Salesforce vs. Zoho: Which Modern CRM Software Can Take Your Business to the Next Level?

Salesforce vs. Zoho

Whom Do We Recommend Salesforce For?

We recommend Salesforce for businesses searching for a customizable CRM platform with loads of products and features geared toward specific needs, like sales, service and marketing. We think the Starter plan offers everything small businesses new to CRM need to build a sales pipeline and manage contacts. As business grows, you can easily purchase add-ons or upgrade plans.  

We think Salesforce’s premium plans are perfect for large businesses and enterprises needing a tailored platform with potent AI-powered automations and insights. Salesforce helps teams provide personalized service at just the right time so that more deals close and your business thrives.

Salesforce’s user-friendly dashboard makes staying on top of deals easy. Source: Salesforce

Salesforce is a top CRM solution because of these features: 

• Variety of plans with seemingly endless features, add-ons and integrations
• Clear dashboard with excellent lead management, forecasting and reports
• AI-powered automations, insights, recommendations and content generation 

Whom Do We Recommend Zoho For? 

Zoho is our choice for small businesses in need of a solid yet affordable CRM solution. We love the user-friendly dashboard, timesaving automations and top-notch contact management features available across all plans. Plus, you can get advanced features, like an AI-powered assistant, by upgrading to premium plans without breaking the bank.

We think Zoho excels at connecting remote teams thanks to its excellent communication features, fully functional mobile app, conferencing integrations and gamification to increase employee engagement. Your teams can collaborate from anywhere to provide timely, personalized service that builds loyalty and increases profits. 

Zoho’s mobile app lets your teams work effectively from anywhere. Source: Zoho

Zoho shines because of these features:

• Standard essential features to streamline your business
• Zia AI for insights, improved lead generation and predictions
• Motivator tool that incentivizes friendly competition

Salesforce vs. Zoho

Price and Plans

Salesforce

• Salesforce offers an assortment of solutions.
• You have to commit annually after a 30-day free trial.
• The best features come with expensive premium plans only.

Salesforce has multiple solutions for different needs, but most are designed for large enterprises and expensive. We’ve focused on the Sales CRM plans. You can also opt for a service-oriented CRM at the same price points or the Marketing Cloud Account Engagement solution with monthly prices ranging from $1,250 to $15,000. All four Sales CRM plans offer a 30-day free trial, but we don’t like that subscriptions require an annual commitment. 

We appreciate that the Starter plan contains the essential tools to work effectively, but we were disappointed by the 10-seat limit. As your needs grow, changing plans comes with a steep price increase. Unfortunately, the best features are restricted to the most expensive plans, and add-ons are costly.

Zoho

• You can choose from stand-alone plans or bundled options.
• All plans offer free-trials, and there are no contracts or commitments. 
• Essential features come standard, and scaling is affordable.

Zoho offers five stand-alone CRM plans, including a free option, plus two bundled packages. We like that you can pay monthly or discounted yearly, with no contracts or commitments. There’s a 14-day free trial for stand-alone plans and a 30-day trial for bundles.

We love that price jumps between plans are small so you can scale affordably. CRM Flex includes the standard CRM platform and a choice of paid apps, so you can customize a plan to meet your needs. CRM Plus includes all eight fully featured Zoho apps.  

Sales Features

Salesforce

• Lead management tools come standard.
• You get clear, accurate forecasts.
• Advanced selling tools come with high-tier plans only.

It’s right in the name: Salesforce excels when it comes to capturing leads, managing pipelines and making sales. We especially love the potent lead management tools. Salesforce automatically routes contacts to the appropriate rep, who has access to a customized contact information page with tools to follow up and close the deal.  

We also found the forecasting feature to be a highlight, although we wish it came standard. You get a complete, accurate view of sales forecasts from the dashboard or the Forecasting mobile app. 

We were disappointed that many advanced features, like AI powered insights, advanced customizations and workflow automations, are restricted to expensive plans.

Zoho  

• You get essential sales tools for free.
• SalesSignals tracks multichannel lead interactions. 
• Motivator keeps your teams competitive.

Zoho makes lead generation and sales management a breeze. Everything you need to communicate with contacts and win deals, like automations and reports, comes free. The bargain-priced Standard plan expands features, adding forecasting and better analytics. 

We love that Zoho is geared toward providing excellent communications with up-to-date information so your team can close deals efficiently. We especially like the SalesSignals feature, which sends alerts when leads interact with your brand across multiple channels, including social media or third-party apps, but it doesn’t come standard.

We think the Motivator feature is especially useful. Through gamification, it creates challenges and rewards to keep your teams competitive and on task. But we were disappointed that it’s missing in basic plans. Other excellent features are restricted to top-tier plans, like AI tools, unlimited customizations and social media data enrichment. Still, advanced tools are a bargain compared to the competition. 

Artificial Intelligence

Salesforce  

• Most features come with the Unlimited plan only.
• Einstein tracks brand mentions and interactions online.
• EinsteinGPT offers personalized content and recommendations.

Salesforce offers stellar AI-powered features, but apart from email and calendar data sync, none comes standard. In fact, most features, like predictions and forecasts, are restricted to the Unlimited plan or as Enterprise plan paid add-ons. 

Einstein Conversation Insights records conversations with time stamps to relevant keywords. Source: Salesforce

We found the Einstein Conversation Insights tool especially beneficial. You can see how your business is being discussed online with visual trends. Plus, Einstein records conversations and highlights keywords so that you can easily access information and share it with colleagues. The Social Intelligence add-on takes things further, providing industry insights from social media to help you find and reach leads.

