Close

Pros

Easy to use interface and very clean UI, amazing roadmap too, they do support under MS for startup program, this include call the customer features.

Cons

Features sets are lacking, however they have a strong product roadmap, which helps to stick with the software

Pros

no fluff. there are not 3 different places to log contacts/opps/accounts/leads it is all on one page. It is simple yet surprisingly powerful. Every one of my reps added can't get over how easy and fluid it makes their life.

Cons

Dashboards are non existent. You will need to be comfortable with exporting/using zapier/or a few support partners to push your data into a visual appealing place

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Choosing Close

Switched From

Reasons for Switching to Close

Pros

What I liked about Close was the consolidation of tools into one CRM. The sales pipeline and lead management was incredibly intuitive and ready to jump into right out of the box.

Cons

Phone features are underdeveloped or possibly intentionally barebone.

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Choosing Close

Switched From

Pros

Close is really easy to get up and running and is simple to work with.

Cons

The cost to go from the base plan to the next level that has several more features is a lot.

Pros

I love the Smart Views which allow custom filtering and sorting of leads. This helps me quickly review different types of leads based on lead score, when I talked to them last, and when I need to follow up with them again.

Cons

I wish basic text formatting was built into the note taking (especially bullet points). I understand with not going crazy with a WYSIWYG, but some simple formatting options would help for quicker note taking.

Pros

It is a great CRM for marketing and sales agencies. I would recommend the software if you do a lot of outbound sales and need to assign tasks to team members.

Cons

It is a little bit of a steep learning curve however once you get the gist of it everything becomes very easy.

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Choosing Close

Switched From

Reasons for Switching to Close

Pros

I like the sales forecasting features. In addition, with amazing CRM features and has handled email management features.
The call recording features has worked really well.

Cons

I have nod had any bad experiences using Close

Pros

Close's UI/UX make it super easy to navigate and manage day to day sales activities. We also use JustCall and the integration is super clean, making it easy to work from a single CRM with a phone plug-in

Cons

I wish there was a better way to clean up data on a macro level

Pros

Easy setup, analytical and simple-to-understand dashboards, predictive dialer rocks, voicemail drops, call cadences, and email marketing tools are all available. I enjoy the Smart Views in Close function and the inbox tool, and I like the fluidity of the email follow-up. I feel so much better knowing that everything is in one place and that I can simply exchange information with my team; my customer service experience has also been excellent.

Cons

I don't like how Close retrieves my planned send emails before they send; if I modify the email I'm scheduling, Close logs all versions. I also believe filters take time to get used to, and I'm not always sure I'm filtering correctly. I wish there was a one-stop video that answered all of your questions or walked you through the intricacies of Close.

Pros

Close is great if you're looking for a sales-focused CRM.

Cons

Not much, there are a few features which seem to be missing but nothing major.

Pros

Very clean UX/UI and easy to use and navigate, everything is sort of "on one page" so you don't really need to scour around or click on weirdly/technical verbiage-marked buttons.

Cons

It's actually almost too simple to the point that it can begin to feel cluttered. You can too easily create multiple entries because of how the integrations are set up, so it's not always clear what the "right" profile is. Similarly, there's very little tracking of progression, it's quite rudimentary in that sense.

Pros

Very simple and fast. It is a light application

Cons

Right at this moment I still have found nothing bad to say about it

Pros

Their contact management module is very well built. Email and event tracking are efficient.

Cons

The app lacks field customization for extra lead/deal data for reports, I found their integrations really limited (you can connect with Zapier but still has some limitations). Your tasks do not have a specific section or dashboard and you can easily lose track of the daily pending tasks.

Pros

I have used close for more than 12 months and I can say that this is the best CRM for startups, I have used it mainly for sending email campaigns and lead management. it has a very simple interface and is easy to use.
Previously we were using a different CRM where you are able to send mail only but not able to see those email responses, you will have to check your email for that but in Close CRM we can send mail and also see if we have any responses.
Managing leads are also easy, either we can bulk import it as a CSV file or we can manually add it so it was very easy to manage the leads and contacts in close CRM.

Cons

Close is very expensive so it was very hard to pay for small startups. Lead management and email campaign were good but apart from that we have not used anything else so for us it was very expensive.

