Sales

Best CRM for Gmail

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Looking for a customer management tool that integrates into your Gmail inbox? We went on a quest to find the best Gmail CRM tool to help you stay on top of your never-ending inbox. After days of comparing features and prices, our pick as the best tool for most people is Freshworks CRM, due to its comprehensive approach to pulling in information from every part of Google’s suite, not just Gmail.

The Best Gmail CRM for Most

Freshworks CRM logo

Freshworks CRM

Best for Most

For a CRM that goes beyond Gmail to integrate with the whole Google suite, Freshworks CRM is exactly what you need. Get powerful tools for developing customer relationships, scheduling, and collaboration all without having to leave Gmail.

Gmail doesn’t live on an island. Google’s full array of tools, from Docs and Sheets to the calendar, contacts, and even Google Meet, all should be easy to integrate if you’re going to use a CRM that lives inside your Gmail inbox. Freshworks CRM gets this on a level better than other platforms.

Plus, if you or team members use the Freshworks CRM outside of Gmail, automatic sync keeps any changes or updates from being lost in the shuffle. No matter how you deploy it, this is a solution that keeps paying dividends with its convenient integrations and time-saving capturing of information.

The Best Gmail CRM Options to Consider

  1. Freshworks CRM – Best for most
  2. HubSpot – Best free Gmail CRM
  3. Agile CRM – Best for simple contact management
  4. NetHunt CRM – Best for automating sequences in Gmail
  5. Copper – Best for tracking sales pipelines

When it Makes Sense to Invest Into A CRM for Gmail

It’s no secret email is a fundamental part of your sales pipeline and business no matter how you cut it. This becomes increasingly true if your team has to manage a ticketing system, if you require additional support features, or if your sales pipeline requires several touchpoints to earn sales. 

You should already be thinking about integrating a Gmail CRM at the first inkling of email fatigue. If your in-house team is constantly complaining about being inundated with emails without any real tools that help them catch up and stay caught up, that’s pretty much the telltale sign you’re ready for a dynamic CRM tool that’ll help your team navigate their share of emails.

Other telltale signs you’re overdue for a Gmail CRM are:

  • Your team isn’t communicating as clearly as it could
  • You’re blatantly losing sales because of lost emails or unaccounted for email replies
  • Your team can’t remember the last time they hit inbox zero
  • You need a better way to keep track of customer responses
  • You need to customize the standard Gmail functions to the needs of your team
  • You want shared access to email tags and notes that can be accessible to anyone on your team but don’t have a way to do that effectively

The good news is a Gmail CRM can be relatively inexpensive, especially considering how much upside you get once it’s integrated into your workflow. Now, saying goodbye to a messy Gmail inbox can begin once you find a Gmail CRM that’s right for you, which is what we get into next. 

#1 – Freshworks CRM — The Best for Most

Freshworks CRM logo

Freshworks CRM

Best for Most

For a CRM that goes beyond Gmail to integrate with the whole Google suite, Freshworks CRM is exactly what you need. Get powerful tools for developing customer relationships, scheduling, and collaboration all without having to leave Gmail.

With Freshworks CRM for Gmail solution, you not only get a better handle on your Gmail inbox, but you also get to integrate the rest of the Google suite. This means Google Calendar, Google Sheets, Google Drive, and a dedicated Chrome extension sync together to help you manage your inbox successfully.

If you’re already using Google to handle all the moving parts of your inbox, Freshworks CRM system supercharges your workflow as you centralize your email conversations and increase conversions.

Anything you do on Gmail automatically shows up on your Freshworks account. You can track opens, track clicks, and set up Google Calendar reminders so you never miss an upcoming event.

Its CRM tool lets you automate email tasks so you free up more time to focus on other parts of your business. With it, you can also create if-then statements to trigger workflows with your emails. 

  • Growth – $29 per user per month billed annually
  • Pro – $69 per user per month billed annually
  • Enterprise – $125 per user per month billed annually

While Freshworks’ Gmail solution doesn’t come with a free plan, you can start with their Growth plan at $29 per user per month. Its most popular Pro tier comes in at $69 a month for 3,000 active contacts. If you manage any more contacts than that you’ll have to go with their Enterprise tier, at $125 a month.

To get started, sign up with Freshworks CRM here. You can try it free for 21 days. 

#2 – HubSpot CRM — The Best Free Gmail CRM

HubSpot logo

HubSpot

Best Free Gmail CRM

Simple, easy, and straightforward, HubSpot brings its usual ease of use to Gmail for free. Get all the power HubSpot delivers in its standard CRM, seamlessly integrated into your Gmail inbox.

If you’re in the marketing world, you know it’s pretty much a given that HubSpot would offer a Gmail CRM integration. They’re the foremost champions of delivering a free-forever CRM that doesn’t skimp on features.

So, of course, the same applies to their Gmail integration. It’s free to use and great for small service or sales startups trying to get a handle of their Gmail inbox from the beginning.

