sales team need not worry about the shortage of important information with seamless sharing because you will get important alerts and valuable information as soon as they are recorded in the system.

A more efficient sales team can be a mobile CRM. The sales representative will go into the world, attend conferences and social gatherings with all the knowledge they need, rather than being attached to a desk.