CRM software centralizes and analyzes business and customer data, aiding sales, marketing, and customer service teams. Cloud-based CRM stores this data on the provider’s servers, allowing users to access it online. This eliminates the need for enterprises to host the software on-site, saving on resources. CRM cloud providers ensure data security in their data centers, and their systems offer automation, contact management, and valuable customer insights.

Our top five cloud-based CRM software picks offer a wide range of benefits for businesses with different CRM software needs. 

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Our picks for the best cloud-based CRM software

Salesforce: Best for improving sales functions

Pros

  • User friendly
  • Easy to customize
  • Navigating within the software is intuitive
  • Wide range of integrations
  • Easy-to-use, flexible reporting and dashboarding functionality

Cons

  • Configuration/setup is complex, time consuming
  • Add-ons cost extra
  • Customer support has a bad reputation
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Account and contact management: The account and contact management feature gives sales reps and sales teams all the information they need to track the people and organizations they do business with. This data includes each customer’s activity history, communications with these customers, key contacts, etc. 

Opportunity management: With this feature, companies can easily manage all their sales deals and enable sales reps to be more productive by keeping them connected to the people and information they need to close deals.

Lead management: With lead management, companies can measure the effect their marketing activities are having on their sales pipeline across all channels.

Quote management: This feature allows companies to show their customers the prices of the products and services they offer. And it enables them to sync quotes and opportunities to ensure their information stays up to date.

Starter: $25/user/month

  • Basic CRM for up to 10 users.

Professional: $80/user/month

  • Complete CRM for any size team.

Enterprise: $165/user/month

  • Deeply customizable CRM for complex sales processes.

Unlimited: $330/user/month

  • Unlimited CRM power and support.

With Salesforce CRM, sales teams can access customer data in one place in real time as well as pull insights from reports and dashboards. Salesforce also offers a suite of products that work seamlessly with its CRM cloud. For example, Sales Cloud, the sales module in Salesforce, helps salespeople close more deals faster. The Marketing Cloud allows marketers to get personalized messages to the right customers at the right times through their preferred channels.

Salesforce can be used by companies in any industry that want to streamline or enhance their sales functions. A customizable CRM available via cloud or local, Salesforce helps sales teams manage contacts and opportunities, track leads, forecast sales, and get insights into how they are performing. 

However, configuring and setting up Salesforce is complex, so it would be worthwhile for organizations that opt to use Salesforce to ensure that their leadership has experience with the application and understands what a good implementation looks like.

Also Read: Best CRMs for Small Business

Microsoft Dynamics 365: Best for enterprises

Pros

  • Integrates with other Microsoft Office 365 products
  • Easy to customize
  • Aligns sales and marketing teams with planning and tracking tools

Cons

  • Requires a lot of training
  • Rigid configuration is difficult to change after setup
  • User interface may be difficult to navigate for users not familiar with Microsoft products
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Sales: Dynamics 365 CRM Sales lets organizations keep all their business contacts in one system, which can be accessed by authorized employees in any department. The application speeds the sales cycles by offering suggested next best actions. It also connects sales reps with customers through their preferred channels. 

Marketing: Dynamics 365 Marketing enables marketing teams to design, predict, and deliver personalized content to customers. Using AI-driven recommendations, salespeople can turn insights into relevant action.

Customer insights: Customer Insights combines data from transactional, behavioral, and demographic sources, giving companies 360-degree views of their customers so they can deliver personalized experiences to them.

Professional: $65/user/month

Enterprise: $105/user/month

Premium: $150/user/month

Microsoft Relationship Sales: $177/user/month

Because Microsoft Dynamics allows organizations to efficiently integrate management software across locations, divisions, and departments, it’s a popular choice for large and growing companies. Using Dynamics 365 API capabilities, organizations can integrate the application with their other key systems.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 is Microsoft’s CRM group of five cloud-based applications: marketing, sales, customer service, field service, and project operations. Customers can buy individual applications or the entire suite, depending on their needs. Dynamics 365 also integrates with Microsoft Office 365 products, including Teams, Word, Outlook, and Excel.

Dynamics 365 offers companies performance metric tracking, real-time analytics, multi-channel relationship management tools, and artificial intelligence-based recommendations. Microsoft Dynamics offers advanced tools not offered by other CRM software vendors.

