Salesforce alternatives and competitors: 10 tools Pros and Cons Analyzed

We are witnessing intense competition in the CRM industry. Customers are more aware of their options and want more features, better modularity, and cheaper costs. Salesforce has lost its market dominance as companies look for Salesforce alternatives.

Despite the competition, there is room for new players because of the demand. CRMs that cater to particular niches aregaining traction.

The global CRM market was estimated to be worth 53 billion USD in 2021 and is expected to rise to over 100 billion USD in this decade.

According to this report, the market shows a growth rate of 13 % annually (CAGR).

The above report indicates the importance of CRMs to companies.
Initially, People used CRMs in B2B companies. Now, some CRMs cater to B2C companies that don’t just focus on sales.

A one-size fits all approach is no longer an option, and customers are looking for niche capabilities that cater to their business.

Today the world of CRM has a somewhat chaotic market distribution.
The market leader, Salesforce, has a 23% share of the US market. Other legacy providers such as Oracle, Microsoft, Adobe, and SAP jointly hold 20%.

That means new CRMs have 50% of the market share, and their piece of the pie is growing.

With so many CRMs in the market, it is crucial to pick the right one based on your requirements.

It’s no longer necessary to spend exorbitantly on Salesforce. There are plenty of Salesforce alternatives that cater to specific tasks at affordable prices.

Trends in the CRM market

Before we get into the Salesforce alternatives, let’s look at the current trends in the market.

1) AI

AI is getting integrated into all industries. With CRMs, AI can provide customers with accurate forecasts and lead generation reports.
AIs can analyze data such as activity, sales, and emails and provide insights. It can analyze customer patterns and help improve customer retention.

AI automates monotonous and manual work. This allows sales teams to focus on important tasks and the business to streamline its operations.

2) Automation

Automation has become an essential element of CRMs. You can schedule emails and messages for a particular time or after a specific action.

AI-enabled chatbots have helped many customer care operations, where the bot takes all the necessary information required from the customer. If needed, a human overlooks the situation and provides a solution.

This reduces man-hours for a company, and companies can complete the task with fewer people.

3) Modularity

A few years back, companies would use CRMs only after reaching a specific size and once business operations became complex.

Nowadays, small businesses can afford CRMs because they are modular, readily available, and cost-effective. That’s why Salesforce alternatives have had so much success.

Customers want pluggable CRMs. These CRMs can easily coexist with the technology stack companies use.

These CRMs are feature precise, i.e., you only pay for your use. A fully managed SaaS CRM is the key to the future of this industry.

4) More than Customers

CRMs should be appropriately named xRMs (where x stands for anything), as they offer more than just relationship management. We have Salesforce alternatives that cater to a variety of niches.

Companies have been successful in managing customer relations with CRMs. Now, businesses are looking forward to this level of management with every interaction of the business.

Every entity a business interacts with comes under the lens of xRM. This includes vendors, marketers, contractors, etc. It’s not limited to external relations; you can also manage internal ties between departments and employees.

5) Connectivity and integration

CRMs of today are not a stand-alone service. They must be integrated with communications systems within a company—slack channels, Microsoft teams, etc.

This is why Salesforce added a new slack feature to keep up with the competition.

CRMs must be able to input data from all these streams. Data coming from IoT and Product details can help interactions with a customer if there is a complaint. It enables you to provide a quick solution in case of any system issue.

6) Developer Focussed

CRMs, for a large part, have targeted B2B companies. But they have been ineffective in B2C companies.

That’s why DevRev created a DevCRM. This CRM caters to companies that build products around general users.

Users can directly interact with developers and voice out concerns. Developers can use this feedback to fix user pain points.

A DevCRM allows developers to be more involved in the company instead of being on the sidelines.

Top Salesforce Alternatives for Your Company

1) Hubspot

Hubspot is a CRM that became successful using the freemium model. You can use most of the functionality for free, like Figma. Only if you want more features you’ll have to pay and upgrade your plan.
Hubspot is a CRM that helps companies with their growth on social media and other channels.

First off, this CRM offers email automation. You can send bulk emails with CTAs and links. The drag-and-drop editor lets you customize your email template. Hubspot provides detailed analytics and metrics to understand unsubscribed, bounce rate, and CTR.

With Hubspot workflows, you can automate repetitive tasks. You can integrate workflows with Slack, Linkedin, Zoom, and more. That way, you can create workflows with all your favorite apps.

You can notify your team members automatically when a new lead is generated.

Hubspot also helps you track your ads. You get all the information in a neat and organized manner.

Hubspot also makes the lives of social media teams easier. You can create drafts and schedule posts for all your favorite social accounts.
With list segmentation, you can differentiate all your different contacts based on your parameters. This helps you connect with your customers with a more personal touch.

2) Zoho: The Best CRM for Invoicing

When you move from Salesforce to Zoho, you’ll wonder why you were breaking the bank before. Zoho is a powerhouse that helps companies manage invoices, grow revenue, convert leads, and more.

Zoho offers all the traditional CRM features such as lead management, sales and marketing automation, account management, etc.

One of the reasons for Zoho’s success is its open developer APIs. Companies and developers can use these APIs to suit their needs. You can use the rest APIs to integrate Zoho with a third-party application.

The notification APIs get you notified when data changes in Zoho CRM.

Another reason why Zoho is remarkable is the customization. You don’t have to use a bland layout like in Salesforce. Instead, you can make the Zoho CRM your own with the Canvas Design Studio.

