Customer relationship management (CRM) software with broad customization options lets businesses tailor their modules, data fields, and specific features to meet their unique operational needs. The best customizable CRM software offers affordable plans, simple system design features, and various third-party software integration options. We evaluated dozens of products to identify the top customizable CRM tools for small business:
- Best overall: Pipedrive
- Great for designing automations for free: Zoho CRM
- Best CRM for white labeling: Bitrix24
- Most customizable CRM for Google teams: Copper CRM
- Great app to tailor for all business functions: Apptivo
- Most simple customization tools: monday CRM
- Best for a broad range of integrations: Salesforce Essentials
- Great to design for direct sales operations: Nimble CRM
- Best Customizable CRM for Small Business Compared
- Pipedrive: Best Customizable CRM (Overall)
- Pipedrive Pricing Plan & Overview*
- Zoho CRM: Best for Designing Automated Workflows
- Zoho CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
- Bitrix24: Best White Label CRM Option
- Bitrix24 Pricing Plan & Overview*
- Copper CRM: Most Customizable CRM for Google Teams
- Copper Pricing Plan & Overview*
- Apptivo: Best for Designing a Whole Business Management Tool
- Apptivo Pricing Plan & Overview*
- monday CRM: Best for Intuitive Customization
- monday CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
- Salesforce Essentials: Best for Integration Options
- Salesforce Essentials Pricing Plan & Overview
- Nimble: Best for Direct Sales Operations
- Nimble Pricing Plan & Overview
- Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
- Bottom Line
Best Customizable CRM for Small Business Compared
| Provider | Starting Monthly Price Per User* | Free Plan? | Our CRM Rating Out of 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
 | $14 | ✕ | 4.85 |
| Visit Pipedrive | |||
 | $14 | ✓ | 4.68 |
| Visit Zoho CRM | |||
 | $49 (up to five users) | ✓ | 4.54 |
| Visit Bitrix24 | |||
 | $23 | ✕ | 4.29 |
| Visit Copper CRM | |||
 | $8 | ✕ | 4.24 |
| Visit Apptivo | |||
 | $10 | ✕ | 4.18 |
| Visit monday CRM | |||
 | $25 | ✕ | 4.14 |
| Visit Salesforce Essentials | |||
 | $24.90 | ✕ | 3.72 |
| Visit Nimble | |||
*Based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for slightly higher rates.
Pipedrive: Best Customizable CRM (Overall)
Pipedrive Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $14
Key Features:
- Customizable CRM data fields
- Custom sales pipelines with weighted probabilities at deals stages and rotting indicator settings
- Access to the app marketplace for connecting CRM with third-party integrations
- Lead, contact, and deal management
- File attachments and activity tracking on CRM records
- Products catalog
- Calendar view on activity and tasks
- Artificial intelligence (AI) sales assistant for performance insights and improvement recommendations
- Deal and activity reporting plus visual dashboards
- Team and individual goal tracking
*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 customizing pipeline (Source: Pipedrive)
Our Expert Opinion
Pipedrive’s customizable pipeline and simple design features grant this product the title of best custom CRM. The provider makes it easy for users to tailor deal stages within the deal and pipeline modules—even allowing them to configure settings for closing probability percentages and when to trigger the rotting deal indication. Plus, Pipedrive’s options for data fields, email templates, and automations allow any sales team to make this CRM their own.
Read our Pipedrive review with comprehensive details on pricing, features, integrations, and user reviews to see if it’s the best solution for your business.
Zoho CRM: Best for Designing Automated Workflows
Zoho CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $0 for three users
Key Features:
- Organize and rename CRM tabs on the home page
- Ability to design CRM search layouts
- Users can build their own list views for CRM records
- Custom workflow automation
- Email template design tools
- Native integration with Zoho Survey, Projects, Desk, Analytics, Campaigns, and Forms
- Leads, accounts and contacts management with activity tracking
- Deal management with one sales pipeline
- Documents storage
- Standard CRM reporting
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is available for a higher cost. Zoho CRM comes with a 15-day free trial for the paid plans.
Zoho CRM creating workflow automation (Source: Zoho)
Our Expert Opinion
Zoho CRM offers complete customization in its system, much of which is included in the free or lower-priced plans. While we like the automation design capabilities the most, Zoho also shines in other areas, like the affordability of customization tools and widespread native integration options. All-in-all, Zoho is an excellent option for teams to tailor for their unique operation.
Check out our Zoho CRM review for insights on features and user reviews to see how they will fit in your sales operation.
