Close CRM vs. VanillaSoft

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Close CRM
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Close.io is a customer relationship management (CRM) software with call management and sales workflow automation capabilities.
$49
per month includes 1 user
VanillaSoft
Score 8.4 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
VanillaSoft is a solution for managing inside sales and lead management processes. The vendor says typical CRM software requires manual intervention and decision making by salespeople before they ever pick up the phone or send an email. In comparison, the vendor says VanillaSoft facilitates faster, more productive sales conversations. The vendor’s value proposition is that data-driven workflows and automated functionality let salespeople focus on selling -- not operating software.…N/A
Pricing
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Editions & Modules
Startup
$49
per month Includes 1 user
Professional
$299
per month Includes 3 users
Business
$699
per month Includes 5 users
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional Details15% discount on annual pricing in addition to the month-to-month prices listed here.VanillaSoft offers several add-ons to use in conjunction with our base platforms including: Auto Dialing Call Recording VoIP SmartCaller ID SMS
More Pricing Information
Features
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Sales Force Automation
Comparison of Sales Force Automation features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
8.9
8 Ratings
15% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Customer data management / contact management8.18 Ratings00 Ratings
Workflow management7.88 Ratings00 Ratings
Territory management8.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Opportunity management10.06 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with email client (e.g., Outlook or Gmail)9.48 Ratings00 Ratings
Contract management10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Interaction tracking8.48 Ratings00 Ratings
Channel / partner relationship management9.73 Ratings00 Ratings
Customer Service & Support
Comparison of Customer Service & Support features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
8.5
6 Ratings
13% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Case management8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Call center management7.55 Ratings00 Ratings
Help desk management10.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Marketing Automation
Comparison of Marketing Automation features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
9.1
6 Ratings
19% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Lead management8.86 Ratings00 Ratings
Email marketing9.45 Ratings00 Ratings
CRM Project Management
Comparison of CRM Project Management features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
8.0
6 Ratings
5% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Task management8.45 Ratings00 Ratings
Billing and invoicing management10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Reporting5.75 Ratings00 Ratings
CRM Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of CRM Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
7.6
6 Ratings
0% below category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Forecasting10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Pipeline visualization8.26 Ratings00 Ratings
Customizable reports4.74 Ratings00 Ratings
Customization
Comparison of Customization features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
8.6
8 Ratings
13% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Custom fields10.07 Ratings00 Ratings
Custom objects10.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Scripting environment8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
API for custom integration6.57 Ratings00 Ratings
Security
Comparison of Security features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
8.1
8 Ratings
3% below category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Single sign-on capability8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Role-based user permissions8.26 Ratings00 Ratings
Social CRM
Comparison of Social CRM features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
10.0
1 Ratings
32% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Social data10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Social engagement10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Integrations with 3rd-party Software
Comparison of Integrations with 3rd-party Software features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
6.5
4 Ratings
9% below category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Marketing automation6.54 Ratings00 Ratings
Platform
Comparison of Platform features of Product A and Product B
Close CRM
10.0
1 Ratings
29% above category average
VanillaSoft
-
Ratings
Mobile access10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Small Businesses
Salesmate
Salesmate
Score 9.8 out of 10
Salesmate
Salesmate
Score 9.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Creatio
Creatio
Score 9.1 out of 10
Groove, a Clari company
Groove, a Clari company
Score 8.7 out of 10
Enterprises
Creatio
Creatio
Score 9.1 out of 10
Groove, a Clari company
Groove, a Clari company
Score 8.7 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Likelihood to Recommend
9.4
(8 ratings)
8.3
(88 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(3 ratings)
Usability
8.8
(3 ratings)
9.0
(3 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Support Rating
9.4
(3 ratings)
8.9
(3 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(3 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
Close CRMVanillaSoft
Likelihood to Recommend
Close
Excellent software to increase sales and follow up with existing and new customers. Email and SMS handling are really easy for the sales team, managing leads is really great, and Close merges duplicate leads to help our Data Leads avoid repetitive and unnecessary calls. As mentioned in some comments before, must improve in reports, Close is not appropriate to handle or track agents' hours making it necessary to implement additional software to cover this area.
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VanillaSoft
VanillaSoft is well suited for any marketing operations or sales operations team looking for a tool to help them efficiently reach prospects and engage with them through a streamlined method. This can be a great way to manage that engagement, measure it, and keep track of various aspects of prospects.
Read full review
Pros
Close
  • Email sequences. Create and send a sequence of emails until the sequence finishes or the contact replies to your email. You can also pause the sequence manually.
  • Email sync. Syncs in real time with your email account, which is huge.
  • Zapier integration. We've automated a lot of our pipeline management through the Zapier integration. This saves us soooo much time.
Read full review
VanillaSoft