Once you sign up with HubSpot and connect your Gmail account, you can track email opens by receiving notifications, log and track all the emails you send, and see which links in your email are being clicked. 

With its sidebar feature, you can easily look up a customer on your contact list and have instant access to all their contact information, as well as a log of support tickets answered and received, and any deals you’ve closed. 

Templates, sequences, and any scheduled meetings are easily accessible right on your Gmail dashboard for increased productivity— no more having to bounce back and forth between tabs or having to deal with missed information. 

HubSpot’s Gmail CRM is free to use with their free plan. Though free can mean saving some money in the long run, keep in mind that it’ll limit your access to certain paid features. 

The good thing about going with a HubSpot solution to handle your emails is that its ecosystem of tools can grow along with your business and your needs change and you experience growth. 

  • Free
  • Basic – $6 a month
  • Business – $12 a month 

To get access to their feature-rich plans monthly fees start at $6 per user. If you want developer-level functions along with unlimited cloud storage you’re looking at a $12 a month price point. 

It’s worth noting HubSpot offers a 14-day free trial if you’d like to try it out first, or you can just play with the free version for as long as you’d like. The free trial, though, is helpful if you want to see whether the paid feature set is necessary for your operations.

Otherwise, get started organizing your contact list and customer emails with HubSpot’s CRM here. 

#3 – Agile CRM — The Best for Simple Contact Management

Agile CRM logo

Agile CRM

Best for Simple Contact Management

Agile CRM helps small businesses with simple, affordable contact management that syncs with Gmail. Plans start at $8.99 monthly!

Agile CRM is great for simple Gmail contact management that gets the job done. 

You can easily keep track of email opens, clicks, and a chronological view of every email you’ve ever sent any given contact. Agile CRM is designed to be synced with your Gmail inbox at time intervals you get to personalize. 

It also makes it easy to track campaigns, by adding or deleting contacts from any active email campaigns. You can add tags to any emails, as well as notes right in Gmail that automatically sync with your Agile dashboard. 

While Agile CRM can prove useful for simple contact management with minimal integration into your Gmail inbox, an additional selling point is how affordable it can be for small businesses. 

While you can choose to go with a free subscription, a paid Agile CRM plan doesn’t exactly put you out of business either— starting at just $8.99 a month for a two-year subscription. 

  • Free
  • Starter – $8.99 for a two-year subscription
  • Regular – $29.99 for a two-year subscription
  • Enterprise – $47.99 for a two-year subscription

With the free tier, you get access to the following contact management perks:

  • 50,000 contacts and companies
  • Custom data fields
  • Lead scoring
  • Unlimited deals, tasks, and documents
  • Appointment scheduling
  • Custom deal milestones
  • 2-Way Telephony

You get generous access to useful tools on its free plan, but it gets even better the higher up you go through its paid options. In other words, it’s a winner in our book.

You can get started with Agile CRM here. 

#4 – NetHunt CRM — The Best for Automating Sequences in Gmail

NetHunt CRM logo

NetHunt CRM

Best for Automated Sequences

For a feature-rich CRM with great automation capability, look no further than NetHunt. Choose from three tiers to optimize your Gmail inbox management.

It doesn’t matter if you’re one user, a small team, or you’re a large company trying to get a handle of your emails, NetHunt is heartily equipped with key tools that turn your nightmare inbox into a seamless CRM system you can work with.

Features like automated notifications, invoicing, a centralized ticketing system, and event notifications ensure your whole team is on the same page as they work for a common goal: more sales and tons of growth.

You can easily automate repetitive manual tasks so you can focus on high ROI activities instead. 

So now you know NetHunt’s Gmail CRM system is great. But how do their prices pan out?

You’re in luck, since NetHunt offers some of the more affordable Gmail CRM plans on the market if you’re going with a paid tool.

  • Professional – $24 per user per month billed annually
  • Professional Plus – $28 per user per month billed annually
  • Enterprise – $48 per user per month billed annually

With NetHunt you can either choose to go with a monthly or yearly plan. The monthly plan is more affordable on a per person basis, saving you 20 percent, so it’s what we highlight here.

The beginner professional plan for $24 per user gives you access to their more standard tools like the ability to organize contacts, manage leads, build sales pipelines, and send email campaigns.

However, the higher your price point, the more access to key features you’ll have. The sweet spot for a tool like NetHunt is its mid-tier plan, at $28 per user. For $4 more, you’ll also be able to share emails, templates, and deals, track team performance, collaborate, build sales reports, and integrate your favorite applications into your workflow.

If you’re unsure about taking the plunge and upgrading your Gmail once and for all, NetHunt does offer a 14-day free trial.

Get started with NetHunt today. 

#5 – Copper — The Best for Tracking Sales Pipelines

Copper logo

Copper

Best for Tracking Sales Pipelines

Bring your sales tracking right into your Gmail inbox--and automate all your followups--with Copper.

Copper is a Gmail CRM that’s great for tracking leads and conversations right from your inbox. In other words, it’s a robust inbox tool perfect for tracking your sales pipeline from beginning to end. 

Once integrated into your workflow, you can automate follow-ups with email templates that are personalized for each customer. If it’s time to re-send an email or get in contact with a prospect, you can get automatic reminders once you set up a personalized trigger.

A customizable drag-and-drop sales pipeline gives you a clear visual of where your sales are at in the pipeline, if a deal is likely to close, and if you’re falling behind with certain prospects on your client list.

Copper doesn’t stop there. To ensure you’re staying on top of your sales pipeline, Copper alerts you with automated recommendations based on appointments you’ve scheduled, upcoming tasks, and your email history.

If you need to get a handle on your sales pipeline and heavily rely on email outreach to do so, Copper is your Gmail sidekick waiting to happen. 

With Copper’s open API and integration with Zapier, you’re able to integrate any apps you’re already working with for a streamlined workflow. However, getting all the perks of an integrated email sales pipeline does come at a cost, so you’ll want to familiarize yourself with Copper’s per-user plans first. 

  • Basic – $25 per user per month billed annually (limit three seats)
  • Professional – $59 per user per month billed annually
  • Business – $119 per user per month billed annually

At $25 per user for their starter plans, Copper can prove to be promising for small startups that need basic Gmail CRM tools. From there, you’re looking at more enterprise-grade pricing tiers at $59, and $119 per seat per month.

You can visit Copper’s pricing page for a detailed look at what tools you get with each plan. And you can definitely try it free for 14 days first without fully committing. 

Get started with Copper here. 

Methodology for Choosing the Best CRM for Gmail

At this point, you’re already using Gmail to stay on top of your incoming emails. The next step is figuring out which Gmail CRM will blend seamlessly into your workflow so you can take your email game to the next level. Ease of use and built-in integrations are pretty much standard features to look for when you’re thinking about finding the right software tool.

However, beyond the basics, these are key criteria we looked at when choosing the top Gmail CRM choices on our list you might want to consider. 

Bulk email management

Email templates, mail merging, and bulk segmentation are only some of the powerful features a useful Gmail CRM can offer. Bulk email management speeds up the process of answering emails, managing leads, and staying in touch with your customers.

Look for Gmail CRM software that enables you to update your contacts in bulk and manage your leads with plenty of flexibility. Features like this go beyond a sidebar CRM addition that only enables you with basic mail sorting functions. 

Collaboration

Probably one of the biggest reasons to invest in a powerful CRM that levels up your team’s Gmail inbox is the need for collaboration where everyone is on the same page. The three main functions of an effective Gmail CRM are to organize, automate, and collaborate your whole email process— whether you’re a team of five or you’re a team in the double digits. 

A CRM worth integrating into your workflow will offer plenty of collaboration features at your disposal. This can look like @mentions to fill in anyone on your team about changes to key data, sharing appointment dates, common file sharing, and even notes on email exchanges. 

Some Gmail CRM software will come with rich collaboration features built-in, others will offer integrations you can take your pick from so you only get what you need. It’s up to you to decide what’ll work best within your team. 

Lead Management

You can’t get away with a half-decent lead management process if your sales depend on capturing and nurturing leads. A dynamic Gmail CRM can offer plenty of tools to ensure you’re staying on top of key leads by knowing where your customers are in the sales cycle, when you last emailed them, and what their click-through and open rates look like. 

Granted, not every Gmail CRM will include every tool your team might need— since some Gmail CRM tools are simpler to use and manage than others. But if you want additional lead management tools that integrate right into your Gmail inbox, a simple sidebar CRM add-on simply won’t cut it. 

Automations

Closely related to bulk email management and collaboration, the automation tools offered by any Gmail CRM should help you save time in the long run. This results in consistent sales data across your team, increased productivity, and a leaner sales operation as your customers move through your sales pipeline. 

When choosing the right Gmail CRM for your business, consider the amount of automation you’ll need to propel your email interactions forward at a faster rate. Bottlenecks that were once slowing down your sales pipeline can be removed quickly with the right Gmail automation tools. 

Freshworks CRM logo

Freshworks CRM

Best for Most

For a CRM that goes beyond Gmail to integrate with the whole Google suite, Freshworks CRM is exactly what you need. Get powerful tools for developing customer relationships, scheduling, and collaboration all without having to leave Gmail.

Summary

What’s the best CRM solution for Gmail? Well, that depends on the features you’re looking for. Though you can be sure there’s a solution for you on this list.

We think Freshworks provides the best CRM for Gmail. Not only does it deliver powerful relationship management tools right within your inbox, but it also seamlessly pulls in the rest of the Google suite tools you use, like the calendar, your contacts, and even Docs and Sheets.

Hopefully, this guide helps you measure the pros and cons of each of the best Gmail CRM tools out there. Choosing the right CRM solution can mark the difference between an overwhelmed Gmail inbox and an efficient one.


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