Also Read: FreshSales vs. amoCRM

HubSpot: Best for teams new to CRM

Pros

  • Free version is free forever
  • Easy to set up and use
  • Keeps client records in one place
  • HubSpot’s App Marketplace offers more than 1,000 integrations

Cons

  • Adding premium features is expensive
  • Customer support only available with paid versions
  • Companies can only assign one email per contact record
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Contact and lead management: Sales teams can add contact records, automatically log their sales activities, and keep their records up to date. Sales reps can view every interaction they’ve had with contacts and use this data to develop campaigns that help them close more deals.

Sales: Organizations can use meeting scheduling as well as email tracking and email automation to get greater insights into prospects, automate tasks, and close more deals faster. The click-to-call tool lets salespeople make appointments more quickly. Robust website tools help sales reps better understand when prospects or customers are active on their websites.

Task management: HubSpot CRM helps customers more easily manage their tasks by enabling them to sort and create deals in the application. With task management, sales reps can schedule and track their tasks as well as call, send emails, and schedule meetings with customers. These things simplify the sales process and allow sales teams to develop long-lasting relationships with customers.

Free plan available

Starter: $30/month for all products – billed annually; $50/month for all products – billed monthly *** includes 2 paid users in Sales and Service Hub  

Professional: $1,600/month for all products – billed annually; $1,781/month for all products – billed monthly *** includes 5 paid users in Sales and Service Hub  

Enterprise: $5,000/month for all products – billed annually only.  *** includes 10 paid users in Sales and Service Hub 

The free plan enables unlimited users to access its contact management, marketing, sales, and customer service tools. As companies get more familiar with using HubSpot, they can add tools or migrate to the paid tiers as necessary.

HubSpot CRM allows salespeople to organize, manage, and track contacts to help them develop better relationships with their clients. HubSpot is great for sales teams that are new to CRM, particularly if they’re looking to leverage the application’s email marketing capability. HubSpot’s free plan is ideal for new businesses that need a simple platform for sales, marketing, and customer service.

Also read: Top Construction & Contractor CRM Software

Oracle NetSuite: Best for e-commerce businesses

Pros

  • Customizable
  • Great tracking, reporting, and forecasting capabilities
  • All-in-one commerce solution for marketing, sales, and operation

Cons

  • Not available as a stand-alone CRM solution
  • Companies must subscribe to Oracle’s flagship ERP
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Sales force automation: NetSuite’s sales force automation functionality gives sales teams visibility into every aspect of their customer relationships. And the dashboard provides sales reps with actionable insights into lead, prospect, and customer activities so they can better prioritize their daily and weekly activities.

Marketing automation: NetSuite CRM’s marketing automation software automates the entire marketing process. It aligns campaigns and programs with sales teams and generates qualified leads that are ready to engage with sales reps.

Customer service management: NetSuite CRM assigns, manages, and routes customer support across multiple channels and provides time tracking functionality so salespeople can see just how much time they’re spending with customers.

Contact Oracle Netsuite for a customized quote.

NetSuite CRM organizes, automates, and syncs customer interactions across different departments, including sales, customer service, marketing, and technical support. As part of its core functionality, NetSuite CRM offers customer service, marketing automation, and sales force automation.

Oracle NetSuite CRM, built on Oracle’s enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform, is well suited for e-commerce businesses that want to provide top-notch customer experiences. The NetSuite CRM module gives organizations of all sizes complete 360-degree views of their customers in real time. 

However, it is particularly well suited for midsize e-commerce companies that need a CRM system to help them better understand the shopping habits of their customers.

Zoho CRM: Best for remote and hybrid sales teams

Pros

  • Easy to use
  • Offers a free plan
  • Integrates well with other Google/Zoho apps

Cons

  • Zia AI is only available with Enterprise and Ultimate plans
  • Limited set of custom fields
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Sales force automation: Companies can automate marketing, routine sales, and support functions, enabling teams to focus on their customers. With this feature, teams can create enhanced workflows to help reduce manual data entry, eliminate redundancies, and speed up the overall sales process.

Motivator: This feature builds team spirit and encourages healthy competition by enabling employees to participate in games and targets together no matter where they’re located.

Artificial intelligence: Zoho CRM’s AI-powered assistant Zia helps teams gather customer information, write documents, or find helpful data, such as sales numbers, to make employees’ jobs easier. Zia analyzes when customers usually answer calls, open emails, or visit the company’s website, then proposes the best time to contact customers.