Pros

I like that you are able to track all forms of communication with a potential business. You can crack phone calls, notes, text messages all in the order that you had the conversation with your business. I also like that you are allowed to send text messages to business if they are hard to get a hold of via phone call.

Cons

I think that they could have better integration with other platforms. Our support team uses fresh desk and fresh chat as their source of emails and chats and with no integration it makes it hard for the support person to see the conversation that goes on between the sale person and the customer without having close.io open.

Pros

Kept all communication and information for a given account/lead visible on one page. Made it very easy to navigate and get an idea of everything surrounding a given lead quickly.

- Perfect for high volume telesales
- Reporting and lead management was great
- Filtering lists made it easy
-Phone and text worked great

Cons

The way things were set up, it made it difficult to manage Parent Child orgs for our Enterprise department. Less ability for customization and integrations.

- We had a few problems with customer support/account manager getting back to us a few times.
(Our account maxed out on calls and we needed to add more several times, but this took a while to flesh out and it completely shut our sales department down a couple times. This happened a few times and we wanted to set things up so it would have added time to our account before we ran out. This should have been addressed so it did not happen and never was.)

Pros

Close integrates all of our customer communication into one place to make it really easy to use. Because it integrates with calling and email, most communication gets automatically logged so there isn't that annoying extra step. And because we're already in it while interacting with customers, adding notes is natural. The result is a CRM system that is up to date and gets used.

Cons

I'd like prettier reporting. The reporting screen basically counts and filters to give a table of results. I would love to have this visualize pipelines and allow us to drill down on results in a more visual way.

Pros

I really like the ease of use and graphical interface. I also love that I'm able to dial straight from the platform and the templating system is fairly easy to use as well.

Cons

Contact and lead management could be slightly improved. Unmerging leads is not possible from what I can understand so be careful not to merge the wrong leads. Also if your working specific verticals, it's nice to be able to port a contact from one lead to another should they have switched companies but that's not a possibility either.

Pros

I love that I can make phone calls out of Close.io using my contact information for any given prospect. It integrates with my email system and captures all my outbound and inbound email traffic and keeps a record of it. The UI is also simple and the sales workflow is better streamlined then saleforce.com in my opinion. I wasn't a fan in the beginning, but after about 2 weeks I loved it's functionality and ease of use.

Cons

It took me a while to get adjusted to their process methodology and in the beginning found it cumbersome and clunky.

Pros

Love the fact that I can power dial a bunch of people and drop voice mails. This is a godsend for my team.

Cons

Stupid workflows, automations were really horrible and was set up poorly by the agent who worked and never was working correctly for 9 months.

Pros

- It's easy to use.
- It can easily search for past emails and share the status with other members because it integrates all the emails and calls with the leads to the platform.
- It allows to add tasks and set up alarms.
- Great tool to organize the database, rank potential customers/investors, and size the opportunities.

Cons

- I would suggest the users to use a isolated microphone because some times we have eco in the calls.

Pros

This is a great email software. It keeps teams informed, inspired and on track for sales!

Cons

At this time I do not have any complaints about the software - all good!

Pros

It makes the sales team at my company so much more efficient and keeps them focused on relevant tasks rather than wasting time on housekeeping tasks

Cons

Some small learning curve for some of the more advanced features.

Pros

User-friendly, great support staff that reaches out to the user, making sure they have everything they need to be more successful. The CEO truly cares for his clients, even taking a little time to give free consultation to help educate in sales.

Cons

Only thing is when you select back to get back to the main list of contacts, it takes you to the top every time and not where you left off in the list. Probably user driven and not the software.

Pros

Close.io is basically a hub for everything you'd need to nurture and close sales. It has built-in calling, SMS and voicemail drop from a unique phone number, all tracked alongside emails and notes. The interface where you track leads is easy to understand and train salespeople on.

Cons

The mobile app is glitchy. I would love to be able to upload new contacts/leads from a business card photo, but I haven't had any luck so far. Hopefully this will be resolved before too long. The desktop interface is amazing though.

