7 Best Customer Database Software Options for 2023

Customer database software lets businesses store client data, manage customer interactions, and monitor customer activity and engagement history. Account management teams can access database software using a customer relationship management (CRM) platform or a project management tool. We evaluated dozens of database products to find the best customer database software for small businesses:

• Zoho CRM: Best overall client database software platform
• HubSpot CRM: Great customer data management software for teams wanting a user-friendly interface
• Zendesk Sell: Excellent for teams needing robust data management
• Freshsales: Solid database software for small businesses needing a built-in call center
• Salesforce: Terrific customer data software for those wanting to integrate with a third-party, industry-specific platform
• Airtable: Best client database software for users who want dynamic views of customer data
• monday.com Sales CRM: Ideal customer database solution for teams looking for simple automation tools

Customer Database Software Compared

*Based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for slightly higher rates.

Zoho CRM: Best Customer Database System Overall

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

Zoho offers a popular CRM system and is one of our picks for the best account management software. With this platform, teams can store and organize account or customer data, track their activity, and connect with contacts through direct or mass emailing. Users can also book meetings with their clients and filter out customer lists within the system.

Account management operations can often become hectic if there isn’t a system for managing client inquiries such as product issues, billing errors, and support requests. Zoho CRM comes with an easy-to-use and robust case management module. The software lets teams receive and respond to support inquiries and create workflow automations for cases. For example, they can create assignment rules to auto-assign cases and notify reps, and also set case escalation rules that go up the hierarchy later based on urgency and case type.

Making calls from your CRM is convenient for work centralization, where you can place calls and log conversations in CRM records on one interface. Unfortunately, Zoho CRM requires integration with an external phone system to place and receive calls. Freshsales is the best alternative for telephonic capabilities as it has a built-in phone available on the free plan.

Zoho CRM Plan Summary

Zoho CRM Key Features

• Record storage and tagging: Account and customer data storage including contact information, associated tasks, events, call logs, and notes as well as the ability to tag records with unique information relevant to your account management operations.
• Data customization: Users can design properties of customer and account records to meet their unique requirements with data fields, links, buttons, and page customization.
• Automated data management: Teams can automatically run data management workflows, such as updating records using online, social data enrichment, and identifying the best time to contact a client.
• Case management: Account management and service teams can collect client inquiries in the form of cases, automatically notify account managers, and prioritize cases based on escalation rules.

Zoho CRM Customer Support

Zoho CRM uses a tier-based system with customer availability determined by the package users select. There’s email support included in all plans. Plus, phone and live chat support on the paid plans, either on a 24/5 or 24/7 basis, depending on your plan. Self-service is also available through online resources like product documentation, guided tours, videos, webinars, and tutorials.

Want to learn more? Our in-depth Zoho CRM review helps you explore its features, usability ratings, integrations, and best-for use case scenarios.

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HubSpot CRM: Best for Ease of Use

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.
**CRM Suite includes sales, marketing, customer service, content management system (CMS), and operations software. Individual modules can be purchased for lower monthly costs.

HubSpot offers a popular CRM system that offers modules that users can bundle or purchase individually for sales, marketing, customer service, operations, and a content management system (CMS). There is a free plan available for unlimited users, which comes with excellent customer management tools like contact data storage, email and live chat communications, and a meeting scheduler.

If your account management team is relatively new to using a client database or CRM equivalent, HubSpot is the best solution for you. The system uses a modern-looking layout and color scheme with button functions indicated on every page—keeping the user interface clean and easy to navigate. Aside from our personal experience with the CRM, ease of use is one of the top attributes users express in their online reviews.

While it does offer a free plan for unlimited users, HubSpot becomes expensive once teams upgrade to the paid plans, whether or not they choose a bundled product. Freshsales is the most comparable to HubSpot and its best alternative—offering a free plan for unlimited users, an easy-to-use interface, and more scalable pricing options.

HubSpot CRM Plan Summary

HubSpot CRM Key Features

• Customer engagement: Ability to contact customers through phone call, email, and chat from the CRM as well as schedule meetings with clients through the meeting scheduler.
• Data management and organization: Teams can store and organize contact, customer, account, and deal data along with associated activity in tailorable records of custom data fields, data properties, required fields, and record layout.
• List segmentation: Contact list filtering based on preset traits and qualities of customers or accounts for sending targeted email marketing campaigns or calling for upselling and cross-selling opportunities.
• Reporting and activity insights: Users can generate CRM reports on their customers and accounts, such as recurring revenue tracking, account management performance, customer website activity, and sales pipeline insights.

HubSpot Customer Support

HubSpot comes with phone, email, and live chat support from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Eastern Time. There are also self-service options through an array of online resources, including the HubSpot Academy, a community forum of product users, and an online library of tutorials and guides.

Want to learn more? See how else HubSpot helps teams manage customers, track conversations, collaborate, and manage data in our HubSpot CRM review.

