How We Review and Test Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Software

Customer relationship management (CRM) software is the tool that helps businesses improve their interactions with potential or existing customers. It’s essentially a database of all customer-related data, including their personal and demographic details, purchase history, support requests, communication logs, engagement with marketing material, and essentially any interaction they have with the business.

This data is centralized so that it’s accessible to sales, marketing, and customer service departments, allowing businesses to offer effective, personalized support and experiences to its customers at every customer touchpoint. It can help businesses identify patterns in customer behavior and satisfaction, which can then help them spot opportunities to optimize the experiences they offer. Having the information stored digitally means the CRM software can be used to automate time-consuming tasks like sending follow-up emails to customers at certain stages of their journey, or log and categorize customer issues, meaning that managing customer relationships is faster and more effective.

In short, CRM software helps you collect as much data as possible on your customers — both as individuals and as a whole customer base — which you can then leverage to offer them better, faster, more memorable experiences with your business.

As mentioned, there are three primary use cases for CRM systems. These are to support efforts in the following areas:

• Sales: supports lead generation, opportunity and pipeline management, and closing deals with new customers
• Marketing: supports how businesses nurture or capture new leads by running targeting marketing campaigns based on customer data. It can also enhance relationships with an existing customer base through personalized communication (e.g. email marketing), loyalty programs, and up/cross-selling, aiming to improve retention
• Customer service: supports businesses in solving problems and issues among existing customers to improve their experience and build customer satisfaction

Our Testing Criteria for CRM Software

We evaluate all CRM systems using the exact same core testing criteria to ensure our reviews are fair and unbiased. Our seven key areas of investigation when testing and researching CRM systems are:

1. Features and functionality – evaluating the presence and quality of core and advanced CRM features. We look at distinct, dedicated sets of features that are important to each of the three primary CRM uses cases: sales, marketing, and customer service
2. Usability and Reliability – evaluating the user interface of the CRM applications and web portals as well as things like learning curve, onboarding, accessibility on multiple devices, and responsiveness when dealing with larger customer data sets
3. Compatibility and Integrations – evaluating the compatibility with third-party apps, software, and hardware
4. Customer Support – evaluating the available customer support options offered by the CRM software provider, and the quality of their service
5. Scalability and Future-Proofing – evaluating the scalability of the software to accommodate business growth
6. Security – a thorough security analysis to identify any vulnerabilities and ensure the protection of sensitive data
7. Cost and Pricing – assessing the CRM products’ value for money in terms of features vs average plan price

We’ll explain more about why and how we test in these areas below. Our testing process includes:

• Hands-on software testing, scoring, and evaluation
• Review documentation and video tutorials
• Focus group interviews with software users
• Third-party reviews and user forums

1. Features and Functionality – Evaluating the Presence and Quality of Core and Advanced CRM Features

Why We Test Features and Functionality: the exact features that a CRM system does or doesn’t have will have a big impact on how well it will fit your business goals and aspirations. Most notably, the presence and quality of certain features help us understand if the CRM product is well suited to the different primary use cases of supporting sales, marketing, and/or customer service efforts. While we’ve noted “Contact Management” as a core feature of all CRM products, we have otherwise separated our feature analysis into three groups to make clear their suitability for the different uses.

How We Test Features and Functionality: first, we established which features are the most important based on our own use and third-party user feedback. Below, we’ve outlined how we test each one, in a nutshell.

1.1 How we test the key features of Sales CRM software

• Lead & Opportunity Management – we evaluate if it’s possible to track lead source channels, whether it allows lead scoring and qualification based on predefined and customizable criteria, how granular the lead segmentation is, how easy it is to track opportunities through the sales pipeline, and whether interactions logs can be linked to specific opportunities.
• Sales Pipeline Management – we look at how easy it is to visualize the sales pipeline, how easy it is to move deals between stages (drag-and-drop?), whether the CRM offers probability and deal value tracking, whether there are automated reminders and alerts for lost or stuck deals, and whether it supports multiple sales pipelines.
• Sales Forecasting – we interrogate the accuracy of the forecasting, the depth of past data it uses, how advanced its prediction models are, how well it integrates with the sales pipeline (for real-time updates), whether it offers scenario analysis, and how much control users have over the forecast timeframes.
• Sales reporting and Analytics – we verify that it offers all the fundamental sales reports we would expect to see (taking off points for ones which are missing), such as sales pipeline reports, lead conversion reports, and sales performance reports, as well as forecasting. We also check it offers the expected functionality when it comes to downloading, sharing, and filtering the reports.
• Sales Automation – we verify that the expected automations are available (removing points where they are not), such as lead assignment automation, the automation of follow-up reminders and tasks, and automated email sequences that enhance the customers experience as they move through the sales funnel.

