| Functionality | 8 <p>Pipedrive offers most of the functionality that SMBs will need. Besides allowing you to manage contacts, leads and your sales pipeline, Pipedrive also allows you to send email sequences, automate workflows, and layer on marketing functionality via add-ons (e.g. create marketing emails, chat bots, web forms, track website visitors).</p><p>However, it lacks some advanced features such as a dialer that allows you to make calls from your browser, adding contacts from LinkedIn and data enrichment. These will require 3rd party integrations.</p> | 6 <p>Zendesk Sell offers a mix of advanced and basic features. On the plus side, it includes built-in prospecting and data enrichment, the ability to send texts and emails, make calls, and even create custom objects. However, its automation is extremely limited, with just one trigger available - you also can’t create custom reports, which feel like glaring omissions for a CRM.</p> |
| Ease of Use | 8 <p>Pipedrive is built for sales team - we found it very easy to locate key information, and most sales workflows such as prioritising and routing leads were also highly intuitive. An average SMB employee should only require 1-2 hours to master key functionalities of the product.</p> | 5 <p>Zendesk Sell is generally easy to set up and navigate, but there are frustrations. On the top of our list is how contacts and companies are stored in the same database. This means that when associating a contact with a deal, you’ll have to scroll through a disorganized list of both individuals and companies. Pages lack color coding, making them cluttered and difficult to scan for key information.</p> |
| Look and feel | 7 <p>We find Pipedrive's interface clean and modern, and acceptable to load <span style="color: rgb(9, 9, 11);">(~2 seconds per page).</span></p> | 4 <p>Zendesk Sell gets the job done but looks dull and uninspired. Some pages, like the automation and reporting modules, feel like unfinished prototypes. Page loads are another issue, with delays of up to five seconds</p> |
| Customisability | 5 <p>Built for sales teams, this also makes Pipedrive less customisable compared to competitors. Although you can customizable most fields and pipeline stages, most of its modules and terminology are rather sales-oriented e.g. you must have a "leads inbox", pipeline cards must be "deals".</p><p>It also lacks the ability to add custom objects, which allows you to track items besides people and companies e.g. subscription types or vendors and track custom web events e.g. add to cart.</p> | 6 <p>Customization is another mixed bag. You can create custom objects, multiple pipelines, and custom fields, which is helpful. However, automation tools are severely limited, with just one trigger available for workflows. You also can’t create custom reports, which restricts flexibility.</p> |
| Ease of Setup | 6 <p>Pipedrive offers a free trial without need to speak to sales. Completing basic setup is simple, taking about 10 minutes to import your contacts and set up pipelines. That said, getting the platform fully up and running, and getting your team up to speed, can take up to a week. This is especially true if you’re exploring Pipedrive’s add-ons for marketing, prospecting, and project management.</p> | 7 <p>Close offers a free trial without need to speak to sales. Completing basic setup is simple, taking around 10 minutes to import contacts and set up pipelines. Due to Zendesk's limited customisability compared to more heavweight CRMs, fully setting up the platform is straightforward, and can be largely done within 1-2 business days. </p> |
| Customer Support | 9 <p>Pipedrive offers 24/7, in-app chat with live human agents. Our team has always found the Pipedrive support team to be friendly, quick to respond, and very helpful.</p> | 3 <p>Customer support leaves a lot to be desired. The AI chatbot is often unhelpful or misleading, and attempts to connect with a human agent resulted in error messages on two separate occasions we were testing it. When connected to a human agent, the response is generic and forces you to go to a Help Centre article. Zendesk's Help Centre, while reasonably well-written, is not always easy to navigate.</p> |
| Integratability | 8 <p>Pipedrive has pre-built integrations with most relevant 3rd party products and an API that allows buyer to build own integrations where necessary.</p> | 8 <p>Zendesk Sell offers a very comprehensive library of pre-built integrations with many relevant third-party apps. It also has an API for custom integrations.</p> |
| Ease of Migration | 8 <p>Pipedrive allows users to export key data (contacts, accounts, deals) via self-serve. Export of most other data are also available via API or on request.</p> | 9 <p>Exporting data is easy. Contacts, deals and reports can all be exported via one click. Its API also allows you export any other necessary data.</p> |