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Zendesk Sell: Best for Robust Data Management

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

Zendesk Sell is a software platform that lets users store and organize customer data, connect with them via phone, text, or email, and gather insights through activity reporting or sales forecasting. The product gets solid online reviews for usability ratings and teams can easily customize customer data records in terms of fields, objects, and tags to meet their sales or account management needs.

What separates Zendesk Sell from the competition is its data management capabilities. In addition to storing and filtering lead, customer, and account records, there’s also automated enrichment, which keeps customer profile information up to date using data found on websites and on social media. There’s also duplicate detection, which prevents cluttered databases by identifying identical records and merging the information into one.

Unfortunately, the platform does not offer a free plan, and the paid plans can get costly—not ideal for startups or growing businesses that need to manage customer data. Zoho CRM and Freshsales are the two best traditional CRM alternatives, each offering a free-forever option and lower-priced, scalable paid plans.

Zendesk Sell Plan Summary

Zendesk Sell Key Features

• Enrichment and prospecting: Credit-based feature that updates contact information on lead or customer profiles as well as creates profiles for you automatically.
• Record management and duplicate detection: Teams can store contact, customer, and account records and keep a clean database with duplicate detection.
• Data customization and filtering: Users can create specific fields or tags associated with customer records and filter out contact lists based on customer attributes.
• Customer engagement: Account management teams can stay in touch with customers through direct email, bulk email, text messaging, and outbound phone calls.

Zendesk Sell Customer Support

All Zendesk Sell plans come with customer support through live chat, phone, and email during standard business hours. There are also self-service resources like a help center and community forum. For additional support, teams can pay extra for premier support packages that come with a technical account manager and system configuration services.

Is this the product for your team? See how else it can help your business track and manage customers by reading our in-depth Zendesk Sell review.

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Freshsales: Best for Engaging Customers Through the Phone

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

Freshsales is the CRM and sales database software product created by Freshworks. The software stands out for its free plan for unlimited users and its cost-friendly paid options. The CRM features and interface usability get solid reviews online, and small businesses get plenty of value from the customer management tools. These include data storage, activity tracking, and data deduplication and enrichment through Freddy Artificial Intelligence (AI) insights.

Account managers need to be ready to answer calls at any time, and their jobs are made easier when they can manage calls and log the conversation information all on one interface. Freshsales comes with a cloud built-in phone system that enables work centralization. Users can place calls from contact records, receive inbound calls, manage a waiting queue, and record and log call notes.

Two-way email sync and the ability to send and receive emails from the CRM offer a convenient way to engage with customers. Unfortunately, this feature is not one of the free tools available with Freshsales. HubSpot is the best alternative for free email features for sending direct and mass emails.

Freshsales Plan Summary

Freshsales Key Features

• Customer and account management: Teams can store contact data for customers and accounts while automatically enriching profiles and tracking timelines and lifecycle stages.
• Cloud telephone system: Users can access a phone system built into the CRM for placing and receiving calls, managing the waiting queue, transferring calls, and logging and recording conversions in customer records.
• Tasks, activities, appointments, and notes: Ability to create tasks, track contact activity, set appointments, and document notes within customer records.
• Freddy AI insights: Built-in artificial intelligence tool that can run advanced customer analytics such as data deduplication, next-best action, out-of-office detection, and sales forecasting.

Freshsales Customer Support

Freshsales offers all users 24/5 phone, live chat, and email support, plus a dedicated account manager for Enterprise plan users. There are also self-service capabilities from resources such as a blog, product update pages, and video tutorials. Users can also read published case studies or utilize a community forum for questions and answers.

Like what you see? Check out our in-depth Freshsales review for insights on pricing, integrations, built-in features, and what users say about the software.

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Salesforce: Best for Software Integration Capabilities

Salesforce is simultaneously a sales tool and software for customer database management. Teams can track account data, monitor activity, and communication history, and create and collaborate on tasks associated with customer records. That platform also has more advanced features like sales forecasting conversation insights that will indicate teachable moments and trending topics during customer phone calls.

Because Salesforce is popular, the provider has enhanced the platform to integrate with over 2,500 native and third-party applications—far more than any other system on this list. Not only are there general-use apps available, but also industry-specific ones that allow firms of all verticals to expand customer database capabilities with industry-specialized features. For instance, the Actium CENTARI platform is a healthcare tool that can integrate with Salesforce to provide next-step medical care suggestions within CRM records.

Because of all the features and advanced tools available in Salesforce, the system tends to be bulky and tricky to navigate, particularly for users new to operating a CRM. HubSpot CRM is the best alternative for ease of use—containing some of the advanced features similar to Salesforce, like analytics and insights, but with a much easier interface to navigate.