1.2 How we test the key features of Marketing CRM software

• Marketing Campaign Creation – we look at the number and quality of tools the CRM offers for creating marketing campaigns and materials for multiple channels. We check there are templates for camping creation and that these are customizable.
• Marketing Campaign Execution and Management – we ensure there is a intuitive, clear centralized dashboard for viewing and managing campaigns across multiple channels. We then check if the CRM offers a calendar view for campaign planning, dynamic audience segmentation, A/B testing tools, dynamic content blocks for personalization, and compliance features such as opt-in forms and consent tracking.
• Lead Scoring – CRMs lose points if they don’t offer customizable lead scoring criteria, but they gain points if the scoring updates dynamically based on real-time activity (e.g. if a lead responds positively to an email). This is enabled if the lead scoring tool integrates with wider activity logs, which we check. Points are given if the CRM offers lead prioritization, automatic lead routing, lead score history, AI predictive scoring, and A/B testing for score refinement.
• Marketing Analytics and Reporting – we look at the number of pre-set reports on offer (the more the better) and then we verify it offers the fundamental reports we’d expect to see (removing points for those that are missing) such as lead source reports, campaign performance reports, and email marketing performance reports, among others.
• Marketing Automation – we verify the marketing CRM offers the automations we’d expect to see, such as lead scoring automation, email campaign automation, and social media posting automation.

1.3 How we test the key features of customer service CRM software

• Ticket Management – multichannel support and ticketing is important here; we take away points if a vital ticketing channel like email or chat is not available. We look for other efficiency-boosting features like ticket prioritization based on defined Service Level Agreements, collaboration and escalation features, knowledge base integration, and customizable ticket forms.
• Knowledge Base – the customer knowledge base must offer clear search and navigation functionality. It should allow through clear categorization of content through tags an meta data, rich content like videos and images, easy content uploading and editing tools, and a content feedback system.
• Customer Interaction History & Communication Logs – we ensure that the CRM will log interactions from all expected channels such as email and chat. We evaluate how easy it is to find and collaborate on the interaction history records, how well they integrate with the ticketing system, and whether or not audit trails and summaries are available.
• Customer Feedback and Surveys – a CRM will receive no points in the category if they don’t offer any basic customer feedback survey tools. If they do, we’ll check the availability of these for different channels, how well the feedback surveys integrate with the customer ticketing system, and whether or not follow-up workflows are available. We like to see that feedback is measurable based on at least three metrics: Net Promoter Score (NPS), Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT), and Customer Effort Score (CES).
• Customer Service Analytics and Reporting – we check that the fundamental reports we’d expect of a customer service CRM are present, including ticket volume reports, customer satisfaction reports, and first-response time reports among others.
• Customer Service Automations – a CRM will lose points for not offering automated ticket routing (to the right service agents) or basic customer follow-up messages, such as to confirm the receipt of their request ticket. We award points for features like automated alerts when tickets come close to a deadline, the automated sending of feedback surveys, automated knowledgebase content suggestions, and the presence of “canned response” email templates for automated responses to common customer queries.

1.4 How we test contact management for all types of CRM software

Contact Management is a core feature for any CRM system – we look to see how easy it is to enter new contacts, whether this can be done in bulk, directly from webforms, or through imports from various channels, like email and social media. We look at the depth of detail available for customer profiles, the tagging and categorization options available, whether or not there are custom information fields, how good the contact search functions are, and whether there is a dedicated relationships mapping features (that shows contacts related by any data point, e.g. company they work for).

2. Usability & Reliability – Evaluating the user interface and learning curve for the CRM Software

Why We Test Usability and Reliability: to ensure it will be easy for your business and staff to transition to using the CRM software without an unnecessarily large amount of training, expense, glitches, or usability issues. CRM systems should enhance visibility, understanding, efficiency, and collaboration among different teams and departments. However, teams won’t be able to work efficiently if using software that’s not intuitive, user-friendly, and reliably fast even when handling large sets of data.

