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When you’re trying to make the sale, you want to be as tactful as possible. You want to talk to your customer at the exact time they want what you’re selling.
This means going beyond storing their basic contact information and tracking points of contact, rebuttals, and previous sales deals.
That’s where contact management software can be one of your most valuable sales tools. It helps you streamline your sales process so that you can close sales faster, keep your most valuable customers, and grow your business.
But how do you find the right contact manager to integrate into your sales system?
In this extensive guide, I review five of the top contact management tools on the market and walk you through the best features as well as their price points.
Let’s get started.
#1 – HubSpot Review — The Best Free Contact Management System
HubSpot stands alone as a powerful free contact management system with tons of accessible tools to enhance your sales cycle from beginning to end.
That’s because HubSpot gives away a free version of its award-winning CRM (customer relationship management) software. Contact management is one of the foundational services included with this suite, but you will find tools for sales, marketing, and customer service teams.
For a free product, it’s unbelievably rich.
Focusing in on just the list of contact management tasks you can do for free with HubSpot’s software still gives you a long list. You can keep track of contact website activity, deals, company insights, manage ticketing, manage ads, email tracking and notifications, and even messenger integrations.
HubSpot’s free contact management software is an excellent stepping stone toward more varied and growth-oriented contact management as your business grows since you can always upgrade to one of their paid CRM plans without having to migrate.
If you’re getting started with contact management and want to do more with your contacts in terms of sales strategy on a budget, I recommend you start onboarding HubSpot’s free tools for a strong beginning.
#2 – BiginReview— The Best For Simple Contact Management
A small or mid-sized business doesn’t always have use for tools built with enterprises in mind. Bigin takes the prize for a simple yet reliable contact manager you can easily start with.
A single dashboard unifies all your data points so you can make strategic decisions at a glance and manage everyone on your roster. It helps to think of it as your own personal yellow pages except for ten times more useful.
You can do things like adding your preferred tags to contacts to find what you’re looking for quickly, glance over at your expected revenue numbers, and see all your pending tasks.
Bigin makes it easier for you to close deals by scheduling follow-up activities and then closely monitoring results, all on an intuitive dashboard.
Bigin’s simplicity bleeds into its pricing structure, too. Here’s a quick overview:
Free
Single user
500 contacts
One pipeline
Express – $7/user per month
50,000 contacts
5 pipelines
Add 10,000 additional contacts for $1/month
Up to 20 custom fields per module and 10 custom dashboards
It’s that simple. One user with one pipeline can manage up to 500 contacts free, forever. And the paid tier isn’t tough to stomach, either.
#3 – PipedriveReview— The Best For Visual Contact Management
Pipedrive is loved not just for the wide array of CMS tools it offers but because it makes the whole contact management and sales process straightforward and visual. It’s been used by over 90,000 companies in more than 170 countries and business giants like Vimeo, Amazon, and Re/Max.
Pipedrive is a highly intuitive system that easily updates and automates contact tasks and sales calls. The easy drag-and-drop features and their clean and approachable interface make them an easily adaptable and usable system.
With a visual dashboard in mind, they don’t falter in the features department, as it offers plenty of tools for powerful contact management like task automation, lead pipelines, and smart lists that track the last time you contacted a prospect.
You can always try Pipedrive free for 14 days. It doesn’t hurt to spend a few days trying out the software’s ins and outs to see if they’re a good company match. Otherwise, the ricing plans break into four tiers:
Essential – $12.50
Advanced – $24.90
Professional – $49.90
Enterprise – $99
#4 – ZendeskReview— Best For Reporting and Analytics
Zendesk is a dynamic CMS that emphasizes the analytical and reporting aspects of contact management.
The last thing you want is to grow a robust list of leads and then have no idea what to do with them due to lack of data. Zendesk’s analytics make it possible for you to engage in better conversations with your prospects with their pre-built analytics features.
With them, you can track rep activities, call response times, and live chat interactions. Their rich reporting features ensure you keep a finger on every touchpoint of your sales cycle. This makes it easy to increase the ROI of each sales rep on your team.
Zendesk’s price breakdowns can get specific depending on the solutions and features you’re looking for. The contact and relationship management tiers start at $19 per seat.
Contact management software that scales with you and offers powerful tools to take you beyond the basics? There’s a tool for that. It’s called Salesforce.
The point of a CMS is to increase the efficiency of your daily operations, so you’re never blindsided by lost sales or missed relationship-building opportunities.
Salesforce does that by offering the tools to build a good contact management base. This means contact history, survey answers, and email responses. But they take it a step further with their social data tool to keep track of what your customer is saying about products and services.
Not only that, but Salesforce makes it easy to collaborate with everyone in your business. You can share documents, comments, analytics and insights, sales history, and any other information relevant to your ROI.
On-the-go contact management is also possible with its mobile app. You can hop on a call armed with plenty of preemptive information about your customer from anywhere. This awesome array of tools makes Salesforce not only a contact management tool but a sales closing system, too, which is why it’s made it on my top five picks.
Here’s a breakdown of each plan they offer:
Essential – $25
Professional – $75
Enterprise – $150
Unlimited – $300
Each plan comes with:
Account, contact, lead, and opportunity management
Email integration with Gmail and Outlook
Access to the Salesforce mobile app and all it’s features
The higher the tier, the more access to customizable features and tools you’ll have. Thankfully, you don’t have to jump right into a plan without testing how they work first.
Salesforce also gives you the option of testing any pricing tier first before committing.
What I Looked at to Find the Best Contact Management Software
Choosing the best contact management software goes beyond making sure they provide the standard contact management software (CMS) tools like sales tracking, customer notes, emails, and sales history.
Your business is unique, which means your CMS needs are also unique. Because of this, it’s hard to pinpoint a one-size-fits-all CMS that you can use in any given sales scenario or industry.
You also have to consider the size of your team, your plans for scaling and revenue growth, and what functionalities are non-negotiable in your given industry.
Beyond that, there are a few specific key factors to think through when trying to make the best choice in a sea of software. Use these criteria to ensure you’re making the best contact management investment possible.
Reporting and Analytics Capabilities
Some contact management systems put more emphasis on sales reporting and analytics than others. This can prove to be a valuable asset or just an extra feature to your team, depending on how you handle your sales process.
These days, contact management software is increasingly robust in terms of the analytics it can gather to help you make the best sales decisions. Some of them can measure everything from live chat interactions to sales calls, email responses, and even what you’re prospective customers say on social media about you or your competitor’s product or service.
Deciding how deep you need your contact management analytics to go will ultimately depend on your sales goals and budget. Consulting with your sales team can be a sound idea in the process of making a final decision.
Sales Process and Software Fit
The sales process you use to sell printers isn’t necessarily the same one you’d use to sell premium car parts. This also means you’ll want to find a CMS that fits every unique point of sale your team goes through continuously.
If done right, this can mean higher ROI, shorter sales cycles, and more revenue. This is where it’s a good idea to take the time to test drive every prospective CMS that looks appealing to your sales team. Most of them have the option for a demo or a 14-day free trial.
These trials exist for a reason. I highly recommend you take advantage of them before you commit.
User Experience
The more scalable integrations and features a CMS has, the more likely it is to have a big learning curve. This is important to take into account when thinking about onboarding your sales team to the system successfully.
Besides that, the user experience for both your front-facing customer features like contact forms and chatbots and the backend features your sales team will have to interact with daily is also a crucial part of the process as far as ease of use goes.
An array of powerful features is pretty much useless if your sales team continually runs into trouble using them, or if integrations prove too clunky to operate properly.
This also raises questions about what support features your preferred CMS provides and whether they offer any accompanying training options like forums, live chats, or even training webinars.
Summary
Finding the right contact management system can make the difference between constant sales, shorter sales cycles, and more efficient business growth all around.
But it starts with figuring out what your sales needs are, how you go through your sales strategy, and what you need to optimize for higher ROI. Once you’ve figured out your key needs, you can start narrowing down your list of prospects.
My recommendations are all excellent products, but they each have their strong suit:
Salesforce – Best scalable contact management software
My top choices for effective contact management are HubSpot, because of their extensive list of free tools, and Salesforce, because of how versatile and adaptable they are. Make sure to use this review as a roadmap to make your final decision.
Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.
Call recording software is a useful tool for businesses and individual users alike.
From quality assurance to employee training, compliance, record-keeping, dispute resolution, and more, there are dozens of reasons why organizations can benefit from recording calls.
But there are so many different call recording solutions on the market today. It can be a challenge to find one that fits into your workday. You don’t want to have to re-do everything just to record calls.