Bitrix24: Best White Label CRM Option
Bitrix24 Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $0 for unlimited users
Key Features:
- Custom data fields in contact and deal records
- Company name can be customized in CRM for rebranding
- Website builder
- Project management
- Unlimited deals and contacts
- One sales pipeline with custom deal stages
- Unlimited product catalog items
- Live chat engagement
- Online store payment and order processing
- Human resources management tools with employee profiles and company structure management
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per month breakdown; monthly billing is available for a higher cost. Bitrix24 offers a 30-day free trial on paid plans.
Bitrix24 rebranding CRM system (Source: Bitrix24)
Our Expert Opinion
Bitrix24 separates from the pack with CRM builder functionality in a white labeling environment. That said, this platform is recommended for those wanting to rebrand their CRM as their own or as a service to others. While product usability brings the provider down a few spots, Bitrix24 offers a powerful solution because of its solid free-forever plan and an infinite number of software modules that expand its use cases past sales and marketing capabilities.
White-labeled or not, Bitrix24 is an excellent solution for managing sales and other business functions like marketing, account management, and special projects. See if it’s right for your team in our Bitrix24 review.
Copper CRM: Most Customizable CRM for Google Teams
Copper Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $23
Key Features:
- Custom sales pipelines
- Up to 10 custom data fields in CRM records
- 2,500 contacts with file storage and activity tracking
- Google Chrome extension which brings the CRM interface into Gmail and Google Calendar pages
- Integration with Gmail, Calendar, Contact, Drive, and Sheets
- Collaboration through notes, mentions and comments on records, and task assignment to other users
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per user, per month breakdown; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. Copper also comes with a 14-day free trial.
Copper CRM adding custom data field (Source: Copper)
Our Expert Opinion
Copper is specialty software designed to simultaneously customize a CRM and connect it with Google applications. Its seamless integration process with Google products and similar interface feel give users the chance to fill in the void of Google not offering its own CRM system. We also can’t overlook how easy Copper makes it for teams to design their data fields, workflows, templates, and pipelines to meet their specific needs.
Be sure to use our Copper CRM review for deep insights into product attributes and features to see if it’s right for you.
Apptivo: Best for Designing a Whole Business Management Tool
Apptivo Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $8
Key Features:
- Custom data fields with mapping capabilities
- Field and role-based security controls
- Custom reports and dashboards
- Users can customize views in their CRM system
- Custom integrations through an application programming interface (API)
- Up to 18 unique business applications
- Contact management with appointment scheduling and notes tracking
- Task management
- Product catalog
- Deal management with multiple pipelines
- File sharing
- Sales stage automation and workflow automation
- Email sync with designable templates plus open and click tracking
*Pricing based on annual billing on a per-user monthly breakdown; monthly billing is available for a higher cost. Paid plans include a 30-day free trial.
Apptivo customizing project record layout (Source: Apptivo)
Our Expert Opinion
Apptivo’s product versatility stood out the most for this CRM system. Allowing users to select and customize numerous applications at a low cost, Apptivo quickly converts from a sales and marketing CRM system into a complete business management system. This includes expanded options for customer service, project management, inventory, finance, human resources, and supply chain management.
monday CRM: Best for Intuitive Customization
monday CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
Cost:
- $10 (priced for three-user minimum)
Key Features:
- Custom user notifications for CRM activity
- Board and item templates for using premade pipeline processes and sales data records
- Unlimited contacts and items
- Custom pipelines
- Unlimited boards
- Kanban board view for pipelines or other sales projects
- Dashboard reporting
- Embedded documents and whiteboard collaboration within CRM
- Document storage in items
- Mobile CRM application
- Unlimited free board viewers
*Pricing based on annual billing on a monthly per-user breakdown; monthly billing is available for a higher cost. There is a 14-day free trial for the paid plans.
monday CRM contact list (Source: monday.com)
Our Expert Opinion
monday CRM is the best overall for product usability. We love its use of spreadsheet data entry, no-code automation tools, and how easy it is to customize your boards and item fields to any sales process or project within a sales operation. The complete tailoring capabilities of the system boards are the cornerstones of a fully customizable CRM. We also can’t overlook the pricing of monday.com, which gives CRM access even to those on a tight budget.
Use our monday crm review to learn more about the features and benefits of this product.
