Sales management is constantly changing, and selecting the right Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool is crucial for optimising business operations and driving growth. Zendesk Sell has long been a popular choice, but that’s about to change.
On September 9, 2025, Zendesk announced that Zendesk Sell will be retired on August 31, 2027. Customers will continue to have full access to the platform until then, but any further development and investment from Zendesk is winding down, and support will shift toward helping teams transition to an alternative platform.
Many Zendesk Sell alternatives now position themselves as all-in-one CRMs, integrating sales, marketing, and support features into a single platform to streamline business processes and enhance the user experience.
All-in-one CRM solutions are especially beneficial for small businesses’ needs, offering integrated tools that are easy to use and scalable as the company grows.
Why the Change?
Zendesk is narrowing its focus to customer, employee service and CX solutions. By stepping away from the sales CRM market, Zendesk aims to double down on what it does best: innovating with AI and enhancing support and service experiences.
Transition Plan with Pipedrive
To ease the transition, Zendesk has partnered with Pipedrive, a leading sales CRM with a native Zendesk integration. Pipedrive offers migration tools, free trials, and direct support to help teams move their data and workflows over smoothly.
What Customers Should Do Now
Explore Pipedrive or evaluate other CRM platforms.
Export Zendesk Sell data (Leads, Contacts, Deals, Notes, Tasks, Smart lists, etc.). Note: Activity logs, like call history and documents, cannot be exported.
Reach out to Zendesk support or your Success Manager if you need assistance.
Data Handling
Data exports are available as CSV files and stay accessible for 30 days after download. After August 31, 2027, any remaining data will be permanently deleted in line with Zendesk’s Service Data Deletion Policy.
Introduction to CRM Software
CRM software streamlines how businesses track sales, manage customer data, and drive revenue growth. It provides sales teams with a single platform to track leads, close deals, and manage routine tasks while fostering genuine customer relationships.
Small businesses use CRM to organise sales and compete with larger companies, while large teams coordinate complex sales processes to ensure nothing is missed.
CRM provides data-driven insights to enhance the customer experience and drive revenue growth. For a more streamlined sales process or enhanced support, start with CRM—it manages tracking, allowing your team to focus on results.
Managing Customer Data
Customer data management is crucial for fostering lasting relationships and achieving tangible business outcomes. CRM software centralises all customer information, enabling sales teams to track interactions, identify deal patterns, and develop more innovative sales strategies.
With custom fields and dashboards tailored by a dedicated account manager, sales reps get precisely what they need to close deals efficiently. This leads to personalised service, faster responses, and data-driven decisions that foster stronger relationships and growth opportunities.
Sales Pipeline Management
Sales pipeline management guides your sales prospects through your sales process to close more deals. CRM software equips your sales team with lead tracking, deal management, and task automation at every stage.
Features like advanced permissions, email tracking, and workflow automation ensure no opportunity is missed. Teams can identify high-quality leads, assign tasks, and track progress with complete visibility. This clarity helps prioritise high-value opportunities and optimise your approach, resulting in increased revenue and more closed deals.
Best Zendesk sell alternatives
Pipedrive
Pipedrive is a CRM designed with simplicity and usability in mind. Its robust deal management features help sales teams organise contacts and streamline the sales pipeline, making it particularly suitable for small to mid-sized businesses looking for an intuitive platform to manage their sales processes.
Key Features
Visual Sales Pipeline: Pipedrive offers a clear, visual representation of the sales process, making it easy to track deals and prioritise tasks. This visual approach helps teams stay organised and focused on progressing leads through the pipeline.
Automation: Automated workflows and task reminders keep the sales process moving efficiently. By automating routine tasks, Pipedrive reduces the administrative burden on sales teams, allowing them to concentrate on selling.
Calendar Sync: Seamless calendar sync allows users to integrate and synchronise their schedules across platforms. This feature provides centralised management of meetings and appointments, making it easier for sales and marketing teams to stay organised and avoid scheduling conflicts.
Mobile Access: A robust mobile app enables sales teams to access crucial information on the go. With mobile access, sales reps can update deals, communicate with clients, and retrieve information from anywhere, enhancing productivity and responsiveness.
Ideal Use Cases
Pipedrive’s straightforward interface and focus on essential sales functionalities make it a solid choice for startups and small businesses. Its user-friendly design ensures quick adoption, even for teams with limited technical expertise.
Pipedrive is particularly beneficial for companies seeking a CRM that emphasises ease of use and minimal setup time.
HubSpot
HubSpot CRM is renowned for its user-friendly interface and comprehensive suite of tools that cater to marketing, sales, and customer service.
Many startups and growing businesses choose HubSpot when they need an all-in-one platform with a free entry point, making it especially attractive for those just getting started or looking to scale efficiently.
Key Features
Free Tier: HubSpot offers a free CRM option with ample features for small businesses. This tier provides access to essential CRM functionalities without the financial commitment, making it an attractive option for budget-conscious organisations.