And you also don’t want to pay for a million features you’re never going to use.
Use this guide to learn more about my top picks and methodology for finding the best call recording software for you.
#1 – Talkdesk Review — The Best For Voice and Screen Recording
Talkdesk is a modern cloud contact center solution. One of the main benefits of using this platform for business communication is the built-in call recording capabilities.
With Talkdesk, you’ll gain deeper customer insights with encrypted screen and voice recordings.
By synchronizing the playback of voice and screen recordings, you’ll have more context for evaluating customer interactions with your support team. This also makes it easier to ensure compliance and provide your agents with in-depth feedback on their performance.
The software has a feature called Talkdesk Speech Analytics. The tool is perfect for analyzing calls based on customer sentiment, keywords, topics, and more.
Some of the other key features and benefits of using Talkdesk for call recordings include:
Inbound and outbound call recording
Custom storage options
Ability to pause and resume live recordings
Store recordings for as long as you need
Storage available on Talkdesk’s cloud storage or use your own storage system
Talkdesk even has tools for quality assurance. Admins can add time-stamped annotations to recorded calls and fill out scorecards to improve agent performance. All of this can be managed from a simple and intuitive interface.
Request a demo to get started. Pricing for this contact center solution is based on the number of agents on your team.
#2 – Cube ACR Review — The Best Call Recorder For Android
Cube ACR is a smartphone app designed specifically for Android devices. It has 10+ million installs worldwide.
In addition to cell phone calls, this simple tool makes it easy to automatically record calls from VoIP platforms like Skype, WhatsApp, Viber, Telegram, WeChat, LINE, Slack, Hangouts, and more.
For such a basic app, Cube ACR has surprisingly good recording quality, and you can clearly hear both sides of the conversation. Just customize your settings to enable VoIP calls, automatic recordings, and control storage backups via Google Drive, Dropbox, etc.
Cube ACR is always coming out with new updates to ensure recordings are stable and reliable.
Other noteworthy features and highlights of Cube ACR include:
Cloud backups
Silent mode
Geotagging to see where calls take place on a map view
Data security with a PIN lock
Automatically remove old recordings to free up storage
If you want to mark an important part of the conversation, simply shake your phone, and Cube ACR will highlight that part of the call so that it’s easy to find later.
While the app is popular for individual use, the software has business-specific features as well. It integrates with certain business tools, has custom development, and offers special business licensing options.
The app is free and has a 4.3/5-star rating with 510,000+ reviews on the Google Play Store.
#3 – Callcap Review — The Best For Call Monitoring
Callcap is a bit unique compared to some of the other software on my list. It’s not really a standalone call recording tool. This platform is branded as a call tracking and monitoring solution, but it does have call recording capabilities.
Marketers leverage Callcap to gain deeper insights into consumer behavior. Any business seeking an advanced solution beyond basic call recording should consider Callcap.
Callcap will automatically record all of your business calls. These recordings are available at any time. You can use them for agent training, employee recognition, lost opportunity analysis, disputes, and more.
All recordings are stored in the cloud and accessible from anywhere, and it is easy to share recordings with team members.
But Callcap takes these recordings to the next level with third-party monitoring services. Their trained analysts provide unbiased scoring for all inbound and outbound calls. The data from Callcap allows agents to improve, close more deals, and increase customer satisfaction.
Other benefits of Callcap include:
Catalog item tracking reports
Track revenue by campaign or employee
Secure and PCI compliant recording and monitoring
Manual pausing and automated scrubbing
Call tracking
Call recovery
Callcap is not for everyone. If you just need a basic solution for recording calls, look elsewhere. But if you want one of the most advanced call recording and monitoring services on the market today, Callcap should be at the top of your list.
#4 – Rev Call Recorder Review — The Best Call Recording App For iPhones
Rev is best known for its online audio transcription and video captioning services. It’s trusted by more than 170,000 customers worldwide, across industries like marketing, legal, media, education, and more.
But they also have an excellent iPhone app for recording calls.
This is a simple and straightforward solution for call recording. It’s a viable option for both personal and business use cases.
Here’s a quick overview of Rev’s key features:
Automatically record incoming and outgoing calls
Free and unlimited call recording
Convert any recording to text with the in-app transcription feature
Easy to share recordings and transcriptions via Dropbox, email, and more
Aside from the ability to transcribe and share, Rev is a no-frills solution for call recordings. It’s perfect for anyone who wants a free and simple way to record calls on their iPhone.
#5 – Aircall Review — The Best Call Center Solution
Aircall is more than just call recording software. It’s a complete cloud-based call center solution made for business teams.
You can set it up in seconds without any hardware, downloads, or headaches associated with traditional phone systems. Best of all, every Aircall plan comes with call recording capability.
If you just need a way to record calls on your existing phone system, Aircall probably won’t be a viable option. This software is designed for businesses that need a completely new phone system. The call recording features are just some of the many perks you’ll get with an Aircall subscription.
Some features of Aircall include:
Automatically record inbound and outbound calls
Customize recording settings at any time
On-demand playbacks
CRM integrations
Clear recording quality
Unlimited calls in the US and Canada
Aircall has additional services for things like call monitoring, call whispering, and call analytics. These advanced features are not available on the entry-level plan.
Pricing starts at $30 per month per user, and you can try it for free for seven days.
#6 – Kixie PowerCall Review — The Best Chrome Extension For Call Recording
Kixie PowerCall is another all-in-one business phone solution. It’s a top choice for remote teams looking for a simple way to manage calls.
This robust Chrome extension can be installed in seconds on Mac, Windows, and Chromebook devices. All Kixie PowerCall plans come with call recording capabilities.
As a Chrome browser extension, it’s easy for agents to make and receive calls from anywhere. Recordings can be managed with a single click, and the software is ready to use out of the box.
Since Kixie PowerCall is an all-in-one phone system, you’ll also benefit from features like:
Single-click voicemail drop
Local presence phone numbers
Click-to-call dialing
Live call coaching
Call reporting insights
Like some of the other software on our list, Kixie PowerCall is better for teams that need a complete business phone solution. If you just want basic call recording features on your existing phone service, you’ll find other options more suitable for your needs.
You get 300 free minutes when you try Kixie PowerCall free for seven days.
#7 – Ooma Office Pro Review — The Best Price for the Total Package
A lot of the best call recording options available come as part of wider business phone solutions. When it comes to getting voice and video with all the features you’d need—including call recording—you can’t beat Ooma Office Pro.
I usually save the pricing information for towards the end of these reviews, but here it’s lede: Ooma Office Pro is just $24.95/user per month.
That sort of pricing for the feature set you get usually requires you to have 20 or more users. Ooma offers just one flat price, which makes it great for teams of any size to update their calling capabilities.
Here’s just a sampling of that feature set:
Virtual receptionist
Virtual extensions
Multi-device ring and ring groups
SMS messaging included
Desktop calling app
Voicemail transcription
Call logs
Call parking
Plus, call recording is adaptable for automatic and on-demand recording. And they’re all stored in your call logs automatically.
Keep in mind, you’ll need to sign up for Ooma Office Pro, as the standard Ooma Office plan does not come with recording features.
If you need a more customizability and analytical capability in the form of a full UCaaS solution, you can step up to Ooma Enterprise for just a few bucks more—$27.99/user per month.
Ooma also offers device flexibility—their mobile app allows you to call from anywhere, but they also sell equipment like traditional desk phones and base stations.
For customer service, sales, or even the legal and medical fields, Ooma Office Pro is a modern business phone solution that will give you the call recording features you need for compliance and improvement.
#8 – Nextiva Review — The Best Call Recording for Massive Organizations
In a large company, a lot of different people need to use call recording for a lot of different reasons. And Nextiva is the business calling solution built to handle the strain.
Think of a huge customer service team—dozens of people need to touch the software, from the reps recording their calls to the customer service and HR managers who will use them to run quality assurance, employee evaluations, and training.
Multiply that by the number departments in your office, then again by the number of offices in your organization…
You can see how call recording frequency and storage needs add up quickly.
With the Enterprise and Ultimate plans of Nextiva One (their voice and video service), you get unlimited recording of both calls and video conferences. Plus, both plans accommodate an unlimited number of users, so everyone can utilize the recording features and access (if you grant it) saved recordings.
Plus, you unlock advanced features of Nextiva’s overall calling service, like advanced voice call analytics, and custom productivity reporting.