Einstein GPT combines Salesforce’s AI with ChatGPT’s generative capabilities. It creates tailored automations, recommendations and alerts so you can work quicker and better. It also generates personalized customer responses and interaction summaries. We love that it learns your customers and lets you know when it’s best to reach out.

Zoho

• Zia provides accurate data while saving you time.
• AI studies customers and makes timely recommendations.
• Zia comes with premium plans only.

We love that Zoho’s AI-powered assistant makes everything about communicating with your contacts easier. Zia provides you with instant customer data, takes notes during an interaction, conducts sentiment analysis and even chats with customers on your website. Plus, it analyzes customer interactions and behaviors, letting you know when you should make contact and which products to sell. Zia can also build custom reports, monitor your sales, make predictions and recommend workflow automations.

Zia is available only with the Enterprise or Ultimate plan, but at a lower price than Salesforce’s plan with built-in AI.

Ease of Use

Salesforce

• The dashboard and mobile app are first-rate.
• You can choose from a large number of add-ons and external integrations.
• The most intuitive tools are in premium plans only.

We found using Salesforce painless despite how complex the platform and its expansive features seem. The foolproof dashboard gives you a full picture of your business with accessible actions to build sales. Plus, you can do everything out of office with the fully operative mobile app.

Salesforce’s seemingly endless list of customizable features makes doing everything smoother. You can purchase additional tools to expand functionality as your business evolves. Plus, thousands of CRM integrations in the App Exchange let you take things further. But we were disappointed that the Starter plan limits integrations and that many of the most valuable tools, like generative AI and advanced automations, don’t come standard. 

Setting up the Starter plan is straightforward, even for first-time CRM users, with online implementation resources. We love how customizable Salesforce’s solutions are, but larger businesses with complex needs might find setup to be challenging.  

Zoho

• The platform is highly customizable. 
• Zoho’s tools are great for connecting remote teams.
• Onboarding help comes with all plans.

Canvas allows you to use a template or design your own custom dashboard. Source: Zoho

Zoho’s user-friendly platform is easy to customize, allowing you to prioritize the most relevant data and tools. We love that you can personalize your dashboard’s look with Canvas. Plus, Zoho integrates with hundreds of external apps so your teams can work with the solutions they already love. 

Zoho shines for helping teams work remotely. The fully functional mobile app allows employees to connect from anywhere. Collaboration tools and conference call service integrations connect teams directly via the platform. We found Feeds, which lets your teams communicate in real time and keep up to date on deals, especially handy.

Setup is simple and every plan includes onboarding help. We think most teams will be able to implement the platform efficiently without needing to dig into Zoho’s comprehensive online training materials.

Customer Service

Salesforce

• There are three levels of customer service.
• Phone support isn’t included for free.
• Online resources help with navigating the platform.

Salesforce’s has three customer service options:

• Standard Success comes free with all plans and provides online learning tools, a help portal, community forums and online technical support through case submission. 
• Premier Success comes free with Unlimited Plans or for 30 percent of your license fees. You’ll get all the free resources plus 24/7 phone support, developer support, coaching and onboarding. 
• Signature Success includes expanded service that most small businesses won’t need. You’ll have to call for custom pricing.

We don’t like that phone support isn’t included free, especially considering how much premium plans could set you back. We appreciate that filing a technical support case ensures you’re connected to the right person, but the waiting period could be problematic.

Zoho

• There are three customer service options.
• All plans include phone support and onboarding.
• Zoho offers abundant online help and learning resources.

Zoho’s offers three customer service plans:

• Classic is free and includes access to many first-rate resources, like articles, e-books, videos, webinars, a community forum and a self-service portal for support requests. You get email, chat and phone support eight hours a day, five days a week, plus 45 days of onboarding. Support request responses may take up to eight hours.
• Premium provides expanded customer service and costs 20 percent of your subscription fee. You get round-the-clock support five days a week, a dedicated onboarding specialist for 75 days and support responses within three hours.
• Enterprise provides comprehensive, 24/7 live support for 25 percent of your subscription price, but it requires a 25-seat minimum. Support responses take less than an hour. You get a dedicated Zoho Technical Account Manager and quarterly usage reports with recommendations to help your team get the most out of the platform. 

We found Zoho’s extensive support resources to be especially useful. We also like that with Jumpstart, you can pay for additional onboarding help for $200 per hour. 

Salesforce vs. Zoho Recap

Choose Salesforce if:

• You want a powerful, customizable CRM solution from a leader in the industry.
• You need the flexibility to add tools and integrations as your business evolves.
• You’re looking for a solution with state-of-the-art AI capabilities. 

Choose Zoho if:

• You want to get essential CRM tools for a low price, or even free.
• You need features to engage your remote sales and marketing teams.
• You’re looking for an easy-to-use solution with onboarding and phone support.

FAQ

What does Salesforce do?

Salesforce offers a variety of unified CRM solutions to help you connect with customers, work more efficiently and increase sales.

Is Salesforce the best CRM?

Salesforce is a leader in the CRM software industry with robust solutions, but the best CRM provider for you depends on your business’s unique characteristics. 

Is Zoho better than Salesforce?

Zoho is a solid CRM solution and could be a better choice for your company depending on your specific needs and the size of your business. 

Is Zoho free to use?

Yes. Zoho has a forever-free plan with basic CRM capabilities. You can try any of its affordable paid plans free for 15 days.