Best CRM for drip campaigns

As a marketer, managing and nurturing leads through drip campaigns is essential for keeping prospects engaged and moving them through your sales funnel. A CRM system that supports drip campaigns can help you automate and personalize your marketing efforts by sending targeted messages at the right time, tracking engagement, and managing your leads all in one place. With the right CRM, you can ensure that your campaigns are effective, streamlined, and tailored to your audience’s needs.
In this blog post, we’ll explore the best CRM options for managing drip campaigns, focusing on tools that will help you optimize your marketing efforts and drive conversions.

Why you need a CRM

When you're managing customer interactions and optimizing drip campaigns, a CRM can help you streamline process, enhance customer relationships, and drive growth.

Challenges without a CRM

Managing drip campaigns without a CRM can be challenging. Below are some common challenges you might already be experiencing.

• Disorganization: Without a centralized system, tracking customer interactions and data becomes chaotic.
• Missed opportunities: Lack of timely follow-ups can result in lost sales and disengaged leads.
• Inefficient processes: Manual handling of tasks wastes time and resources.
• Lack of insight: Inadequate data analysis hampers strategic decision-making.
• Inconsistent communication: Irregular touchpoints can dilute customer relationships.

Benefits of a CRM

Fortunately the right CRM can help you address these challenges, and provide some extra benefits.

• Centralized information: All customer data is stored in one place, ensuring easy access and management.
• Enhanced efficiency: Automation of repetitive tasks saves time and reduces errors.
• Improved customer relationships: Personalized communication strengthens customer loyalty.
• Better decision-making: Data-driven insights enable more informed business strategies.
• Increased sales: Timely follow-ups and targeted campaigns boost conversion rates.
• Consistent communication: Automated workflows ensure regular and relevant touchpoints with customers.
  
  

How to evaluate and choose a CRM

With a lot of CRMs in the market to comb through, it can be hard to figure out which one fits your specific requirements. To help you with your decision making process, we've put together some of our top tips.

1. Define your requirements

When choosing the best CRM for drip campaigns, start by identifying the key features that align with your business needs. Look for capabilities such as automated email sequencing, segmentation, analytics, and integration with other tools you use. For example, if you run an e-commerce store, ensure the CRM can handle customer segmentation based on purchase history and behavior.

Key features of a CRM for drip campaigns

• Automated processes: Streamlines tasks by automating repetitive workflows.
• Contact enrichment: Automatically finds Leads, Customers email addresses and contact information, enhancing efficiency.
• Structured pipeline: Tracks Leads, Customers through defined stages, ensuring process clarity and effectiveness.
• Mail merge and email sequences: Increases communication efficiency with follow-up templates and automated sequences.
• Social media integration: Seamlessly imports leads and customers from LinkedIn, Instagram, X and more to track everyone within the CRM.
• Analytics: Provides essential data analysis and predictive insights for better planning.

2. Budget considerations

Balancing cost and return on investment is crucial. While some CRMs come with a hefty price tag, many offer scalable solutions that grow with your business. Consider the long-term benefits of improved customer engagement and higher conversion rates when evaluating the cost. Affordable CRMs for small businesses can provide robust drip campaign features without breaking the bank.

3. Selection process

Researching and choosing the right CRM vendor involves several steps. Start by reading reviews and testimonials from other founders and business owners. Attend webinars and demos to see the CRM in action. Look for vendors that offer excellent customer support and training resources to help you get the most out of their platform.

4. Get a demo

Trial periods are invaluable for evaluating different CRM platforms. Take advantage of free trials to test how well each CRM handles drip campaigns. Compare features, ease of use, and integration capabilities. Pay attention to how user-friendly the interface is and whether it can scale with your business as it grows. To schedule a demo and explore how Folk can enhance your drip campaigns, click here.

3 tips for implementing a CRM for drip campaigns

At this stage, it's all about making the most of the first few weeks with your new CRM. For a smooth impementation process, we suggest making sure you tick off these three things as soon as you can.

1. Import your data into your new CRM

Transitioning to a new CRM involves importing your existing data to ensure continuity and effectiveness of your drip campaigns. Most CRMs support CSV file imports, making it easy to transfer your contacts and leads. This way, you won't have to worry about manually adding contact information.