When you think about it, it all comes together nicely. Call recording for anything from training to stakeholder meetings can be used in tandem with the analytics, reporting, and Nextiva’s built-in team messaging and collaboration tools to spur improvement everywhere in your organization. And at scale.
What seals the deal for Nextiva is the price point for large teams. The Enterprise plan—which includes everything I’ve described above—is $31.95/user per month for 100 or more users.
That’s a better value and feature set for teams that large than just about anybody else out there.
#9 – RingCentral Review — The Best Archiving and Storage for Recordings
Whether you’re using recordings for training, posterity, note-taking, or anything else, what good are they if you can’t access and store them easily?
If you choose RingCentral Office for your team messaging, video conferencing, and phone system, you get generous call recording limits and an excellent dashboard for managing them.
You get the full suite of communication tools, plus features like:
Call whisper and barge
Hot desking
Real-time call analytics
Open API
Single sign-on
Dozens of integrations
RingCentral allows storage of 100,000 call recordings per account, kept for up to 90 days. That’s a nice allowance without even getting into their tool for organizing and storing recordings.
That would be the RingCentral Archiver, a clean, easy-to-use dashboard for viewing and accessing all call recordings in your organization.
In it, you can see recordings, voicemails, and SMS messages all at once, see the numbers they came from, and when they were made or received.
You can easily connect the Archiver to Dropbox, Smarsh, or Google Drive, allowing you to easily sync and backup recordings on your cloud storage. That way you can save any recordings that may be about to hit the 90-day expiration date.
Automatic call recording and the Archiver only come on RingCentral’s Premium and Ultimate plans. You can utilize on-demand call recording on the Standard plan, but you won’t have many options for accessing, storing, or downloading them.
RingCentral Premium is the best plan for most businesses wanting voice, video, messaging, recording, and easy archiving. Pricing for that package scales based on the number of users:
What I Looked at to Find the Best Call Recording Software
There are certain factors that I looked for while narrowing down the top recommendations on my list. You can use this methodology as well when shopping around comparing different tools side-by-side. Consider this as your buying guide for call recording software.
Use Cases
Why are you seeking a call recording solution?
The answer to this question will help narrow down your options. Some tools are better for sales and marketing, while others are better for training, management, monitoring, and quality assurance.
There are smartphone apps for call recording for personal use and full-scale business phone solutions with built-in call recording features.
The type of calls you’re recording will impact your decision as well. Some solutions only support traditional calls, while others support WhatsApp call recording, Skype call recording, and other third-party platforms.
On-Demand vs. Automatic Recording
Do you want every inbound and outbound call to be recorded automatically? Or would you prefer to control if and when a recording starts and stops?
The ability to choose between on-demand and automated recording is definitely something to keep in mind as you’re shopping around.
For large-scale business use, automatic recording will probably be your best option. It’s one less step your staff has to think about during a call. But for personal use, you probably don’t need to record every single call you make or receive.
Live Monitoring and Call Evaluation
Live monitoring is a crucial tool for call centers. In addition to recording the call, this feature allows managers or admins to listen in on calls in real-time.
Overall, this is a proactive way to improve quality assurance.
Some software takes QA one step further by providing call evaluation metrics. There are tools out there that can use recordings for sentiment analysis, conversion insights, and more to provide advanced scoring grades for each call.
Security and Compliance
Security needs to be a top priority for conversations that include sensitive information. Examples include credit card information, medical information, personal details, and more.
Certain businesses must follow industry-wide regulations to ensure compliance. Make sure the software you’re considering meets all necessary regulations, even if it’s something as simple as notifying the caller about the recording and giving them the option to opt-out.
Storage
Another factor to consider is to assess the way recorded calls are stored and accessed from platform to platform.
What type of storage restrictions does each plan have? How easy is it to access, organize, and listen to those recordings at a later time?
For example, let’s say you’re dealing with a customer dispute. A customer claims that they never gave your staff permission to charge their credit card over the phone. Can you quickly locate that recorded call to find out what happened?
The best call recording storage systems are searchable and well-organized.
Conclusion
Call recording software comes in different shapes and sizes. The best option for you will depend on your unique wants and needs.
I’ve made suggestions in my reviews of the top products:
RingCentral — Best archiving and storage for recordings
Consider a smartphone app or standalone call recording tool for simple call recordings. More advanced call recording software will come with features for screen recordings, call monitoring, and customer insights. Choose an all-in-one business phone system to get features that go above and beyond just call recording.
Regardless of your call recording needs, you can find what you’re looking for using my recommendations listed in this guide.
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– The world’s first and only blood test to use pregnant mom’s blood to detect fetal diseases like sickle cell disease and cystic fibrosis (www.unityscreen.com)
– The only prenatal test in the US for detecting fetal Rh blood type incompatibility (affects 15% of births)
– The first FDA Emergency Use Authorized COVID-19 test to run on high-throughput Sanger instruments (https://billiontoone.com/covid-19/)
In the coming years, we will also launch a cell-free DNA test for cancer detection and monitoring.
We’re looking to hire a few engineers to help us with a number of projects that are used by patients, physicians, and internal staff.
Our HQ is in Menlo Park, but engineering is fully remote (US based). Tech stack: Python/Django, PostgreSQL, React, etc.
Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.
There’s a constant war between growing a business and keeping an operation lean, mean, and agile.
How does a company stay efficient, even as they are trying new things and bringing on employees?
It’s actually quite simple: business process management (BPM) software. Rarely are answers this easy.
BPM software helps organizations of all sizes streamline operations and minimize waste.
Visualize every process from end to end. Find opportunities for efficiency and automation. Get more done with fewer mistakes.
If optimizing your business processes sounds like a good idea, this post will tell you everything you need to know about how to find the perfect BPM software for you.
The Top 5 Options for Business Process Management Software
How to Choose the Best Business Process Management Software for You
These tools are supposed to make life easier, right?
Yes. 100 percent.
And not just you, but your employees, customers, and potential clients, too.
Any organization can benefit from implementing BPM software. Because of their broad usefulness, these products come in a lot of shapes and sizes.
Thankfully, you can break your search down into three essential goals.
You are looking for BPM software that will help you:
Clearly visualize business processes
Automate more business processes
Monitor and improve business processes
Design. Run. Automate. Improve. Repeat.
Once you get set up, it will be that simple.
Figure out which features you need by considering each product in light of how it will help you visualize, automate, and monitor the daily work of your business.
Process Visualization
The first responsibility of BPM software is to help companies define and document their business processes.
These platforms have a visual workflow builder that lets you map out every step of every process from start to finish.
Missing steps and redundancies are plain as day. If there’s a breakdown in the billing process, for example, it will be easy to understand and address with BPM software. There’s a clear picture of how the paperwork is moving (or not) from start to finish.
This is way better than finding out there’s an issue from a confused or angry customer. By providing a full, end-to-end visualization of the process, BPM software is really helpful for diagnosing and treating common symptoms of business inefficiency.
What’s really nice is that you can quickly modify workflows without writing code.
Check out the drag-and-drop workflow builder in Orchestly, where you can see how each stage and transition can be easily defined:
Each product does it a little differently. It’s a good idea to watch their videos to see what the UI is like. This will give you a base-level sense of how each BPM software thinks about process management.
If you are a fan of the flow chart style, Orchestly is going to work well. Tallyfy wants to get away from flow charts and works off what they call a blueprint. Pipefy is designed to work best in board-based and Kanban settings.
Which one looks like it’s swimming in your current?
Process Automation
As elegant and useful as the visualization aspects of BPM software are, the process automation is where you’re going to see the major impact on your operations.
With workflows represented in a clear fashion, you can identify different points and transitions where you can add automation.
In the Pipefy workflow builder, for example, you can make it so one action triggers another. There’s no code to write, just select the option that pushes the workflow along.
This can take an incredible amount of busywork out of people’s day-to-day. A sales rep completes their proposal and it’s automatically routed to the right manager for review and approval.
Not only is that rep moving on to their next task, the pending approval is queued up exactly where it needs to be for the manager.
Nothing gets missed or held up.
BPM software is great at automating routine and recurring processes like:
Requests for approval
Inventory updates
Time-off requests
Promotions
Customer onboarding
Training new hires
There’s really no limit to the applications. You can implement uniform policies, keep everyone informed, and ensure that every last lowercase j is dotted.
With regards to automation, you want to choose BPM software that strikes an appropriate balance in your workspace. Something sophisticated enough to handle the job that is still within your IT wheelhouse.
The big edge that the code-heavy platforms have is that they can be 100% customized to fit your situation.
