When building a CRM for small agencies and consultants, I wanted each deal to have its own information without losing the connection to the customer.

So I kept Deals, Contacts, and Companies as separate databases, but connected them through relations.

This means one contact can have multiple deals, while each deal can still have its own:

→ Stage

→ Value

→ Follow-up

→ Expected date

→ Status

I found this makes the pipeline much easier to manage without putting everything into one giant database.

I also made the Deal Database available separately for free for anyone who wants to try this part of the workflow on its own.

How do you prefer CRMs to structure this separate databases or everything in one place?

We took over a CRM where nearly every inactive contact had been dumped into the same list.

Some had never received a proper follow-up. Others had already taken a demo and gone quiet. A few had clearly said no. There were also people who had changed jobs and leads still assigned to sales reps who no longer worked there.

Our first thought was to put everyone into one follow-up sequence.

That would have been a mess.

We cleaned the records first, removed bad contacts, and separated the people we had spoken with from the ones who had simply been ignored. We also marked the clear no’s instead of continuing to chase them.

Only after that did automation become useful. Basic reminders could stay inside the CRM, while the stronger leads got more research before anyone contacted them again. Some needed a personal message. Others just needed to be closed and left alone.

The CRM wasn’t really the problem. We didn’t have a clear picture of what had already happened with each person.

How do you separate old opportunities from leads that were never properly worked?

okay i need to vent to people who actually get it because if i have to explain this to leadership one more time im going to lose my absolute sanity. basically our execs are completely obsessed with turning our CRM into this hyper-automated tracking machine. like they want instant dashboards, zero-click pipeline tracking, and automated everything... but they are completely blind to the fact that our data is actual garbage?? like cool love the vision bro, but you cannot automate a process that the Enterprise AEs are actively fighting every single day.

The main thing driving me insane is this myth of frictionless data capture. Mr. leadership thinks if we just automate all email and calendar logging, we'll magically know everything about the pipeline. except lmao nope...our activity timelines are completely drowned in automated out-of-office replies and useless internal calendar invites, so the data is just pure noise. the Enterprise AEs are literally bypassing the broken sync anyway by keeping their actual good notes on their local desktops. it’s so ironic because i spend six hours fixing broken sync integrations and storage limits just to look at automated dashboards that are entirely fabricated. automated telemetry cannot fix broken sales habits, full stop...

And don't even get me started on the workflow bloat... to try and "force" clean data, they made me build these crazy validation loops where every minor pipeline stage requires them to manually type into that mandatory 'Next Steps' text box. now the page layouts look like a literal NASA control tower. and shocker... it totally backfired. the team is annoyed so they just dump placeholder text like "asdasd" into the text box or straight up manipulate close dates to stop the automated Slack alerts from yelling at them. marketing is out here launching sequences using totally stale data, lead routing is breaking because of missing territory tags, and everyone is confused. at this point a clean Google Sheet beats a choked CRM any day of the week.

Is anyone else genuinely losing it trying to build advanced automated workflows for people who still can't update a deal status correctly?? how are y'all pushing back on leadership's crazy expectations without sounding like a hater??

All CRMs have their limitations. I think one way to mitigate these limitations is to develop your own modules or apps that interact with the CRM that cover the gaps.

The interaction can happen using REST APIs either on the CRM side or your own app.

For example, if a user enters a new contact in the CRM, I want something to happen that is specific to my company. For this to happen, the CRM calls an endpoint in my app sending the contact's info in the request.
The CRM therefore needs to have the ability to define a url that is used to make the request to it every time a contact is saved.

Also, this should work in the opposite direction. I want to call an endpoint in the CRM to save a new contact. For example, I entered a contact in Excel and Excel can send this contact information to the CRM to be entered automatically by calling an endpoint in the CRM.

I was wondering if there's an open source CRM that supports these scenarios. A CRM that has a lot of API endpoints.

The goal is not to modify the CRM'ss code to add new features but to have it interact with my own app which has the extra features. This way I am in total control of the new features.

Loved the product and mindset.

Referred many friends to subscribe.

Their integrations got me banned from LinkedIn.

They didn’t take ownership or help resolve it.

The risk and cost of getting banned is too high.

Stay away.

We recently have been trying to link our Hubspot to our Connectwise and PowerBi through the native integration and we are having major issues with deal amounts not coming through?

If you have been experiencing this issue or perhaps know of a solution, please drop it in the comments below.

Over the last few years, I've built websites for businesses across different industries—clinics, agencies, real estate, education, retail, and local service businesses.

One thing became obvious.

Most clients initially ask for "a website."

But after launch, they come back asking for things like:

• CRM to manage leads
• WhatsApp integration
• Appointment booking
• AI chatbot
• Invoice & billing
• Lead tracking
• Email automation
• Analytics dashboard
• Staff management
• Inventory
• Customer follow-ups

At that point, the website becomes only 10–20% of what they actually need.

That's why I'm experimenting with a different approach.

Instead of treating the website as the final product, I'm building it as the front door to a modular business platform where businesses can enable only the features they need.

