I am developing a new technology centre and I need to keep track of client visits, outstanding actions, status of interest, contact details, names etc.

I am new to business development and need to set up a central database that myself and one or two others can access and update remotely.

I have been recommended salesforce.com which is very good but probably too big and expensive for our needs, at most we will have 200 clients within two years.

We are currently using XL on a shared server but its not ideal

Any advice appreciated

S

Podio
Zoho CRM

Are two of the cheaper but still very customisable and capable platforms I’ve used.

Lots of others out there, Relenta, Sugar CRM …

I’m a BDM, having used some various CRM systems over the years, the SalesForce one has been one of the better ones. You can use one of the more basic versions for very little cost per month.

We use one of the more expensive versions of it, but then I’m managing a fair number of staff in my team over multiple sites, so it’s fairly essential for me, to keep a handle of what’s going on.

Im told by my tame techies sugar crm is very good and cheap. Worth a look.

I’ve used Dynamics and Prospect and they are both a bit clunky

Salesforce is the best I’d say especially the integration into exact target which I find useful for lead/relationship nuturing but Sugar is pretty decent too.

I’ve used both extensively.

One thing you need to figure out is whether you want integrated email and if messages become “attached” automatically to contacts/deals/cases/etc. If you do then this will greatly reduce the apps available.

definitely recommend Zoho over SF – especially regarding your comment about the likely size of the client base – I’ve used both over the last few years.

i think the zoho team will allow you to play with a demo version if you get in touch with them – when we moved from SF to Zohe, we got excellent crossover support.

HTH

Yep, Zoho offer a 30 day trial AND a fully free version (with limited functionality).

Salesforce in it’s basic form isn’t very expensive at all and works very well.

Zoho is good but clunky and the apps are a bit disjointed IMHO
I’m currently looking at Bitrix24 (http://www.bitrix24.com) as an alternative for a client.

Salesmonkey – I think being able to attach messages easily would be a good function, so that would be ideal, there are only two of us to run office, create website, do meetings etc so anything that is quick and easy to build is important

I’ve used Act, Goldmine and Salesforce. Salesforce is far easier to use and is cleaner

Have a look at pipedrive.com it may suit what you want and is much cheaper than Sugar/Salesforce and to my mind more intuitive.