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The 7 Best Free CRM Systems for Business with Cara Wood

In this episode we meet Cara Wood, CRM expert and staff writer for Capterra.  Capterra is a marketing company that specializes in business software reviews.  Today we take Cara’s expertise and have her walk us through 7 free CRM systems for business.  For each of these tools we discuss the  pros, cons, and in what situation the CRM system makes the most business sense. All of these systems are free systems or work in the freemium model; you get started for free and charged you as you grow. 

7 Free CRM Systems Reviewed

Cara wrote an article regarding free CRM systems for business. She researched a number of CRMs and focuses on free one’s specifically. CRM stands for  Customer Relationship Management tool.   It contains contact information on clients and prospective clients.  It also provides reports on sales, tracks lead flow, a to-do list, reminders, and the ability take notes on each interaction.

Fortune is in the Follow Up

I adhere to the 3×8 rule  where you call 8 times in 3 day intervals. It’s by constant follow up are you able to get on your prospects radar and create a relationship.

Many people hate CRM systems. Sales people worry about peers poaching prospects. Most CRMs provide bounds to keep people separated. CRMs should be of help, not a hindrance.

CRM Systems For Business

Hubspot – Cara’s personal favorite. Totally free, not a freemium. The pros of this system is that it’s integrated with the Hubspot marketing software.

Insightly – This system is integrated with email, but not full content marketing email integration.  All features are available. Free for two years. Two users. 150 contacts. Most businesses don’t start paying to use a CRM until 100 contacts.  $12/user

Zurmo – Open Source CRM. You load this on your servers. Provides gamification. 

Bitrix24 – CRM for 12 free users and 5Gb of storage and contains Project Management software (fully loaded) for managing projects.

Free CRM – Free for a year only. 100 free users and 10K contacts. Feature rich. $25/user/mo.

Really Simple Systems – great for novice CRM users for 100 accounts. $8/mo per user.

Highrise – 2 users and 100 contacts.

Note: For some of the systems mentioned in  this post there are  affiliate links.

How To Find Cara Wood

Cara Wood is a marketer at Capterra, a website that helps business software buyers find the perfect software. She enjoys writing about CRMs, marketing tech, and retail tech. And when she’s not writing, she can be found horseback riding and singing Taylor Swift songs. Find her on LinkedIn and Twitter!

This is the article she wrote: The 10 Best Free and Open Source CRM Software Solutions

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