6 best CRMs for small businesses in 2025

Whether you know it or not, you’ve got a stake in CRM software. As a customer, you’ve already interacted with customer relationship management and decided which companies deliver the best experiences. While nearly all enterprise organizations use CRMs to provide first-rate service to millions of customers, a CRM for small businesses is just as valuable.

Implementing a CRM process into your workflow improves your business in a big way—no matter your customer base. This guide will answer some of your most pressing questions about the best CRM software for small businesses and teach you how to leverage them for growth.

• How small business CRM systems work
• Benefits of having a CRM tool for small businesses
• Why small businesses need a CRM platform
• Key features of a CRM for small business
• The best CRMs for small businesses
• How to choose the right small business CRM
• Frequently asked questions
• Get innovative SMB solutions with a modern CRM

A CRM system is like a digital filing cabinet and communication hub for small businesses, designed to track every customer interaction. These smart tools record details about customer contacts, such as when someone first reaches out, makes a purchase, or asks for support. Collecting and managing CRM data from multiple touchpoints helps businesses better understand customers and their journeys.

These systems help businesses work smarter and more efficiently. CRM can automatically sort and qualify sales leads, remind sales teams about follow-ups, and even suggest the best ways to communicate with different clients.

Businesses can also use the insights they collect to create more targeted marketing campaigns for higher lead conversion rates.

Here are some ways using a sales-focused CRM for small businesses can significantly benefit your company.

Get pipeline and performance visibility

Sales management teams require a complete view of their sales pipeline and team performance to plan, track, and analyze their sales process. CRMs help them gather information about customers across channels, including websites, social media, and voice.

Seeing how many customers are in each stage of the pipeline or funnel tells you whether you’re on track to meeting your goals. Additionally, bottlenecking within the process shows you where to direct your focus and adapt your sales CRM strategies.

Boost sales productivity while reducing costs

CRMs can optimize spending and costs, optimizing your ROI. For example, after leading alcoholic beverage distributor Standard Beverage began using Zendesk Sell, the company saw a 300 percent increase in customer accounts.

CRMs can boost conversions and cut costs by automating repetitive tasks, freeing up your time to generate more sales. A CRM can also streamline everyday workflow, so your team has time and energy to pursue more leads, expand your services, add exciting new products or promotions, and identify upsell and cross-sell opportunities.

Deliver personalized sales experience to sell faster

Sales reps need the right tools to provide personalized sales experiences to every customer. With data-driven insights, agents get context into the customer’s buying journey and close deals more quickly. This also helps you build lasting relationships, even as your company grows.

It can also reduce human error by automatically keeping customer data in one place

Remove silos for a better customer experience

Communication and data silos happen when people fail to share important information. CRM software reduces inefficient silo working by letting everyone share their data easily. By integrating support data with sales tools, your business will benefit from more opportunities for enthusiastic collaboration, unified data and easier sharing, and seamless customer experiences.

With a cloud CRM, you have cloud-based storage capabilities, meaning critical customer information is accessible no matter where your team operates. Plus, every team member can see the big picture and how their job contributes to it.

Many small businesses use spreadsheets, calendars, emails, and memory when managing customers. While these may serve you initially, a disorganized system will lead to lost information and customers. Here are five reasons you should opt for a CRM instead.

Centralized customer data

A CRM platform is the single source of truth (SSOT) for all customer interactions, eliminating the chaos of scattered spreadsheets and disconnected communication channels.

By consolidating customer information into one system, small businesses can ensure every team member has access to the most up-to-date and comprehensive information. Customer data management with a CRM prevents data duplications, reduces the risk of miscommunication, and provides a 360-degree customer view.

Improved customer relationships

With a CRM, small businesses can deeply personalize the customer experience (CX) by tracking and analyzing interactions across multiple touchpoints. A detailed history of customer communications, preferences, purchases, support requests, and more helps develop a nuanced understanding of each customer.

This rich data allows for more targeted, meaningful interactions and demonstrates to customers that you understand and value their unique needs.