Salesforce Plan Summary

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

Salesforce Key Features

• Contact and account data organization: Teams can organize customer information through data storage, profile views, contact data, and internal conversations about each customer.
• Customer and revenue insights: Users can generate reports on projected revenue based on customers and leads in the pipeline as well as get conversation insights regarding trending topics and teachable moments during customer calls.
• Case management: Ability to automate inquiry routing to proper agents, assist with customer cases, track tickets, and store knowledge articles to help account managers during conversations.
• Task and activity tracking: Teams can view and assign tasks associated with customer records and track each account’s communications history and prior activity.

Salesforce Customer Support

Salesforce’s tier-based user assistance comes with phone and email support, including 24/7 availability on the higher-priority plans. Self-service options are also available through online resources like Trailhead, webinars, product tutorials, user guides, and certification classes.

Check out our in-depth Salesforce review to get comprehensive details on its features, integrations, and other solutions that can help teams boost revenue and manage customers.

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Airtable: Best for Dynamically Viewing Database of Clients

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

Airtable is a project management tool that can be used as a database for clients and a makeshift CRM system. Users can add records into a spreadsheet-style format and track them through numerous views, including calendar, Gantt, Kanban, gallery, and timeline. Since many users are already familiar with the spreadsheet format, the product is intuitive for adding data and easy to operate when changing views.

Even though it’s not a standard CRM, customer records within Airtable can still include some of the rich fields often allowed in CRMs, such as file attachments, checkboxes, drop-down menu options, tags, and assigned users. There are similar collaboration capabilities where teams can assign and manage tasks associated with customers and comment on records to keep everyone in the loop on activity.

Because Airtable isn’t a traditional CRM, it doesn’t have some crucial customer management features such as calling, pipeline management, or revenue forecasting built into the system. HubSpot CRM and Freshsales are great alternatives that come with some of the usability attributes offered by Airtable, as well as sales-specific tools.

Airtable Plan Summary

Airtable Key Features

• Multiview options: Teams can enter, edit, and view data records multiple ways, including spreadsheet/grid, calendar, form, Kanban, gallery, Gantt, and timeline views.
• Data storage and collaboration: Users can store customer data in the system and collaborate on records through task assignments and record comments.
• Application designer: Drag-and-drop ability to create custom interfaces with tailored data fields, automations, visualizations, and data sources.
• Rich data fields: Data records can include rich data components such as file attachments, drop-down menu options, and checkboxes.

Airtable Customer Support

All Airtable users get access to email support as well as self-service options like a knowledge base and on-demand webinars. Priority support and a dedicated customer success manager are also available for Enterprise users.

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monday.com CRM: Best for Data Workflow Automation

*Pricing based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.

While monday.com offers project and work management tools, the monday.com Sales CRM is the templated version, designed to specifically be a sales tracking and customer database software. The system has a free plan, scalable paid plans, and features for managing customer data, record tracking on multiple views, email communications, and data duplicate tracking. There’s also a unique feature for post-sales management where users can track customer onboarding and renewal progress and manage client projects.

monday.com and its CRM-specialty product are great for automation. Teams often need to move data around their system, notify users, or assign tasks depending on record updates, such as a lead converting to a customer or a new client generated. Automation gives users a hands-free option to complete these tasks. Compared to other platforms, monday.com has the easiest automation designer to use. It offers no-code, if/then flows where users select items from a drop-down, add conditions, pick an action, and then enable the automation.

The free plan is, unfortunately, limited to two users and basic data management features like record creation, document management, and Kanban viewing of customer data. Airtable is a great alternative that is not a traditional CRM and has a free option with up to five users, more expanded viewing options, and rich field record management capabilities.

monday.com Plan Summary

monday.com Key Features

• Contact and account management: Teams can store customer and account records in the system, such as contact data, activity history, prior communications, association documents, and pipeline status.
• Intuitive data workflow automation: Easy-to-use, no-code automation with a portal for creating data workflows, such as moving items (customers) to other boards if their status changes or notifying reps if a new item (contact) is added to the system.
• Post-sales management: Built-in module for post-sales management, including tracking progress on client onboarding and renewals as well as client project management with billable hours tracking and quoting features.
• Email communications: Users can send, receive, and track emails through monday.com by integrating with Gmail or Outlook.

monday.com Customer Support

monday.com Sales CRM comes with 24/7 support on email and phone channels, with no restrictions based on the plan. All users also get access to a knowledge base and webinar self-service resources, and Enterprise plan users get a dedicated customer success manager.

Want to see how else monday.com can support your business? Our monday.com review tells you everything you need to know about its features, pricing, and best-for use case scenarios.

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How We Evaluated the Best Client Database Software

To determine the best customer database software, we considered platforms with features specific to customer and data management, such as data storage, integrations with external databases, and call tracking capabilities. We also looked at automation tools like customer conversation routing and automated communications through email or chat. Finally, we evaluated specific product attributes such as price, system ease of use, and user support.

The tabs below offer insight into our evaluation process of the best software for managing a customer database: