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10 Best CRMs for Business Consultants (Reviews & Pricing) in 2023

The consulting industry is based on relationships. More to the point, it is based on managing those relationships effectively.

Beyond almost any other field, consulting is one in which you must establish a deep well of trust. Consultants aren’t just one tool or solution; you are a guiding light, and businesses put themselves into your hands fully.

Which means you absolutely cannot let them down. Not only is that a super-lame move, it will quickly come back to bite you. Lost revenue, poor reviews and plummeting Net Promoter Scores are all in the offing, not to mention earning you a reputation for being a total dillweed. Why risk it?

Instead, you need the ability to manage a variety of customer information and details in various places. Day in, day out, rain or shine, in boom markets and bust.

A customer relationship management system (CRM) does just that, enabling you to streamline a wide degree of functionality for your consulting firm. From lead generation to customer support, a CRM for consulting will keep all your customer information in one place, complete with sales strategies, supporting documents and scripts.

Today we’ll be talking about CRM software for consultants, how it works and what the benefits are. We will also provide a list of the top 10 CRMs for consulting programs, so you can compare the pros and cons and choose the right system for you.

Not certain that a CRM for consultants will work for you? That’s okay. Just keep reading and make up your mind at the end. (Warning: there will be puns.)

What is a Consulting CRM?

Before we discuss the best CRM for consultants and whether you need one, it’s first important to understand just what a CRM does for you.

A customer resource management system, or CRM, consolidates your business processes into one software program. They become viewable from a single environment, so you can track all aspects of your workflow and marketing automation from the same dashboard, on desktop or mobile.

It enables seamless project management for large, medium and small businesses alike, bringing teams together from office to field. In so doing, it can help consultants manage, track and maintain relationships with new leads and new customers alike, then keep those customers happy long into the future.

Conversely, without effective management of lead data and client relationships, any marketing efforts will be of little to no value. If you generate new leads only to lose them, what’s the point?

So, let’s take it as given that a CRM is a good idea, for consultants and everyone else. Now let’s take a look at some additional important benefits.

Top Benefits of a CRM for a Consulting Business

The consulting industry constitutes a $132 billion market, with nearly half of that business occurring in the United States. There is, suffice it to say, enough to go around – as long as you have the right tools. Whether you’re an independent consultant or a large firm, you need a CRM that will get the job done.

What else can you expect from a good CRM? Among other benefits, you can:

  • Easily build your sales pipeline: By tracking all contact information, outreach efforts, templates and deals in the right CRM, you can easily increase your pipeline management prowess and profits overall.

  • Pump up sales forecasting: Consulting services rely heavily on sales forecasting, both for yourself and for your clients. Learning how to do it well—and using the tools that enable it—is critical.

  • Receive follow-up notifications: When you hear back from a prospect, or when it’s time to reach out to them again, your CRM should give you a notification so you can make a plan for contacting them and fit more outreach into your workflow overall.

  • Track all client communication: Again, you need to know what’s happening on a real-time basis, so that you can communicate appropriately with the people who matter. A quick overview of past contact and future outreach will make it easier for providers like you to serve prospects and clients well.

  • Store customer data and contact management: Whether we’re talking integrations with Microsoft, importing contacts from Excel or interfacing with other apps, your CRM needs to have the ability to store customer data, then sort contacts as necessary.

  • Implement time tracking: How long does it take to engage in a certain business activity? Your CRM should tell you. That way, you can manage your own time more effectively, and that of everyone on your team.

  • Enjoy efficient lead management: Lead cultivation can’t be an all-day, every-day activity. You need time for everything else as well, which is where efficient lead management comes in. Put lead generation and qualification on autopilot, nurture prospects with email automation, and plan your outreach with helpful scripts and sequences.

  • Customize reporting dashboards: What works for your consulting agency won’t necessarily work for someone else’s, so there’s no such thing as an out-of-the-box solution when it comes to reporting. Make sure you find a CRM that can give you the customizable reports you want.

