Top CRM Options for Marketing Teams in 2024

Ways To Finding the Right Marketing CRM to Drive Growth in 2024

In today's data-driven world, marketing is more crucial than ever for business success. However, executing effective campaigns at scale requires centralized organization, automation, and analytics that only the best CRM systems can provide.

A marketing CRM acts as your single source of truth for all customer profiles, campaign tracking, ROI measurement and more. It transforms disjointed tools and spreadsheets into an integrated hub that supercharges your efforts.

But with so many options on the market, how do you identify the solution best suited for your unique needs and budget? In this article, we'll explore the top CRM platforms for modern marketers and what to look for in a marketing CRM.

Key Features of an Ideal Marketing CRM

Before you go ahead selecting a system, determine the core capabilities required to support your goals. Top priorities for most teams include:

- Contact Management: Centralize all customer and prospect data in one place with customizable profiles.

- Marketing Automation: Create personalized, segmented journeys with built-in triggers and dynamic content.

- Campaign Tracking: Analyze performance of emails, ads, and events end-to-end from exposure to conversion.

- Reporting & Analytics: Surface actionable insights to optimize strategies through dashboards and reports.

- Integration: Connect CRM to other tools via pre-built connectors to sync data seamlessly.

- Customization: Flexibility to modify workflows, fields, and views according to your processes.

- Scalability: The system should grow alongside your business from startup to enterprise level.

- Support: Robust documentation and assistance available as you learn the platform.

7 CRM Options for Marketing Teams in 2024

With a clear outline of core criteria, here's a top 7 recommendations based on capabilities and pricing:

HubSpot CRM

HubSpot is a leader for good reason - it combines marketing, sales, and service automation in one easy-to-use platform. For marketers, strong features include a generous free tier, contact management, email marketing, landing pages and analytics. Integrations with Google, Slack and hundreds more apps extend its use cases. While more limited for larger enterprises, HubSpot is a top choice for SMBs.

Pipedrive

Popular for sales teams, Pipedrive has emerged as a strong marketing CRM as well. Key differentiators are customizable canvases to track pipelines visually and integration of AI to predict lead behavior. Marketers enjoy features like advanced campaign tracking, retargeting, and opportunity split testing. Flexible pricing starts from $12/user. Pipedrive is a well-rounded option that grows with you. 

Zoho CRM

Affordable and highly customizable, Zoho is one of the most full-featured mid-sized CRM solutions on the market. Marketers get robust automation, flexible custom fields, web forms and built-in analytics. Highly scalable infrastructure and pricing makes Zoho ideal for businesses ranging from SMB to enterprise size. Over 350+ app connectors extend its reach. 

Salesforce

The perennial leader offers the most robust platform for complex enterprise workflows across sales, marketing, and service departments. Advanced tools like Einstein automation, journey builder and Sales Cloud Digital 360 empower innovation. High price point is offset by massive feature set, robust security, and industry-leading mobile apps. However, Salesforce requires careful configuration and dedicated admins. 

Microsoft Dynamics 365

By combining the power of Office 365 and deep CRM functionality, Dynamics 365 is a compelling all-in-one platform for companies heavily invested in Microsoft tools. Its AI capabilities, like lead scoring and predictive analytics, help marketers focus efforts. Expensive but scalable infrastructure supports global operations. Integrations to LinkedIn, Adobe and others boost productivity. 

Insightly

For lean marketing teams on tight budgets, Insightly punches above its weight and below its price point with features like task management, forms, email, and estimates. Powerful reporting and a customizable UI make it easy to track ROI without complexity. Mobile apps provide anytime flexibility. Less robust than top players but highly affordable starting at $10/user. 

ACT! CRM

A nimble option for small businesses, ACT! excels at contact management, basic automation, and light analytics capabilities. An easy-onboarding process paired with mobile apps helps marketers stay organized and responsive across touchpoints. A budget-friendly price point and unlimited contacts/users make it hard to beat for startups. Limited advanced features.

Maintaining a 360-Degree View of Customers

Once a core marketing CRM is selected, best practices include customizing it to align with your goals:

- Define fields that capture the most meaningful customer attributes for your vertical.

- Integrate additional apps to surface key customer behaviors from across channels.

- Create dynamic views to track campaigns, leads in varying stages or top revenue generators.

- Segment contacts for targeted personalized messaging at scale. 

- Activate features like predictive scores to prioritize hot leads automatically.

- Set data sharing permissions between departments for full visibility.

- Conduct periodic reviews to optimize workflows as strategies evolve.

With the right system and implementation, marketers gain true visibility into what drives buying decisions. This allows building invaluable relationships while measuring everything for continuous refinement.

Conclusion

It is advisable in today's hyper-competitive landscape, leveraging technology to market smarter is essential for sustained growth. By selecting a comprehensive marketing CRM tailored to your specific needs, teams gain an integrated platform to streamline operations, deepen customer understanding and scale efforts to new heights.

Share your experience with any of the listed CRM’s on the comment section.

Disclaimer: This blog post is for informational purposes only!