10 Best Client Management Software in 2023 (Free & Paid)

Scaling a customer base is a positive sign of success. But with it comes added demands to from managing communication and meeting growth targets. 

Client management software is designed to streamline task and activity workflows so teams can focus on what matters most—providing first-class customer service!

In this guide, we’ll look at the best client management software to meet the unique needs of your business!

What Should You Look for in Client Management Software?

Teams should look for client management tools with task management, CRM strategy, reporting, scheduling, goal tracking, third-party integrations, and mobile accessibility to grow their client base in a sustainable way. 

Through the lens of a long-term view of a business, sustainable practices help reduce costs and remain competitive in a changing marketplace. And without the right client management tools, it creates more work to keep up with operations, individual responsibilities, and the sales process.

Here are other features to consider when choosing client management software: 

• Customization to tailor customer communications and preferences, industry-specific standards, and sales processes
• Security and permission controls to maintain data integrity, prevent data breaches, and comply with regulations  
• Real-time collaboration tools to comment and edit documents, presentation decks, and spreadsheets 
• Budget management to allocate resources, identify revenue opportunities, and project future trends
• Automation to manage follow-ups, communication, customer lifecycle, and repetitive tasks
• Time tracking tools to identify where teams are spending their time and improve their workflows
• Custom web forms to capture leads and personalize sales approaches

The 10 Best Client Management Software

1. ClickUp 

ClickUp is a productivity platform to help teams of all sizes organize tasks, accounts, deals, documentation, and customers in a single location. With free CRM templates and 15+ flexible views, you can easily manage everything from sales pipelines to customer orders. Whether you prefer lists, tables, or a Kanban board, ClickUp makes it easy to track every stage of your customer interactions!

Communication is a crucial part of any client management system. ClickUp makes it easy to collaborate on deals, send project updates to clients, and onboard customers with its built-in email feature. Plus, adding relationship links between tasks and  documents creates a two-way path to navigate related information! 

ClickUp best features

• Notes, labels, and tags for advanced sorting and filtering, and more context in every time entry
• Over 1,000 integrations to bring all relevant data and information into one platform (intergrate ClickUp with Salesforce)
• Assigned and threaded comments in any ClickUp Doc, task, or Whiteboard
• Multiple assignees to assign more than one member to a task at a time
• Reporting and Dashboards for an instant high-level overview of work
• Automated formulas to accurately calculate your billable time
• Advanced time estimates to forecast your workweek
• Create and keep track of sales goals and metrics

ClickUp limitations 

• So many powerful collaboration tools can pose a learning curve for some users
• Not all views are available in the mobile app—yet

ClickUp pricing

• Free Forever
• Unlimited: $7/month per user
• Business: $12/month per user
• Enterprise: Contact for pricing

ClickUp ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.7/5 (6,500+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.7/5 (3,500+ reviews)

2. HubSpot CRM

HubSpot CRM is a customer relationship management platform designed to help businesses grow. It offers a comprehensive suite of tools to help teams manage their client relationships and interactions, from tracking leads and deals to managing customer data. It also features automation capabilities to help streamline workflows for sales reps, customer service agents, and marketers.

The platform’s integration capabilities allow businesses to connect HubSpot CRM with a variety of third-party tools, such as email marketing platforms and payment processors. With its intuitive user interface, comprehensive suite of features, and integration capabilities, HubSpot CRM is an ideal tool for businesses of all sizes. 

HubSpot CRM best features

• Contact and pipeline management
• Email and prospect tracking
• Contact website activity 
• Email template builder
• Landing page builder

HubSpot CRM limitations

• Expensive pricing plans compared to other client management software
• Lacks intuitive tools for workflow automation 

HubSpot CRM pricing

• Professional: Starts at $1,600 per month 
• Enterprise: Contact HubSpot for details

HubSpot ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.4/5 (1,800+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.5/5 (3,600+ reviews)

3. Salesforce

Salesforce is a cloud-based CRM software helping businesses manage their contacts and sales activities. The platform allows companies to store data, create customized reports, automate workflow processes, and track customer interaction. It also offers services for marketing automation, analytics, lead generation, and more. 

With Salesforce, businesses can gain insights into their customers and use this data to make informed decisions. And with integrations to connect with existing data and systems, teams are in control of their client management systems in one place. 

