If you’re like a lot of companies, your sales process feels like a tangled mess that could use some TLC & streamlining as you move into the new year. There are many tools that can help you start decluttering your process and we’ve outlined our top picks for the main categories of any good sales process. Use this as a guide for discovering the right tools for you and your team for each stage of your process.
CRM Software For Managing Your Contacts and Opportunities
A good CRM software tool helps you manage your sales pipeline, contacts, and your sales opportunities so you and your team can stay organized. CRM software has become the must-have foundation of any good sales process, so the entire team can stay on the same page throughout the entire sales lifecycle. In addition to keeping track of the current pipeline, a good CRM software will also have great reporting capabilities so you can forecast upcoming sales and see your sales trends easily.
Our top CRM Software picks:
1. Pipedrive ( Starts at $15/user)
Pipedrive seems to be a rising star in the Small Business-focused CRM space. They are really focused on a great user-experience and building features that help small businesses de-clutter their sales process. They have a growing marketplace of connected apps that helps you easily discover other apps that play nice with their product.
2. Hubspot CRM (Starts at $0/user)
Here’s a CRM solution that’s actually free from the company that started out creating marketing software. This free CRM packs a big punch and also has a phenomenal user-experience. You can be up-and-running in just a few minutes. They do have many upgrade points within your free account, so watch out – They’ll probably get you paying them something at some point as you get hooked!
4. Salesforce (Starts at $25/user)
What can we say? Salesforce is the elephant in the room and for good reason – they sort of started it all. With a product that is more geared towards larger companies, Salesforce seems endlessly configurable and so it can take you weeks or months to get set up depending on your requirements and appetite for customization.
Proposal Software for streamlining Proposal Creation, Delivery & Tracking
A good proposal software tool can literally save your team hours per day and give you insights into your sales process that weren’t available in the attach-my-pdf-to-an-email sales process of yesteryear. There are some great proposal software tools available now that let you create, deliver, and track your sales proposals in minutes, instead of hours. These tools integrate directly with your CRM of your choice to sync contacts & opportunities. These tools even have great e-signature features to help you get your deals to the finish line quicker.
Our top proposal software picks:
1. Proposable (Starts at $39/user)
(We admit, we’re a little biased on this one) Proposable is great for companies that have small to medium sized sales teams. Proposable is building great features that help you organize the proposal process, like “Manager Approval” to prevent unapproved proposals from going out, and “team collaboration” for when multiple team members need to work together on the same proposal.
2. PandaDoc (Starts at $49/user)
Pandadoc is a great proposal tool and is focused on providing a great solution for small businesses. Their e-signature features are top-notch if you want a product that’s similar to docusign, or another dedicated e-sign solution.
3. Proposify (Starts at $30/user)
Proposify is a geared towards smaller agency’s and they do a great job at offering a flexible proposal design experience for people that want to nerd out on their proposal designs.
Sales Explainer Video for Explaining Your Product or Service
Explainer Videos are becoming a real secret weapon in the sales process. With a short visual explainer video, you can quickly communicate the core value that you’re providing to your prospect and move things forward fast. Most good explainer videos visually explain the benefits of your product or service and show the pain that you’re solving. With explainer videos, you really get what you pay for, so don’t try to get one made for the price of a cup o’ Joe – go with a company that has a reel of videos that you’re impressed with. You’ll likely find that you’ll pay more from a quality explainer video company, but get a finished product you’re really proud of.
Our top explainer video picks:
Alliance Videos (Starts at $1,199 per video)
These guys have put together a great small team and a great reel to browse through. Not nearly the cheapest option nor the most expensive, but a great end-product for a mild investment.
Explainify (Starts in the mid $1000’s per video)
Here’s a company that specializes in highly polished explainer videos and has been doing it just about as long as anyone in the industry. They have done lots of work for lots of big names and with good reason – just start browsing their reel to get an idea of the quality these guys put out.
RawShorts (Starts at $39/mo)
Are you a DIY business owner who has the time and a decent eye for design? Check out the RawShorts suite of tools to create your own explainer video on your own time. This is a great option if you don’t have a budget for a high-quality video, but need something that will visually explain what you’re offering.
Video Hosting for Sharing and Tracking Sales Videos
Once you have some great sales video content, you’ll need to store them somewhere for easy sharing and tracking. Youtube was the obvious choice for years, but there are some other great business-focused video hosting options now that you should consider.
Our top video hosting picks:
Youtube (Starts at $0.00)
The best thing about Youtube for hosting your sales videos is the price – Free for all the basic sharing and hosting features. Also, Youtube can get your video to a broad audience quickly and for free. This is a great place to start if you’re looking for a quick and cheap way to host your sales video material.
Vimeo (starts at $7.00/mo)
Vimeo is a great option for hosting sales videos as well when you need a bit more control and flexibility with your uploaded videos. With features like letting you customize the video player experience to match your brand, to integrations with most major video editing software, Vimeo is a fairly affordable and feature-packed solution for storing and sharing your sales videos.
Wistia (Starts at $0.00)
Wistia is a great option for businesses that are serious about tracking their videos online. They offer many business-focused features for tracking your videos, doing a/b tests, and optimizing your video’s SEO.
Online Storage for sales document & sales asset storage and sharing
1995 called, and they want their file cabinets back… It’s high time to get organized in the cloud and save some trees by using an online document storage tool, where you can store all your business and sales documents and assets in one place. These tools let you control security and sharing of all your documents as well as allow you to “collaborate” on them with other team members as needed.
Our top document storage picks:
Dropbox ( Starts at $0.00)
Dropbox is a great tool that’s traditionally been seen as a great fit for individuals and Small businesses who want a dedicated and rock solid cloud storage solution for their documents, but don’t want to pay an arm-and-a-leg for it. Great collaboration features make this a really attractive tool to try out and use for your daily storage needs.
Google Drive (Starts at $1.99/user)
Google Drive now offers far more than just a replacement for Microsoft Word and Excel, you can now store any document in Drive while also having many great collaboration and sharing features.
Box (Starts at $5/user)
Box is geared more towards larger companies and they have positioned themselves as a great option for those that need more security features.
