The right Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software can streamline sales and customer engagement tasks with ease and accuracy — thus fostering better customer retention while also bringing in additional revenue.
Agile CRM helps users automate their marketing, sales, and customer support from a single platform. Its affordable pricing makes it an enticing option for small businesses and startups.
But we want only the best for you 🙂
That’s why we’ve shared the pros and cons of Agile CRM, as well as 11 of the best Agile CRM alternatives:
- EngageBay
- HubSpot
- Insightly
- Pipedrive
- Zoho
- Bitrix24
- Freshsales
- Copper
- Salesforce
- Apptivo
- Nutshell
Happy reading!
Why Do People Use Agile CRM?
Agile CRM is a good option for small businesses with basic marketing and automation needs. It’s quite affordable and is easy to use.
The most important reason small businesses choose Agile CRM is its pricing. Here’s the pricing breakdown:
- Free: This plan is free forever for 10 users, and offers 1,000 contacts, lead scoring, appointment scheduling, and email tracking.
- Starter: This plan costs $8.99/month and adds marketing workflow automation, 2-way email integration, social monitoring, knowledge base, and more.
- Regular: The Regular plan costs $29.99/month for custom deal tracks, 2-way CRM telephony, mobile marketing, and 50,000 contacts.
- Enterprise: For as low as $47.99/month, you get post-call automation, call recording, automated voicemails, integrations, and a dedicated account representative.
It’s clear where the value of using Agile CRM lies — the Enterprise plan offers unlimited contacts at just $48/month.
On the flip side, Agile CRM seems to have lost the glory it enjoyed during the early days. Let’s take a look at some of the glaring disadvantages of using the CRM solution.
The Drawbacks of Using Agile CRM
Here’s a list of some of the key drawbacks of using Agile CRM:
- Email deliverability issues: According to many users, Agile CRM’s email deliverability rates have gone down considerably.
- Poor customer support: Lengthy complaint resolution times and inefficient handling of issues are major concerns when using Agile CRM.
- Basic reporting tools: Agile CRM’s reporting and analytics tools are pretty basic, and many users have complained about the segmentation feature’s ineffectiveness.
- High downtime: Users pointed out multiple instances where certain fundamental features stopped working for days on end.
- Inflexible email templates: The email templates are not fully customizable, meaning you can’t alter them to match your brand image. The drag-and-drop designer is quite basic with just the essential toolkit.
User Reviews of Agile CRM
The real problems in any platform start when you actually use them — and Agile CRM is no exception. Hear out the issues voiced by validated users:
Top 11 Ideal Agile CRM Alternatives
Going the Agile way is not ideal for small businesses, especially in light of the recent issues faced by users. Fortunately, there are plenty of excellent options that offer amazing ROI.
Let’s take a look at 11 of the best Agile CRM alternatives: EngageBay, HubSpot, Insightly, Pipedrive, Zoho, Bitrix24, Freshsales, Copper, Salesforce, Apptivo, and Nutshell.
|
Agile CRM Alternative |
Best for | G2 Rating |
Pricing |
| EngageBay | Small to midsize businesses | 4.3/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $8.99 per user/month |
| HubSpot | Businesses of all sizes | 4.3/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $50 per month |
| Insightly | Small to midsize businesses | 3.9/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $29 per user/month |
| Pipedrive | Sales teams in small and midsize companies | 4.3/5 | Plans start from $12.50 per user/month |
| Zoho CRM | Businesses of all sizes | 3.9/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $14 per user/month |
| Bitrix24 | Businesses of all sizes | 4.0/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $19 per month |
| Freshsales | Businesses of all sizes, particularly those with a large sales team | 4.4/5 | Plans start from $15 per user/month |
| Copper | Small to midsize businesses | 4.3/5 | Plans start from $25 per user/month |
| Salesforce | Businesses of all sizes | 4.2/5 | Plans start from $25 per user/month |
| Apptivo | Small to midsize businesses | 4.4/5 | Free, Paid plans start from $8 per user/month |
| Nutshell | Small businesses with inside sales teams that have relatively long sales cycles | 4.1/5 | Plans start from $19 per user/month |
EngageBay
Small businesses need a comprehensive set of features, from email marketing to sales pipeline management and support — all in one affordable package.