The upshot to the no-code platforms is that non-technical users are going to be up and running in no time. They won’t need help to build out and adjust workflows. This kind of independence is really important, and shouldn’t be sacrificed lightly in favor of a more comprehensive tool.
Process Monitoring
What if you never had to send another “Hey, how’s it going?” email?
With BPM software, you can monitor your processes in real-time without ever having to bug someone again. No one does.
Users see exactly where they are on all their tasks. Dates and deadlines are clear, and everything they need to do is laid out in front of them.
Supervisors have total visibility of all projects and jobs. With workflows feeding information into dashboards, managers have a clear view of KPIs and bottlenecks can be seen—and avoided—well in advance.
Leadership can leverage your BPM platform to track tons of useful data for measuring productivity, forecasting costs, and further refining processes.
Another nice feature of good BPM software are the collaborative tools that help teams stay on track.
These aren’t monitoring tools per se, but the ability to comment, @mention, or flag tasks may serve as a critical early warning system.
The Different Types of Business Process Management Software
BPM Software can do a whole lot on its own or it can act as a guide.The type of BPM software you need depends on your goals—visualization, monitoring, and automation—and how complex your desired workflows are.
In some ways, you can think of these four different types of BPM software as a stack that grows increasingly robust:
Let’s go in-depth on each type to build a firm sense of how these capabilities help companies respond to different challenges.
Business Process Modeling Software
When you see business process modeling software, think of it as a BPM solution that helps with the visualization side of process management.
These tools produce clear documentation, SOPs, and visual representations of workflows that can easily be shared throughout the company.
This is crucial for maintaining consistency of business operations and a boon to new hires who can understand exactly where they fit in.
Workflow Management Software
The next step up in functionality is workflow management software. With this type of BPM software, individuals and teams can interact with the workflows.
They can mark assignments as done, ask questions about specific tasks, and get all the information they need in one centralized location.
Workflow management solutions have a blend of visualization and monitoring capabilities that are really great for keeping everyone on track.
Workflow Automation Software
BPM software that fits in this category will let you automate repetitive tasks within workflows. Set rules that automatically route tasks, files, data to the right person or team.
Say a customer fills out a form, for instance. This could trigger a welcome email series and automatically route their contact info to the appropriate rep.
That’s a simple example, and you can set rules that automate as many steps as you like throughout the customer lifecycle.
These tools tend to connect to a variety of data sources and work well across the organization. Often they come with pre-built workflows and templates for HR, accounting, sales, and so on.
Scope out the solutions on the vendor website to see examples of who’s having success with each product. Are these markets and use-cases that apply to your business?
In terms of automation capabilities, the simpler, lighter workflow automation tools can do a lot. The more expensive premium tools can do a lot more.
I know that’s an oversimplification, but in the end, the “power” of BPM software lies in how well a team can use it. The heavyweight automation features included with premium products are amazing, no doubt, but they take some time to master.
Low-Code Application Development
Low-code application development platforms weren’t built for BPM, but they are growing in popularity as a solution.
Low-code application development platforms allow novice developers the ability to whip up custom applications that meet unique business needs. Really, anyone who puts the time in can figure out how to use these intuitive platforms with little to no coding.
Why is this important for BPM?.
The thing is, at a certain point, super-complex workflows can get unmanageable. There’s no one straw that breaks the camel’s back, but if your average user is having to reach out to IT to sort out problems with their daily work, there’s probably an issue.
Low-code application development comes at the problem from a different angle. Instead of deploying a system and trying to fit it to your needs, why not build a system that’s specific to your organization?
These tools connect with third-party SaaS apps, so you can build out really rich workflows that leverage information from the tools you already use.
It’s a different approach to the same problem as traditional BPM software. If your teams are comfortable with a low-code solution, I’d go for it. They’re really affordable and have few hard limits in terms of what you can do.
#1 – Orchestly — Best for Simple Workflow Automation
Orchestly is built to optimize your everyday business processes.
Say you want to hire a new worker, file an expense report, or request new content. Maybe the marketing department wants a killer post about the best business process management software.
In each case, there are several steps of validation and review that need to be baked into each process. With Orchestly’s visual workflow editor, literally anyone can build out the exact steps required.
Here’s an example of an onboarding workflow in Orchestly.
Each step in the series of tasks is clearly defined in a series of stages (white boxes), connected by transitions (turquoise boxes), and parallel transitions (orange boxes). Drill down into each stage to the set of conditions that need to be followed before, during, and after any transition.
This is a super easy interface to master.
There are tons of pre-built templates and, once users want to fine-tune their own scenarios, all of the visualization and basic automation is managed with an intuitive drag-and-drop editor.
Another really nice thing about Orchestly are the monitoring features. There are a host of ready-made report types that give you deep insight into your processes.
You can drill down into transitions to discover how many requests are at a particular stage, the ratio of approvals to rejections, and other metrics. Plus, you can filter search results to get a real time picture of specific employees, projects, or customers.
Orchestly comes with other features that help you extend BPM functionality throughout your organization:
Role-based access control
Request manager
Form designer
Audit log
Email templates
APIs, extensions, and webhooks
Orchestly offers a free version that is limited to five users and three orchestrations (their word for workflow). The paid version, Orchestly Business, is $7/month per user with an annual subscription.
You can try Orchestly Business free for 15 days. If you have never given BPM software a shot, this is a great, low-risk option to start out.
#2 – Pipefy — Best BPM Software for Kanban
Pipefy is winning over a lot of people because of its approachable style. For companies that are already managing processes within a Kanban framework, Pipefy is going to fit like a missing puzzle piece.
This platform has the feel and flexibility of an agile project management tool, yet you’ve got the power of BPM software.
Switch between calendar, list, and Kanban views. Yes it looks like Trello, but in Pipefy you can use the drag-and-drop editor to add rules, custom fields, and ensure that everyone assigned to the process knows exactly what’s necessary to keep things moving.
Build out completely custom workflows with Pipefy’s easy editor. There are hundreds of plug-and-play process templates available in its free gallery.
What’s really helpful for marketing and sales is that you can design these workflows to kick off as soon as someone fills out a form, or reaches out by phone, email or SMS.
They’ve really made it as easy as possible for people to configure their workflows without writing a line of code.
Intuitive doesn’t even begin to describe how helpful Pipefy is for first-time users. It’s always suggesting the next step.
Plus, your customers and clients can create and track requests without being a Pipefy user, which is great for collaboration with clients and other stakeholders.
Other helpful features include:
Reporting dashboards
Native integration with Slack and GitHub
API access
Self-service portals and forms
SLA and deadline tracking
Pipefy offers a free trial of their paid plans and a free version for up to five people. To really take advantage of this awesome tool, I recommend one of the paid plans:
Business: $18/month per user
Enterprise: $30/month per user
Unlimited: contact sales
If you like the idea of moving cards through a pipeline, this is a great product. You can start small and gradually automate every one of your processes with Pipefy.
Easy to build, easy to adjust, Pipefy is perfect for the continuously improving agile workflow. If your teams are happy running Kanban, look no further than Pipefy.
#3 – Creatio Studio — Best Low-Code Solution
Creatio Studio gives you the best of both worlds in terms of power and learning curve. Non-technical users will find the platform just about as easy to use as any popular BPM software, but there’s no ceiling to what they can do if they are willing to learn.
The free version of Creatio Studio works for business process modeling, allowing teams to diagram workflows in a collaborative setting. View, comment, and edit the designs in real time, and save everything to a process library for easy access.
To manage, monitor, and automate processes, you’ll need the Creatio Studio Enterprise. With it, you can design workflows and business applications of any complexity.
Think of building with blocks rather than writing code. Creatio compares it to building with LEGO—you don’t have to make the parts so much as select what you want and snap it together.
There are hundreds of ready-to-use templates in the Creatio marketplace to help you get started. As you design and refine processes within the visual design builder, Creatio automatically generates the corresponding business logic.
It’s a great product that straddles the divide between technical and non-technical users. Creatio is constantly suggesting actions and helping users double-check their work.
In addition to helping people design exactly what they need, Creatio Studio comes with:
Role-based access control
Interactive dashboards
API access
No-code data migration
One-click pdf documentation
AI and machine learning tools
Creatio Studio is free for an unlimited number of users and Creatio Studio Enterprise starts at $25/month per user.
Shortlist the free version of Creatio if you are just starting to think about business process management. It will help you get off on the right foot at no cost.
If, on the other hand, you are hitting the limits of your current BPM software, Creatio Studio Enterprise is one of the most capable, affordable options available.