If you are a B2B company, Zoho is one of the best options for a CRM.

3) DevRev: One of the Best Salesforce Alternatives for PLG

In the previous section, I talked about DevCRM and its importance.
Only customer-centric companies survive in this day and age. A community of happy users and developers helps companies achieve product-market fit and exponential growth.

I would be understating if I called DevRev an app. DevRev is an ideology that empowers companies to excel with product-led growth.

DevRev helps developers and product managers understand what users want and need. Instead of building unnecessary features, companies can optimize their MVPs and build from there.

Adding DevRev to your product is simple with the PLuG SDK. Users can give feedback with a simple chat box. This feedback reaches the developer directly.

This simple approach allows developers to have ownership over their features. They can make necessary changes and update features based on user pain points and requirements.

4) Freshworks

The Freshworks CRM offers tools for sales, marketing, HR, IT, and customer teams. They have different tools for different needs.
They have Freshmarketer for marketing, Freshsales for sales, Freshdesk customer desk for managing revenue and customers, and Freshteam for HR work.

You can try out these tools on a free trial with your company team. Freshdesk also offers two free tools — Freshpin and Freshstatus. These tools help in monitoring live websites and events.

With Freshworks, you can manage your contracts, collaboration, pipelines, tasks, and quotes. You can also automate tasks with their AI tools.

Connecting with customers with the CRMs phone and email support is easy. That way, you never have to leave the CRM.
It also gives you insights into your engagement. You can then use these insights to optimize your sales pitches for different contacts.

5) Netsuite

Netsuite is another CRM that focuses on sales and customers. It provides all your supplier, partner, and customer information in one place.

Just like the other B2B CRMs, it offers sales force automation, marketing automation, lead generation, and sales forecasts. With the Netsuite CRM, you easily access all your information across the entire customer lifecycle.
The main reason to get his CRM is campaign management. It helps companies execute their marketing plans across different channels.
It also offers great customization, reports, and analytics.

You can use the workflow builder to automate processes and connect your orders with your inventory data, saving countless hours.

6) SAP CRM

The SAP CRM is part of the SAP Enterprise Resource Planning Business Suite. This CRM helps companies meet customer expectations.
Sap CRM offers different sub-modules to manage different tasks.

Here’s a list of some of the common sub-modules — Sales, marketing, analytics, service, and Hybris.

Most of the sub-modules are self-explanatory. The Hybris sub-module helps companies manage all of their marketing and E-Commerce needs.

SAP CRM mainly targets large corporations. Take SAP CRM analytics, for example. It helps big companies decide on future strategies by providing information about current product acceptance, retention rates, customer satisfaction, complaints, etc.

7) Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM

Dynamics 365 offers customizable solutions for all your business requirements. You can make use of multiple CRM tools in tandem to fit your requirements.

Dynamics 365 focuses mostly on Sales. They help companies grow their business with an event-driven sales process. They do this by understanding high-quality leads and clients. With the help of pipelines, the entire process of contacting and selling becomes easy.
The CRM lets customers connect with companies easily using multi-channel service options and AI service bots. That way, only if needed, agents will speak to customers. Otherwise, AI bots can solve most problems.

The CRM also streamlines your entire customer service process. It helps your company improve by analyzing feedback, surveys, and discussion forums.

It also makes onboarding new customer agents easy with in-app learning options.

8) Infusionsoft

Infusionsoft is one of the top CRMs that pops up when you search for Salesforce alternatives.

Infusionsoft is a CRM that helps you with sales, marketing, E-Commerce, and content management.

Their goal is to improve the length of customer lifecycle relationships. New users get personalized training to learn the CRM. It typically lasts between 4–12 weeks.

The fact that it has an onboarding process indicates that it is difficult to learn and has a steep learning curve.

It is also much more expensive than the competitors mentioned above.

9) Zendesk Sell

This CRM helps you manage all of your sales. If you want to enhance your customer experience and improve customer experience, you should choose this over Salesforce. It is also much cheaper.

You can try out this CRM with a free trial. After that, the prices are still affordable.

Zendesk Sell has features such as sales reporting, analytics, mobile CRM, email and text automation, sequencing, and tracking.
It also helps you create targeted prospect lists like most CRMs.
Companies that have used this CRM have commented that it has helped them make data-driven decisions and improve sales with a better customer experience.

10) ClickUp

The ClickUp CRM is for people who like using apps like notion and Trello. This CRM helps you organize and improve your customer relationships with lists, Kanban boards, and tables.

It helps you note down the company’s goals and track progress.
You can integrate ClickUp with Slack, Zapier, Github, and countless more apps.

This CRM is great for companies that are more product and design oriented.

You can make your ideas concrete and create the entire flow with whiteboards.

Why New-Age Companies Need a DevCRM

A DevCRM is essential to motivate employees. Let’s look at DevRev to understand this better.

DevRev brings all of a company’s tickets, issues, and tasks to one place. “Trails” helps developers understand the relationship between good features and customer impact.

Developers will get an emotional connection with users. When they see the direct impact of their work in solving problems, they get motivated and stay with the company.

Developers like to get straight to the point. With DevRev, pointless meetings are thrown out of the window.

This past decade, companies have been unsuccessful in retaining employees. They thought that employees wanted goodies and stock options. They were wrong.

Developers want only one thing — impact. That’s what DevRev gives developers.

If you use DevRev, you get happy customers, leading to happy developers. Two birds with one stone.