Pros

Close CRM's user interface is a testament to user-centric design. Navigating through the platform is effortless, enabling sales teams to focus on what truly matters

Cons

I do just wish that there was more of a build in terms of on going policy management through the CRM

Pros

I like how organized close is. And How efficient it is when sending quick texts

Cons

Truthfully there isn't anything I like least about it. I've used other CRM's and they were trash. Close has always been userfriendly and the Ux Ui is simple

Pros

There are too many to list – If you do cold calls this is a no brainier, you need to buy it today! It support The best apps. Better together. as well which means it hooks into hundreds of other marketing tools also. Their support is second to none, these guys seems to be hustling hard with support, product development and just providing a kick ass experience for their customers. I recommend this product.

Cons

This thing is EXPENSIVE.. but the truth is you get what you pay for and you geta lot. Your paying for the best and it has a price tag which clearly says it’s the best because it’s more than double the cost of other competitive products. The downside is though I have 3 team members and I’m paying close $300 to $400 a month for 3 people that’s crazy considering there are other products that do VoIp with Twillio for less than $10 a user. So I went from paying $50 a month for CRM and $80 for Twillio VoIP($180) to $300 a month. So my prices doubled, which sucked however after using this product it is worth the extra price but if they raise the prices anymore that is just pushing because it really his priced rather high for the market it’s in. Even the enterprise “SForce” CRMs are not as expensive as that (course those CRMssuck compared to this when it comes to cold calling). The problem is I can’t easily scale with it. So I’ll be stuck with a 3 users fora while where if they had it at a lower price point I would buy a license fore very one of my staff but since it’s so expensive I can’t justify it for anyone but my sales people. I think they are missing out on revenue by not having license does not have the VoIP stuff for like $5 a user so my support team could use it without VoIP and be on par with other CRM price

points. It’s clear though this is a nitch product for telephone sales teams.

SO that being said if you do not do a lot of phone sales then this product is probably overkill for you and there are many others that are more of “client manager”type of product where this bad boy is a pure sales beast and nothing else.. It will help increase your sales without a doubt! In terms of client management and being asingle point for all customer data it does the job but it does not really do that any better than other products out on the market for half its cost. It’s really the phone cold calling stuff is what makes it so awesome so if any other CRM companies ever figure this out and try to clone/copy it they will have some real competition but so far there is nothing like it and I would buy all over again! Also I really never write reviews either so the fact I’m even doing this speaks to much this thing rocks!

Pros

- Connected email - Sequences are easy to design on multiple channels - Very customizable and dynamic copy in sequences

Cons

- Email inboxes get disconnected from gmail occasionally - Some customizations, which are nice, make it a little complicated

Alternatives Considered

Pros

The email auto-tracking is by far the the tool of close.io. The fact you can create a lead and it automatically brings all of the history of emails you exchanged with them gives a lot more insight and visibility into salesman follow-up performance. Also, the call feature; if you have a strong internet connection, and especially if you're a startup and your salespeople is constantly on the run. Support also responds very quickly to feedback, which made a lot easier the switch from our former CRM.

Cons

For our business, it´s very important to do bulk imports. However, the tool does not let you to opt out of duplicating leads, which makes us take longer to "curate" each file we want to import.

Pros

By far the easiest and most intuitive way to manage relationships that I've come across. If it's a big struggle for you to have a bunch of lists of leads, and with your limited time you struggle to stay on top of each and every one of them, then Close.IO is awesome. It has helped us make sure none fall through the cracks, and does that in a way where I don't have to think about it. It just lets me know. Integration through Zapier also brings it to another level of automating workflows.

Cons

It's missing some features that other CRMs have, especially for the price. Although the 'smart views' (how you segment the contacts into different lists) is really really awesome and VERY powerful, there are some limitations that sound like should be there but are just missing (e.g. having different default columns per 'smart view', which sounds like a given to me since someone cares about different data depending on if the contact is a cold lead, qualified lead, or client). Instead now I have a bunch of columns that some people within my company don't care about but are just confusing to them.

Also, you have to get the pro/business to get several features that I initially expected would be part of the main one, e.g. there's not a single report that can draw a graph to visually get at-a-glance info of any kind in the basic version. They also don't post their roadmap openly, so I have no idea what features will be coming.

So in this respect it feels slightly like an incomplete product, but as mentioned, worth it for how incredibly well they execute the main function we need it for (effectively managing relationships/lists of contacts for both sales and client relationships).

Pros

Lays everything out in a way that is simple, functional, and very user friendly. Most things make sense at first glance without much of a learning curve.