Increased sales

Identifying and prioritizing high-value leads is a fundamental step in any sales strategy, and it’s a key function of the best CRM platforms. The system can automatically score leads based on their interactions and potential value so sales teams focus their efforts on the most promising opportunities.

Features like automatic follow-ups and dashboards with sales pipeline views help pursue those valuable leads with consistency while monitoring pipeline progress for individual team members or entire sales teams. These automations also help reduce administrative overhead for busy sales representatives.

Better, faster customer service

Post-sale customer service should not be an afterthought when building your CRM and sales process. CRMs provide support teams with immediate access to customer histories.

When a customer reaches out with a question or issue, support reps can quickly understand the full context of previous interactions, enabling faster and more informed responses. The system can also automate support functions like ticket routing and follow-up reminders to keep inquiries from falling through the cracks.

More seamless team collaboration

Departmental silos can lead to miscommunication and a lack of consistency between sales, customer support, marketing, and other teams. CRMs break down those silos by creating a shared environment where all relevant teams can access and share critical customer information. This cross-department visibility keeps everyone in the loop and ensures a more aligned, efficient organization that responds quickly and effectively to customer needs.

Key features of a CRM for small business

Although most CRMs offer valuable features, not all solutions suit small businesses. Here are the components that every small business should look for in a CRM.

Centralized platform and complete customer view

Your CRM dashboard is a visual representation of all your business activities—perfect for small businesses that need to maximize every customer interaction. It easily tracks goals, contacts, and metrics with charts, reports, graphs, and maps. It’s a one-stop shop for the most crucial and up-to-date CRM data, so you always have an eye on your business performance, which is essential when operating with a lean team.

Importantly, a dashboard must be customizable and tailored to reflect your unique sales process because not everyone needs to see all their numbers at once. For small businesses where employees often wear multiple hats, employees should be able to pick and choose precisely what data they want to display on their personalized dashboard.

Accurate forecasting and out-of-the-box reporting

Access to past data and smart CRM analytics enables teams to identify areas for improvement and forecast sales trends. This saves you from end-of-quarter surprises and helps you manage your pipeline in real time—crucial when operating with the limited resources of a small business.

Zendesk Sell gives you complete pipeline visibility to plan, track, manage, and analyze your sales process with out-of-the-box reporting. Even with a small team, you can:

• Uncover sales insights with accurate forecasting
• Keep agents on track to hit sales goals with custom performance dashboards
• Track and manage each stage of the sales pipeline to optimize conversions

You can then use this information to provide data-driven coaching with metrics on your pipeline, activities, and goals, helping your small team perform like a much larger organization.

Bulk email and an automated power dialer

For small businesses looking to scale their outreach without adding headcount, bulk email allows you to send automated emails to leads and customers. Many CRMs also include pre-made templates so you can easily create messages and monitor success. Finally, third-party integrations can sync with popular email apps and ensure your messages come through.

An automated power dialer will help with telephone outreach by automatically adding phone numbers to an agent's queue and dialing them in sequence. In turn, your staff can cut out rote work and focus on more important tasks.

Automated triggers and reminders

When you write down a task on a sticky note, it won’t send out a reminder when that due date is approaching. For small business owners juggling multiple responsibilities, a CRM can help with reminders, follow-ups, and more to ensure timely adherence.

Easy-to-use scheduling with automated triggers and notification features is like gifting every team member with a personal assistant who reminds them of important appointments.

Automatic activity tracking of calls, emails, and appointments

Collecting your pipeline data won’t do much for you without proper management. At its most basic, a CRM system helps manage your contact lists. Designed with small business efficiency in mind, standard and batch data management tools also allow you to:

• Automatically collect customer data from calls, emails, and appointments, saving precious time for your lean team.
• Segment your contact lists into different groups to target customers precisely when running new promotions or announcing new products.
• Delete duplicate accounts and update old data as it becomes obsolete.
• Put up-to-date security in place so your customer information is safe from hackers and breaches, providing enterprise-level protection for your small business.