2. Create your first pipeline

Setting up your first pipeline is a critical step in organizing your drip campaigns. Design your pipeline with stages that reflect the progression of your drip emails, from initial contact to conversion. This structure will help you track the effectiveness of each campaign and make data-driven adjustments.

3. Onboard your team

A successful CRM implementation for drip campaigns requires that your team is fully onboarded and comfortable with the new system. Provide comprehensive training and resources to ensure everyone understands how to use the CRM to its full potential, from setting up automated emails to analyzing campaign performance.

The 5 best CRMs for drip campaigns

1. folk

folk is a modern CRM platform for managing contacts, workflows, and relationships, offering customizable pipelines, AI-driven tools, and integrations to enhance deal management and prospecting. folk can support multiple business functions including marketing and sales

Key features

• Contact enrichment: Automatically enriches contact details by finding emails and LinkedIn URLs, enabling efficient outreach without manual data entry or additional costs for email services.
• Social media ntegration: Seamlessly import contacts from LinkedIn,  Instagram, X and more to track contacts within folk, and use templates for quicker, streamlined communication.
• Mail merge and email sequences: Full email sync compatible with Gmail and Outlook templates, and tracking features, enabling users to manage all communications directly from the CRM.
• AI-powered features: AI tools assist in managing contacts and relationships, automating routine tasks, and suggesting actions to improve productivity.
• Integrations: folk integrates seamlessly with over 6,000 apps, including Gmail, Zapier, and Make, allowing users to centralize their workflow and reduce manual data entry.

Pros

• Ease of use: folk is praised for its intuitive interface, making it accessible even to non-technical users with quick onboarding and a minimal learning curve.
• All-in-one: folk streamlines your workflow by allowing you to import contacts from LinkedIn, automatically find their emails, reach out through customizable email sequences, and track interactions in a pipeline, eliminating the need for multiple tools and saving time and money.
• Full personalization: Custom fields, dashboards, pipelines, automation and workflows. So you can work with your marketing team, and collaborate with your sales team all in one place.
• Integrations: folk integrates seamlessly with over 6,000 apps, including Gmail, Zapier, and Make, allowing users to centralize their workflow and reduce manual data entry.

Cons

• Reporting: Currently lacks reporting features, but there are plans for future implementation.
  
  

Price and plans

You can try folk for free with a 14-day free trial. After that, a monthly or annual subscription plan is as follows.

• Standard: $20 per user, per month.
• Premium: $40 per user, per month.
• Custom: Starts from $60 per user, per month.

2. HubSpot

HubSpot CRM is a user-friendly, scalable platform offering integrated tools for managing sales, marketing, customer service, and operations efficiently.

Key features

• Marketing hub: Includes email marketing, ad tracking, landing pages, and lead generation tools, crucial for creating and managing effective drip campaigns.
• Sales hub: Provides deal tracking, pipeline management, sales automation, and reporting, helping you nurture leads through various stages of the sales funnel.
• Lead scoring: Prioritize leads with predictive scoring to improve sales efficiency, ensuring your drip campaigns target the most promising prospects.
• Automation capabilities: Offers powerful automation tools for tasks like email marketing and lead nurturing, making it easier to set up and manage drip campaigns.
• Customizable dashboard and reports: Allows users to create customized dashboards and reports to track the performance of drip campaigns and gain insights into lead conversion rates.

Pros

• User-friendly interface: The intuitive interface makes it easy to set up and manage drip campaigns, even for beginners.
• Comprehensive free plan: Offers a robust free version that includes essential CRM features, making it ideal for small businesses and startups looking to implement drip campaigns without a hefty investment.
• Seamless integration with marketing tools: Integrates smoothly with marketing tools, allowing for a unified approach to managing drip campaigns and customer interactions.
• Automation capabilities: Provides powerful automation tools for email marketing and lead nurturing, which are essential for effective drip campaigns.
• Customizable dashboard and reports: Enables users to create customized dashboards and reports to monitor the success of drip campaigns and make data-driven decisions.

