Ever wonder how to choose CRM software the right way? You've come to the right place — here's where you'll find the secrets for selecting the tool that'll meet your every need.

Customer relationship management (CRM) software is a solution many companies use to maintain strong relationships with their new, potential, and existing clients, with Gartner predicting it would become the single largest revenue area of spending in enterprise software.

With the CRM market projected to reach $88.19 billion by 2024, it's now more important than ever to invest in such a solution.

There's one tiny problem: how do you choose the right software?

You'd probably have a hard time doing this on your own. But with this buyer's guide, you can navigate the tumultuous sea of vendors and choose a tool that fits your requirements, use case, and budget.

What Is CRM Software?

CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software is a system that manages all your company's interactions and relationships with customers, leads, and suppliers while tracking customer data and uncovering growth opportunities.

Plus, CRM provides excellent customer support throughout the buyer's lifecycle, helping you stay connected with your customer base at every touch point.

Who is CRM for? Well, everyone! No matter your industry or department, you can use this tool to manage every aspect of the customer journey and have all information about them readily available.

How exactly do you use CRM, though? Let's find out.

Types of CRM Software

While most CRM platforms share common goals, they can be categorized into four main types based on their primary function. Understanding these types helps you align a solution with your specific business objectives.

• Operational CRM: Automates daily sales, marketing, and service processes

• Analytical CRM: Analyzes customer data to identify patterns and trends

• Collaborative CRM: Shares customer information across departments

• Strategic CRM: Builds long-term customer relationships through data-driven strategy

How Is CRM Software Used?

A good CRM tool harnesses the power of data to:

• Track customer behavior — CRM helps you uncover valuable insights about your customers, such as how they interact with your products and services, what their preferences are, etc.

• Automate feedback collection — Tired of always guessing what your clients think about your brand? CRM collects all customer feedback in a single place, which allows you to improve your services.

• Make data-driven decisions — The best way to drive business growth and create stronger customer relationships is through a CRM program. Through data analysis, this tool predicts user behavior and identifies patterns so you can make better business decisions.

• Personalize customer experiences — CRM knows how to make your customers feel seen and understood. With this tool, you can deliver tailored customer interactions that strengthen your bonds.

• Improve brand perception — It's important to listen to what people say about your company on social media channels. This helps create customer loyalty and improve brand visibility.

But these are only a few of the things it can do.

The right CRM software streamlines your business processes by replacing cumbersome spreadsheets and complex databases and connecting your workflows into one place.

Which brings us to the benefits of using CRM…

What Are the Benefits of Using CRM Software?

Like any other tool you have in your business, CRM software comes packed with tons of benefits:

• Better customer relationships: 85% of people cite improved customer experiences as one of the top three benefits of CRM software. It's no wonder. Since this software makes customer information accessible to anyone who needs it, your team members can boost customer satisfaction.

• Increased sales processes: A good CRM tool automates your business operations and key tasks through marketing automation. This frees your employees' time, so they can focus on more productive tasks.

• Better analytics and targeted marketing campaigns: CRM software transforms raw data into actionable insights, helping you measure and improve marketing performance.

• Reduced costs: Many CRMs are flexible and scalable, meaning that they're easy to implement and grow with your business. Plus, since most tools have a per-user pricing plan, you only have to pay for what you need, including features. As a result, you keep costs low and use CRM as you like.

In conclusion? Well, since you gain visibility into all your operations, you can increase team productivity and streamline your sales pipeline.

So, how do you choose the best CRM system for your needs? Let's dive in.

How to Choose the Right CRM System

The CRM software market will continue to grow, reaching a volume of $131.90 billion by 2028. With this huge increase, more and more CRM systems will sprout like mushrooms after rain.

Which doesn't make your decision easier.

It'll take hours to compare them all; plus, since each one has unique features (which sound good on paper, but do you really need them?) it's even harder to wrap your head around which solution to choose.

Luckily, choosing the right CRM provider can be a walk in the park if you follow these steps:

Step #1: Identify specific goals and objectives

Every selection process begins with identifying your challenges and needs, aka what you're trying to accomplish.

For example, do you just wanna get rid of slow-loading spreadsheets? If you're a small business, then you won't need much out of your CRM tool. But what if you wanna overhaul your customer support service?

To help, answer these questions:

• Is your current tool enough to meet business requirements?

• What do you want to address with CRM?

• How many people will use the CRM system?

• What is the size of your budget?

• Will you integrate the CRM software with other existing tools?

By mapping out your goals and expectations, you can focus on CRM software that actively works to improve your operations, a crucial step given research from Gallup shows only 15% of U.S. workers feel their organization has communicated a clear plan for integrating new AI technologies.

Step #2: Assess your budget

Curiosity got the better of you — a quick Google search showed you some options that caught your eye. You considered them and added them to your shortlist, only to find they're waaay too expensive.

To avoid disappointment and wasted time, try to set your budget from the get-go. Talk with your team members to set your expectations, and rule out any CRM tool outside the price range.