How We Test Usability and Reliability: We evaluate the onboarding process of the We conduct qualitative audits of the visual design, layout, and user experience of the app or web portal interfaces as well as any variations in these things across multiple devices. For reliability, we collect quantitative data on how smooth and fast the platform operation is when handling large data sets of over 100,000 contacts.

3. Compatibility and Integration – Checking compatibility with different software and hardware systems

Why We Test Compatibility and Integration: to ensure it will be possible (even better: easy, seamless) for users to integrate this software into their existing ecosystem and connect it with the other applications and software they are using. This results in maximized data accuracy and efficiency across all activity; it minimizes information silos, disjointed reports, and disruption during implementation which can make it harder for the team to adopt and appreciate.

How We Test Compatibility and Integration: we look at the total number of third-party and native integrations available, as well as whether the CRMs integrate with the top 20 most-used business software and business communication applications used in the US (including Slack, Teams, Zoom, and various VoIP phone providers). We evaluate compatibility and performance across multiple internet browsers and devices as well as how easy is it to connect the systems hardware like printers and scanners.

4. Scalability and Future-Proofing – Evaluating the scalability of the CRM product to accommodate business growth

Why We Test Scalability: the software a business uses should never be a limiter of their growth. It’s important to assess that the software will accommodate the size and complexity of the customer bases the business hopes to have in 5+ years without them having to upgrade to unrealistic enterprise-level plans. The risk of not considering this is that they will either stunt their growth or start offering poor customer experiences due to not being able to manage such large customer groups. Another risk is that they’ll need to spend time, money, and effort changing platforms in a few years time.

How We Test Scalability: we look at the limitations of the software at different price points. We’re particularly interested in how limited the product are before users pay high or custom prices for enterprise level plans. Common limitations include number of contacts, numbers of users or seats, the range of reports and dashboard options, storage space, level of customization, access to watermark-free marketing material, guest accesses and offline access, among other things. We also consider how quickly the lower-tier plans can access software updates, how often the software updates, and how often it adds new integrations.

5. Security Assessment – Conducting a thorough security analysis to identify any vulnerabilities and ensure the protection of sensitive data

Why We Test Security: to ensure there is no chance of the software a business is using opening them up to security vulnerabilities, breaches, financial penalties, or damages to brand reputation.

How We Test Security: We check the software uses high-level encryption (for data “in transit” and “at rest”) and that it offers 2-factor authentication and user permission options. We collate the available compliance reports and certificates (GDPR, HIPAA, CCPA), and we verify that the provide has a process in place to address data breaches (do they have disaster recovery plans set up?). We also check if the platforms allow you to securely export and delete data.

6. Customer Support – Reviewing the available customer support options offered by the software.

Why We Test Customer Support: to ensure that this software will not be an unnecessary blocker to business operations and customer management when users encounter glitches, downtime, or are stuck due to lack of product knowledge. Speed and timing are critically important to customer management, whether the activity is closing a deal, sending strategy emails, or responding to customer requests and problems. Any lags can have a tangible impact on the success of your sales pipelines, marketing campaigns, and customer service efforts.

How We Test Customer Support: we combine quantitative data about the number of support channels available, average response times, and average resolution times with quantitative data about the quality of the service, which we make sure to test out with our own support requests. We award extra points if the provider offers phone support and 24/7 live support (we look less favorably on ones which only offer ticket-based support systems).

7. Value for Money – Evaluating the ratio of features to cost

Why We Test Value: any business, including solo or freelance ventures, will care about the bottom line. Any software is an expense, and it’s important for businesses to know they’re not eating into the ROI of the product by overpaying for something that is not good value. We try to give the fairest assessment of not just how cheap/expensive each CRM product is, but how much value it offers for their price point in terms of its feature offering.

How We Test Value: we do calculations to weigh the plan prices against the quality and breadth of features to answer the question, “does it offer better or worse value for money than its competitors?”. Other factors include whether or not it offers a free plan, free trial, or a money-back guarantee window. We do our due diligence on checking for hidden fees and costs, and we evaluate how the range of price points it offers businesses (as well as how the prices compare to equivalent plans for competitor software).