I am both an Act! Consultant and a Zoho Consultant. Or, as I like to say, I cover CRM software from A (Act!) to Z (Zoho). I am not saying that one product is necessarily better than the other; they are just “different.” My Act! users tend to represent smaller business (1-15 users) while my Zoho users tend to be larger business (15 and up). That’s not to say that a large company of 30 or 40 users couldn’t be happy in Act!, and a single user might be attracted to the functionality of Zoho.
For the most part my Act! users have simple needs; they want be able to add contacts, create notes and schedule appointments; Act! more than fills the bill. Generally speaking, larger companies have more complex needs such as telephony integration or advanced automations that are beyond Act!’s capabilities. Some functionality, such as custom tables or accounting integrations, can be achieved in Act! through the use of add-ons products; however, this leads to a large increase in the price of the software. With Zoho these functionalities are included in the basic price.
MicroCAD, based in Watertown, MA, has worked with Tech Benders since 2004. They loved Act! but they had outgrown it. The primary driver behind MicroCAD’s search for a new solution was a need for a cloud-based solution that could integrate all the different applications they used. MicroCAD used a variety of software for their processes; the software didn’t communicate with each other and required a lot of manual intervention to combine relevant data. We helped them with their Act! to Zoho conversion, insuring that they didn’t lose any of their important data.
MicroCAD switched from Act! to the Zoho One suite, which offers more than 50 applications. Micro CAD chose Zoho One because of its excellent integration capabilities with the third-party applications that they were already using. Ironically, this switch actually saved them money. Today MicroCAD not only uses Zoho CRM, but also Zoho Desk, Zoho Campaigns, Zoho Social, Zoho Workdrive, Zoho Analytics, SalesIQ, Zoho Cliq, Zoho Meetings, Zoho People, and Zoho Forms. Plans are currently underway to transition from QuickBooks to Zoho Books.
You can read the entire case study here.
Not sure if Act! or Zoho is a better fit for your company? Contact the Act! Consultants and Zoho Consultants of Tech Benders!
