Zoho vs Freshsales

Zoho CRM and Freshsales are two robust platforms designed to support businesses in managing customer relationships and driving sales. Zoho CRM offers a highly customizable solution with a wide range of tools for sales, marketing, and customer support, making it ideal for businesses seeking flexibility and scalability. Freshsales, on the other hand, focuses on AI-driven insights, sales automation, and integrated communication tools, catering to teams that prioritize data-driven sales processes. In this blog post, we’ll compare their key features to help you decide which CRM aligns best with your needs—or if folk might provide a more balanced alternative with user-friendly contact management and customization options.

What is Zoho?

Zoho is a CRM system with a strong sales focus. It has journey orchestration, sales process management, and workflow automation features. There's also something for marketing teams, including event management and customer segmentation.

Key features of Zoho

• Sales automation: Automates sales tasks like lead management, deal tracking, and follow-up actions.
• Customizable dashboards and reports: Allows users to create and customize dashboards and reports for in-depth analytics.
• Multi-channel communication: Integrates with email, phone, social media, and live chat to manage customer interactions.
• Lead and contact management: Manages customer information, tracks interactions, and segments contacts for targeted campaigns.
• Workflow automation: Automates routine tasks and processes to improve efficiency and reduce manual effort.
• AI-powered sales assistant (Zia): Provides predictive analytics, task automation, and intelligent suggestions to enhance sales performance.

What is Freshsales?

Freshsales is a CRM platform by Freshworks designed to help businesses streamline their sales processes with AI-powered tools and automation. It provides features like lead scoring, deal tracking, email and call management, and workflow automation to enhance efficiency and drive conversions. Freshsales also integrates communication and sales in one place, offering tools for personalized outreach and detailed insights to improve sales strategies.

Key features of Freshsales

• AI-powered insights: Freshsales leverages AI to provide recommendations, predict deal outcomes, and offer actionable insights to improve sales strategies.
• Lead scoring: Automatically prioritizes leads based on their engagement and likelihood to convert, helping sales teams focus on high-value opportunities.
• Deal tracking: Provides a visual sales pipeline to track deals through various stages and monitor progress in real time.
• Email and call management: Integrates email and phone communication, allowing users to manage interactions directly from the platform.
• Workflow automation: Automates repetitive tasks like sending follow-up emails or updating deal statuses, reducing manual work and improving efficiency.

Zoho vs. Freshsales: Feature Comparison

Let's break down the key features of two CRM software solutions and take a closer look at their sales automation, email marketing tools, and contact management.

1. Sales pipeline management

Zoho CRM's pipeline management feature provides a visual overview of the sales process, allowing users to track deals at various stages and manage the flow of opportunities effectively. It offers customization options for different sales processes, ensuring flexibility for diverse business needs.
Freshsales offers a visual sales pipeline that helps you track deals through various stages in real time. The drag-and-drop functionality allows you to easily move deals between stages, providing a clear overview of your progress. Integrated tools like lead scoring and AI insights further enhance your deal management by identifying priorities and predicting outcomes.

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2. Ease of use

Zoho CRM offers a user-friendly interface with customizable dashboards and easy navigation, making it suitable for businesses of all sizes. Freshsales provides an intuitive design with drag-and-drop features, but users may find its advanced settings require a steeper learning curve compared to Zoho.

3. Contact enrichment

Zoho CRM's contact enrichment, powered by Zia, automatically updates records using online data, filling in missing details like emails and social media profiles. Freshsales lacks a native contact enrichment feature, which may require additional tools for comprehensive data updates.

4. Outreach

Zoho CRM supports multichannel outreach, automating workflows and using AI for sentiment analysis to prioritize customer responses. Freshsales manages outreach through email, phone, and chat, offering personalized campaigns and engagement metrics, but lacks the depth of dedicated multichannel platforms.

5. Automation

Zoho CRM offers robust automation with Blueprint, Macros, and Zia AI for predictive actions, streamlining tasks like emails and alerts. Freshsales automates lead assignments and follow-ups, supporting complex workflows, though advanced setups may require familiarity with its configuration options.

6. Integration

Zoho integrates with numerous third-party apps, including Google Workspace and QuickBooks, enhancing its functionality. Freshsales also offers integrations but may not match Zoho's extensive range, potentially limiting expansion opportunities.

7. Artificial Intelligence

Zoho CRM's Zia AI boosts productivity with automated tasks, predictive analytics, and workflow suggestions. Freshsales' Freddy AI provides lead scoring and sales forecasting, enhancing decision-making but may need user familiarity for optimal use.

Price and plans comparison

Let's take a closer look at the price and plans of both Zoho and Freshsales.

Zoho prices

Zoho offers a free plan limited to three users suitable for small businesses. After that, an annual subscription plan is as follows.

• Standard: $14 per user, per month
• Professional: $23 per user, per month
• Enterprise: $40 per user, per month

Freshsales prices

Through Freshworks, Freshsales provides a few price plans, depending on the product you need. The following is an overview of their annual subscription.

• Growth: Starts from $9/user/month.
• Pro: Starts from $39/user/month.
• Enterprise: Starts from $59/user/month.

Introducing folk CRM: the best alternative to Zoho and Freshsales

Looking for an affordable alternative? We recommend folk. A multiple award-winning CRM platform loved for its easy-to-use, plug-and-play CRM system. folk can support multiple business functions including sales, marketing, recruitment, and more. You can use folk as a soloprenuer, small to mid-size team, and large enterprise.

Key features

• Contact management: Bring all your contacts into one place seamlessly, from social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram and X to multiple inboxes including Gmail and Outlook.
• Notes and reminders: Attach notes directly to a contact's profile in folk, and access them on the go. And assign reminders so you know exactly when to follow-up.
• Sales pipeline dashboard: Manage your entire sales cycle and leads with a highly customizable sales pipeline dashboard that can be used in Kanban-board view or listicle.
• Ease of use and customization: Easily customize the pipelines, dashboards, automation, email sequences, so that you can use it across your sales cycle and pipeline management – and other business functions such as recruitment, marketing, and more.
• Social media integration: Import people and companies from LinkedIn, Sales Navigator, Instagram, and X within a click thanks to folk’s Google Chrome extension.
• Contact sync from Gmail and Outlook: Full email sync enabling users to manage all communications directly from the CRM.
• Find email addresses in a click: Contact enrichment powered by Apollo, and Dropcontact so you can fill in missing data points with 1-click.
• Email sequences: Send email sequences with reminders if your leads don’t reply to your first emails. It includes an AI integration allowing you to personalize email at scale.

Price and plans

folk has a 14-day free trial. After that, there are affordable monthly or annual subscription plans. The annual subscription plan is as follows.

• Standard: $20 per user, per month.
• Premium: $40 per user, per month.
• Custom: Starts from $80 per user, per month.

Zoho vs. Freshsales: What's the Verdict?

Between Zoho and Freshsales, it's clear how each CRM offers unique strengths catering to various business needs. Zoho excels with its comprehensive features and customization options, making it ideal for businesses seeking robust sales and marketing tools. Freshsales, on the other hand, shines with its intuitive interface and AI-driven insights, appealing to teams looking for a user-friendly experience. However, for companies that need a more personalized approach to relationship management, folk provides a flexible alternative to these traditional CRM options, blending ease of use with customization. Try folk today, free.