  • Refine your sales process: As you become proficient with each of the above capabilities, you’ll need to refine them to better meet the needs of your sales process over time.

That said, each of the above steps relies on your having a worthy CRM. Where can you find one?

10 Best CRM Solutions for Consultants

Enough chitchat. Which are the actual-factual best CRM solutions for consultants?

That is to say, which ones prioritize sales strategies for consulting firms without forgetting other types of business needs, such as user experience, metrics tracking, social media marketing campaigns and new business generation?

Which will generate handy task management to-do lists, allow you to manage finances and retainers, and put email marketing and e-commerce sales activities on autopilot?

Which will fry your eggs for you in the morning? (Seriously, do you know a CRM that will do that? We’ve been looking for so long.)

The following list of 10 best CRM solutions for consultants can get you most of the way there, even if breakfast foods are still in-egg-cessible at the moment. (What? We warned you about the puns!)

1. Close CRM

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We saved the best for first. Why is Close the best, you ask? Easy: our comprehensive suite of sales activities tools, which all exist in the same environment. Say goodbye to the constant shuffling between tools and systems just to get through the workday. Now you can track your customer journey and customer experience in one place, from marketing to sales to service.

Close also allows you to manage lead generation, qualification and referrals, both from the desktop and the mobile app. If you’re looking for optimization of tasks for everyone on the sales team, you’ve come to the right place.

PROS

Close has been around longer than many of the CRMs currently on the market, and has had time to build and optimize features that consultants need. It is also one of the most comprehensive, offering customer resource management tools from the earliest lead generation phase through to the post-purchase stage.

Its thoroughness is matched only by its affordability, with a reasonable monthly price following a 14-day free trial. You’d be surprised how much calling, emailing, SMS, call training and customer service value you can get all in one place, for one low price.

CONS

Close is the only CRM you’ll ever need, but that does mean it is a more comprehensive system than others. As such, plan for a little extra time spent on that learning curve as opposed to, say, a basic marketing CRM that doesn’t include many sales or service tools.

Pricing

$25 per user, per month

2. Hubspot

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Hubspot is another popular CRM tool for consultants, combining marketing, sales and service tools in one environment.

PROS

Their patented hub-and-spoke content marketing approach is one of Hubspot’s biggest selling points, and one of the innovations that put them on the map. Although you can now find this functionality replicated in a variety of other CRMs, Hubspot still does it best.

If content marketing is your game, Hubspot may be your name. Or at least, the name you’re looking for.

CONS

Hubspot is not known for being intuitive. That’s not just because it’s comprehensive, but also because according to some users, it just ain’t that friendly. User-friendly, that is.

Pricing

$45 per user, per month

3. Pipedrive

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Billing itself as the CRM designed by salespeople for salespeople, Pipedrive has a strong marketing focus. That’s great, but it may mean you lack some of the functionality you need in consulting, which is very heavy on templates and documentation, in addition to those sales techniques.

PROS

Pipedrive has a very clear and easy-to-use dashboard.

CONS

Because it’s a bit more basic than the above two CRM choices, Pipedrive might be a good option for those who are intimidated by a comprehensive suite of tools. If that’s not you, though, you’ll likely just be frustrated by limited functionality.

Pricing

$14.90 per user, per month

4. Salesforce

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Another old-school CMS, Salesforce has gathered its share of fans over more than a decade.

PROS

Salesforce has a good track record of helping people achieve their sales goals. Moreover, their CRM does include many of the tools you’d want in the consulting industry, from marketing to service.

CONS

Some users complain that Salesforce is sluggish and its updates pretty weak.

Their pricing is also somewhat opaque. The below figure is for its small business plan, but it has more than a dozen options from which to choose. Don’t be surprised if you discover that your payment isn’t what you thought it would be.

Pricing

$25 per user, per month

5. Zoho CRM

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Zoho offers a great deal of customization and flexibility for users, whether you’re in the consulting space or otherwise.

PROS

Through KPIs, predictive intelligence, segmentation and an omnichannel approach, Zoho gives you a comprehensive look at your contacts and outreach. It’s a pretty good all-in-one environment for anyone who needs a CRM. So … everyone.

