Zoho vs Salesforce: Pick the Best CRM for You in 2023

Zoho CRM is a more affordable option than Salesforce. Zoho CRM’s free-for-life edition is a great option for small business owners who want the basic features of a CRM, such as contact management and standard reporting. And, if the number of your CRM users grows past three, the jump to the enterprise option is anything but prohibitive at $40 per user per month, and gives you advanced features like AI-backed suggestions and more customization options.

Salesforce is a more expensive choice than Zoho CRM, especially if you factor in the potential outside costs of hiring a Salesforce administrator, which is typical for medium to large businesses attempting to get the most out of the software’s Enterprise or Ultimate editions. However, Salesforce’s Essentials plan is $25 per user, per month — only $11 more than Zoho’s standard plan. Salesforce offers a 30-day free trial for those looking to test it out.

Zoho CRM has a large feature set to help businesses effectively track leads, contacts, and deals. It even ties in social media data regarding contacts, and allows you to communicate with contacts in-platform through live chat, email, and other channels. Zoho also offers marketing capabilities, like its ability to run email nurturing campaigns. The Enterprise plan includes the CommandCenter, where you can personalize the customer journey of your leads.

Salesforce, however, reigns supreme when it comes to range and depth of features. All plans offer robust contact, account, lead, and opportunity management functions. Users will also get great 360 degree views of their contacts’ demographics, communication history, and past actions. But, its Enterprise and Ultimate plans shine brightest, boasting workflow tools that allow you to easily automate almost any CRM task, including lead scoring and distribution to reps.

Zoho CRM is known as one of the more user-friendly CRMs. Its intuitive, no-frills interface and wizard-guided setup make it easy to get the software up and running quickly. Zoho users also enjoy how easy it is to customize when compared to Salesforce — albeit, this is in part because the customization options are less complex. Users can pay an extra 20-25% of the license fee for onboarding support, or, if they have over 25 users, an account manager for ongoing help.

Salesforce offers tremendous functionality and the highest level of customization, but it comes with quite the learning curve, which prompts many businesses to hire an in-house Salesforce administrator to manage the system. Setup is a cumbersome process due to the software’s flexibility, and mistakes can lead to issues later on. However, fans do often state that once you’ve learned the platform, it offers endless possibilities and easy navigation.

Zoho CRM includes 40+ standard pre-built report types that users can run, along with unlimited custom reports in the Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate plans. For your convenience, all paid plans allow you to schedule reports to automatically run on certain dates. Plus, reports can be easily represented visually in charts and graphs. Zia, the AI assistant that can answer your questions about analytics in real-time, is available in the two highest plans.

Salesforce offers pre-built and custom reports in every plan. Building your own reports is simple thanks to the drag and drop editor; just pick your filters, fields, and visualization type and you’re done. Its higher-tier plans include advanced reporting features like cross filters and bucketing that enable users to organize data in an easy-to-find manner. Salesforce gives you all the tools you need to track key metrics and also investigate how to improve a team’s sales performance.

Zoho CRM’s sales automation features are primarily focused on communication and follow-up with leads or clients. For example, it can automate email follow-ups to be sent after a certain number of days. It can also be configured to create new contacts when you’ve received an email from an unfamiliar email address. If you want to create workflows for other processes (like approval for requested discounts), you’ll have to purchase the Enterprise or Ultimate editions.

Salesforce’s automation extends beyond those found in Zoho. Its Lightning Flow Automation tool enables users to build processes that standardize and automate your most common CRM routines. Users can even build out workflows that recommend next steps to their salespeople as they move through a deal. Also, design self-service wizards for tasks like updating a contact’s address, thereby ensuring team members follow the most productive company procedure.

Zoho CRM's mobile app enables users to access data from their IOS or Android devices while on the move. It offers time management features like a daily planner, map, and alerts to help you stay on track. Plus, top plans offer task automation; simply text the actions you want taken to Zia, an AI, who’ll perform them for you. When offline, you can check and amend contact info, and even leave voice notes that’ll be reflected in the CRM when you’re back online.

Salesforce’s mobile app is essentially the entire Salesforce CRM in the palm of your hands. Its most notable feature is its offline mode, which, compared to Zoho, enables you to see and update more information, including dashboards and opportunities. Online, the mobile app gives AI-powered insights that foster smart decisions and the ability to customize your mobile experience by personalizing navigation and selecting favorites for even greater productivity.

Zoho CRM and Salesforce both support a large number of third-party applications. The Zoho App Marketplace currently has over 1,000 integrations spanning business applications, document storage, marketing tools, and more. Many of the most popular integrations are free (G Suite, PandaDoc, Office 360, Mailchimp, Dropbox). While its app plugins cost extra, some offer free versions with limited functionality.

Salesforce AppExchange, on the other hand, allows for the implementation of over 7,000 pre-integrated apps that can help you improve your performance in a variety of key areas, from document management to sales automation. The integration with these apps is seamless and enables you to customize your experience more than you would with Zoho. But, more than half cost money. Popular free integrations are ZoomInfo, Cirrus Insight, and Yesware.

All Zoho CRM users have access to live chat and phone support during local business hours. You can pay extra for Premium support, which bumps support access to 24/5, but costs 20% of your license fee. Businesses with 25+ users can pay 25% of their license fee to get a dedicated account manager and 24/7 support. Still, Zoho’s customer service staff is notorious for delays. If you need an answer in a pinch, you can turn to their knowledge base and community forums.

All Salesforce plans come with email and live chat support, along with access to Salesforce’s community forums and knowledge base, which are extremely helpful. Thanks to the software’s ubiquity, even the most niche questions have likely been answered. Premium support plans can be purchased separately as well. They include additions like 24/7 support, one-on-one coaching, and advanced diagnostics that can help you get the most out of the platform.