Although many low-code platforms are built for general use, Creatio was originally founded as bpm’online in 2011. Every aspect of the design has BPM in mind, which lowers the learning curve tremendously for non-IT users.
#4 – Tallyfy — Best for Automating Recurring Processes
Tallyfy gets away from the idea of flowcharts. Instead of shapes and arrows to guide your design process, Tallyfy keeps everything in something they call a blueprint.
There are pre-made blueprints you can use for marketing, finance, sales, HR, and more. Once you have designed a blueprint, you can use it over and over again.
In the example below, you can see a blueprint that captures the entire onboarding journey.
Blueprints are easy to customize without code. Point and click to add new tasks to blueprints. Within tasks, you can set required fields and add drop down menus that will pull the names of employees, customers, and projects from connected databases.
When you go to launch these blueprints, end-users love how easy it is to complete each task.
Managers can view progress at a glance or drill down into specific tasks. Clients who need to approve a request or sign off at a particular step will just see that.
Working off blueprints, it’s incredibly easy to set up and automate recurring processes. Quickly create a library of blueprints that suit your needs, and continuously improve each step. Turn all of your recurring processes into error-free workflows that save time and eliminate stress.
After launching your automated processes, Tallyfy’s process monitoring capabilities help you keep track of all your flows in real time. Some of the highlights include:
Powerful search and filtering
Custom process views
Role-based access control
Audit trails
Commenting
Issue flagging
Having commenting and issue flagging as separate features is so important for surfacing problems quickly.
How many times does a red alert get buried for a few hours among the constant flow of @mentions and comments? With easy opportunities to flag problems, companies never let an employee, client, or goal fall through the cracks again.
You get two months of Tallyfy free if you sign an annual contract for any of their three pricing tiers:
Tallyfy Docs: starting at $42/month, includes 10 members
Tallyfy Basic: starting at $100/month, includes 8 members
Tallyfy Pro: starting at $100/month, includes 4 members
The way their tiers break down is really easy, though it looks a little unusual at first. Docs lets you create read-only blueprints, Basic lets you launch blueprints as a process, and Pro lets you add automation.
If you need additional users, the added cost increases at each tier, from $4/user with Docs, to $12.50 with Basic, and $25 with Pro.
They offer a free 14-day trial, if you want to see what Tallyfy is all about. I really recommend the blueprint-style BPM software to any business that has repetitive tasks they need to get right every time.
#5 – Zoho Creator — Best for Customizable Workflows
Zoho Creator is a low-code application development platform that can be used to create a wide range of customizable business process workflows.
Unlike Creatio Studio, Zoho Creator wasn’t born as a BPM tool. Think of it as a blank slate with an intuitive toolkit that allows companies to create everything from serverless apps to full-blown, totally specialized ERP software.
The reason companies are finding success with Zoho Creator in the BPM space is that it comes loaded with tools to build out customized workflows.
Between the templates and the drag-and-drop platform, everyone with a few weeks of Zoho Creator under their belt will think they’re a developer.
There’s nothing dazzling about the UI, but it’s easily navigable and you can build out really sophisticated apps to automate your business processes.
Zoho is really great at guiding users through each step, whether they are trying to set up a simple payment process, or design a mobile app for their office.
To really handle the complex tasks, users will have to familiarize themselves with Zoho’s proprietary language, Deluge, which is short for Data Enriched Language for the Universal Grid Environment.
It’s a mouthful to say, but in terms of building out custom scripts quickly, Deluge is a huge step in the right direction.An HR manager with no code experience will be able to automate a recruitment application. A sales rep can build a system to track leads automatically using Deluge.
With other platforms, end-users are at the mercy of their automated workflows and have little ability to make changes to the system. With Zoho, they can keep control and ensure that their workflows are designed according to best practices and current challenges.
For their part, technically gifted users will love Zoho Creator because they can add logic and function to their applications without having to wrestle with conventional tools.
Some of the other features that help you get off the ground quickly include:
50 ready-to-use apps
Schema builder
Developer sandbox
Payment gateway integration
Audit trail
Automated application backup
Pricing is remarkable, considering how powerful the platform is.
Basic: $10/month per user
Premium: $20/month per user
Ultimate: $35/month per user
The Basic tier is quite robust, though you are limited to building 3 apps. You get more apps and greater functionality at the Premium and Ultimate tiers.
You can certainly manage simple workflows with Zoho Creator, but I wouldn’t make this your first pick for that reason. It’s just too powerful to justify using when you have Orchestly and Pipefy available.
Choose Zoho Creator if lighter tools aren’t meeting your BPM needs.
Summary
There is no reason to fly blind. Get immediate insight and oversight of all your business processes with an appropriate BPM solution.
If you are just starting out, I really recommend Orchestly for and Tallyfy.
If you have simple automation and workflow goals, go with Orchestly and see how far it gets you. For many companies, it’s going to be enough to better manage all of their operations.
Tallyfy is going to knock out repetitive tasks really quickly with the workflow automation tools. Blueprint your processes and then manage them with little oversight.
For agile teams, especially those working within a Kanban or Scrum process framework, I would definitely check out Pipefy. It’s built for agility. Make adjustments on the fly and monitor performance to continually evolve better processes.
Between Creatio Studio and Zoho Creator, the two low-code options on this list of best BPM software, the choice ultimately comes down to what your users like.
Judging from reviews, lots of new users are falling in love with Zoho’s Deluge scripting language. If that’s the case, you may want to consider implementing Creator and other products from Zoho, like their CRM, which also rely on Deluge.
If someone is looking for a more traditional take on highly-customizable BPM software, I’d point you to Creatio Studio.
Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.
Looking to dive right in? My top recommendations for webinar software to suit just about every business need are Demio, Livestorm, or EasyWebinar.
With so many people working from home, it’s become even more apparent as to just how important it is to stay connected with your audience.
When you can’t do this in person, how the heck are you supposed to do it?
By hosting webinars, of course!
Just about every business is hosting webinars these days. It’s a fantastic way to engage with prospects and build a ‘face-to-face’ connection without physical contact.
However, hosting webinars, whether live or recorded, can be a lot of work with a few challenges along the way. That’s why it’s essential for you to have the right webinar software on your side.
I’ve put together a list of the top five webinar software out there, and we’re going to cover the in’s and out’s of how to choose the best webinar software for you!
Most of the top webinar software will have very similar characteristics. That is, making your webinar easy to record and share, the video and audio are high-quality, and there is a range of interactive features like live chat or built-in polls.
So, with a plethora of webinar software to choose from that all seem to offer the same things, how are you supposed to choose the best one for your needs?
Well, you need to narrow in on three important factors.
Attendee Capacity
The number of participants you can have in your webinar at one time is going to be a vital factor in your decision-making process. Some webinar software is designed for smaller groups, while others have the capacity to host thousands of attendees at one time.
Maybe you’re not sure how big your webinar will be or how quickly it will grow. In that case, you should consider whether your software provider has a plan that allows you to scale your attendee capacity alongside your business growth.
Furthermore, if you can have thousands of participants at one time, how well does the software function? Is there any latency or known technical issues that arise when everyone is logged in?
The great thing here is that most webinar software providers have tiered pricing based on how many participants you’d like to have in each meeting, so if you find one you really love, you’ll likely be able to make it work.
Accessibility
How easy is it for your participants to join the webinar? Do they have to download an extra app or plugin, or can they launch from their preferred web browser and be immediately joined in?
For some users, the stress of requiring an extra app or program to join a webinar is too overwhelming or complicated. So much so that they may choose to ditch their plans to join your webinar altogether.
With this in mind, it’s important to focus on choosing a webinar software that is easily accessible for your participants. Many options simply launch from a web browser, and this way, your participants are unlikely to find a reason to back out of committing.
Customer Support
Imagine if you’ve put in weeks of hard work to pull off an incredible live webinar, and five minutes before you’re set to begin, the software crashes.
Just the thought of this alone has me feeling sick.
If you plan to hold live events often, it’s imperative you use a webinar software provider that offers 24/7 customer support to get you out of these sticky situations.
Furthermore, technology can be challenging and fickle. Having access to a team of professionals who know the software inside and out at your fingertips at any time of day really should be an important factor when considering which tool to use.
The Different Types of Webinar Software
What we are going to focus on here is what the different types of webinars are and whether your preferred software accommodates your ideal webinar. In essence, there are three basic types of webinars.
Most of the top webinar software will have the capacity to offer all of the below, but it’s certainly something to keep in mind when doing your research and making sure it meets your needs.