Cons

Notification system is genuinely trash. If I have the software on my laptop, there should be some way their API talks with MacOS notifications API, I think someone just has to build the connection.

Pros

Everything functioned flawlessly on the first try. I was able to set it up to use my domain name email. I imported all my contacts from Gmail. I could add customizations that would make it easy to keep track of my clients.

The search function knocked my socks off! I couldn't remember the name of a certain funding agency. Just by entering the client's name, it gave me the funding agency.

Close.io was created for people trying to make an initial sale. I keep my clients three or four years and they often need a break from therapy for a few months. It was easy for me to give clients a status, such as "paused" or "completed goals".

I was able to collect leads from my Wordpress website using Planso Forms. These create a new lead in Close.io.

The options to add a phone line and bulk email surprised me. I haven't seen this in any other CRMs. I can create email templates and send out messages to groups of people using my domain name email. The messages are plain text, which is just right for smart phones.

I tried out the phone function on my computer. I have been using Magic Jack, and getting complaints from clients about MJ. The Close.io phone line is from Twilio and is much clearer. By installing the app on my phone, I can have a second phone number on my cell and I don't have to give clients my personal number.

Cons

I'm in Canada. I wish the price wasn't so high, especially with the exchange rate.

As an online therapy provider, I also have to pay for a telepractice platform and an online scheduler. If Close.io offered integration with Verishow and Accuity Scheduling, they would be able to offer a complete virtual office for online therapists, tutors, and coaches.

Pros

Great if you have the patience and developments resources to help you customize everything. API is good, but for most non-enterprise organizations, who has time to be messing with APIs? Built in VoIP is a nice feature, but do your math and make sure the price is worth it.

Cons

- Searching for data is near impossible. Can't filter for anything logically without getting into "raw queries," so you better be half an engineer if you want to search for anything.
- Reporting is a joke. The reporting tools might as well not exist. Be prepared to ask developers to leverage the API and sync into some other tool.
- No matter what they may sell you, it's a CRM best used with small sales teams. It's not for account management or companies that expect anyone without an engineering degree to figure out how to analyze the data inside of it.

Pros

This is a great tool if you are just bulk burning through new biz leads and have a fast sales cycle. the calling through Close.io is great, call recording great, ability to create custom lists for lead calling also great

Cons

This is not a CRM period! I would only recommend this if you were integrating it with a dedicated CRM system. The notes are chaotic and very difficult to look back through history and find important past conversations. There is no ability to do ANY form of contract management once a customer is closed and there is also no ability to attach anything to the opportunity info. So if you have a relevant presentation or any documentation relevant to a potential sale you best save it in a google drive and make a custom field to stick the link in.

Pros

- really easy to use
- stripped down to the bare minimum, not many tabs for the sales team to navigate
- new email chain function is impractical as it's a manual task to set up for so few sales contacts
- customer support a few years ago was bad but has improved greatly
- price

Cons

- hard to extract data in a meaningful way. The search functionality is quite rudimentary
- data analysis is barely existent
- insufficient tagging
- feels like a doctored spreadsheet with nicer formatting but less usability

Pros

Integrates into other platforms easily. Great to use

Cons

Not so user-friendly. UI & UX could be better

Pros

- Built-in call and email integration.
- Flexible and powerful API w/ great documentation.
- Dynamic lead lists (called "Smart Views") powered through search.
- Native Mac and WIndows apps.
- Responsive support team.
- Custom fields

Cons

- Costly for budget conscious teams. (But not less expensive than Salesforce and like platforms)
- No native mobile apps yet. (Not recommended for outside sales teams)

Pros

The features that helped us the most:

-real-time integration with gmail. We send and receive all our email through the app. Besides being more convenient it also keeps all correspondence logged in an easy to reference way.
-recorded calls - all calls and voice-mails are automatically listed right along with notes and emails. This is incredibly useful with longer sales cycles. We are able to go back and actually hear what the customer said on the call two months ago. So much better than just notes, especially if there is every a disagreement.
- Support is amazing. Always very responsive and timely and walked us through our limited implementation issues, (see below). Additionally, they are always improving the app, so about the time I suggest an option I'd like to see it is already slated to be rolled out.

Cons

Not really any cons to speak of, but we had a couple issues at first:

- call quality was poor. This was due to trying to use a wireless connection and after switching everyone over to wired, it went away. So while not an app problem, something to consider if you or your team work remotely.

