CRM that's client oriented?

April 21, 2015 7:21 PM

Can anyone point me to some CRM that's client oriented, rather than sales and sales-team oriented?

I have been fiddling around with Apptivo, which is completely not working, but when I look around, it seems like every application is more focussed on managing your team of employees or sales reps than managing your clients. (This is a huge problem with Apptivo, too.)

I do need a "tasks" piece, but again it's more like "Finish Jane Doe projectXYZ by April 15." Hopefully that would be seen under the "Jane Doe" file AND under the "tasks" list.

Another thing that would be useful is to be able to sort by things like birthdays (e.g., "who's turning 70 this year?" and "who's older than 25?")

It needs to be usable on a smartphone and it needs to have a calendar (I want to avoid Google's, if possible).

Being able to do emailings would be great, but isn't my main priority. Making sales is not a priority at all.

Being able to attach documents to a particular client would be great.

It needs to be super secure, obviously, since it'll have people's documents and dates of birth, etc.

And... cheap is good, too. Less than $20 per month would be ideal.

I think I would need similar functions to maybe lawyers or accountants.

Am I asking for the wrong thing? Is what I want not really CRM?

I am completely overwhelmed and any information would be greatly appreciated.

posted by small_ruminant to Technology (7 answers total)

My experience with accountants has been that what we had seemed to be referred to more as a practice management program, rather than a CRM. But the only one I have enough experience with to even know the name of it is, unfortunately, the incredibly-accountant-focused Practice CS, which aside from not being something I'd see as very useful outside that industry, is as far as I know only available as a part of an incredibly expensive package of accounting software. (Like, thousands of dollars a year.)
posted by Sequence at 7:26 PM on April 21, 2015

Check out Zoho, it's something I'm currently starting to use. Looks like there's a good report designer, so you could do a birthday report.
There is an app for phone, it even works offline.
Free trial, $15/month for the standard version. The free version has limits on things like making custom fields.
posted by Sophont at 8:45 PM on April 21, 2015 [1 favorite]

Highrise was designed by the 37 Signals guys specifically to be a streamlined client manager and not a sales team manager.
posted by COD at 4:49 AM on April 22, 2015

CiviCRM might work for you. It's open source, but you can also buy customized versions of it from IT companies. The only thing on your list it doesn't have built-in is the calendar, but I bet there's a calendar add-on out there somewhere or you could easily hire someone to build it.
posted by snaw at 7:23 AM on April 22, 2015

I've just started to look at SugarCrm and while it does have tools for salespeople, it also has a service module with accounts, contacts and cases. Like CiviCrm (I think) it's open source, and you can also hire small It firms to customise it for you. Im pretty sure it does have a calendar module that allows scheduling too.
posted by mgrrl at 3:21 PM on April 22, 2015

Just to add about SugarCrm, the look and feel of the vanilla deployment is a bit dated, in my opinion.
posted by mgrrl at 3:22 PM on April 22, 2015

Response by poster: Zoho so far is too company based- it feels very B2B. I might call them to ask about how to customize it, though, because I use zoho mail already.

I am investigating Highrise but I can't find a person to talk to, and I can't find any info on their security.

I am intimidated by CiviCRM because I don't even know how to analyze it. If I have to ask someone to create something for me, how will I even know how to analyze THAT? It sounds like I'd have the same problem with SugarCRM.

Someone PMed me about WorkXPress but it turns out to be WAY over my budget ($100/mo plus a big set up fee.)

I'm frustrated because I feel like what I need is SIMPLER than anything anyone else offers and yet I can't find it.

I did discover that a relevant phrase is CXM, though. "Client Experience Management." That is probably closer to what I'm looking for, if that helps anyone.
posted by small_ruminant at 3:36 PM on April 22, 2015