Step #3: Make a list of features and functionalities

Budget: ✅

Needs: ✅

Features: Loading…

List your must-have features by consulting your sales team—they'll be the primary users. Focus on essential capabilities first, then add nice-to-have features if budget allows.

Usually, CRM software should have the following features:

• Reporting capabilities

• Lead management

• Sales forecasting

• [Project management software] (https://www.getguru.com/reference/how-to-choose-project-management-software)

• Marketing automation

• Contact management

• Collaboration tools

• Customer satisfaction polls and surveys

But we can talk in greater detail about these features later on — stay tuned.

Step #4: Research CRM software vendors

This step takes time, so grab some coffee! ☕ Here are the best research approaches:

• Buyer's guides: Start with comprehensive guides like this one

• Review sites: Check G2 or TrustRadius for real user feedback

• Network recommendations: Ask colleagues about their experiences and ease of use

Step #5: Request demos and trials

Before you try out the tools, however, there's one more thing you have to do.

And that is to trim your list of vendors to between three and five preferred options. Not only does this bring you closer to your final decision but it also helps you test tools more quickly.

With that done, you can now request demos and trials from your top contenders.

Most providers offer free 30-day trials that you can take advantage of by signing up. Some vendors even have free plans, which is highly useful especially if you don't need much out of your CRM.

Reach out to the vendors on your list and take the tool for a spin. Remember to invite your team members, too. Their feedback will be invaluable since they're the ones who'll use it most. Let them get a sense of the CRM software and try to narrow down your list even further.

Step #6: Make your decision and implement

After going through all the above steps, you should be closer to making the final choice.

For some, it's clear right from the testing phase who's the winner. But for others, testing several tools might only narrow down their options to two good ones.

If you're in the latter category, do some more research, test them further, and ask for opinions. Make your final decision and begin implementation.

Your chosen tool's ease of use will determine how fast the onboarding process takes — and how easy it'll blend with your existing workflows.

We've promised that we'll look closer at the features — and we're ready to deliver on it.

What CRM Features to Look for?

CRM software is more than just a marketing tool; it's a good way to drive more sales and retain customers. But what features should you focus on when selecting a new system?

Here are a few ideas:

• Contact management: At the center of any CRM program you should find contact management tools. These help organize your customer data, such as client interaction history and demographics. They are supposed to offer insight into what you can do to improve the user experience.

• Lead scoring: This feature identifies quality leads and helps you filter them. Which means your team can stay on top of them and remove dead leads before they clog your workflows.

• Report analytics and dashboards: Your chosen CRM solution should provide a complete view of your operations. It should have reports, lead info, forecasts, etc., that are visually pleasing and easy to understand. And let you customize them however you want for better visibility.

• Integrations: Connects with existing tools like project management, accounting, and email platforms. Research shows data accessibility shortens sales cycles by 8–14%.

• Customer service tools: CRM is all about customers (it's in the name, after all!) so it should have customer service capabilities like pre-made templates, automated sales histories, etc.

So, after all this, the question remains: which is the best CRM software currently available?

Let's see…

10 CRM Software Solutions to Consider

Maybe you don't wanna spend hours checking lists on Capterra; a simple buyer's guide is enough. And guess what? THIS is the only guide you need to make the correct decision.

So, to aid your selection process, we've made a list of the best CRM vendors that you should definitely check out.

HubSpot CRM

HubSpot is an AI-powered customer service tool with free CRM software for your teams.

With this handy tool, you can track and analyze your whole sales pipeline in real time on a visual dashboard.

Moreover, you have detailed reports you can access to spot growth opportunities.

In the words of a happy reviewer, "You don't only have a CRM to track your tasks, but also … a place where you can literally do anything you need within your business."

HubSpot also notifies you when someone opens an email, so you can follow up instantly via live chat, email, or phone.

And it integrates with Guru!

Salesforce

Salesforce is a cloud-based CRM tool that analyzes your data to bring you valuable insights while helping you attract and retain loyal customers.

What does Salesforce do? Well, "It tracks leads, accounts, contacts, and opportunities and the screens are very similar, so it's easy to learn."

In a nutshell, Salesforce unites your teams into a single source of truth; as a result, they'll always have customer data and knowledge at their fingertips. Furthermore, it's adaptive, scalable, secure, and flexible, meeting your business needs no matter the size.

You can integrate Salesforce with almost any data source, such as MuleSoft, Tableau, Slack, and even Guru.

Pipedrive

Pipedrive offers a combo of sales CRM and pipeline management into one user-friendly solution.

With this agile CRM software, you can automate your sales pipeline and save more time. It also lets you dive into real-time sales reports to get a good view of your sales funnel. With Pipedrive's advanced analytics, team monitoring, and forecasting, you can make better data-driven decisions.

"It helps me a lot in maintaining fruitful partnerships and exceptional lead follow-up. The fact that Pipedrive can increase revenue through sales management is, in my opinion, its best feature."