-Some merging issues when pulling lead data from our web form. Again, this was not an app problem so much as a developer problem on our end, but it was a headache for a couple days none the less.

Pros

Its pretty good to follow up, increase sales (productivity), email or chat are pretty solid tools to development a good business relationship.

Cons

Must improve reports/analytics tool, It is only focused on sales and not all KPI's are well reported or break and working hours record.

Pros

We use pipedrive for email marketing and Close.io for cold calling. Our system works like this. Our marketing team use pipedrive to send out email to possible leads and follow up with them and when it results in a successful response from the prospect the sales team collects the phone numbers. Then these prospects with phone numbers have been downloaded to csv and transferred to Close.io CRM for sales team. Then they do all the cold calling with in Close.io CRM. Our department also have access to this CRM to make support calls later on. We can say our sales team's productivity has increased a lot after implementing this CRM. They do not need to manually do the sorting and recording of calls made and everything can be done in settings just one time.

Cons

When importing the prospects from a CSV if there are duplicates in the file, it doesn't detect that and gets added just like an other contact. There are no option to segment the contact in to different categories.

Pros

- Easy to get started
- Easy to import leads
- Easy to keep track of how everyone at your organization is interacting with the client
- Pretty simple, but effective reporting

Cons

- Expensive
- Low quality call audio
- Low customization
- Rigid sales structure set-up

Pros

Looking back - nothing honestly.
We wish we would've never heard of them.

Cons

Close.com BROKE our agreement and KILLED our company.

Pros

Automation and their inbox is a huge pro.
Their search feature is arguably the best anyone could ask for. We are still discovering search tricks. GREAT ROI!
A great help page on the Close.IO site for finding suggestions and troubleshooting.

Cons

We did have a tough time with our firewall when first setting up Close.IO, so make sure to include your Network Admin in the conversation of switching to Close.IO early on in the process.
Sometimes getting someone on the phone can be a challenge, but email and scheduling a call have never been a problem.

Pros

I like the automations, data, and insights it provides. Also, the task & Pipeline management are pretty solid.

Cons

Smartviews even tho it is one of the main features is not that easy to customize or get used to if this is your first CRM. There are better solutions that make this type of customization easier.

Pros

This software was a colossal waste!! DO NOT waste your time or money!! I used this software for less than a week before they were snooping around dictating my business practices and interrupting my business transactions. I am absolutely disgusted by this service. I tried to get get a hold of the sales rep 5 (FIVE) times and each and every time it goes to voicemail. They don't work weekends and wont answer you on weekends, so don't bother. They will email you a week later and if there are technical difficulties, they absolutely will not talk to you in a timely manner, they will just shut your acount down. THEN they tried to extort me for my credit card in reward for their terrible sales and joke in the form of what they call "tech support/customer service". Ridiculous! I lost so much money dealing with them! It was a horrific experience!

Cons

The joke they call "customer service/tech support". It's an extortion scheme!

Pros

My favorite thing about Close.io is the ability to add custom fields that help with reporting and overall ease of use. Also being able to call directly from the software and have the calls recorded and task creations are very simple.

Cons

The user interface could use some improvement. The flow of things can sometimes get a little chaotic so creates extra time to learn the system.

Pros

Awesome UI
Best filtration and search
Nothing extra
Not overloaded
Very fast

Cons

If your database more than 100K contacts, you will be disconnected, because you will ...."impacted our infrastructure".... When you try to solve a problem and chat with technical support, you will be ignored.

But there is no public limitation. Try to use. Are you lucky? Maybe not and your work will be suspended immediately. And then you will long try to switch to another platform without any help from those support. Maximum you will have a day.

Pros

Flexible - easily tweaked
Not overkill

Cons

No mobile interface - nobody in our company sits at a desk and "does sales"... we are all on the road on jumping meeting to meeting, so it would have been awesome to have an app version or a more user friendly mobile version.

Pros

Close is an easy way to keep track of leads and customers alike. We can set tasks, see who is calling, and have visibility to communication the client has had with other people in the company.

Cons

I really don’t have many complaints. One tiny nitpicky thing: the icon in my tool bar continues to bounce even after someone else has answered a call. It can get confusing.