These tools also allow you to leverage cloud CRM software so anyone from your team can drop contacts into the list and prevent time-sensitive leads from wasting away in unshared spreadsheets.

Although most CRMs offer valuable features, not all solutions suit small businesses. Here are the components that every small business should look for in a CRM.

Centralized platform and complete customer view

Your CRM dashboard is a visual representation of all your business activities—perfect for small businesses that need to maximize every customer interaction. It easily tracks goals, contacts, and metrics with charts, reports, graphs, and maps. It’s a one-stop shop for the most crucial and up-to-date CRM data, so you always have an eye on your business performance, which is essential when operating with a lean team.

Importantly, a dashboard must be customizable and tailored to reflect your unique sales process because not everyone needs to see all their numbers at once. For small businesses where employees often wear multiple hats, employees should be able to pick and choose precisely what data they want to display on their personalized dashboard.

Accurate forecasting and out-of-the-box reporting

Access to past data and smart CRM analytics enables teams to identify areas for improvement and forecast sales trends. This saves you from end-of-quarter surprises and helps you manage your pipeline in real time—crucial when operating with the limited resources of a small business.

Zendesk Sell gives you complete pipeline visibility to plan, track, manage, and analyze your sales process with out-of-the-box reporting. Even with a small team, you can:

• Uncover sales insights with accurate forecasting
• Keep agents on track to hit sales goals with custom performance dashboards
• Track and manage each stage of the sales pipeline to optimize conversions

You can then use this information to provide data-driven coaching with metrics on your pipeline, activities, and goals, helping your small team perform like a much larger organization.

Bulk email and an automated power dialer

For small businesses looking to scale their outreach without adding headcount, bulk email allows you to send automated emails to leads and customers. Many CRMs also include pre-made templates so you can easily create messages and monitor success. Finally, third-party integrations can sync with popular email apps and ensure your messages come through.

An automated power dialer will help with telephone outreach by automatically adding phone numbers to an agent's queue and dialing them in sequence. In turn, your staff can cut out rote work and focus on more important tasks.

Automated triggers and reminders

When you write down a task on a sticky note, it won’t send out a reminder when that due date is approaching. For small business owners juggling multiple responsibilities, a CRM can help with reminders, follow-ups, and more to ensure timely adherence.

Easy-to-use scheduling with automated triggers and notification features is like gifting every team member with a personal assistant who reminds them of important appointments.

Automatic activity tracking of calls, emails, and appointments

Collecting your pipeline data won’t do much for you without proper management. At its most basic, a CRM system helps manage your contact lists. Designed with small business efficiency in mind, standard and batch data management tools also allow you to:

• Automatically collect customer data from calls, emails, and appointments, saving precious time for your lean team.
• Segment your contact lists into different groups to target customers precisely when running new promotions or announcing new products.
• Delete duplicate accounts and update old data as it becomes obsolete.
• Put up-to-date security in place so your customer information is safe from hackers and breaches, providing enterprise-level protection for your small business.

These tools also allow you to leverage cloud CRM software so anyone from your team can drop contacts into the list and prevent time-sensitive leads from wasting away in unshared spreadsheets.

If you’re a small business, you don’t need months-long onboarding—you need a CRM that’s inexpensive and easy to set up. Take a look at our CRM software guide for the top CRMs for small businesses, broken down by their features and price.

Jump to:

• Zendesk Sell: Best for small and large businesses needing integrated CRM
• Drip: Best for e-commerce lead management
• Agile CRM: Best for businesses that want basic automation
• Constant Contact: Best for businesses with limited customization needs
• HubSpot: Best for inbound marketing professionals
• Salesforce Sales Cloud: Best for businesses that live in the Salesforce ecosystem

1. Zendesk Sell

Zendesk Sell is a powerful, modern sales CRM that maximizes productivity, processes, and pipeline visibility for small businesses. It prioritizes usability and CRM best practices, ensuring high adoption among your team and return on investment.

Additionally, businesses can seamlessly integrate with Zendesk customer support software out of the box to deliver a best-in-class customer experience. The result is an integrated CRM with a complete 360-degree contact view that delivers the productivity tools, automation, and advanced reports and analytics sales teams need as their business grows.

Zendesk Sell gives companies the resources and tools to create a seamless sales experience for prospects. Users can customize Sell to fit any sales process, unify key prospect and customer information, and align teams for success. The software offers ease of use and flexibility with a host of apps and integrations in the Zendesk Marketplace to extend Sell’s functionality to fit your business needs. With a simple interface, you can enjoy a fast setup, high adoption, and immediate ROI.

Additionally, Sell stays with your agents wherever they go. With our mobile app, you can access the full functionality of Sell from your mobile device. Geolocation abilities further enhance your sales experience on the go.

Zendesk Sell boasts the right balance of powerful yet easy-to-use tools with solutions that help small businesses close more deals faster. As a result, Zendesk is the top CRM for small businesses.

Features

• Pipeline management
• Reporting dashboards
• 360-degree contact view
• Email tracking and templates
• Lead tracking
• Advanced sales analytics
• Workflow automation
• Integrated communication channels
• Prospecting and lead generation tools
• Forecasting
• Mobile support
• Marketplace with 1,800+ third-party integrations

Pros	Cons
Flexible, scalable platform Robust lead and deal management features	Free trial only lasts 14 days

Explore more Zendesk pricing plans.

2. Drip

Best for e-commerce lead management

Drip focuses on lead management in the e-commerce industry. It has cloud-based capabilities and a tagging system that lets users organize their contacts using any custom field. Drip bases its pricing on the number of subscribers users have on their contact list.

Its dashboards and analytics point to actionable segment insights, generate personalized benchmarks, and suggest business actions based on past performance results. Drip’s library of pre-built templates for emails, forms, and pop-ups functions with its visual builder. Together, they allow you to design and personalize a unique SMS for your business.

Features

• Workflow automation
• Contact management
• List segmentation
• A/B testing
• Analytics/ROI tracking
• Email templates
• Dashboard
• Tagging

Pros	Cons
Easy to use Email automation features	Steep learning curve Slow, buggy performance

Pricing: Plans start at $39month for up to 2,500 contacts. A 14-day free trial is available.

3. Agile CRM

Best for businesses that want basic automation

Agile CRM automates sales, marketing, and service in one location. It has basic automation features like email campaigns and lead nurturing. Agents can integrate Agile with several third-party service providers, websites, and apps. Teams can also consolidate email, social media, billing, and comprehensive customer data in one location.

With its Telephony feature, you get one-click calling, call scripts, and voicemail automation. You can automate personalized SMS texts with custom follow-up emails, too. Agile tracks email performance, providing relevant metrics and data in real time. Agile also offers a cloud-based SaaS service that works on most mobile devices.

Features

• 360-degree contact view
• Project management
• Lead scoring
• Appointment scheduling
• Auto dialer
• Lead prospector

Pros	Cons
User-friendly interface Pipeline visibility	Basic automation options Limited data privacy

Pricing: Paid plans start at $8.99 per month, billed biennially. A free plan is available.

4. Constant Contact

Best for businesses with limited customization needs

Constant Contact is an email marketing provider that targets e-commerce brands. Users can create e-magazines, email coupons, and social media campaigns with limited customization to bring in leads from different platforms. The software includes an AI-powered website builder with a content delivery network (CDN) for users to design simple e-commerce websites. Pricing depends on the number of contacts on a user’s email list.

Constant Contact uses one-on-one messaging tools and automated follow-ups, so you have fewer manual administrative tasks. The database, behavioral tracking, and rules engine assist with gauging company performance and ROI. Constant Contact also pairs you with an onboarding specialist to assist with goal setting and platform training.

Features

• A/B testing
• Analytics/ROI tracking
• Image library
• Social marketing
• Contact database
• Segmentation
• Landing pages/web forms
• Dashboard

Pros	Cons
Easy to use Design customizations	Limited AI features Limited customization options

Pricing: Plans start at $12/month for up to 500 contacts. A 30-day free trial is available.

