The 7 Best Insurance CRM Software Options for 2023
Jess served on the founding team of a successful B2B startup and has used a wide range of sales and marketing tools over the course of her 15-year career. She uses her industry knowledge to deliver the best answers to your questions about sales tools and sales management.
This article is part of a larger series on CRM.
Insurance customer relationship management (CRM) software lets agencies manage sales leads, handle underwriting activities, and procure and manage insurance policies in one system. The best CRM for insurance agents will offer cost-friendly tools relevant to overseeing deals, supporting insured customers, and building a brand through marketing campaigns. We evaluated dozens of providers to identify the top seven insurance CRM software products for small business:
- Best overall: HubSpot CRM
- Excellent sales enablement tools: Pipedrive
- Great low-cost customization features: Zoho CRM
- Best for business-to-business (B2B) insurance sales: Freshsales
- Solid for integrating with insurance tools: Salesforce Sales Cloud
- Best option for life insurance sales: Insure.io
- Terrific multi-line sales tool: Less Annoying CRM
Best Insurance CRM Software Compared
Provider | Starting Monthly Price per User* | Free Plan? | Our CRM Rating Out of 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
 | $45 (up to two users) | ✓ | 4.60 |
 | $14.90 | ✕ | 4.54 |
 | $14 | ✓ | 4.33 |
 | $15 | ✓ | 4.24 |
 | $25 | ✕ | 4.19 |
 | $25 per month | ✕ | 4.03 |
 | $15 | ✕ | 3.64 |
*Based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for slightly higher rates.
HubSpot CRM: Best Insurance CRM Overall
Overall Score:
4.60 / 5
Pros
- Free plan for unlimited users
- Excellent CRM includes marketing platform and content management system (CMS)
- Highly intuitive CRM to navigate and operate
Cons
- Paid plans get expensive
- Not an industry-specific CRM; lacks built-in underwriting and policy management tools
- Users can’t get electronic signatures to approve policies until the Professional plan
When to Use HubSpot CRM
- You want to mass market personal lines of insurance: HubSpot is a marketing platform and CRM system combined into one. This allows users to easily manage marketing through social media posts, online ads, or email campaigns to target individuals for personal insurance lines, such as auto, home, and renters insurance.
- You need a free CRM to send quotes to prospective clients: HubSpot offers one of the best free CRM systems on the market. Within the no-cost features are contact and deal management, as well as the ability to create and send customizable quotes to potential insureds to compare policy premiums by a carrier.
- You want to present your agency as an insurance thought leader: Agency owners like to use speaking engagements, webinars, and content to promote their brand and present themselves as thought leaders. HubSpot includes a content management system (CMS) for users to easily develop and provide content in their CRM through hosting an on-demand video library and blog as well as obtaining search engine optimization (SEO) recommendations for more web traffic.
When to Use an Alternative
- You are a growing agency: Though it has excellent free tools, all paid plans, whether you bundle or purchase them individually, are expensive and not cost-effective for fast-growing insurance agencies.
- Alternative: Zoho CRM and Freshsales are CRM systems that offer a free-forever plan like HubSpot. But they have cost-friendly paid plans that scale data storage, features, and the number of seats for a business’ growing needs.
- You want a low-cost method for receiving signatures to bind coverage: HubSpot lets you manage the sales process and send quotes to insureds on the paid plan. However, to obtain electronic signatures to bind those policies, users must subscribe to the Professional plan, which gets expensive.
- Alternative: E-signature capabilities are available on Pipedrive’s Professional plan starting at $49.90 per user, monthly.
HubSpot CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-month breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Each plan offers a 14-day free trial.
**CRM Suite includes sales, marketing, customer service, content management system (CMS), and operations software. Individual modules can be purchased for lower monthly costs.
HubSpot CRM managing blog page (Source: HubSpot)
Our Expert Opinion
HubSpot stands out for its marketing and content management capabilities. It’s a top option for agencies whose book of business comprises mostly personal lines of coverage and need to mass-deploy campaigns to larger audiences. Its all-around usability lets users quickly obtain value from the features without a steep learning curve. Finally, HubSpot is useful for managing the sales process, including the end stages when producers need to send quotes for signatures.
HubSpot CRM has many special use cases through its advanced marketing tools, free-plan availability, user-friendly interface, and built-in CMS module. Check out our full HubSpot CRM review to see if it’s right for your business.