For example:

• 🦷 Dental clinic → Appointments + Patient CRM + WhatsApp reminders
• 🏡 Real estate → Property CRM + Lead automation + AI follow-ups
• 🏋️ Gym → Membership management + Payments + Attendance
• 🎓 Academy → Student portal + Course management + Notifications

The website stays the same, but the business modules are different.

I'm curious how other developers handle this.

Do you usually stop at the website, or do your clients eventually ask for internal tools and automations too?

I'd love to hear your experience.

We got about 4 stores all luxury retail with expensive than usual products. Got around 400-500 clients who spend monster amount. Then around 10000 who shops once (registered for membership) or sometimes a few.

Whats the best CRM tips you can give me?

If you're unhappy with your CRM and have special requirements, why don't you switch to an open source one and have AI customize it for you? I see people say their CRM doesn't do this or that and they're still spending too much time doing manual work in it.
In this case, customize an open source CRM to address these issues.

Fork the code and maintain it your way.

I know one of the pushbacks is that they don't want to host it themselves or maintain it.
In this case, why don't you hire someone to customize it for you? Let them use AI for that. It will make it a lot cheaper for you and you get the new CRM a lot faster. You test it heavily and if it works to your satisfaction, you tell them to host it somewhere, and you pay them. This is a one time thing.
Then you pay a small hosting monthly or yearly fee to the host. There won't be any per user fees or storage or per X fees. You get all the features for a simple hosting fee and with no limitations.
The hosting company will backup the database for you. Your technical concerns can all be addressed by the hosting type and features. Redundancy, scaling, backups... whatever.

People keep saying you have to maintain it. Once it's running, you don't have to maintain anything.
If an unexpected problem rises, tell the person who did the work to look at it.
If you have a technical person at your company, they can probably fix it.
The person who handed off the new CRM can train you or your technical person.

Every company has its own needs from a CRM, some of which are very specific, and therefore there's no CRM that can do everything you want. Then you will have to create your own CRM or customize an open-source one.

I’m trying to find a good CRM for my type of business. I own a service-based B2B company where I’m a vendor for apartment communities, so a lot of my sales/outreach is done in person.

Right now I’m using Notion, basically set up like Excel/Google Sheets. It works, but it’s almost entirely manual. It’s just me and my secretary using it.

I do a lot of follow-ups through in-person visits, phone calls, and emails. I understand I’ll probably still have to manually enter some information, but I’d like a CRM that can automate or assist with things like follow-up reminders, tracking contacts, sales stages, notes, tasks, etc., rather than having everything written down and managed manually.

What CRM would you recommend for a small B2B service business with a heavy emphasis on in-person sales and follow-up?

When looking at a pipeline, the deal stage doesn't always tell you enough.

Two deals can both be in the same stage, but one might be moving normally while the other has been sitting there for too long.

So I added a simple Deal Health check based on the expected date.

The idea is to make it easier to spot:

→ Deals that are on track

→ Deals getting close to their expected date

→ Deals that are late

→ Deals that are already done

It's a small feature, but I think these little visual cues make a deal tracker much easier to scan

curious what's one thing you think a deal tracker should flag automatically?

Its free if anyone wants it

Trabalho com CRM e vejo esse erro em praticamente todo report que passa numa

reunião. Vale compartilhar porque é simples de reconhecer depois que alguém aponta.

O caso típico: base de 200 mil, 180 mil têm e-mail válido e recebem a campanha, 20 mil ficam de fora porque o cadastro está incompleto. No fim do período: recebeu a campanha: 1.620 compras em 180.000 = 0,90% não recebeu: 60 compras em 20.000 = 0,30% 

"A campanha triplicou a conversão." Ninguém questiona, porque o número é grande.

O problema é que quem não recebeu, não recebeu por um motivo, e esse motivo tem

relação direta com propensão de compra. Cadastro incompleto anda junto com menor

vínculo com a marca. Esses dois grupos já eram diferentes antes de qualquer envio.

Quando se sorteia 10% da base ANTES do disparo, o grupo de fora converte a 0,75%,

porque é feito da mesma gente. Aí o lift real aparece: 20%, não 200%. A campanha

funcionou, mas o report exagerou dez vezes, e foi sobre esse número inflado que a

empresa decidiu aumentar o investimento.

O teste de dez segundos que resolve a maioria dos casos: "existe alguma razão para

esse grupo comprar mais ou menos que o outro, independentemente da campanha?" Se

a resposta for sim, não é grupo de controle. Se você precisar pensar muito para

responder, também não é.

Os falsos controles mais comuns, todos parecem legítimos: quem não tem e-mail

válido, quem deu opt-out, quem não abriu a mensagem, quem ficou fora do segmento,

quem teve falha de entrega, e o mesmo período do ano anterior.

This is a monthly megathread where you can all clamour for CRM attention without being banned for spamming this forum. Share your CRM, or consultancy service to your hearts content, (just keep your dignity!) The idea here is to keep the rest of r_crm less spammy, so don't be surprised if your regurgitated chatGPT output and link don't ever get approved elsewhere on this sub.

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When replying, please use the following format:

Put [ASK] at the start of your comment if you're asking/looking for something.