Marketing Integration: Deep integration with HubSpot’s marketing tools enables seamless cross-departmental collaboration. Sales teams can align their efforts with marketing campaigns, ensuring consistent messaging and maximising lead nurturing efforts.
Full Context: HubSpot provides full context on customer interactions throughout the buying journey, giving teams comprehensive visibility into customer information for more personalised and effective sales and service interactions.
Customer Support: HubSpot provides excellent customer support and resources for onboarding and training. With extensive documentation, tutorials, and a supportive community, businesses can quickly learn to leverage the platform’s capabilities.
Ideal Use Cases
HubSpot is a fantastic option for businesses looking to integrate their sales efforts with marketing campaigns, providing a unified platform for growth.
Its comprehensive suite of tools supports end-to-end customer journey management, from attracting leads to closing deals. HubSpot is particularly beneficial for companies seeking a CRM that bridges the gap between sales and marketing functions.
Salesforce
Salesforce is often regarded as the gold standard in CRM solutions. It’s a versatile platform that offers a wide array of features tailored to different business sizes and industries, and is exceptionally well-equipped to meet the advanced needs of larger or more complex sales teams requiring enterprise-level customisation.
Key Features
Customisability: Salesforce offers robust customisation options, allowing businesses to tailor the platform to their specific needs. This includes custom dashboards, fields, and business processes, enabling companies to create a CRM that genuinely reflects their operations.
Integration: With a vast marketplace of apps and seamless integration capabilities, Salesforce can be connected with most other business tools. This connectivity ensures that all business data is consolidated in one place, providing a comprehensive view of customer interactions.
Activity Tracking: Salesforce offers comprehensive activity tracking features that enable the management of contact and deal activities. This functionality automates task management, logs calls and emails, and boosts team productivity by ensuring all interactions and follow-ups are tracked in one place.
Analytics: Advanced reporting and analytics tools provide deep insights into sales performance and customer behaviour. Salesforce’s AI-driven analytics can predict trends and offer actionable recommendations, empowering businesses to make data-informed decisions.
Ideal Use Cases
Salesforce is ideal for businesses looking for a scalable and highly customisable CRM solution. Its powerful features cater to both small startups and large enterprises, adapting to the complexities of various industries.
However, its complexity can be overwhelming for smaller teams without dedicated IT resources, which may require additional training and support to leverage its capabilities fully.
Dynamics 365
Dynamics 365 by Microsoft is a formidable CRM solution that combines sales, customer service, and enterprise resource planning (ERP) functionalities. It also offers integrated project management features, making it an ideal solution for businesses that require both CRM and project management capabilities in a single platform.
Key Features
AI Capabilities: Advanced AI tools enable the prediction of customer needs and automate routine tasks. These capabilities allow proactive customer engagement and operational efficiencies, reducing manual workload for sales teams.
Microsoft Integration: Seamless integration with Microsoft Office and other Microsoft products enhances productivity. This integration ensures a familiar user experience and streamlined workflows, particularly for businesses already using Microsoft solutions.
Scalability: Dynamics 365 is designed to scale with your business, supporting complex operations and large datasets. As companies grow, Dynamics 365 can adapt, offering customisable modules that cater to evolving needs.
Ideal Use Cases
Dynamics 365 is particularly beneficial for businesses already entrenched in the Microsoft ecosystem, offering a cohesive experience across platforms. Its robust capabilities make it suitable for enterprises requiring a comprehensive CRM that integrates with existing Microsoft tools. Dynamics 365 is especially advantageous for companies with complex operational needs and a large customer base.
Similar to Salesforce, its complexity can be overwhelming for smaller teams without dedicated IT resources, which may require additional training and support to leverage its capabilities fully.
Intercom
Intercom is primarily known for its messaging capabilities, but it also serves as a powerful CRM for sales and customer engagement. Its automation and segmentation features help sales teams focus on the right leads, ensuring that follow-up efforts are directed toward the most promising prospects for improved conversion rates.
Key Features
Conversational Interface: Intercom excels in providing a conversational approach to customer interactions. This interface facilitates real-time communication, fosters stronger relationships, and enhances customer satisfaction.
Customer Segmentation: Advanced segmentation tools help in targeting specific customer groups. By understanding the unique needs of different segments, businesses can tailor their messaging and offers, improving conversion rates.
Automation: Automating repetitive tasks and messages saves time and increases efficiency. Intercom’s automation features ensure consistent follow-ups and engagement, allowing sales teams to focus on more strategic activities.
Ideal Use Cases
Intercom is ideal for businesses focused on enhancing customer communication and engagement through personalised interactions. Its messaging-first approach is particularly beneficial for companies that prioritise customer experience and real-time support. Intercom is well-suited for industries such as SaaS, where ongoing customer engagement is critical.