Cons

• High cost at higher tiers: Pricing can become expensive as you move to higher tiers, which may be prohibitive for small businesses scaling their drip campaigns.
• Limited customization in free plan: The free plan and lower tiers have limited customization options, which can restrict flexibility for growing businesses implementing drip campaigns.
• Email marketing limits: Email marketing functionality in the free plan is restricted by limits on the number of emails you can send, which can be a drawback for businesses with larger email lists.
• Complexity in advanced features: Some advanced features, such as custom reporting and workflows, have a steep learning curve and may require additional training.
• Additional costs for add-ons: Many useful features, like advanced CRM capabilities and integrations, come as paid add-ons, increasing the overall cost.
  

3. Salesforce

Salesforce is a robust CRM platform for large enterprises, offering tools for sales, marketing, service, and analytics, with extensive scalability.

Key features

• Comprehensive ecosystem: Salesforce offers a unified platform combining CRM, marketing automation, and customer service, making it ideal for managing drip campaigns and nurturing both leads and customers.
• Customization and scalability: Highly customizable to tailor drip campaigns to specific customer segments and scalable to grow with your business needs.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) integration: Salesforce Einstein provides AI-driven insights, optimizing drip campaign strategies by predicting customer behaviors and preferences.
• Extensive integration capabilities: Integrates seamlessly with a wide range of third-party applications, enhancing the effectiveness of your drip campaigns by ensuring smooth data flow.
• Enterprise-grade security and compliance: Offers robust security measures, crucial for protecting sensitive customer data during automated drip campaigns.

Pros

• Comprehensive feature set: Covers all aspects of sales, marketing, and customer service, making it powerful for managing drip campaigns and customer relationships.
• Highly customizable: Allows businesses to create tailored drip campaigns with custom fields, objects, and workflows.
• Extensive integration capabilities: Integrates with numerous third-party applications, ensuring seamless operation of your drip campaigns.
• Scalability: Suitable for businesses of all sizes, from startups to large enterprises, with the ability to grow alongside your business.
• Advanced analytics and reporting: Provides deep insights into campaign performance, helping you refine and optimize your drip marketing strategies.

Cons

• High cost: Can be expensive, particularly for small to medium-sized businesses, with high licensing fees and additional costs for add-ons.
• Steep learning curve: Requires significant time and training to become proficient, which can be challenging for startups with limited resources.
• Complex setup and customization: Initial setup can be challenging and may require expert help, adding to the overall cost.
• Overwhelming for small teams: Robust features may be overkill for smaller teams, leading to underutilization of the platform’s capabilities.
• Integration complexity: While offering extensive integration capabilities, integrating with third-party applications can be complex and require technical expertise.

Price and plans

On an annual subscription, Salesforce’s Service Cloud plan is as follows.

• Starter suite: Starts from $25 per user, per month.
• Pro suite: Starts from $100 per user, per month.
• Enterprise: Starts from $165 per user, per month.
  

4. Pipedrive

Pipedrive is a web-based CRM for small businesses, offering lead management, automation, email integration, and customizable pipelines to optimize sales.

Key features

• Lead and deal management: Centralized tools to manage leads and customers, helping teams act quickly on opportunities.
• Sales automation: Workflow automation to handle repetitive tasks, such as lead routing and follow-up emails, enhancing drip campaign efficiency.
• Email integration: Full email sync, templates, and tracking features, enabling users to manage all communications directly from the CRM.
• Advanced reporting and analytics: Real-time data analytics and custom reporting tools to track the performance of drip campaigns and gain actionable insights.
• Customization and security: Options to customize pipelines, fields, and user permissions, with robust security measures to protect data.

Pros

• User-friendly interface: Intuitive and visually appealing interface, making it easy to navigate and manage drip campaigns.
• Sales pipeline focus: Designed for managing sales pipelines, offering a visual approach that helps track leads and customer activities effectively.
• Customization: High degree of customization, enabling users to tailor the platform to specific drip campaign processes with custom fields and workflows.
• Affordability: Competitive pricing, making it accessible to small and medium-sized businesses without sacrificing essential CRM features.
• Automation features: Includes automation tools that streamline repetitive tasks, such as sending follow-up emails, saving time and boosting productivity.