This is where EngageBay comes in: it offers a 360-degree view of your customer across marketing, sales, and customer support without burning through your wallet.
Features
These key EngageBay features help small businesses improve customer relationships, and make the CRM software one of the best Agile CRM alternatives:
- Omnichannel marketing: EngageBay lets you reach a wider audience through multiple channels — phone, email, SMS, social media, and the web.
- Social Suite: You can now manage all your social media accounts, including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, from a single window. The social listening feature lets you figure out what your audience is talking about (on social media).
- Email marketing: Send out newsletters, launch drip campaigns, and easily send welcome emails. The drag-and-drop builder lets you seamlessly design visually stunning email forms without needing code.
- Activity timeline: What’s a CRM if it cannot keep track of your customer’s interactions? With ‘Activity timeline,’ you get a complete history of all the interactions with each customer to help you better understand your customers.
- Sales tools: EngageBay’s suite of sales tools help you push leads down the funnel, schedule appointments, manage tasks, create proposals, and more.
- Helpdesk and live chat: You can deliver exceptional customer support using helpdesk, live chat, ticket prioritization and routing, and service automation.
Here’s a short explainer video of EngageBay:
Pricing
EngageBay offers four plans: Free, Basic, Growth, and Pro.
- Free: The free plan is free forever and offers 500 contacts, 1,000 emails, email marketing, autoresponders, email broadcasts, sequences, and more.
- Basic: The Basic plan starts at $14.99/month for 1,000 contacts, 3,000 emails, SMS marketing, social suite, tag manager, ticket macros, project management, and canned responses.
- Growth: The Growth plan costs $49.99/month for 10,000 contacts, 25,000 emails, marketing automation, A/B testing, custom domains, and timezone-based email delivery.
- Pro: With a price tag of only $99.99/month, this plan offers pro-level tools for advanced businesses, including web analytics, role management, conversational inboxes, account-based marketing, call scripts, and team hierarchy. You also get unlimited contacts and 50,000 emails.
EngageBay also offers a 10% discount on annual plans and a 20% discount on biennial plans.
Why EngageBay is a great alternative to Agile CRM
- Unified Platform: EngageBay provides a holistic set of tools encompassing marketing, sales, and customer support CRM functionalities. By consolidating these services, businesses can streamline their operations, positioning EngageBay as a viable and economical substitute to Agile CRM.
- User-Centric: With its intuitive interface, EngageBay ensures that users can swiftly familiarize themselves with its features. This is especially advantageous for companies that need to transition to a new CRM system without delays.
- Affordable Pricing: Unlike many other CRM tools in the market, EngageBay offers many of its features free of cost. This makes it a great choice for businesses looking for a budget-friendly CRM solution.
- Excellent Customer Support: EngageBay is known for its proactive and friendly support, even for free users. This ensures that businesses can resolve any issues quickly and efficiently.
User reviews
One of the reviewers on G2 mentioned how EngageBay “Streamlined exactly what they needed and got rid of useless functionality”. The user recommended EngageBay for its ability to simplify and streamline sales campaigns, making it an excellent Agile CRM alternative.
Cons
- Limited integration: Some users have reported that EngageBay’s calendar widget and appointments functions need better integration allowances.
- Additional costs for extra features: EngageBay charges extra for certain features, such as tracking website activity, which are not included in the All-in-one suite.
How does EngageBay compare with Agile CRM? (G2 ratings by category)
|
Category |
Agile CRM |
EngageBay |
| Overall Star Rating | 4 Stars | 4.5 Stars |
| Quality of Customer Support | 5.9 | 9.1 |
| Contact Management | 7.4 | 9.1 |
| Email Personalization | 7.6 | 9.1 |
| Email Deliverability | 6.9 | 9.0 |
| Email Marketing | 7.0 | 9.4 |
| Lead Management | 6.8 | 9.4 |
| Online Behaviour Tracking | 7.4 | 8.6 |
| Reporting | 7.7 | 8.7 |
| Dashboards | 8.7 | 8.4 |
Read also: The Top 13 EngageBay Alternatives of 2023 [With Pricing]
HubSpot
HubSpot is a market disrupter when it comes to marketing automation and CRM. That said, HubSpot’s paid plans are too expensive for small businesses (think thousands of $$$ a month!).