Free plan available for up to 3 users

Standard: $14/user/month – billed annually; $20/user/month – billed monthly

Professional: $23/user/month – billed annually; $35/user/month – billed monthly

Enterprise: $40/user/month – billed annually; $50/user/month – billed monthly

Ultimate: $52/user/month – billed annually; $65/user/month – billed monthly

Companies can create games between individual sales reps or teams, no matter where they’re located. Zoho CRM’s AI-powered assistant Zia predicts leads and deals, identifies potential customers ready to convert, and helps large sales teams boost productivity by focusing their efforts.

Zoho CRM allows organizations with remote and hybrid workforces to easily increase leads, accurately measure performance, and efficiently speed up the sales cycle. Zoho CRM is a good system for organizations with remote and hybrid workforces because it offers a gamification feature that fosters friendly competition.

Also Read: Zoho vs Salesforce

Pipedrive: Best for visual sales pipeline tracking

Pros

  • Automatically tracks calls and emails
  • Clear visual representation of the sales pipeline
  • Users can operate in remote and hybrid environments

Cons

  • Costs increase for added features and integrations
  • Becomes more complex to manage as teams grow
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Visual sales pipelines: Pipedrive provides a clear visual interface that allows users to move deals through distinct stages.

Email integration: Users can send and receive emails directly within Pipedrive.

Activities and goals: Pipedrive allows users to set activities and goals.

Sales reporting: With comprehensive sales reporting tools, users can get insights into sales performance, track revenue, and analyze sales metrics.

Custom fields and pipelines: Pipedrive offers the flexibility to customize fields and pipelines according to specific business needs.

Mobile apps: Pipedrive provides mobile apps for both iOS and Android.

Contact and deal management: Users can easily manage contacts and deals, ensuring all relevant information is organized and easily accessible.

Essential: $14/user/month – billed annually; $24/user/month – billed monthly

Advanced: $29/user/month – billed annually; $39/user/month – billed monthly

Professional: $49/user/month – billed annually; $64/user/month – billed monthly

Power: $64/user/month – billed annually; $79/user/month – billed monthly

Enterprise: $99/user/month – billed annually; $129/user/month – billed monthly

Users consistently praise Pipedrive’s intuitive visual interface tailored for sales teams. Of particular note is its customization capabilities, allowing teams to adapt it to their unique sales processes without requiring coding. Its integration with tools like Zapier and other plugins offers a cohesive ecosystem for businesses. Additionally, the active Pipedrive community and excellent support, available directly via chat, further enhance the user experience. The feedback underscores Pipedrive’s practicality, ease of training, and onboarding, making it a top choice for sales pipeline management.

Pipedrive is a cloud-based CRM predominantly tailored for sales teams, emphasizing visual sales pipeline management. Its strengths lie in its user-friendly interface, automation capabilities, and seamless email integration. 

Compared to platforms like Salesforce, Pipedrive offers a more streamlined experience, making it ideal for businesses that want simplicity without the bells and whistles. However, unlike more comprehensive CRMs such as Microsoft Dynamics 365, it might lack certain advanced functionalities. While it’s excellent for tracking sales and managing contacts, larger enterprises with complex needs might find it limiting. 

Pipedrive is akin to HubSpot in its ease of use but doesn’t quite match the depth of features found in more extensive CRM systems.

Choosing the best cloud-based CRM solution

CRM cloud software is a valuable tool for businesses of all sizes in any industry that want to track sales, follow up with prospects, and manage customer relationships. 

Cloud-based CRM platforms come in all sizes, and they can be complicated and expensive to implement. The right solution depends on a company’s biggest CRM needs. For example, large e-commerce companies would do well to consider Oracle NetSuite CRM, while organizations that want to boost their sales functions would be better off opting for Salesforce.

Also Read: CRM Software Guide

Aron Vaughan Avatar
Aron Vaughan
Staff Writer
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Aron Vaughan is a TechnologyAdvice Staff Writer focused on coverage and research in the fields of Business Intelligence, Sales, and IT software categories. During his career, he has covered a wide array of cutting-edge tech topics from Artificial Intelligence to Sustainable Energy, Augmented Reality, and more. With a background in journalism, he is dedicated to crafting articles that inform readers and deliver the best possible answers for data-driven decision making.