Item: Zoho CRM
Rating: 9
Author: Peter Marquez

Overall Satisfaction

Zoho provides the core functions of customer relationship management well. It ranks high for the value it delivers. In a competitive space this is a big winner.
The product is adaptable. You can easily customize it to suit various business needs. I have personally customized it to manage all types of business relationships beyond just sales prospects and clients including: Suppliers, partners and most interestingly prospective new hires as an application management system with rules, workflow and automated processing.
Zoho CRM can be easily integrated with Zoho's other services -- campaigns, support, etc. All of those services deliver good value. However, most interestingly, Zoho's API (Application Programming Interface) make this product a dynamo. Using the API I have integrated Zoho deeply into web sites where I have combined Twitter and LinkedIn functionality to pass identity information into the Zoho CRM. The information can also be linked to web site traffic tracking systems like Visistat.
The workflow and rules engine is capable enough to handle most basic requirements and adds values to all of the powerful features above.
Automated email to clients and sales reps in response to users completing Zoho generated Landing Page forms. Also supports rules-based scheduling of long-term follow-ups

The user interface is generally well laid-out. However, it can be hard to find things that you regularly need. The customization tools are powerful and available, but they are not well located. Additionally they can be a bit cumbersome.
Usability. Because of the product's use of AJAX, some of its behaviors are not always as a user might expected. For instance, the browser back button and the application back-buttons do not take you back to where you expect. Again this is clumsy, but something that you get used to and work with.
This is true for all CRMs, but it takes time to get familiar with the environment and to understand its sales process/management architecture. The creation of events and task, recording calls -- scheduling them and recording them requires some focus.

The integration capabilities have driven business by playing a role in the automated gathering of web site visitor data, responding to visits, and managing follow-up communication weeks after first contact. The product has paid for itself several time over.
Key Client Facing Benefits:
-- Automated relationship management
-- Better client communication and follow-up
-- Simple development of landing pages and conversion process
Key Sales Facing Benefits:
-- Tracking account process
-- Better forecasting
-- Better time management

The rating is based on:

I would recommend that prospective users ask these questions before making a selection:

How large is your sales team?
How sophisticated is your team?
What is your primary goal?
How quickly do you want to roll this out?
How important is value?
How important is the ability to customize and integrate your CRM with other functions?

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