Fortunately, they offer a free plan with plenty of tools for businesses to get started.
Features
These free features can help you scale your company:
- Marketing: You get free standalone forms and lead capture forms to help you collect customer details. In addition, Hubspot CRM lets you send optimized bulk emails through the drag-and-drop editor.
- Landing pages: You can create responsive landing pages without writing a single line of code.
- Shared inbox: HubSpot lets you set up a shared inbox for all incoming emails and live chat.
- Customer Service: HubSpot offers a suite of customer support tools, including email scheduling, ticketing, live chat, canned snippets, and ticket pipelines.
Interested in HubSpot competitors? Understand the pros, cons, and pricing of each in this detailed guide.
Pricing
HubSpot offers a free plan, and three paid plans.
- Free: As mentioned above, HubSpot’s free plan includes basic features for businesses just starting out, including forms, landing pages, shared inboxes, live chat, and ticketing.
- Starter: This plan starts at $45/month for 1,000 marketing contacts, email marketing, ad management, email health insights, user management, and more.
- Professional: This plan starts at $1,600/month for 2,000 marketing contacts, content strategy, ABM tools and automation, A/B testing, and website traffic analytics.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan starts at $5,000/month for 10,000 marketing contacts, campaign reporting, calculated properties, advanced record optimization, up to 300 teams, and more.
Why HubSpot is a great alternative to Agile CRM
- User-friendly interface: HubSpot is known for its intuitive and easy-to-use interface. This makes it accessible to users of all skill levels, ensuring quick adaptation and maximization of its capabilities.
- Powerful CRM functionality: HubSpot offers robust CRM functionality, allowing users to easily manage and organize their contacts, track interactions, and gain valuable insights into their sales pipeline.
- Automation capabilities: The automation features in HubSpot Sales Hub enable efficient lead nurturing, email sequences, and task automation, saving time and improving productivity.
- Exceptional customer support: HubSpot is praised for its excellent customer support, ensuring a seamless user experience.
User reviews
A user on G2 highlighted the rarity of encountering bugs and the usefulness of the features in HubSpot. This makes it a reliable and efficient Agile CRM alternative, especially for businesses that require a comprehensive and robust CRM system.
Cons
- Limited Customization: Some users have reported limitations in customization, particularly for unique sales pipeline stages or complex workflows. Advanced customization features may require technical expertise or higher-tier subscription plans.
- Pricing: While HubSpot Sales Hub offers a range of powerful features, some users have found the pricing for additional features to be high, especially for small businesses.
- Contact Management: Some users have reported issues with handling contacts working at multiple companies, which can impact internal workflows.
Read also: Insightly vs Hubspot vs EngageBay — Find Out Which CRM Is Best For You
Insightly
Insightly is another highly affordable CRM designed for small businesses. From business process automation to contact lists, and lead scoring, Insightly has it all — making it an excellent Agile CRM alternative.
Features
The following features make Insightly CRM a good choice for SMBs and startups.
- Dataset rules: Dataset rules help you model datasets and improve security through permission limits.
- Email tracking: You can track open and click rates and real-time monitoring of your email campaigns. Insightly also notifies you when an email is opened.
- Automation: You can schedule tasks and emails, execute external system business logic, and automate deal management using workflows.
- Lead routing: The ‘lead timeline’ tool keeps track of all communications with a lead, including phone calls, tasks, emails, targeted marketing campaigns, and meetings. This information helps you follow up with your leads at the right time.
Pricing
Insightly offers three plans: Plus, Professional, and Enterprise.
- Plus: This plan costs $29/month and offers companywide collaborations, project delivery, and the ability to use on multiple devices.
- Professional: The Professional plan costs $49/month for Insightly Voice, lead management, and lead tracking.
- Enterprise: For $99/month, you get a suite of pro features, including opportunity management, sales team assignments, business intelligence, and event and task activity sets.
Why Insightly is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- Tailored dashboards: Insightly offers the flexibility for users to design dashboards that align with their specific needs, ensuring they monitor the most crucial metrics. This adaptability ensures users prioritize their essential tasks effectively.
- Project management features: Insightly goes beyond traditional CRM functionalities by offering project management features. Users can track project progress, assign tasks, and set milestones, making it a versatile tool for managing not just customer relationships but also internal operations.
- Enhanced relationship tracking: With Insightly, users receive a detailed overview of each contact, encompassing interactions, annotations, and related tasks. This fosters deeper and more informed connections with customers.
User reviews
Insightly is praised for its user-friendly interface and valuable analytics. As per a G2 review, it is an efficient CRM solution that provides insightful data to help businesses make informed decisions, making it a
Cons
- Learning curve: Insightly can be a bit complex to learn initially, especially for those who are new to CRM systems.
- Limited reporting features: While Insightly does offer reporting capabilities, all are somewhat limited compared to other CRM systems.
- Cost: Insightly can be a bit expensive, especially for small businesses or startups with a tight budget.
Read also: 3 Incredible Insightly Alternatives for Small Businesses
Pipedrive
Pipedrive is a great sales CRM software for businesses and teams looking for a comprehensive tool to manage their sales processes. With over 300 integrations, Pipedrive is a perfect sales CRM alternative to Agile CRM.
Features
Take a look at the key features of Pipedrive.
- Sales automation: Pipedrive’s AI sales assistant offers powerful tips, useful ideas, and more to help sales teams close deals smoothly. The sales automation workflow builder automates mundane tasks and streamlines sales processes.
- Email marketing: Though a sales CRM, Pipedrive also offers email marketing to help you send out personalized email campaigns. With email analytics, you can track KPIs and other metrics.
- Integrations: Pipedrive’s Marketplace integrations offer 300+ integrations across accounting, chatbots, email marketing, lead generation, proposals, contracts, and task management. Examples include Zapier, Teams, Slack, DocuSign, Messenger, and more.
- Add-ons: Pipedrive’s add-ons improve the platform’s capabilities (paid separately). This includes LeadBooster, Campaigns, and Web Visitors.
Pricing
Pipedrive has four plans.
- Essential: The Essential plan costs $9.99/month and offers 3,000 daily deals, AI sales assistant, and deal management.
- Advanced: The Advanced plan costs $19.90/month and offers 10,000 daily deals, customizable email templates, and 2-way email sync.
- Professional: The Professional plan costs $39.90/month and gives you 100,000 daily deals, contact timelines, team management, formula fields, and more.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan is Pipedrive’s most advanced plan, with a starting price of $59.90/month. Here, you get unlimited deals, enterprise-level security and features, and more.
Why Pipedrive is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- Sales-centric tools: Pipedrive is tailored for sales teams, boasting functionalities such as deal monitoring, streamlined pipeline oversight, and detailed sales analytics. It’s an optimal choice for enterprises aiming to refine their sales operations.
- User accessibility: Pipedrive stands out for its straightforward and easily navigable interface, minimizing the learning curve and enabling users to harness its capabilities promptly.
- On-the-go access: With Pipedrive’s efficient mobile application, users can seamlessly manage their CRM data remotely, a significant boon for sales professionals who frequently operate beyond office confines.
User reviews
A reviewer on G2 mentioned Pipedrive as “The CRM that Keeps Your Sales Pipeline in Check” highlighting the tool’s adaptability and effectiveness for sales management use case.
Cons
- Advanced features missing: While Pipedrive offers a range of sales-focused features, it lacks some of the advanced features offered by other CRM systems, such as advanced analytics or AI-powered insights.
- Email integration: There can be some issues with integrating Pipedrive with their email systems, which can cause some inconvenience.
Read also: 13 Perfect Pipedrive Alternatives That Can Do More
Zoho
Zoho CRM is another affordable CRM solution for SMBs. It offers dozens of tools that all work together to give you a complete business solution. With Zoho, you get easy contact management, workflow automation, sales forecasting, an easy-to-use interface, and more.
Features
Here are the key features of Zoho:
- Sales pipelines: Zoho’s sales pipeline tool offers deal and lead management, accounts, contacts, and a 360-degree dashboard to help track everything sales-related.
- Teams: Zoho is a great tool for team management and collaboration as it offers admin control, restrictions, meeting schedulers, documentation library, and more.
- Sales automation: Through rules, triggers, and logic, Zoho’s automation tool reduces time spent on repetitive jobs and mundane work, and lets employees work on high-level tasks.
- Field management: Zoho’s mobile CRM makes it easy for field agents and sales reps to manage their customer relationships from anywhere in the world – as long as they have stable internet access.