Live Webinars
Some would say that live webinars are irreplaceable. Certain chemistry can come out of live public speaking that you don’t get with pre-recorded content.
Live webinars can help establish your brand as a ‘real-life’ person and put a face to your name. They’re interactive, personal, and really, they can be seen as significant events.
In a nutshell, live webinars provide you with the opportunity to connect and build a relationship with your audience in real-time.
Recorded Webinars
Recorded or automated webinars are newer to the world of online marketing, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are better than live webinars. You can record the content, schedule it to go live, and even set it to expire within a specific timeframe.
Recorded webinars are great for maximizing your reach because they’re accessible for more participants whenever it’s most convenient. No longer do you have to worry about finding a time that works for every single person.
Series Webinar
Essentially, a series webinar can be made up of multiple live and/or automated webinars, which are scheduled over multiple dates and times. The content should involve gradual learning for the participants with an incentive to come back for more.
These types of webinars are great for broader or more complex topics with dense information that is more easily digestible over a series of webinars.
Holding a series will really put you out there as the expert in your field. But, naturally, they take a bit more time and effort than the one-off webinars.
#1 – Demio — The Best For Live Events
Demio is the cream of the crop when it comes to modern, user-friendly webinar software that is bound to help your business grow. It’s suited to almost any size business that wants to hold interactive live events to drive their marketing campaigns.
One of the best bits? There is no download required! Not only will your attendees have access to a beautiful platform that clearly reflects your branding, but they’ll also be able to join from any browser with just one click.
So, what makes them the best for live events? Here are a few of their top features:
Run interactive polls and get stats in real-time
Embed launch offers and CTAs designed to convert sales on the spot
Share handouts for instant download with your attendees
Give attendees video and microphone permissions as needed
Public and private chat functions for live Q&A
In a nutshell, Demio is so interactive it’s bound to leave your audience feeling like they truly know you!
Another great thing about Demio is that you can record your webinar and send it to all registered participants so no one misses out if they can’t make it, even if they do miss the chemistry of a live event.
Demio offers three pricing plans:
Starter: $34/month for up to 50 attendees
Growth: $69/month for up to 150 attendees
Business Plan: $163/month for up to 500 attendees
Demio offers a 14-day free trial of their Growth plan, so you can give it a try before you buy.
#2 Livestorm — The Best For Ease of Use & Automation
If you’re looking for webinar software that allows you to run live, on-demand, or automated webinars with just about any goal in mind, Livestorm could be the one for you.
If you want to hold a live event or detailed product demo, you can do that. If you want to build an educational customer training series or an online course, you can do that, too.
Livestorm is a simple yet powerful video communication tool. They really stand out for their ease of use and detailed automation.
You don’t need to be tech-savvy to use this software. You can have a webinar up and running in no time, thanks to automation features like an event registration page, promotional emails, and automatic custom event reminder emails.
Some other great features of Livestorm include:
Join the webinar in any browser with one click
Full suite of webinar types such as live, on-demand, and pre-recorded
Screensharing capabilities
Interactive live chat, polls, and Q&A within the webinar
Excellent analytics and reporting capabilities
Another great feature? Livestorm also offers comprehensive customer support in multiple languages.
In addition, they also have a very useful self-service documentation section of their website. I love this offering because they’re incredibly handy when you’re facing a minor set-up issue or pesky technical difficulty that you know you could solve alone without needing to explain yourself at length to tech support.
Livestorm plan options include:
Basic: Free for up to 10 live attendees
Premium: $99/month for up to 100 live attendees
Enterprise: Personalized quote based on your requirements
#3 EasyWebinar — The Best For Beginners & Social Media
The EasyWebinar motto is ‘wildly easy to use live and automated webinar platform,’ and by all accounts, they seem to hit the nail on the head. They are also reportedly one of the only webinar platforms that have successfully integrated marketing strategy with webinar technology.
This software is for anyone wanting to launch their first seminar quickly and painlessly with a drag and drop page builder and tons of seamless integrations at your fingertips.
The highlight of this software? EasyWebinar allows hosts to livestream to Facebook and YouTube at the same time.
Why is this so impressive?
Well, it essentially gives you uncapped potential regarding how many people your content can reach at one time. Of course, those viewing through Facebook or YouTube won’t get the platform’s built-in interactive capabilities, but your message could still be reaching thousands more people.
Other notable features of EasyWebinar are:
Seamless integration with popular platforms such as WordPress and MailChimp
In-depth engagement tracking tools covering webinar watch time and in-platform clicks
Browser-based viewing
Turn live events into evergreen webinar funnels
Allows four presenters in one room, all with sharing capabilities
Although EasyWebinar is not the cheapest webinar software on the market, this platform certainly packs a punch. There are three pricing plans on offer:
Standard: $78/month for up to 100 room attendees
Pro: $129/month for up to 500 room attendees
Enterprise: $499/month for up to 2000 room attendees
You can try both the Standard and Pro plan for free or schedule a demo of the Enterprise plan.
#4 – WebinarNinja — Best For High-Quality Training or Coaching
WebinarNinja is a close contender of Demio in terms of their modern, beautiful design, and flexible webinar capabilities. They are also slightly more cost-effective for smaller groups than Demio.
WebinarNinja is trusted by well-known B2B brands such as Baremetrics, AppSumo, and Podia, which essentially supports their ranking as the best for high-quality training or coaching purposes.
You can run any type of webinar with WebinarNinja: live, automated, series, or hybrid. The key features that come into play with the coaching or training aspect are uploading PowerPoint presentations, creating Q&A spaces, and easily sharing information.
Some other notable features of WebinarNinja are:
Tons of integrations with notable systems such as MailChimp, ConvertKit, HubSpot, Squarespace, and ClickFunnels
Beautiful ready-to-use templates for quick and simple webinar creation
Save marketing materials within the software for easy access
Create custom branded registration and thank you pages designed to convert
Furthermore, WebinarNinja reportedly has some of the best customer support out there. This support is extended via live chat, email, and a comprehensive resource library for set-up guidance and minor troubleshooting.
WebinarNinja has four pricing plans available:
Starter: $39/month for up to 100 attendees
Pro: $79/month for up to 300 attendees
Plus: $129/month for up to 500 attendees
Power: $199/month for up to 1000 attendees
Every membership comes with a 14-day free trial, so you can pay nothing and get started today!
#5 – WebinarJam — Best For Large Businesses
With the ability to host up to 5,000 attendees at one time with little to no delays, WebinarJam is easily one of the best out there for large businesses.
A really great highlight of WebinarJam is that, although it’s designed for huge audiences, you don’t have to skimp out on some of the awesome interactive features that software for smaller groups has on offer.
My favorite interactive feature is the advanced live chat within the webinar that actually pulls the person’s video to the stage, so to speak. You can also include offer pop-ups and countdowns to encourage attendees to take action.
These features are almost more important for a larger business than small ones, to remove that ‘faceless large business’ barrier some may perceive.
Some other features that WebinarJam has to offer includes:
Top-notch 24/7 customer support
Email and SMS reminder notifications
Create paid webinars and accept payment directly through the software
Stream directly to YouTube for further participant reach
Compatibility with multiple browsers and systems
The key selling point of WebinarJam? It automatically records your content every single time.
Why is this so nifty? I don’t know about you, but forgetting to hit that pesky record button is a frequent pastime of mine.
There are three pricing plans on offer:
Basic: $499/year for up to 500 attendees
Professional: $699/year for up to 2,000 attendees
Enterprise: $999/year for up to 5,000 attendees
WebinarJam are so confident you’ll love their software that they offer a 30-day money-back guarantee, so your purchase is risk-free. At the time of writing, they also have a $1 14-day trial for a limited time only.
Summary
My top recommendations for webinar software to suit just about everyone’s needs are Demio, Livestorm, or EasyWebinar.
At the end of the day, the best webinar software for you is potentially going to be different from the best for me. That’s why it’s important to use the methodology discussed here to do your due diligence in choosing the best webinar software for your business needs.
Don’t forget to also take advantage of free trials and money-back guarantees to get a real feel for how your chosen software works before you commit long-term.
Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.
You’re making a lot of calls, but leads aren’t converting and agents are losing track of conversations.
These are just two of the reasons that any business looking to grow should get auto dialer software. It automates thousands of repetitive manual tasks—not just dialing—and optimizes the experience of everyone involved.
That way, agents can focus totally on customers.
Managers get real-time KPIs at a glance.
And customers never get another 2 a.m. phone call.
What I’m saying is: everyone loves these products.