Pipedrive: Best for Sales Enablement
Overall Score:
4.54 / 5
Pros
- Low-cost artificial intelligence (AI) features
- Great sales enablement features like Smart Docs, Smart Contact, e-signature, and team member mentions and comments
- Solid deal and lead management capabilities to oversee the long sales process
Cons
- No free plan
- Smart Docs tools requires Professional plan
- Primarily a sales CRM; lacks robust mass marketing and customer service features
When to Use Pipedrive
- You want to boost insurance producer performance: Pipedrive is a solid sales enablement tool for insurance producers to maximize new premium generation. It is a top pick for best lead management software with useful tools like Smart Contact for auto-enriching CRM lead data, AI assistant obtaining performance-improvement recommendations, and team collaboration on deals through mentioning and commenting on CRM records.
- You use a high-volume sales strategy: Because the insurance world is relatively saturated with many competitors, most agencies use high-volume tactics to pursue clients, without much consideration for industry, company size, or specific lines of insurance needs. Pipedrive is especially great for these businesses thanks to its Smart Docs tool. Producers can quickly generate and send quote proposals by auto-populating template documents with stored CRM data.
When to Use an Alternative
- You want to manage policyholders in your CRM: Pipedrive is primarily a sales CRM in that most features focus on lead management, deal management, and tracking the sales process. Therefore, it lacks other useful modules like customer support and case management for assisting policyholders.
- Alternative: HubSpot and Zoho CRM are excellent options with customer service features built into the CRM.
- You need a free CRM for insurance brokers: While a great CRM for an insurance agency, startups may not like Pipedrive as it doesn’t offer a free-forever plan.
- Alternative: HubSpot and Freshsales are our top-recommended picks for free CRM solutions.
Pipedrive Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Paid plans include a 14-day free trial.
Pipedrive commenting notification on deal record (Source: Pipedrive)
Our Expert Opinion
Pipedrive stands out as a top-of-the-line sales CRM that helps insurance producers increase new business generation. Most of its “wow” features involve either bringing in more leads or getting them through the sales process. We see this CRM as a powerful enablement tool that can automate tasks, such as insurance quote proposal generation, and work with other team members on large deals through its collaboration tools—something common in this industry.
Pipedrive helps sales reps boost lead generation and close more deals. Read our full Pipedrive review with insights on pricing, features, and integrations to see if it’s right for you.
Zoho CRM: Best for Low-cost Customization
Overall Score:
4.33 / 5
Pros
- Free and low-cost plans for solid scalability
- Accounts and deal management included on Free plan, along with documents storage
- Robust system customization options to convert into an insurance agency CRM
Cons
- Not an insurance CRM; lacks policy management and underwriting features
- Poor product usability ratings, especially for new users
- Quote generation not available until the Professional plan
When to Use Zoho CRM
- You want to convert a general CRM into an insurance CRM: One of the great aspects of Zoho is the robust CRM customization options, many of which are included on the Free or Standard plan. Agencies can take their general CRM and tailor it into an insurance management system by designing data fields, tabs, views, lists, and pipelines to meet their operational needs.
- You need a free account management system: A great module for Zoho is the built-in account management software. It is available for free along with deal, lead, and contact management and allows account managers or service agents to easily track activity, store and share insurance documents, and organize contact details. Users can also monitor other deals or policy procurements associated with each account.
When to Use an Alternative
- You need a simple CRM: Though most insurance agents are well-versed in using a CRM, Zoho CRM can be particularly difficult to set up and navigate for new users due to its clunky interface design.
- Alternative: HubSpot and Insurio are insurance agent CRM systems notably easy to use.
- You need direct integrations with insurance tools: Since it’s not a CRM built for insurance, Zoho CRM lacks direct integration with insurance underwriting and carrier tools to obtain premium quotes from the CRM.
- Alternative: Salesforce is similar to Zoho CRM in popularity and advanced features, but with a far larger arsenal of integrations, including over 140 insurance tools.
Zoho CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Zoho CRM also comes with a 15-day free trial on the paid plans.
Zoho CRM customizing modules (Source: Zoho)
Our Expert Opinion
Zoho CRM is an excellent low-cost option for users needing free and scalable plans. This product’s primary value is its system customization, allowing agencies to alter data fields, sales pipelines, layouts, and even full modules to handle insurance activities. Zoho is also an end-to-end sales management tool. You can oversee leads and deals, as well as customer support activities, after binding a policy through case and account management features.
Read our Zoho CRM review to learn more about the product’s features, integrations, and pricing to help you better understand the product.