Salesforce Essentials: Best for Integration Options
Salesforce Essentials Pricing Plan & Overview
Salesforce Essentials is Salesforce’s small business CRM option. It costs $25 per user, per month, comes with a 14-day free trial, and offers features like lead, account, deal, case management, and campaign deployment. For customization, users can tailor sales processes, data fields, and email templates to meet their needs. There’s also expanded customization through the Lightning process and app builders, and robust integration options.
Salesforce Essentials Lightning app builder (Source: Salesforce)
Our Expert Opinion
Like many of its native products, Salesforce Essentials can directly integrate with nearly infinite external applications. We like its use of the Lightning building tools that use low-code solutions for teams to create detailed process automations and entire applications within their CRM. We also find that sales managers can get value from Salesforce Essentials through its custom and advanced reporting tools.
Salesforce Essentials is an advanced, highly customizable CRM for small businesses to manage their unique operation. Find out if it’s right for your business by exploring our Salesforce Essentials review.
Nimble: Best for Direct Sales Operations
Nimble Pricing Plan & Overview
The Nimble Business plan is $24.90 per user, monthly and comes with a 14-day free trial. Included are contact management, email engagement, data enrichment, workflow automation, and lead qualification features. There are also prospecting credits for purchasing contact data and pipeline management to track deals. In terms of customization, teams can design things like data fields, reports and dashboards, automated processes, and pipeline stages.
Nimble CRM customizing data fields in lead records (Source: Nimble CRM)
Our Expert Opinion
Nimble is a viable option for direct sales teams with a unique sales process or day-to-day operation. Its heavy focus on deal tracking, lead management, and prospecting give it a specialty use case for more traditional revenue operation. Nimble CRM also stands out for its easy-to-use customization for all aspects of the CRM system, including data fields, pipelines, and reports.
Visit Nimble to get the full scoop on features and integrations to see if it can help your business grow.
How We Evaluated the Best Customizable CRMs
To determine the best CRM for custom design features, we evaluated the specific capabilities relevant to tailoring a CRM system to meet unique operational needs. For instance, custom data fields and pipeline stages, along with no-code automation design tools make it easy to track the information you want to keep tabs on and automate repetitive sales tasks. We also looked at other general product attributes like price and customer support availability. The tabs below offer insight into our evaluation process of the best options to create customized CRM systems:
We looked at overall features crucial to any CRM system, regardless of its primary use case or niche purpose. For instance, customizable sales pipelines are relevant to every business since each sales team uses its own process to generate and close opportunities. We also wanted to see the providers offer a mobile app, a wide range of integration options, and solid reporting tools that include custom metrics reporting.
Pricing considered free plan availability and access to various subscription 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 with billing options. Finally, we looked at the costs specifically required to access the custom CRM development tools, like altering data field properties, designing system layouts, or creating workflow automations.
We evaluated niche features specifically for tailoring a CRM system. Being able to create and store custom templates, for instance, lets users easily pull relevant email formats, report designs, or other resources while completing day-to-day tasks. We also evaluated any custom branding options the provider offers as well as whether there are white labeling capabilities to design and resell a CRM as a service.
Extensive support availability and quality service help prevent poor outcomes users may experience while using these products. This criteria was evaluated in terms of customer service hours of availability and channel options via phone, live chat, and email. We also looked at help center resources users can access for self-service including product tutorials, user forums, or training modules.
In addition to firsthand experience evaluating the best customizable CRM for small business, we looked at what actual users say about each product according to reviews. These criteria consider how real teams feel to gain insight into value for the price paid, product usability, and how much users liked the CRM features and customization tools.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What is a customizable CRM?
A customizable CRM is software for sales, marketing, and service management that offers many features to tailor the product to specific user needs. For instance, it will come with customizable data fields, layouts, automations, pipeline stages, and even modules for teams to have a CRM that meets any unique operational or informational requirements. It’ll also supply integration options to expand the CRM’s functionality and sync data across systems.
What is the best & most affordable custom CRM?
The best CRM varies depending on needs and use cases. For instance, we ranked Pipedrive as the best overall custom CRM because it has comprehensive capabilities for sales pipeline and deal-tracking customization that is easy to design. If, however, you are on a tight budget and need the most affordable custom CRM, we would recommend either Zoho CRM, which has a free plan and scalable paid plans, or Apptivo, which starts at $8 per user, per month.
Bottom Line
Custom CRM software is crucial to a product meeting your industry and operational requirements. By offering an array of design features to customize data fields, page layouts, templates, and automations, businesses can ensure their CRM is configured to meet their needs. While we ranked Pipedrive as the best overall custom CRM, other systems are better suited for specific businesses depending on features needs, budget, and usability requirements.