Here are the top six auto dialer software options on the market. They’re helping companies revolutionize outreach and connecting agents with a higher number of high-quality leads every hour.
How to Choose the Best Auto Dialer Software for You
Auto dialers call a list of numbers from a preset contact list. As soon as a call is answered, the auto dialer plays a pre-recorded message or transfers the call to an agent.
Sounds simple.
And it is, until you start thinking about multiple agents calling 70 to 80 numbers every hour.
This is why popular auto dialers come with additional tools to help agents manage contact lists, store information, and push trackable leads through the pipeline.
Here are the main features you are going to be looking at as you assess your choices.
Auto Dialer Modes
Most vendors offer multiple dialing modes and several offer the full range.
Preview Dialers call a number as soon as an agent is ready. Information about the contact is automatically displayed on the agent’s screen.
Progressive Dialers call one number at a time in a specific order. Progressive dialers will hang up or leave a message after a predetermined period of time, automatically calling the next number on the list.
Power Dialers call more than one number at a time and keep calling based on a call-to-agent ratio. You can configure the ratio so that the dialer increases or decreases call volume based on the number of agents available.
Predictive Dialers make calls based on algorithms that minimize the chance of someone answering when no agent is available. Essentially, they throttle the call volume according to predicted agent availability.
There’s a time and a place for each mode. Progressive dialers, for instance, prevent agents from cherry-picking leads.
You’ll also see smart or intelligent progressive dialers. These always call one number at a time, but the contact list is actively prioritized based on real-time customer data.
So, for example, if a customer fills out a form online, an intelligent progressive dialer will bump their contact info to the front of the list, putting the next available agent in touch.
In-Call Features
Onboarding new agents is a lot easier with in-call supervisor features like:
Listen: managers can hear the call
Whisper: managers can speak to the agent without the customer hearing
Barge: managers can join the call
It can be hard to understand the value of these features if you’ve never used them before. That’s okay. You can still make a good decision about what’s important by putting yourself in the customer’s shoes.
Warm transfer is an in-call feature that customers love. Basically, it allows an agent to stay on the line with a customer while they’re being transferred to another agent.
It’s super simple to relay information during a warm transfer because all three people are on the line and there’s no risk of a caller getting routed to nowhere.
That way, no customer has to waste time repeating information to the next person they speak to.
Workflow Automation
How much time does it take to wait four rings and leave a message? Too long, especially if this happens hundreds of times a day.
With live answer detection, agents are only connected with real people. That saves an incredible amount of time.
If there is no answer, an auto dialer with voicemail drop places a pre-recorded message in the inbox and begins dialing a new number.
That’s hundreds of hours a year, right there.
Within the agent dashboard, you can kick off pre-built workflows with the click of a button. Initiate an email welcome campaign, send a secure bill, or use voice broadcast to send a recorded message to thousands of numbers at the same time.
So many time-consuming tasks are now simple dashboard buttons that initiate highly-trackable workflows.
Click. The agent is on to the next call.
Call Recording and Reporting
Auto dialer software is going to come with its own CRM, integrations with popular CRMs, or both.
What it’s going to do is connect all recorded calls with specific customers, automating all of the traditional storage and filing tasks.
If you are already using CRM software you love, find an auto dialer that integrates easily. If not, auto dialer software that comes with a built-in CRM or lead management system is going to work much better for you out of box.
Compliance
The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and other regulations have put legal limits on what telemarketers can do. In fact, robocall lawsuits can result in five-figure damages for a single call.
In order to meet all legal and privacy obligations, you want auto dialer software that works behind the scenes to ensure that you are only calling the right numbers and keeping every conversation securely stored for future reference.
The good news is that the best auto dialer software helps the companies who use it from getting in hot water.
All of the products on this list, for example, have tools to make sure you aren’t calling numbers on the national Do Not Call list (DNC).
Be conscious of compliance, but don’t stress too much. By picking auto dialer software from the top vendors, you know you are getting a product that has kept many other businesses safe.
The Different Types of Auto Dialer Software
There are two distinct service categories that include auto dialer software. These are:
Sales Engagement Platforms
Contact Center Software
Just by looking at the names of these categories, you may have a good idea of the type of auto dialer software you need.
Sales Engagement Platforms
Auto dialer software is one part of a campaign. Sales engagement platforms give you the other tools necessary to conduct effective outreach at scale. Typically, these are outbound dialing platforms, though some come with inbound functionality.
It can be surprising how many other marketing and sales tools are included, even with basic-tier subscriptions.
You may get an email autoresponder, lead generation tools, and the ability to route calls to other channels like text or chat.
Between vendors, there’s a lot of variation in dialing modes, in-call capabilities, and workflow automation. You are looking for something that’s affordable at scale and provides your agents the support they need.
The questions you should be asking are:
How does this platform fit into your company’s sales cadence?
Does it have the tools your agents need to assist customers and track them from one stage to the next?
You may find a sales engagement platform that works well for a non-sales auto dialing campaign—fundraising comes to mind, or leaving pre-recorded messages for doctor’s appointments.
Contact Center Software
Contact center software used to be called “call center software”, but modern customers make contact via phone, text, social, chat, and so on. It is set up to handle inbound, outbound, or blended contact centers that handle communication in both directions.
The auto dialer software that comes with contact center solutions is nearly identical to what you get with a sales engagement platform. The major difference is that you are going to have a lot more inbound call functionality.
If your campaign strategy relies heavily on inbound communication, contact center software may better complement your auto dialer than a sales engagement platform.
Contact center software is also much better at centralizing all company communications in a single place. This can be important in preventing information silos.
If you are not worried about inbound calls and you already have a tool that centralizes communication at your company, a sales engagement platform is all you need for auto dialer software.
If you need more than that, a contact center solution will best fit your needs.
#1 – Phoneburner — Best For Remote Teams
Phoneburner, as a company, has been a 100% remote team since 2008. They know what life is like for a distributed workforce and they’ve designed a sales engagement platform that rises to the occasion.
New leads are automatically routed to the right agent by LeadStream, Phoneburner’s intelligent lead distribution system.
It’s easy to use and customizable, so you can configure the system to distribute leads according to your business processes.
This is a huge time-saver and a really important feature for teams where a manager isn’t just a few desks away.
One of the things I really like is how easy it is for colleagues to share content like phone scripts and email templates. They can also share button configurations, instantly setting up new agents with one-click workflows built to fit best practices.
Even though it’s enterprise-grade software, you can have Phoneburner working minutes after purchase.
The robust sales engagement platform provides everything you need, including:
Power and preview dialer
Local caller ID
Voicemail Drop
Trackable emails
Native CRM
150+ integrations
SMS support (available as an add-on)
Pricing for Phoneburner is not complicated. An annual subscription costs $1,512, which breaks down to $126 per user/month. It’s a 15% discount off their monthly price of $149 per user.
It’s a higher sticker price than some, but that’s all you pay.
It offers truly unlimited dialing and there are no extra monthly costs—no setup fees, usage fees, or per-minute charges.
Administrator accounts are free unless they use the auto dialer. They get advanced reporting features like leaderboards, real-time dashboards, and smart lead distribution via a dedicated portal.
One last thing: Phoneburner gives you as many seats as you need during your free trial. That’s not typical and says a lot about how confident they are in their service.
#2 – VanillaSoft — Best For Outbound Sales
VanillaSoft is a cloud-based sales engagement platform with business-class VoIP. Get started with nothing more than an internet connection and watch your sales team make better connections.
They have preview and progresssive dialing modes, both of which pull data automatically from your CRM and make calls based on lead-scoring and prioritization.
All the legwork is behind the scenes. Agents are always talking to the highest-quality leads.
On top of that, logical branch scripting ensures that every agent delivers consistent, on-brand information to customers. You can build out script libraries that present the agent with guidance and tips for every stage of the conversation.
I really like the foolproof calendar that lets people from any timezone schedule calls and set appointments without any accidental overlap. Never double-book a demo again.
You can use the built-in lead and sales tracking software in VanillaSoft or integrate with your CRM. Either way, the reporting and analytics are there to help you optimize performance.
Quickly identify which agents are converting leads and which need a little more help.
Some of the other aspects of VanillaSoft that attract sales teams are:
In-call supervisor features
Voicemail drop
SMS texting and email marketing
Local Caller ID
Skill-based call routing
Salesforce integration
You’ve got everything you need to get sales reps up to speed quickly. Once they’re comfortable, there are more than enough tools to help them visualize and improve their performance.