  • Our employees love it - very user friendly, easy to grasp, very little down time to learn it. They feel very confident immediately.
  • Great technical support - I can get solutions to customer problems that make our company look more responsive to our clients. Our clients appreciate our solving their problems immediately.
  • Because of the real time analytics - we can address immediate issues with marketing campaigns to make our client's personnel look great to their superiors.
  • Because of all the functionality - we can provide a turnkey approach from a small company with big company capabilities.
Read full review
Cons
Close
  • Make it so one can set the time at which the emails go out.
  • Make it easier to set up my workflow.
Read full review
VanillaSoft
  • It really needs an "undo" button. I can't tell you how many times I was typing notes etc and hit a wrong button and all was gone so I had to start over.
  • This may be the way we have it set up....we have term codes which are how the callers terminate a call they were on. They finish the call, then type notes in the notepad section of what happened, then they terminate the call. But there are times that I need to go onto a record and just leave a note but don't need to terminate it as anything. If there is a way to do that, it would make my life a lot easier.
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Likelihood to Renew
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
We have no reason not to renew. VanillaSoft has been the best CRM (for us) that we have ever used. The value is great, we love the system, and it's easy to get assistance from VanillaSoft team when needed. Our team is so used to the calling and admin functions there is no desire to change.
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Usability
Close
It's my favorite CRM to recommend to sales organizations. Robust Telephony options including a Power Dialer, SMS, and Voice Drop, are completely integrated into the CRM. The kicker is you can have "Unlimited" contacts where many platforms charge based on the number of users. This can make a huge difference in monthly billing.
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VanillaSoft
The entire system is set up so perfectly. It makes training callers much quicker, and admin tools are so easy to navigate when you get used to using it. Also, if there is ever something I cannot figure out, I can get support from VanillaSoft very quickly to resolve and get my task accomplished.
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Reliability and Availability
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
It is very rare that we have system issues. Maybe a handful of times over the years, we had to contact support about being unable to access. It was always a quick response from the VanillaSoft team, and they would clearly explain the issue and usually give time frame on fixing, or have it fixed immediately.
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Performance
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
I work on all aspects for VanillaSoft for our company. The pages overall do load very quickly. Reports are amazing, I can get quick report, customized reports, and anything I may need to present to client in very little time. It has made my job so much simpler. As far as I know, integration goes smoothly as well.
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Support Rating
Close
I haven't really had the need to use their support, but the only time I had an issue with the platform, the Close team was very attentive and responded in a short span of time. Also they take minimal time to solve issues. The only con here is there is no way to reach out to them apart from email.
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VanillaSoft
Response time was acceptable for the relatively few problems any of our users may have encountered. Fortunately, such occasions were rare.
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In-Person Training
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
It was very helpful and informative. The learning of the tool is something anyone can do, as the setup is so well thought out.
Read full review
Online Training
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
It was very thorough. VanillaSoft team did not rush us. They explained the various functions clearly and were open to any and all questions we had as we began to learn the system. Also, once training completed, if we encountered anything we could not figure out, the support team was fantastic in helping us out.
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Implementation Rating
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
Our implementation was very easy.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Close
Pipedrive was great for us for a long time. We used it for over 4 years. Our product and process was simple. When things got more complex, we needed something that could handle our growing needs and Pipedrive kept falling short. We built our own custom solution in Airtable and though it worked, we spend a lot of time managing it. Close was able to solve all our issues and save us hours per week in admin work.
Read full review
VanillaSoft
VanillaSoft stacks up against Microsoft Power BI very well by allowing the data visualization in a more effective way, Power BI has positioned itself as one of the more robust and intuitive tools for business intelligence and data presentation. VanillaSoft and Microsoft Power BI are a great bundle for the report and analytics team.
Read full review
Scalability
Close
No answers on this topic
VanillaSoft
VanillaSoft has been great. The flexibility of the system is wonderful. The scalable software options are impressive as well. I would strongly support VanillaSoft's capabilities in this area. You really can do just about anything to get the setup and or integrations you may desire for your company needs.
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Return on Investment
Close
  • Positive - It's much easier now with Close.io to make sure that no deal falls through the cracks. Therefore helping us recover lost revenue.
Read full review
VanillaSoft
  • Ability to contact more clients each day.
  • The ability to save my correspondence and notes on each interaction allowing for the appearance to the customer that I am very engaged when we are speaking.
  • Increased sales from the calendar setting and saving my notes.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Close CRM Screenshots

Screenshot of All-in-one Close inboxScreenshot of Sales Funnel Report in CloseScreenshot of Call Assistant automatic transcription and summaryScreenshot of Built-in calling in Close

VanillaSoft Screenshots

Screenshot of The VanillaSoft Call Activity Dashboard makes it quick and easy to monitor your sales campaigns.Screenshot of Easily build your own reports using the VanillaSoft Web Reports Wizard.Screenshot of VanillaSoft offers the ability to arrange modules into four panels for access to almost everything in one screen.Screenshot of VanillaSoft caller screens can be displayed in three panels