CONS

Zoho requires ooooodles of customization and setup. Don’t get this CRM if you’re not up for the challenge.

Pricing

$0 up to three users

6. Capsule

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Capsule is a streamlined CRM that contains many good features without a lot of fluff.

PROS

The upside of their streamlined approach is that you get most of the functionality you need to run your consulting practice efficiently, manage contacts and perform regular outreach.

CONS

The flip side of streamlining is always that you might miss out on sales or marketing tactics you need because the system doesn’t allow much customization. Your level of need is a question only you can answer.

Pricing

$18 per user, per month

7. Salesflare

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For those who are tired of constantly updating their CRM, Salesflare might provide a good solution. Its automated features make streamlining your workflow a good deal easier.

PROS

One of Salesflare’s cooler aspects is that it allows you to automate your CRM data input. That means, wherever your data is coming from, you can structure the CRM to integrate it without much (or any) effort on the part of your team.

CONS

Salesflare is particularly suited to small and medium-sized businesses, so if you plan to grow beyond this, it’s not a your best option.

Pricing

$29 per user, per month

8. Streak

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Streak is the go-to solution for those who use Gmail all the time.

PROS

With a Chrome extension, Gmail integrations and a framework built on Google’s technologies, this is the perfect customer resource management tool for anyone who wants Gmail in their life for years to come.

CONS

Because it is so dedicated to helping businesses integrate with Gmail, it is quite limited compared to more comprehensive CRMs that are agnostic to your existing tools. If you’re not really into the Google ecosystem, you should choose a platform that offers integrations to everything. And while Streak does offer a Free plan, you should be prepared to pay for basic functionalities like reporting or integrations.

Pricing

$0 per user, per month

9. Insightly

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Those who love a clean and modern dashboard will love Insightly. It makes capturing and managing leads easy, on both its web and mobile applications.

PROS

Insightly offers a range of email services, from templates and automation to segmentation and scheduling. Its contact management is pretty comprehensive as well.

CONS

Insightly users aren’t impressed by the customer support or by its functionality, which many say is quite limited. While it might be a good starter CRM for those looking to climb a shallower learning curve at the start, this might not prove a good long-term solution.

Pricing

$29 per user, per month

10. Less Annoying CRM

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The name says it all, doesn’t it? Less Annoying CRM aims to be just that: a less obnoxious option when compared to all of the above.

PROS

Less Annoying has a number of pros, including a transparent pricing structure with no tiers; a pretty solid list of CRM features; and a 5-star customer support team. Their entire goal is to be easier for the user, and they accomplish that pretty well.

CONS

If there’s one thing users complain about, it’s the fact that in trying to be less annoying, this CRM also becomes less comprehensive. They don’t offer the same robust tracking functionality for ROI and their email automation suffers in comparison to some of the systems above.

Pricing

$15 per user, per month

CRMs for Business Consultants: Final Thoughts

The benefits of using a CRM in a consulting business are almost too numerous to name: better organization, faster lead generation, greater follow-through, more deals signed, less work, higher revenues, more commissions, happier workers … did we forget anything? Morning eggs, maybe?

If you haven’t yet made the jump to a CRM platform that gives you complete control over the entire customer life cycle, from that very first touchpoint to a signed contract to many happy years together, it’s time you started today.

Close is here to make sure you get just that. Our industry-leading sales software is ideal for busy consultants who want a fully customizable one-and-done CRM solution. No longer will you worry about lost information, annoyed customers or missed opportunities; you’ll have everything at your fingertips from now on.

With Close, you can track every sales activity and customer data point in the office, in the field, on desktop and on mobile. View it 24/7, online and off, in a house and with a mouse. See, most companies say they offer a complete solution, but Close actually does.

All that remains is for you to give it a try. You can check out a demo here to see what we mean or enjoy a 14-day free trial to experience it for yourself. We look forward to helping you help the people you care about, so sign up today!