VanillaSoft pricing is broken down into their base platform and add-on products:
Sales Engagement Platform: $100/month for first user, $80 per additional user
Dialing: $30/month per user
Recording: $30/month per user
VoIP: $33/month per user
Discounts are available with an annual subscription and you can use VanillaSoft with your existing phone lines or VoIP provider.
This is one of the most recommended products on the market.
Why? All of the features are easy to use and it’s flexible enough to work for inside sales, telemarketing, fundraising, and more.
There’s no free forever version, but VanillaSoft offers a two-week free trial for up to six users and 2,000 calls.
#3 – Voicent Cloud — Best Standalone Auto Dialer Software
Voicent is auto dialer software that can be molded to fit your situation.
Here’s their offer: Get one of the best standalone auto dialers on the planet for less than $20/month per user. Then, add the specific services you need à la carte.
With Voicent, you select the exact set of tools that meet your particular needs. No more shopping around and trying to fit yourself into a prepackaged plan.
Features like marketing automation are reasonably priced add-ons in Voicent instead of being confined to an expensive premium subscription that’s bloated with tools you won’t use.
If you just need the auto dialer software, rest assured that Voicent’s base plan has you covered. You get all four dialer modes (progressive, power, predictive, and preview), as well as:
Native CRM and integrations
Campaign builder
Rich agent dashboard
Ability to play audio files while talking
Calling over SIP, IP PBX, and analog phone lines.
DNC compliance tools
All of that and more is included with the Base Plan, which starts at $19/month per user with an annual subscription.
Paying month-to-month, it’s $29 per user.
In addition to the subscription fee cost, Voicent has usage fees, which are charged per minute based on your calling plan:
4¢ Plan: no credit, pay as you go
3¢ Plan: starting at $75, with 2,500 minute credit
2¢ Plan: starting at $130 with 6,500 minute credit
1.5¢ Plan: starting at $375 with 25,000 minute credit
With a yearly Base plan rate of $228, Voicent is extremely affordable, but be sure to budget the usage fees into the total monthly cost.
Voicent Cloud only supports calls in the US and Canada, though they offer on-premise software that allows for global outreach.
Voicent is a great solution for companies that need really solid auto dialer capabilities, but don’t want a full contact center or sales engagement platform.
#4 – Mojo — Best For SMB Sales
Mojo is a sales engagement platform that operates on a copper-wire infrastructure.
Agents call into the Mojo platform from a landline or mobile and it begins dialing their list. From a browser or mobile device, they get the crisp sound of old school telephones.
Mojo makes up to 85 calls per hour with a single line power dialer, or up 300 with a triple line power dialer. Both single and multi line dialers are used by a single agent.
Give a small team titanic reach with Mojo.
The built-in lead management and marketing tools make it easy to track every call, follow up, and stay organized. Navigable dashboards provide a clear view of KPIs and prospecting lists, while preview mode provides extensive customer information before every call.
Mojo helps growing businesses make the most of every answered call. Agents can leave notes, schedule follow-ups, initiate drip campaigns, and more, all from within the platform.
Some of the other great features include:
Voicemail drop
Roving dialer (share licenses between team members)
Live answer detection
Time-zone calling guard
Leaderboard
Mobile caller ID
Monthly pricing for individual users is $99 for a single line dialer and $149 for a triple line dialer.
I like it for small businesses because there are no hidden costs, no contracts, and no per-minute fees.
For teams, Mojo pricing works as follows:
Lead Manager: $10/month, plus you must purchase one of the following dialer options
Single Line Dialer: $89/month per license
Triple Line Dialer: $139/month per license
Mojo has especially well-developed lead generation and tracking tools for realtors, who make up the majority of Mojo’s clientele.
Judging from recent reviews, however, it seems like a diverse range of businesses are taking advantage of Mojo’s outbound dialing solutions.
Agents can access the Mojo platform with VoIP, but it may not deliver the same copper-wire clarity as a phone source.
#5 – RingCentral — Best For Compliance
RingCentral can support every channel of communication, providing companies with a full-service contact center solution.
They offer one of the most feature-rich autodialers on the market, with progressive, predictive, and preview dialing modes.
They also offer TCPA Safe Dial, which allows companies to call unsubscribed cell numbers without risking legal troubles. Additionally, you can scrub campaign lists against your own DNC list or use RingCentral’s integrations with compliance solutions from DNC.com and Gryphon Networks.
The dashboard is user-friendly, letting agents quickly configure appropriate settings based on specific calls. Seamless integrations with top CRM software and compliance tools ensure that agents are only using the powerful auto dialer to reach valid customers at the right time.
Since this is complete call center software, RingCentral has a host of call routing features that outbound-only autodialers lack, such as real call back numbers, 24/7 reachability, and IVR.
Other great features that come with RingCentral include:
In-call coaching capabilities
Real time reports and analytics
Live answer detection
Voice broadcast
Intelligent call routing
Time-zone conscious technology
Despite offering omnichannel support, RingCentral Contact Center has competitively priced plans that compare with lighter auto dialers and sale engagement platforms:
Essentials: starting at $19.99/month per user
Standard: starting at $24.99/month per user
Premium: starting at $34.99/month per user
Ultimate: starting at $49.99/month per user
All plans include unlimited calling and text in the US and Canada, as well a larger number of toll-free minutes at each tier. Additional minutes are billed at 3.9¢ per minute.
RingCentral is a great choice for organizations that want powerful autodialing capabilities and the ability to centralize all of their communications within a single hub. Scale quickly without losing oversight or getting into regulatory trouble.
#6 – Kixie — Best For Local Presence
Kixie is a cloud-based sales engagement platform with phenomenal auto dialer capabilities.
Deploy Kixie in minutes and teams can begin making secure calls anywhere in the world via the Chrome extension or mobile app.
No matter where your customers are, they are going to see you calling from a local number. Several options on this list have a local caller ID, which is super helpful, but Kixie’s AI-powered local presence takes it a few steps further.
First of all, they never spoof numbers. When a customer receives a call from a local number, they can call that number back and connect to the right agent.
Kixie also automatically removes numbers that get flagged as spam, taking that time-consuming chore off your plate.
The end result is that Kixie’s intelligent local presence has delivered users upwards of a 500% increase in connection rates.
Kixie also helps you connect with leads faster with its AI auto dialer. As soon as a new lead shows interest, Kixie bumps their name to the front of the list and puts an agent in touch right away.
Agents don’t have to change the way they work to take advantage of all these automated features. Integrate directly with tools like Pipedrive to enable click-to-call from within the sales management tools you already use.
Some of the other time-saving and sales-boosting tools included with Kixie are:
In-call coaching features
Voicemail drop
IVR
Sales leaderboards
One-click integration with Salesforce, Zoho, Hubspot, and more
Real-time reporting
Kixie offers quarterly subscriptions or annual subscriptions at a 15% discount. Pricing is broken down into three tiers.
For annual subscriptions, you’re looking at:
Integrated: starting at $29/month per user
Enterprise: starting at $55/month per user
Custom: contact Kixie sales to create a plan
Calls minutes are billed according to the current rates and vary per country. You can add unlimited calling in the US and Canada for $30/month per user.
The additional cost of local presence will depend on how many different area codes you need and whether you want to include international numbers.
Kixie’s customer support has a consistent reputation for solving problems quickly, which has translated into a constantly improving product over the long-term.
Kixie offers a seven-day free trial for Integrated and Enterprise plans, as well as extended trials for Custom plans.
Summary
Good auto dialer software can save a sales team hours each week and potentially weeks each year.
RingCentral is going to take care of any communication problem you have, providing best-in-breed service in any channel. When it comes to auto dialer software, they offer a robust product that has multiple safeguards to prevent any problems with compliance.
VanillaSoft is going to be great for outbound sales teams. High agent turnover isn’t an issue because it’s so easy to bring people up to speed and the in-call coaching capabilities are really strong.
With Phoneburner, remote teams are completely set up. The lead distribution system routes calls to the right agents without oversight. Agents can quickly and easily transfer calls and share information within the platform, making coordination easy in the distributed workplace.
For smaller teams, Mojo can supercharge outreach with a few triple-line dialers. Combine that power with reasonable pricing and zero per-minute fees, and you have an auto dialer solution that’s perfect for SMBs.
If you are interested in really leveraging the power of local presence, Kixie is the tool you want, though it’s a really great auto dialer no matter how you cut it.
And if what you are looking for, in the end, is a standalone autodialer, Voicent is the choice for you. It’s a powerful product, and you can add other features one by one without worrying about having to jump up into a new pricing tier.
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