... we'll assume the rest are people recommending without being asked :D

As always, please disclose your relation to what you're posting.

I built a Notion CRM for small agencies and consultants, with separate databases for companies, contacts, and deals.

I decided to make the Deal Tracker part available for free on its own.

It lets you manage individual deals, track their stage and value, connect them to a company/contact, set follow-up dates and reminders, and keep Won/Lost deals organized.

I also included an example version so you can explore the workflow without changing your own data.

If you want to see how the full CRM connects everything together, I've included a link to it as well.

I’m 24 and graduated in 2025 with a Psychology degree. I’m currently trying to transition into marketing, and I’ve become particularly interested in CRM, lifecycle marketing, email marketing, and marketing automation.
What attracts me to this area is the combination of psychology/customer behaviour, communication, technology, analytics, experimentation, and understanding what actually drives customers to take action.
I’ve been looking at entry-level and junior roles, and I’ve noticed that many of the positions I’m interested in seem to focus heavily on practical skills and experience rather than requiring a specific marketing degree.
I’m considering spending the next 6 months seriously building my skills before trying to make the transition.
My current learning plan includes:
CRM and lifecycle marketing fundamentals
Email marketing strategy
Customer segmentation
Customer journeys
Marketing automation
HubSpot and/or Klaviyo
Email copywriting
Excel/Google Sheets
Basic SQL
Marketing analytics
A/B testing and experimentation
Campaign reporting and performance analysis
My goal isn’t to become an expert in six months. I want to become competent enough to understand how the work is actually done, build a few relevant projects, and eventually be competitive for a junior CRM/lifecycle/email marketing role.
For people currently working in CRM, lifecycle, retention, or email marketing:
If you were starting over with a Psychology degree and no professional marketing experience, what would you prioritize learning during your first 6 months?
Are there any skills/tools that you think aspiring CRM/lifecycle marketers spend too much time learning, or anything that beginners commonly overlook?
And realistically, how difficult is it to get that first CRM/lifecycle marketing job without a marketing degree?
I’d really appreciate advice from people who actually work in this area.

Most field-service CRMs treat every technician like a permanent software user.

I never liked that model.

A tech may only need access to one job, one customer, for one period of time. Why should that require giving them a permanent account with ongoing access to the company's CRM?

So with Chameleon-CRM, I built it differently.

When a job is dispatched, the technician can receive a secure Magic Link and access PIN by email.

That gives them access to their technician workspace where they can see what they actually need for the job — customer/job information, dispatch details, photos, notes, status controls, and the tools needed to complete the work.

They don't need a traditional CRM username/password.

And the important part:

When the job is over, the business can revoke that access.

The workflow becomes:

Create job → Dispatch tech → Send temporary access → Tech completes work → Revoke access

The technician's ability to work in the field doesn't mean they need permanent access to the company's entire business system.

I also deliberately separated this from employee/time-clock access. If someone is actually an employee who needs payroll and time tracking, they're managed accordingly. Being dispatched to a job doesn't automatically make someone a permanent internal CRM user.

This has turned into one of my favorite parts of building Chameleon-CRM because it changed the question from:

"What role should this user have?"

to:

"What does this person need access to right now?"

That's a much more interesting way to think about fieldservice software.

I'm curious what other people running service businesses think about this approach.

Would you rather give every field tech a permanent CRM account, or give them access only when there's actually work assigned to them?

I am a big believer of Apollo for prospecting, sequencing and dialing (anything outbound). I hate that it does not have a CRM integration with Attio. Like how do people keep a tab of Apollo activity in Attio (like dials, prospecting etc.). This might be a deal breaker for me to migrate from Attio over to Hubspot or something.

I’ve been building something that sits between a CRM and a social app.

Traditional CRMs are built around contacts, accounts, deals and activity.

Social networks are built around people, interaction and connection.

I’m exploring what happens when you combine the two. A CRM × Social layer focused on the actual relationships behind your network and represented to you in a real time visual map with an intelligence layer

I’ve built the MVP and I’m looking for a few people who use CRMs to test it and tell me where the idea falls apart.

I’m particularly interested in whether this feels like a genuinely useful new direction for CRM, or just an interesting idea on paper.

What do you feel your current CRM is missing when it comes to managing real relationships?

If you’re interested in testing the MVP, drop a comment or DM me - I’d love your feedback and I’ll send you a voucher for coffee ☕️

I've noticed that entering information into a CRM is often the easy part.

The more interesting part is what happens afterwards.

Does your CRM simply store the information, or have you built processes around it so that the right action happens at the right stage?

I'm curious how different teams handle that transition from recording information to actually doing something with it.

I've been thinking about how much CRM functionality a small business actually needs.

For many freelancers, consultants and small teams, the main questions after sending an important email are pretty simple: Was it opened? When was it opened? And when should I follow up?

That's one of the reasons I built OpenDot, a lightweight Gmail extension focused on email open tracking and real-time notifications without requiring users to move their workflow into a full CRM.

I'm curious how people here see this: at what point does a business actually need a full CRM instead of a lightweight email tracking tool?