Freshsales: Best for Commercial Insurance Sales
Overall Score:
4.24 / 5
Pros
- Free plan includes unlimited users, account management, and a built-in phone system
- Scalable, low-priced paid plans
- Includes visual sales pipelines and deal management with deal rotting and deal teams
Cons
- Price, quotes, invoices, and onboarding documents management requires paid add-on
- Expensive tools for managing sales quotas
- Two-way email sync not included on free plan
When to Use Freshsales
- You exclusively sell business-to-business (B2B) insurance products: Freshsales includes many features useful for insurance agencies who only sell commercial insurance like business owner’s policy (BOP), cyber, professional liability, and commercial property coverage. It has lead management with scoring tools, deal management with rotten indicators, and options to create deal teams useful for handling larger insureds.
- You want to use a multi-channel engagement strategy: Besides offering a solid B2B CRM system, Freshsales is equipped with excellent communication tools for lead generation, nurturing, and assisting insured customers. These include a built-in phone system, email, live chat, text, AI chatbot, and integration with Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Apple Business.
When to Use an Alternative
- You need quote generation tools included in your CRM: One key issue with Freshsales is that creating quotes and insurance onboarding documents requires an add-on for $19 per user, monthly.
- Alternative: HubSpot offers basic quote customization on its Free plan, while Zoho CRM has full quote creation and deployment options on its Professional plan for $23 per user, monthly.
- You want to use your email in your CRM for free: While it has a free plan, users cannot connect their Gmail or Outlook systems to the Freshsales CRM system until the Growth plan, where they can keep email data in sync while sending and receiving messages through the CRM.
- Alternative: HubSpot allows email sync and usage, along with email marketing campaign management on its free-forever plan.
Freshsales Pricing Plan & Overview*
Besides a free plan, Freshsales offers a 21-day free trial for testing the paid plans. There are also optional add-ons users can purchase with their subscription plans. One is the Configure, Price, Quote add-on, which costs $19 per user, per month for quote document templates, invoicing, and document activity tracking features. Another is for additional bot sessions, which is $75 per month for 1,000 extra live chat sessions that can automate lead generation and customer support conversations.
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost.
Freshsales adding users to a deal team (Source: Freshsales)
Our Expert Opinion
Built-in policy procurement, binding, and management features are the only thing preventing Freshsales from being the best overall insurance CRM. It’s a great product for handling the business insurance sales process because of its robust deal management capabilities, which include rotting indicators, deal insights on closing probabilities, and suggested next-best actions. Agencies can also assign full teams to deals to collaborate—ideal for sales opportunities that have potentially large premium amounts.
Freshsales is excellent for its B2B capabilities, communication tools, account management modules, and Freddy AI (artificial intelligence) features. See if it’s right for your business in our comprehensive Freshsales review.
Salesforce: Best Insurance Third-party Integrations
Overall Score:
4.19 / 5
Pros
- Includes account and case management to track insured customer activity
- Excellent features for managing sales teams and territories
- More than 2,500 native and third-party integrations, including over 140 insurance tools like Vlocity, Veruna, InsureVue, and neon
Cons
- No free plan and relatively expensive paid plans
- Difficult CRM to set up and operate
- Expensive quote management features
When to Use Salesforce
- You want to connect a regular CRM with insurance-specific tools: The default Salesforce CRM has no built-in features specific for overseeing agency operations, policy management, insurance procurement, or carrier underwriting. But it offers CRM integrations with over 140 insurance tools like InsureVue, Veruna, neon, and Vlocity. This lets users expand their sales, service, and marketing CRM to other insurance operations uses.
- You manage multiple insurance branches: As agencies expand into multiple office locations, they can use Salesforce to oversee various sales territories and track performance based on location or lines of insurance, such as commercial, personal, or employee benefits products.
When to Use an Alternative
- You need a highly intuitive insurance CRM software: Due to its high-level product sophistication, multi-capabilities, and wide range of integrations, Salesforce is notoriously difficult for users to set up and operate, especially for those new to the CRM world.
- Alternative: HubSpot and Insurio are solid alternatives for platform ease of use.
- You need a low-cost CRM system: As a CRM for insurance agents, Salesforce is relatively expensive—starting at $25 per user, per month. Additionally, the system does not offer a free-forever option to try out the features on a cost- and risk-free platform.
- Alternative: Zoho CRM and Freshsales are the best options that include a free plan and cost-friendly paid plans.