Pricing
Zoho offers four plans.
- Standard: The Standard plan costs $14/month and offers task management, pipelines, sales forecasting, email insights, templates, and more.
- Professional: The Professional plan costs $23/month for macros, assignment rules, webhooks, custom reports and dashboards, and email relays.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan costs $40/month for email parsers, custom functions, developer sandbox, segmentation, advanced dashboard components, and more.
- Ultimate: The Ultimate plan costs $52/month for advanced BI intelligence, scalability, and Zoho Analytics.
Why Zoho is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- Comprehensive feature set: Zoho CRM offers a wide range of features, including sales force automation, customer support and service, marketing automation, and inventory management. This makes it a comprehensive solution for managing various aspects of a business.
- AI capabilities: Zoho CRM includes an AI assistant that can provide predictive sales analytics, lead scoring, and deal prediction, helping businesses make more informed decisions.
- Unified Zoho ecosystem: Zoho CRM effortlessly syncs with other offerings from the Zoho family, including Zoho Books, Zoho Projects, and Zoho Campaigns. This integration fosters a cohesive environment to oversee diverse business facets.
- Affordable pricing: Compared to other CRM systems, Zoho CRM offers affordable pricing plans, making it a good option for small businesses or startups.
User reviews
A user praised Zoho CRM as a “comprehensive CRM software that empowers Businesses“. This highlights Zoho CRM’s extensive features and its ability to enhance business operations, positioning it as a strong Agile CRM alternative.
Cons
- User-friendliness: Zoho CRM’s interface can be a bit complex and cluttered, making it difficult to navigate.
- Limited customization: While Zoho CRM does offer some customization options, these are somewhat limited compared to other CRM systems.
- Slow Response Rates: Some users have reported slow response times from Zoho CRM’s customer support team.
Read also: Zoho Alternatives — CRM Solutions You Can’t Avoid
Bitrix24
Here’s another amazing sales CRM software for small businesses and startups. With Bitrix24, you get sales pipelines, chats, email marketing, lead management, automation, and more. It’s easy to integrate and manage invoices with Bitrix24, which also supports multiple currencies.
Features
A deep dive into the key features of Bitrix24:
- Multichannel marketing: Bitrix24 allows you to connect with your prospects and customers on multiple channels for a more comprehensive customer experience.
- Live chat: You can embed live chat into your web pages so visitors can resolve their queries quickly.
- Lead management: Customizable web forms, segmentation, and personalization all come together to help you nurture leads and convert them into customers.
- Sales Intelligence: With Bitrix24, it’s easy to calculate your ROI on campaigns, track your metrics, get performance analysis, and streamline various sales processes.
Pricing
Bitrix24 has five plans.
- Free: The Free plan offers chat, calendar, knowledge base, tasks and project management, and more.
- Basic: The Basic plan costs $61/month for an advanced web builder, advanced CRM, online store, and customer support.
- Standard: The Standard plan starts at $124/month for advanced collaboration features, marketing tools, online document management, administration support, and more.
- Professional: Bitrix24’s Professional plan is touted as their most popular one, starting at $249/month. You get full access to their task and project management features, X5 CRM, sales intelligence, HR management, and advanced marketing automation.
- Enterprise plan: The Enterprise plan costs $499/month, has scalability options, Enterprise pack, advanced sales intelligence, multiple branch management, and more.
They also have an on-premise edition starting at $2,990.
Why Bitrix24 is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- All-in-one toolset: Bitrix24 presents an extensive array of functionalities, encompassing CRM, project oversight, and team collaboration. This positions it as a multifaceted solution for enterprises aiming to optimize their workflows.
- Efficient task automation: With its powerful automation features, the platform aids businesses in minimizing redundancy and enhancing operational efficiency.
- Budget-friendly: With its complimentary tier, Bitrix24 emerges as an economical choice for fledgling businesses or startups mindful of their budget constraints.
User reviews
Bitrix24 is recognized for its Integration and Team Collaboration capabilities. This makes it an excellent Agile CRM alternative for businesses that value seamless integration and teamwork.
Cons
- Learning curve: The platform’s interface can be complex and may require a learning curve for new users.
- Customer support: Some users have reported that Bitrix24’s customer support could be improved.