Salesforce best features

• Activity management to sync emails and engagement activities into one platform
• Slack integration to streamline the client management process
• Account, contact, lead, and opportunity management 
• Shared view of every customer with Customer 360
• Email integration with Gmail or Outlook

Salesforce limitations

• Steep learning curve to understand the tools and how to effectively use them for day-to-day workloads
• 24/7 Support is available on the most expensive plan (check out these Salesforce alternatives!)

Salesforce pricing

• Essentials: $25 per user per month
• Professional: $75 per user per month
• Enterprise: $150 per user per month
• Unlimited: $300 per user per month

Salesforce ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.3/5 (13,000+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.4/5 (17,500+ reviews)

Check out these CRM tools for Mac!

4. Freshworks CRM

Freshworks CRM makes it easier for teams to track leads, automate marketing campaigns, segment customers into different categories, manage customer data in one place, and quickly build customer relationships. Through features like contact management, lead scoring, customer segmentation, task automation, and customer insights, businesses can increase revenue and get a better understanding of their customers. 

The CRM tool also helps teams stay organized by providing detailed reporting on customer interactions and allowing users to set up rules-based workflows that can be used to automate repetitive tasks. Additionally, Freshworks CRM integrates with popular third-party applications like Google apps, Zapier, and Mailchimp, making it even easier for teams to get the most out of their customer data!

Freshworks CRM best features

• Pipeline management to visualize the entire sales process organized by stage
• Sales Goals to set and track goals based on revenue or the number of deals 
• Filter, sort, and search functionality on the mobile app
• Deal performance dashboards
• Drag-and-drop interface 

Freshworks CRM limitations

• Project management features are only available on the expensive plans
• Limited reporting capabilities to customize key metrics

Freshworks CRM pricing

• Starter: $19 per user per month
• Growth: $49 per user per month
• Pro: $95 per user per month
• Enterprise: $199 per user per month

Freshworks CRM ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.6/5 (900+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.5/5 (500+ reviews)

5. Pipedrive

Pipedrive is a CRM system designed to help sales teams increase their productivity and close more deals. It offers an array of features that help streamline the sales process, including contact management, email tracking, call logging, lead scoring, sales forecasting, and automated workflows. 

With Pipedrive, a sales team can quickly organize their leads, contacts, and deals so they can stay focused on the tasks that really matter. The software also allows users to easily create custom pipelines and automated emails to help nurture leads and increase conversions.

Pipedrive best features

• Segment leads to create personalized, targeted communication
• Drag-and-drop interface to quickly update deal statuses
• Activity reminders and team collaboration
• Customizable web forms 
• Revenue forecasting

Pipedrive limitations

• Limited customization for user permission settings compared to other free client management software 
• Project scope and document management tools are paid add-ons

Pipedrive pricing

• Essential: $14.90 per user per month
• Advanced: $24.90 per user per month
• Professional: $49.90 per user per month
• Enterprise: $99 per user per month

Pipedrive ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.2/5 (1,600+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.5/5 (2,800+ reviews)

Check out these Pipedrive alternatives!

6. Drip

Drip is an e-commerce automation tool designed for businesses to increase their online sales. It provides the technology and tools needed to create, launch and manage campaigns that target customers with personalized emails, notifications, webpages, and more.

Drip’s marketing automation tools help teams increase customer engagement and loyalty, personalize their interactions, identify and nurture leads, generate more sales, and measure the impact of their efforts. The platform integrates with popular web services like Shopify, Squarespace, and WooCommerce, so companies can easily connect their e-commerce store to the Drip platform and get started quickly!

Drip best features

• Integrations with popular ecommerce software, including Shopify, BigCommerce, and Magento 
• Marketing campaign automation across email, onsite, and social media channels 
• A/B testing for up to four email content variations or subject lines at a time
• 50+ fully customizable templates
• Drag-and-drop form builder

Drip limitations

• Workflow and funnel setups will take time to build and iterate for effective use
• Lacks project management or documentation tools

Drip pricing

• Starts at $39 per month for up to 2,500 people on an email list

Drip ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.4/5 (450+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.4/5 (170+ reviews)

Bonus: Drip campaign templates

7. Zoho CRM

Zoho CRM offers a suite of tools and features for businesses to manage and leverage their customer data. These features include contact management, lead tracking, sales automation, marketing automation, customer service tracking, analytics, and reporting. Zoho CRM also offers integration with third-party applications and services, such as Zoho Campaigns, Zoho Reports, and more. 