Salesforce Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Salesforce offers a 30-day free trial on paid plans.
Salesforce Veruna integration, managing documents (Source: Salesforce)
Our Expert Opinion
While expensive, Salesforce can provide an all-in-one insurance agency management solution through third-party and native integrations. With over 140 insurance-related software options, teams can convert their sales system into a business management platform that handles claims, policy procurement, and carrier premium quotes. It’s also useful when agencies begin opening multiple office branches and need a CRM for overseeing territory management across products or locations.
Check out our Salesforce review for deep insights into the product’s features, integrations, pricing, add-ons, and user reviews.
Insurio: Best for Life Insurance Sales
Overall Score:
4.03 / 5
Pros
- Industry-specific CRM with tools for policy management and quote procurement
- User-friendly interface with easy-to-operate features
- Nearly all modules are included on the Basic plan
Cons
- No free plan
- Does not have capabilities for procuring and managing policy for property and casualty insurance lines
- Bulk email requires a paid add-on
When to Use Insurio
- You want a CRM designed for insurance: Insurio is an industry-specific CRM specifically built for agencies to manage sales activities, marketing campaigns, client and insurance services, and agent recruitment in one product. The higher-level plans provide agency management tools like lead assignments based on territory and employee hierarchy tracking.
- You exclusively sell life and annuities coverage: Insurio offers insurance application and procurement features specifically for helping customers obtain life, long-term care (LTC), disability, and annuities insurance. It integrates with over 30 carrier systems for users to gather quotes they can directly send out to leads.
When to Use an Alternative
- You want to manage property and casualty insurance from your CRM: While an insurance-specific CRM, Insurio’s specialty features and integrations are exclusive for life and annuities coverage. Therefore, teams cannot use this CRM for property and casualty (P&C) coverages like commercial property, general liability, cyber, or professional liability insurance.
- Alternative: Salesforce is the best alternative on this list as it integrates with over 140 insurance tools, most of which allow procurement and policy management for property and casualty coverage.
- You want low-cost email marketing tools: The Insurio paid plans are already relatively expensive, and the mass email capabilities require an add-on, with one currently still in development that will cost $10 per 10,000 email sends.
- Alternative: HubSpot offers mass email and campaign management on its Free plan.
Insurio Pricing Plan & Overview*
Insurio offers paid plans based on modules and use case requirements. The first tier, for instance, is exclusively for sales features, followed by a Marketing, Agency Management, and combined module with Marketing and Agency Management capabilities. Coming soon are also two paid add-ons for the CRM. One is a bulk email tool for $10 per 10,000 emails sent, and the other is $5 per team member for tracking aggregated team performance and goal data.
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-month breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Insurio also offers a 30-day free trial.
Insurio life insurance application (Source: Insurio)
Our Expert Opinion
One common attribute of industry-specific CRMs is that they don’t have the user-friendliness of popular general-use systems. That is not the case for Insurio, as it offers a clean, intuitive interface and built-in features that are easy to operate. Plus, we like its highly specialized capabilities that focus on procuring life, disability, and annuities insurance through its integrations with carrier systems that allow users to quote and bind policies from the CRM.
Less Annoying CRM: Best for Multi-line Sales
Overall Score:
3.64 / 5
Pros
- Only one, low-cost pricing tier for a simple buying process
- Customization tools are easy to operate for users to tailor into an insurance CRM
- Multiple, custom sales pipelines for users to track leads and opportunities for various insurance lines
Cons
- No free plan
- Does not have a mobile app
- System does not include quote generation features
When to Use Less Annoying CRM
- You want a simple CRM buying and user experience: Less Annoying CRM is known for its hassle-free buying process, which uses one plan that includes all the CRM features. Additionally, this CRM offers an interface with minimal buttons and clear data presentation—making it especially easy to navigate.
- You need to manage multi-product sales: Less Annoying CRM is a cost-friendly solution for overseeing multiple sales pipelines. This is especially useful for insurance agencies selling personal lines, commercial lines, and employee benefits packages like health, dental, and vision. As each of these requires a unique process, teams can track all their leads and opportunities accordingly using different pipelines.
When to Use an Alternative
- You need to manage policies, sales, and insureds on-the-go: Less Annoying CRM does not currently have a mobile app. Users can, however, access the platform mobility, but it must be done through a web browser where they can only view data records.
- Alternative: Salesforce and Freshsales each offer powerful mobile CRM apps for handling insurance sales activity from anywhere.