- Overwhelming features: The platform’s extensive features can be overwhelming for businesses that only require a simple CRM solution.
Read also: Bitrix24 Alternatives: Transform Your Customer Engagement and Drive Sales
Freshsales
Freshsales is a unified CRM to help your business align marketing and sales team and manage interactions with potential customers. Freshsales is great for medium-sized businesses and startups.
Freshsales has an intuitive and easy-to-use interface, making it a great option for startups that don’t have the expertise, resources, and funds needed to train their employees on complex CRM solutions.
Features
Freshsales has a plethora of features, including:
- Sales management: With Freshsales, you can automate sales campaigns through automated scheduling, deal tracking, interaction tracking and management, and follow-up workflows. Plus, Freshsales offers goals and milestones to help sales reps achieve their goals easily.
- Deal management: Freshsales Freddy AI automatically recognizes high-value prospects and offers predictions on deal win probability. This helps sales reps and managers make informed decisions to drive revenue.
- Profile enrichment: Automatically captures relevant information, including public information, to enrich lead profiles. The data is automatically added to the CRM.
- Advanced filters: Automatic contact assignment to sales reps through filters and other criteria – a feature called ‘territory management’.
Pricing
Freshsales offers three plans.
- Growth: The Growth plan starts at $15/month and offers contact management, sales sequences, deal management, and more.
- Pro: The Pro plan starts at $39/month for multiple sales pipelines, time-based workflows, territory management, and up to 3,000 bot sessions/month.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan offers advanced CRM customization from $69/month. With this plan, you get custom modules, AI-based forecasting insights, audit logs, and a dedicated account manager.
Why Freshsales is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- Robust lead management: The platform offers robust lead management and sales pipeline tracking tools, helping businesses streamline their sales process and efficiently nurture leads until conversion.
- Integration capabilities: Freshsales supports integration with email marketing and marketing automation tools, enabling businesses to enhance their marketing campaigns.
- Real-time notifications: The platform provides real-time deal opportunity notifications, allowing sales reps to connect with clients promptly.
User reviews
A user on G2 emphasized that “Fresh Sales helps track your email/outbound messaging and engagement with the outside world!“. This focus on monitoring and managing communication with external parties sets it apart as a unique and effective Agile CRM alternative, especially for businesses that prioritize outreach and engagement.
Cons
- Mobile app: Some users have reported that Freshsales’ mobile app could be more feature-rich and offer a smoother user experience.
- Performance issues: Freshsales can be slow and sluggish at times, especially when working with large datasets or running complex reports.
- Customer support: Freshsales’ customer support response time has been criticized by some users.
Read also: 15 Freshworks Alternatives for Great Customer Support
Copper
The next marketing and sales automation platform on this list is Copper. Copper’s inclusion in this list is because of its uniqueness: It directly integrates with Gail and helps you organize contacts, manage tasks, track sales, and more. It also helps you collaborate with others in real-time.
Features
Here’s a list of the key features of Copper CRM:
- Google Workspace integration: Copper CRM seamlessly integrates with Google Workspace making it easy to get relevant information directly into Copper – including Google calendar meetings, Gmail activities, and more.
- Integrations: Copper integrates with multiple apps to improve the overall features of the platform. Integrations include LinkedIn, Zapier, QuickBooks, Dropbox, PandaDoc, Calendly, and more.
- Contextualized communication: Copper lets you instantly view complete information about your customers and their activities.
Pricing
Copper CRM offers three plans:
- Basic: The Basic plan costs $29/month for 2,500 contacts, Google Workspace integration, pipelines, contact enrichment, and team collaboration.
- Professional: The Professional plan costs $69/month for 15,000 contacts, workflow automation, bulk email and templates, reporting, and integrations.
- Business: The Business plan costs $134/month for unlimited contacts, email sequences, drip campaigns, website tracking, lead scoring, and LinkedIn integration.
Why Copper is a good alternative to Agile CRM
- G Suite integration: Copper offers a comprehensive CRM solution that integrates seamlessly with G Suite, allowing businesses to manage their customer relationships directly from their email inbox.
- Project management tools: The platform provides robust project management tools, helping businesses streamline their workflows and improve efficiency.
- Multi-channel communication: Copper supports multi-channel communication, enabling businesses to interact with customers across various channels from a single interface.