Apollo.io
Apollo.io is a CRM platform that combines sales engagement with a comprehensive database of leads.
Key Features
Lead Generation: Access to a vast database of potential leads can significantly boost prospecting efforts. With Apollo.io, sales teams can quickly identify and connect with high-quality prospects, thereby shortening the sales cycle.
Sales Automation: Streamlined workflows and automated email sequences enhance sales productivity. Automation ensures that leads are consistently nurtured, reducing the risk of missed opportunities.
Data-Driven Insights: Real-time analytics offer actionable insights into sales performance. By analysing sales data, businesses can optimise their strategies, identify areas for improvement, and drive better outcomes.
Ideal Use Cases
Apollo.io is best suited for businesses looking to enhance their lead generation capabilities and drive data-informed sales strategies.
Its extensive lead database and automation features make it ideal for companies aiming to expand their reach and improve prospect engagement. Apollo.io is particularly advantageous for sales teams focused on outbound efforts and market expansion.
Monday.com
Monday.com is a versatile work operating system that can be customised as a CRM, offering flexibility and ease of use.
Key Features
Custom Workflows: Create custom workflows that fit your team’s unique processes and sales cycles. Monday.com’s flexibility allows businesses to design a CRM that aligns with their specific operational needs.
Collaboration Tools: Enhance team collaboration with shared boards and communication features. These tools facilitate seamless communication and coordination, ensuring that all team members are aligned and informed.
Visual Dashboards: Comprehensive dashboards provide a clear overview of sales activities and progress. Visual representations of data help teams track performance and make informed decisions quickly.
Ideal Use Cases
Monday.com is perfect for teams seeking a flexible and collaborative platform that can be tailored to their specific needs.
Its adaptability makes it suitable for a wide range of industries and team sizes. Monday.com is particularly beneficial for companies looking for a CRM that emphasises teamwork and visual data representation.
Benefits of Using a CRM System
A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is a vital tool that enables businesses to streamline their sales processes, strengthen customer relationships, and increase overall sales productivity.
By centralising and automating key sales and marketing functions, a CRM helps teams work smarter, not harder. Whether you manage a small sales team or scale a large enterprise, leveraging the right CRM system can provide the competitive edge needed to grow revenue and enhance customer satisfaction.
Streamlining Sales Processes
A CRM system helps automate routine tasks such as data entry, follow-up reminders, and lead scoring, which frees up time for sales teams to focus on closing deals and nurturing relationships.
By automating these processes, businesses can enhance their operational efficiency and ensure that no opportunities are overlooked. A well-integrated CRM can synchronise across departments, providing a unified view of customer interactions.
Enhancing Customer Relationships
At the heart of any CRM system is the ability to foster stronger, more personalised relationships with customers. By centralising customer data and interactions, businesses can tailor their communication and service to meet individual customer needs.
This personalisation not only improves customer satisfaction but also builds loyalty, encouraging repeat business and referrals. A CRM can also track customer feedback and preferences, enabling proactive engagement strategies.
Boosting Sales Productivity
With a robust CRM, sales teams have access to valuable insights and analytics that enable better decision-making. These insights can highlight trends, identify high-value customers, and predict future sales opportunities.
By leveraging data, sales teams can prioritise their efforts on the most promising leads, optimise their sales pitches, and ultimately close deals faster. Effective CRM systems also facilitate collaboration among team members, ensuring that everyone is aligned and informed.
Lead Generation and Email Marketing
Lead generation and email marketing fuel real business growth. CRM software enhances both by equipping sales teams to identify high-quality leads, send targeted emails, and effectively track conversations.
AI-powered features handle lead scoring, email tracking, and follow-up automation, ensuring no prospect is overlooked. Integrating your CRM with other tools aligns marketing and sales, resulting in more qualified leads, better email results, and consistent attention from initial contact to closing.
Marketing Sales Alignment
Aligning marketing and sales isn’t just desirable—it has a direct impact on your bottom line. A good CRM provides both teams with a single platform to collaborate, share knowledge, and track every customer conversation. You get precise data, simple dashboards, and deal monitoring that actually tells you what’s working.
This means your teams can talk to customers as if they know them, solve problems more quickly, and make decisions based on real information rather than guesswork. Choose a CRM that brings marketing and sales together, and you’ll see stronger customer relationships, better experiences, and results that matter to your business.
Conclusion
Choosing the right CRM is a strategic decision that can significantly impact your sales performance and business growth. Each of the alternatives to Zendesk Sell discussed here offers distinct advantages, catering to different business needs and objectives.
Whether you prioritise customisation, ease of use, or integration capabilities, there is a CRM solution that will align with your goals.
By carefully evaluating your business requirements and exploring these alternatives, you can make an informed decision that enhances your sales processes and supports your company’s growth journey.
The key is to select a CRM that not only addresses your current challenges but is also equipped to adapt to future developments in your business landscape.