Cons

• Limited advanced features: Lacks some advanced CRM features, such as extensive marketing automation and AI capabilities, available in other platforms.
• Basic reporting in lower tiers: Reporting and analytics features in the basic plans are somewhat limited, requiring upgrades for more in-depth insights.
• No built-in email marketing: Does not include built-in email marketing features, requiring integration with third-party email tools for such functionality.
• Price increases with add-ons: Cost can increase quickly when additional features or integrations are added, making it less cost-effective for businesses with growing needs.
• Limited customer support hours: Customer support is not available 24/7, which can be inconvenient for businesses operating in different time zones or needing immediate assistance.

Price and plans

Pipedrive's annual subscription plan basis is as follows.

• Essential plan: Starts from $24 per user, per month.
• Advanced plan: Starts from $44 per user, per month.
• Power plan: Starts from $79 per user, per month.
• Enterprise plan: Starts from $129 per user, per month.

5. 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

• 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.

Pros

• Affordability: Zoho CRM offers competitive pricing with various tiers, making it accessible to small and medium-sized businesses as well as larger enterprises.
• Customization: Extensive customization options allow businesses to tailor the CRM to their specific needs, including custom fields, modules, and workflows.
• Integration with Zoho suite: Seamless integration with other Zoho products (like Zoho Books, Zoho Projects, and Zoho Campaigns) creates a comprehensive ecosystem for managing different business functions.
• Multi-channel communication: Zoho CRM supports email, phone, social media, and live chat, enabling businesses to manage all customer interactions from a single platform.
• AI-powered features: Zia, the AI assistant, provides intelligent insights, predictive analytics, and task automation, helping to improve sales and marketing efficiency.

Cons

• Steep learning curve: The extensive customization options can be overwhelming for new users, requiring a significant time investment to master the platform.
• Complex setup: Initial setup and configuration can be complex, particularly for businesses without technical expertise or dedicated IT resources.
• User interface: Some users find the interface to be outdated or cluttered compared to other modern CRM platforms, which can affect usability.
• Performance issues: Occasional reports of slow performance, especially with large datasets or complex operations, can hinder productivity.
• Limited third-party integrations: While Zoho integrates well with its own suite of products, integration with third-party applications can be limited or require additional effort.

Price and plans

Zoho's free plan is limited to three users. After that, more features and seats are available on an annual subscription plan as follows.

• Standard: $20 per user, per month.
• Professional: $35 per user, per month.
• Enterprise: $50 per user, per month.

Conclusion

Choosing the best CRM for drip campaigns is a crucial step in optimizing your customer engagement and driving business growth. Whether you are a founder of a startup, a small business, or a tech company, the right CRM can streamline your processes, improve lead nurturing, and enhance your overall marketing strategy. Each CRM we reviewed—folk, Hubspot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, and Zoho—offers unique features and benefits tailored to different business needs and budgets. By evaluating your specific requirements, budget considerations, and the scalability of the CRM, you can make an informed decision that aligns with your business goals. To experience the benefits firsthand, you can try folk for free here.

Need a helping hand? Use our free tool to find your perfect CRM match.

Frequently Asked Questions

What do marketers use as a CRM?

Marketers often use CRMs like folk, Hubspot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, and Zoho to manage their customer relationships and enhance their drip campaigns. These platforms offer features such as contact management, email sequencing, and automation tools that streamline processes and improve customer engagement, making them ideal for startups, small businesses, and larger enterprises.

Do I need a CRM?

Yes, depending on the complexity of your process, a CRM can significantly enhance your ability to manage customer interactions, automate repetitive tasks, and optimize drip campaigns. It centralizes data, improves efficiency, and provides valuable insights, making it essential for growing businesses.

How much does a CRM cost?

CRM costs vary widely depending on the platform and features. Prices can range from free plans to $20-$129 per user per month. Higher-tier plans with advanced features and customizations can be more expensive, so it's essential to choose a CRM that fits your budget and needs.

Does folk’s CRM respond to drip campaigns needs?

Yes, folk's CRM is well-suited for drip campaigns. It offers features like contact enrichment, LinkedIn integration, email sequencing, and automation tools. These capabilities streamline the process of managing and executing drip campaigns, making folk an effective choice for businesses looking to enhance their customer engagement and lead nurturing strategies.