With these tools, businesses can gain greater insight into customer relationships, automate sales processes, and build stronger customer relationships. Additionally, the CRM software also provides industry-specific solutions for a number of sectors, including retail, eCommerce, finance, and healthcare. 

Zoho CRM best features

• Customer segmentation based on their region, requirements, lead source, and responsiveness level
• Leads app card scanner to automatically import them into CRM
• Web-to-lead forms with a simple drag-and-drop builder 
• Hierarchies to associate sub-campaigns

Zoho CRM limitations

• Requires other Zoho products to use the client management tool to its fullest potential
• Rules customization is available on the expensive plans 

Zoho CRM pricing

• Standard: $14 per user per month
• Professional: $23 per user per month
• Enterprise: $40 per user per month
• Ultimate: $52 per user per month

Zoho CRM ratings and reviews

• G2: 4/5 (2,300+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.3/5 (6,200+ reviews)

Check out these Zoho alternatives!

8. Airtable

Airtable is a cloud-based project management tool that combines an easy-to-use spreadsheet with the power of a database and the flexibility of custom applications. With Airtable, small teams can create highly collaborative workspaces for teams to work together on projects. 

The platform also integrates with other apps and services like Slack, Zapier, and Dropbox to provide a complete client management system for customer management. 

Airtable best features

• Actions to goals linking functionality to streamline reporting 
• Shareable forms to populate records into the Airtable base
• Timeline View to track events, resources, and projects
• Automation with Javascript functionality
• Form View for contact management

Airtable limitations 

• Limited sorting and filtering options compared to other client management software tools
• Limited customization options for workspace appearance (check out Airtable alternatives)

Airtable pricing

• Free version
• Plus: $10 per user per month
• Pro: $20 per user per month
• Enterprise: Contact Airtable for details

Airtable ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.6/5 (2,100+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.7/5 (1,700+ reviews)

9. Monday.com

Monday.com is a project management platform for teams to easily collaborate, manage, and organize their work. It helps teams manage projects and tasks with real-time updates and visual task boards that allow everyone to keep track of activity on both an individual and group level. 

With features like automated notifications, reporting capabilities, and integrations with third-party apps, Monday makes it easier for teams to stay on top of their projects and tasks in a streamlined way. It also allows users to easily customize their project boards with different layout options and set up board-specific rules to keep everyone organized!

Monday best features

• Custom fields to build a sales cycle workflow and customer relationship management system 
• Google Drive, Dropbox, Box, or OneDrive file uploads for document management
• Lead management with custom criteria automation
• Client communication with email integration
• No-code dashboard customization 

Monday limitations 

• Steep learning curve to familiarize with functions and interface (check out Monday alternatives)
• The Time Tracking Column feature is only available in the Pro and Enterprise plans

Monday pricing

• Individual: Free forever
• Basic: $8 per user per month starting at 3 seats
• Standard: $10 per user per month starting at 3 seats
• Pro: $16 per user per month starting at 3 seats
• Enterprise: Contact Monday for details

Monday ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.7/5 (7,550+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.6/5 (3,700+ reviews)

10. Nutshell

Nutshell is a cloud-based pipeline management platform for teams to streamline the process of project development from concept to completion. It provides a suite of tools to help teams plan, track, and collaborate on projects in real-time. 

With Nutshell, teams can manage multiple projects at once, assign tasks and due dates, communicate with team members, and monitor progress. The platform also includes project templates, reports and analytics, and a messaging system to help teams with lead management from start to finish.  

Nutshell best features

• Contact management to find every contact, customer, and conversation
• Intelligent formas to collect leads directly from the website
• Sales automation with pipeline trigger customization
• Presentation-ready reporting charts
• Prebuilt email templates

Nutshell limitations

• Interface is not as modern or intuitive compared to other client management software on this list
• Report and performance tracking is available on the expensive plan

Nutshell pricing

• Foundation: $16 per user per month
• Pro: $42 per user per month

Nutshell ratings and reviews

• G2: 4.2/5 (740+ reviews)
• Capterra: 4.2/5 (370+ reviews)

Manage Customer Relationships With ClickUp

ClickUp is a powerful and versatile platform for managing your clients and improving your business workflows! By eliminating silos and fast-tracking communication, everyone is on the same page and working towards the same revenue goals.

Whether you’re a small business or a large enterprise, ClickUp has the flexibility productive teams need to maximize their client service management efforts. Start a free ClickUp Workspace today!