Act! CRM vs. Zoho One

Swiftpage ACT! would be well suited if you are using a desktop computing environment. ACT! is an old product and they were on the desktop for many years (and still are). Also, ACT! would also be well suited if you are not as concerned about implementing a CRM product that might require a little more training (e.g. if you had employees/salespeople that needed to be trained). Also, ACT! seems to be more generic than some of the industry focused products you see nowadays. For example, MethodCRM works well with non-profits that are on the cloud.

Incentivized

Zoho One helps me to create and document each of my closures by creating deals. Zoho One helps me to generate reports, which helps me to track my contact. Zoho One helps me on creating tasks and reminds me to get it done on time. Zoho One keeps each steps and actions I took from lead to a deal.

Incentivized

• Integrated Email Marketing: For a small business, you can have a strong method to handle email marketing in an integrated non-disparate solution.
• Tailoring: There are no limits on what data you can store in the system and the ease of making changes can be done by a nontechnical person.
• User Interface: The tool is easy to get around in both the desktop (fat client) and (webclient) which both are quite similar in functionality.
• Integration: The tool integrates with Word, Excel, and Outlook nicely. And, it integrates with Google Mail and Contacts. There is a nice selection of third party tools available for various needs like AddressGrabber which allows for easy input of contacts from various sources such as email signatures, webpages, etc.
• Templates: I have enjoyed being able to store tons of various templates for letters which we use over and over for various communications like sales proposals, quotes, and nudging clients along the funnel and sales process.
• Automation: SwiftPage ACT! has a small business automation engine which allows for reminders and workflow to be administered by the system. It's not as sophisticated as some enterprise workflow automation solutions but for the price it's an awesome addition.
• Maintenance: Very rarely have a problem which needs to be dealt with and costs to upgrade are minimal at best. We hosted the system internally for the web client and implemented it ourselves initially but had upgrades subsequently done by a local partner simply due to time/cost scenario. In other words, less to have someone else do it.

• Customized dashboards
• Easy to see the kpis for different aspects of my business
• And offers a consolidation of CRM campaign and other applications without having to use other technologies from other companies so it's great to consulate consolidated
• The analytics is great what else
• Collaboration tools are excellent

Incentivized

• The auto saving function is not great. It means a simple slip or mistype can change an entire record easily.
• The reports are clunky and if you've changed the field names, that doesn't get reflected in the reports.
• The interface is still clunky. It is hard to see all the information for a contact all in one place. It gets broken up too much.

Incentivized

• In my opinion, SUPPORT IS AWFUL!!!
• If you want to get in touch with a support representative, your best bet is to call the sales number and demand to speak with an agent.
• Each of the tools operates in a silo, from a support perspective. Some applications, like books, have chat-based support and others require an e-mail.
• In my experience, expect any e-mail to the main support e-mail to go unanswered.
• The first year of support was great, but after we renewed for the second year, it has become terrible.

Once our current subscription expires, we no longer plan to use ACT. We are moving to a more complete CRM system that allows us, as a project based service company, to track projects, contacts, time and employees all with one software program. ACT has very limited modules to integrate these functions and therefore is no longer a good fit for us.

Incentivized

ACT follows the basic rules you would expect for this type of software, but actually doing anything sophisticated with it is near impossible without assistance or training. Unless you use it regularly it is difficult to use. I wouldn't recommend it unless you have internal IT support and it will be used regularly.

We've been a long time user and are always tweaking our automation to gain efficiencies while improving our service levels. It's pretty easy to come up with what you want to do and then do it yourself. Though, if you're looking to do some really tricked out automations, use of a Zoho Consultant would be a better idea as you'll get exactly what you need much quicker.

Incentivized

There has been an ongoing problem with Google synchronisation which no one seems to be bothered about fixing, even though it clearly states on the website that the software synchronises with Google. When the customer-facing support team are on the phone, they are brilliant, it's the back-end development support which is severely lacking.

Support is great as a customer, as a partner I get moved to that team more often and find issues in the support being provided. It also appears that the support agents do not take into account all the information provided and default back to the "step 1 of the playbook" instead of taking into account the business reason the support is being requested and understanding the steps already taken.

Incentivized

Delay your upgrades! ACT appears to ship out new software with virtually no checking and no concern about bad installs do to their customers.

ACT! CRM is more cost effective than like a Salesforce, but that is for a reason, it lacks a lot of the functionality that a Salesforce has. Pipedrive is actually another cost effective platform I've been evaluating as a potential ACT! CRM replacement. I like it's modern day look and feel versus ACT!.

Incentivized

There is nothing quite close to what Zoho offers with Zoho One in terms of breadth and depth of applications integrated together as a single product. Also, you get to manage a single license and user management on Zoho One, whereas you would need to work with multiple vendors and also simultaneously take care of billing and contract management with all of them. It is much easier with Zoho One

Incentivized

• It's been easy to keep track of progress of goals with the software. This provides the opportunity to know what is working and what is not.
• We have had to adjust a lot of things since the Virus issue took a foothold, but it is providing invaluable to make those adjustments.
• Our ROI has increased at least 30%.

Incentivized

• It is hassle-free to access, which saves you a lot of time and manual effort to get the data accessible.
• Lead status and follow-ups in one place- what you require is a paradise for the Sales team.
• Reduces the work of HR a lot.

Incentivized