User reviews
A G2 user described Copper as “The right app for juggling many moving parts!“. This highlights Copper’s ability to handle complex tasks and processes, making it a viable Agile CRM alternative.
Cons
- Pricing structure: The platform’s pricing structure may be a bit steep for small businesses or startups with limited budgets.
- Mobile app limitations: Copper’s mobile app lacks some of the functionality of the desktop version.
- Limited customization: Copper’s customization options may be limited compared to other CRM solutions.
Read also: Copper CRM Pricing & Comparison With Top Small Business Software
Salesforce
Salesforce offers a lot of products. Since this list concerns affordable alternatives for small businesses, we’ll focus on ‘Salesforce Business CRM’.
While other Salesforce products may be too expensive for small businesses, this particular product is designed especially for SMBs and startups. Let’s dive in.
Features
- Forecasting: Salesforce offers real-time sales forecasting to help your sales reps and managers stay ahead of the curve. Get reports, forecasting, and insights based on customized duration.
- Social insights: With this feature, you get complete social media engagement insights to help you take decisive actions.
- Lead generation and management: Salesforce offers a suite of tools to help you convert leads into paying customers.
Pricing
Salesforce small business CRM offers four plans:
- Essentials: starts at $25/month
- Sales Professional: starts at $75/month
- Service Professional: starts at $75/month
- Pardot Growth: Starts at $1,250/month
Why Salesforce is a Great Alternative to Agile CRM
- Robust functionality: Salesforce offers a comprehensive suite of features that cater to all aspects of customer relationship management, including sales, service, marketing, and more. It’s a versatile CRM tool that can handle complex business processes.
- Personalization: With its wide customization opportunities, Salesforce allows companies to mold the platform in alignment with their unique requirements.
- Advanced analytics: Salesforce provides powerful analytics tools that can help businesses gain insights into their customer data and make informed decisions.
User reviews
A reviewer on G2 stated that “Salesforce is power“. This reflects Salesforce’s robust and powerful features, positioning it as a strong Agile CRM alternative.
Cons
- Complexity: Salesforce’s extensive features and customization options can make the platform complex and difficult to navigate for beginners.
- Cost: Salesforce can be expensive, particularly for small businesses. The cost increases with the addition of more advanced features and users.
- Setup duration: Initiating Salesforce might demand a considerable amount of time, particularly for enterprises with intricate requirements.
- Skill acquisition: To exploit the full potential of Salesforce’s functionalities, users might necessitate specialized training, which can extend in duration and expense.
Read also: Is Salesforce a CRM? A Simple, In-Depth Guide
Apptivo
Apptivo is a comprehensive CRM platform to help you grow and scale your business easily. It’s simple, customizable, and even offers mobile CRM functionality.
Features
Here’s a deep dive into the key features of Apptivo.
- Lead management: Apptivo offers lead conversion, lead scoring, follow-up management, and sales funnel to help you convert leads into customers.
- Contact management: Apptivo’s contact management feature helps you manage all your contacts in one place.
- Opportunities planning: With Apptivo, you can easily track sales opportunities in your pipeline and convert them into earnings.
- Territory management: Apptivo makes it easy for you to create custom territories and sales strategies based on geographic locations.
Pricing
Apptivo offers four plans:
- Lite: The Lite plan costs $10/month for 100 custom fields, 25 workflows, 8 custom dashboards, and 24/7 customer support.
- Premium: The Premium plan starts at $15/month for 46 apps, 250 custom fields per app, 75 workflows, 25 custom dashboards, and 3rd party service integration.
- Ultimate: The Ultimate plan costs $25/month for 150 workflows, 50 custom dashboards, 150 workflows, email sequences, SMS, CPQ, and more.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan offers 500 custom fields, custom integrations, SLA, dedicated customization, white labeling, and an account manager.
Why Apptivo is a Good Alternative to Agile CRM
- Intuitive design: Apptivo boasts a straightforward and easily navigable interface, simplifying CRM task management for users.
- Budget-conscious pricing: Apptivo’s pricing structure stands out as more economical than numerous other CRM solutions, positioning it as a favorable option for small to mid-sized enterprises.
- Versatile connectivity: Apptivo supports seamless integrations with a range of external applications, such as Google Workspace and Office 365, amplifying its utility.