Pipedrive connects with tons of apps, including Guru.

Insightly

Insightly provides sales and marketing teams of all sizes with an affordable CRM platform that helps them increase productivity and build lasting customer relationships.

It has plenty of useful features, such as project management, lead tracking, and workflow automation. With these, you can increase sales efficiency and transparency, eliminating bottlenecks and inconsistencies.

But Insightly also scales with your company, meaning that it'll always work to elevate your customer experience and solve customer problems faster, regardless of your business's size.

"Insightly is very user-friendly and customizable to fit your specific needs ... Overall, it massively improves the efficiency of my team."

Insightly integrates with Guru — see how here.

Sugar Sell

Sugar Sell is an advanced CRM solution that connects your marketing, sales, and service teams so they can focus on accelerating sales, increasing productivity, and creating engaging customer experiences.

This on-site CRM tool combines AI technology, marketing automation, and customer service to fuel growth, aligning with a broader trend where 33% of U.S. workers report their organizations have begun integrating new AI technology to improve business practices.

"... almost anything you can think of] _[can be automated and you don't need to be a tech wizard to achieve some really slick processes._"

So, not only does it deliver the right leads, but Sugar Sell also puts your marketing campaigns on autopilot, resulting in better outcomes.

It's also renowned for its integrations, one of them being with Guru.

Zendesk Sell

Zendesk Sell, a modern CRM platform, helps sales reps accelerate revenue and enhance customer experience.

Zendesk is easy to use and intuitive, meaning that your teams will have no problem learning it.

"Zendesk has truly simplified our customer support journey. The clean and straightforward interface made it a breeze to navigate through customer tickets."

No wonder — with features like advanced analytics, productivity tools, and dashboards, you have everything you need in one place. Moreover, you can unlock better team productivity and always meet customer expectations at all touchpoints.

Among Zendesk Sell's countless integrations is an integration with Guru.

Zoho CRM

Zoho CRM is suitable for midsize to large organizations offering various useful features, such as workflow automation, contact management, and an AI-powered conversational assistant.

What exactly does it do? Zoho CRM helps you close more deals, enjoy better visibility into your sales pipeline, and build stronger customer relationships.

Moreover, your business can harness the power of KPIs, predictive intelligence, and omni-channel to deliver tailored experiences that create loyal consumers.

"Zoho CRM plays well with others. Integrating with different business tools feels like a harmonious symphony rather than a tech battle."

And surprise! Zoho CRM integrates with Guru.

Copper

Copper is an easy-to-use CRM software solution with a strong focus on growing your business.

How does it achieve that? Through simple workflow automation that gets rid of tedious tasks. And 360-degree visibility into sales activities across all your teams. This way, you avoid missing growth opportunities and losing leads.

Moreover, "Copper CRM is a user-friendly and customizable CRM that seamlessly integrates with Google Workspace, making it an ideal choice for businesses that rely on Gmail, Calendar, and other Google apps."

And yes — Copper easily connects with other tools, including Guru. But it's particularly ideal for those working with Google Workspace.

Apptivo

Apptivo is more than just CRM software — it's a SaaS business management tool for companies of all sizes.

What people like most about Apptivo is its customer service. "The entire support team at Apptivo is helpful, easy to reach, and knowledgeable." So, if you have a problem with the software, Apptivo can help you figure it out in a few minutes.

Moreover, this tool has typical CRM features, like schedule reports, workflow automation, multiple sales cycles, etc. Apptivo also comes in various shapes and sizes, like mobile or integrated.

Speaking of integrations, Apptivo seamlessly blends with your current tools; and don't forget about Guru!

Monday.com

A Monday you'll definitely not hate, Monday.com is a project management solution at heart. But it also has fully customizable CRM capabilities, such as automated task generation and formula building.

You can personalize Monday.com however you want, depending on your needs. It has building blocks like automations, integrations, and dashboards that help you create an intuitive workspace for your teams.

"We can section staff into teams to ensure the right info is displayed to the right people — this keeps things clean and allows us to categorize the content that's applicable for different teams."

Monday.com integrates nicely with third-party apps — and yes, with Guru, too!

Connect Your CRM to Your AI Source of Truth

Choosing the right CRM is just the first step. The real value comes from connecting your CRM data to your company's broader knowledge ecosystem.

Most CRMs store customer data, but critical information lives elsewhere:

• Product documentation

• Support playbooks

• Marketing campaign details

• Internal processes and procedures

This is where an AI Source of Truth like Guru becomes essential, especially when data from Gallup shows that 7 in 10 U.S. employees never use AI, highlighting a significant adoption gap. Guru connects all your apps to create a single company brain that teams can access through Slack, Teams, or their browser.

The result? Trusted, permission-aware answers that combine CRM insights with organization-wide knowledge. When experts update information, it's corrected once and propagates everywhere. Watch a demo to see how Guru amplifies your CRM's power.