- You want to create and send insurance quotes from the CRM: While users can store and share documents from Less Annoying CRM, there are built-in tools for generating quote proposals, sending them to insureds, and obtaining signatures to bind coverage.
- Alternative: Pipedrive and HubSpot are the best alternatives for quote management capabilities.
Less Annoying CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $15 (up to 10 users)
- 30-day free trial
Key Features:
- Contact management with notes, files, tasks, and events tracking
- Lead monitoring, reporting, and prioritization
- Email and email logging
- Sales pipeline management
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Businesses with over 10 users must get custom pricing.
Less Annoying CRM pipeline report for policies (Source: Less Annoying CRM)
Our Expert Opinion
Less Annoying CRM isn’t an especially advanced product, but can be ideal for those needing a simple, low-cost way to manage multi-line product sales. It has customizable sales pipelines, and users can design one for each line of insurance they offer. This makes it easy to track, collaborate, and report on leads that fall in one or many sales processes. The system also supplies solid tools for managing tasks and calendar events associated with CRM records like leads or contacts.
Like what you see? Find out if it’s right for your business in our Less Annoying CRM review with complete insights on features and integration capabilities.
How We Evaluated the Best CRM Software for Insurance Agents
To determine the best CRM for insurance agents, we evaluated the features relevant to an agency’s sales, service, and policy management operations. For instance, deal management lets you track each opportunity in the long sales and policy procurement process. Additionally, obtaining quotes from carriers and storing certificates of insurance keeps operations more centralized. We also examined other critical product attributes, including price, general CRM features, and customer support.
The tabs below offer insight into our evaluation process of the best insurance CRM systems:
25%
General Features
20%
Pricing
20%
Niche/Advanced Features
20%
Help & Support
15%
Expert Score
25% of Overall Score
We looked at overall features crucial to any CRM system, regardless of its primary use case or industry. A mobile app, for instance, lets sales and service teams track and complete tasks while on the go. We also wanted to see a wide range of system customization options, solid reporting and analytics tools, and plenty of third-party integration options for insurance and general-use software products.
20% of Overall Score
Pricing considered free plan availability and various scalable pricing options businesses could afford as they grow. We also looked at the availability for a subscriber to either pay monthly or save by paying annually. Finally, we assessed the costs of using the features specifically useful for insurance agency operations.
20% of Overall Score
We evaluated niche features specifically for insurance agencies, brokers, and wholesalers. Robust deal and lead management, for example, allow reps to track all steps of the long sales process and store critical data that could be useful while selling or underwriting a potential insured. We also examined insurance CRM solutions for policy management and premium quote generation. Finally, we considered each product’s ability to support marketing, social media, and content development campaigns.
20% of Overall Score
Extensive support and service help prevent poor user experiences and outcomes users may encounter while using any of these CRM software platforms for insurance. Help and support were evaluated in terms of customer service hours and the availability of support via phone, live chat, and email. We also looked at self-service and help center resources users can access, like tutorials, forums, or training modules.
15% of Overall Score
In addition to firsthand experience with these insurance CRM products, we evaluated what actual users say about each product according to reviews. These criteria consider how customers feel to gain insight into value for the price paid, ease of use when operating and navigating the CRM, and how users feel about the CRM’s features.
*Percentages of overall score
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What is CRM software insurance?
Insurance CRM software is a product that suits an insurance agency due to its built-in features and integrations. For example, managing policies and obtaining insurance quotes from the CRM, either by a built-in tool or connection to a third-party system, lets teams handle sales, marketing, and service operations in the same interface. A CRM for insurance agents can either be a general-use system customized to meet insurance needs or specially prebuilt for agencies, as seen with Insurio.
Why is insurance CRM software important for agencies?
Insurance sales often require a lengthy process, and many players are in the mix. There’s the insurance producer who builds the relationship and manages the deal; the agency underwriter who brokers with carriers to obtain quotes; and finally, the account manager handling the client after binding the policy. Having a centralized system for sales activity, policy management, customer service, and marketing campaigns allows teams to better collaborate and work in one interface.
Bottom Line
Insurance CRM software lets agencies manage sales, marketing, service, and policies in one system. Whether designed for insurance or a general-use product, the CRM will include useful tools like quote generation, marketing campaign deployment, deal management, and document storage. While we found HubSpot to be the best overall CRM for insurance agents, other products could be a better fit, depending on your needs. Insurio, for instance, is designed for selling and managing life and annuity insurance policies.