User reviews
A user praised Apptivo for its training support and customer service team, stating, “I liked Apptivo CRM training support and customer service team“. This makes Apptivo a great Agile CRM alternative, especially for businesses that value excellent customer support.
Cons
- Limited advanced features: While Apptivo offers a range of basic CRM features, it may lack some of the advanced features provided by other CRM platforms.
- Performance issues: Some users have reported occasional slow performance and downtime.
- Learning curve: Despite its user-friendly interface, there can be a learning curve when first starting with Apptivo, particularly for users new to CRM systems.
Read also: The 7 Best CRM for Startups in 2023 (Pricing, Features)
Nutshell
Nutshell is an all-in-one marketing and sales CRM for SMBs, and mid-level companies. With Nutshell, you get sales automation, email marketing, team collaboration, and pipeline management.
Features
- Sales automation: Nutshell lets you automate your sales process with ease, and also helps customize pipeline triggers.
- Email marketing: With Nutshell, you can automate and personalize email sequences using pre-built email templates. Nutshell also offers email sync so that you get all your emails in one place.
- Team collaboration: Nutshell lets you stay notified of everything that needs attention through tagging and mobile alerts.
- Contact management: Nutshell helps you store your contacts, notes, and conversations in one place so that everyone can access the same updated information.
Pricing
Nutshell offers three plans.
- Nutshell: This plan starts at $16/month for contact management, email & calendar sync, activity reminders, sales reporting, and more.
- Nutshell Pro: Nutshell Pro starts at $42/month for sales automation, email sequences, funnel and forecast reports, and more.
- Nutshell Limitless: This plan offers unlimited Nutshell seats for $4,975/month and is suitable for massive sales teams.
Why Nutshell is a Good Alternative to Agile CRM?
- Simplicity: Nutshell stands out for its intuitive design and straightforward functionality, ideal for companies venturing into CRM systems for the first time.
- Cost-effective: With its budget-friendly pricing tiers, Nutshell remains a viable option for small to mid-tier enterprises.
- Customizable pipelines: Nutshell offers customizable sales pipelines, allowing businesses to tailor their sales processes to their specific needs.
User reviews
Nutshell is described as a “Great easy to use CRM for small businesses and small teams“. This makes it an ideal Agile CRM alternative for small businesses and teams that need a simple and easy-to-use CRM tool.
Cons
- Search functionality: Some users have reported that the search functionality can be improved for ease of use.
- Mobile app limitations: While Nutshell offers a mobile app, some users have noted that it has limited functionality compared to the full browser version.
- Data import issues: Some users have reported issues with data not transferring over from their old CRM, leading to some data re-entry.
Read also: A Comprehensive Guide to Less Annoying CRM Alternatives
Conclusion
Having a bad CRM can have detrimental effects on the progress (and profits) of your business. It is better to research well and choose a small business platform that fits your company’s needs.
If Agile CRM does not cut it, the 11 Agile CRM alternatives mentioned in this blog post are excellent contenders.
For small businesses, EngageBay is among the best Agile CRM alternatives: it offers a 360-degree view of your customers, has excellent customer support, and is easy to use.
The best part?
It’s quite affordable — even the Pro plan with unlimited features costs under $100.
Sign up now for the version, or book a 30-minute demo with our experts at a time of your convenience.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Agile CRM?
Agile CRM is a comprehensive customer relationship management (CRM) tool that combines sales, marketing, and service capabilities into one platform.
It offers features like contact management, lead scoring, email marketing, web analytics, and helpdesk. Agile CRM is designed to help businesses manage customer relationships more effectively and streamline their sales and marketing processes.
What is Agile CRM’s Pricing?
Agile CRM offers a free version for up to 10 users. For more advanced features, they offer three paid plans: Starter, Regular, and Enterprise.
The Starter plan costs $14.99 per user per month, the Regular plan costs $49.99 per user per month, and the Enterprise plan costs $79.99 per user per month.
Is Agile CRM suitable for SMBs?
Yes, Agile CRM is suitable for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs). It offers a range of features that can help SMBs manage their customer relationships, sales, and marketing efforts more effectively.
Additionally, Agile CRM’s pricing structure, which includes a free version and various tiered pricing plans, makes it a cost-effective solution for SMBs.