5. HubSpot

HubSpot is a free CRM software that integrates with other HubSpot tools, making it simple for inbound marketing teams to set up and use. It also has additional premium features that are purchasable at a scaling rate. Like many CRMs, HubSpot markets itself as an easy-to-use platform where you can track and analyze sales activity in real time. View your sales pipeline data on a visual dashboard, including reports on sales activity, productivity, and individual performance.

The CRM allows unlimited users, unlimited data, and up to 1 million contacts with no time limits or expiration dates. A meeting scheduler can automatically connect with your Google or Office 365 calendar and record meetings. HubSpot automatically adds meetings to your contacts database as potential customers schedule or request meetings.

Features

• Contact management
• Gmail and Outlook integrations
• App Marketplace integration
• Custom support form fields
• Email tracking and notifications
• Meeting scheduling
• Deal tracking
• Pipeline management
• Reporting dashboard

Pros	Cons
Easy to use Email automation features	Additional cost for features like automation Limited customization options

Pricing: HubSpot CRM is free. HubSpot Sales Hub begins at $15 per seat/month, billed annually.

Learn more: Discover how the HubSpot CRM integrates with Zendesk and how Zendesk and HubSpot compare.

6. Salesforce Sales Cloud

Best for businesses that live in the Salesforce ecosystem

Salesforce Sales Cloud is a CRM solution with integrations and additional software components. Salesforce provides an entire tech stack with different sales, service, marketing, commerce, and communications platforms. Features like reporting and analytics capturing and automation make Salesforce a popular option in the SaaS industry.

However, many companies will need to upgrade to the Pro Suite plan ($100 per user/month) to fully utilize the platform. Additionally, Salesforce works best with other Salesforce applications, so for any business with existing software, this might be an overly complex option.

Features

• Contact management
• Email integration
• Automated workflows
• Sales engagement
• Sales forecasting
• Pipeline management
• Sales insights
• Reporting and analytics
• Meeting scheduling
• Available support software

Pros	Cons
360-degree customer view Customization	Expensive for small businesses Steep learning curve

Pricing: Plans start at $25 per user/month. A 30-day free trial is available.

Learn more: Discover how Salesforce integrates with Zendesk and how Zendesk and Salesforce compare.

Your small business CRM software should meet your customer, sales app, and sales management requirements without weighing you down with extra tools. Since there are many types of CRM software, you’ll want to think carefully before choosing one. Consider these must-have qualities before choosing a CRM vendor:

• Productivity-boosting features: As teams expand and take on more customers, your business needs the right tools to stay ahead of growing demand. A great CRM can boost your productivity by automating tasks in your workflow, centralizing messaging and documentation, fostering team collaboration, and much more.
• Scalability: Managers and agents thrive when CRM tools for small businesses scale to their company's needs and requirements. A scalable CRM will accommodate new hires as you grow, adapt to changes in your sales process, prospects, and sales funnel best practices, integrate with a wide range of third-party platforms, and more.
• Low total cost of ownership (TCO): The total cost of ownership (TCO) should stay low from setup to ongoing maintenance. Your CRM's TCO includes the software's purchase price and the cost of operation. In addition to keeping costs low, a great CRM will offer a fast time to value. Tools like Zendesk Sell ensure businesses can quickly adapt to customer expectations and stay relevant.
• Centralized tool for sales and support: Most CRMs focus on either sales or support functions. While this emphasis can complement your profit model, small business CRMs should cover both. Using one solution for sales and support results in a lower TCO than juggling two CRMs, the ability to track customers through the whole sales cycle, easier access to support data for lead conversion, and sales insights for customer retention.
• Modern, easy-to-use interface: Ease of use is vital for CRM management. Modern CRMs should deliver intuitive interfaces that organize your data in unified workspaces. Businesses also need insight into what functions work best at any stage of the sales cycle and across different channels. With most CRMs, some complexity is inevitable. Small business CRM tools should provide customer support as Zendesk Sell does to work around that.

Talk with your team and consider everyone’s needs so you can build a strong CRM strategy that everyone approves of.