Hubspot x Pipedrive: Which AI CRM is the best?

AI has evolved from being merely a feature to becoming the driving force behind smarter pipelines, quicker decisions, and enhanced customer relationships.

Today, CRM platforms compete on how extensively they incorporate AI into each interaction, offering everything from predictive insights to automated workflows.

While Hubspot and Pipedrive both offer intelligent sales assistance, their levels of AI integration, ease of use, and overall business impact differ notably. For teams prioritizing simplicity over complexity and avoiding cluttered dashboards, folk provides robust AI integration that enables timely follow-ups and insightful data extraction from calls and emails, showcasing the most potent application of AI in a CRM.

Why AI Integration Matters?

AI revolutionizes CRMs, transforming them from static databases into proactive sales assistants. Rather than waiting for sales reps to sift through contacts or compose follow-up messages, AI now automates crucial tasks, predicts outcomes, and instantly enriches data.

• Faster decisions. AI identifies which leads to prioritize based on intent signals and deal velocity.
• Smarter outreach. Tools recommend message templates and timing, while also detecting tone and sentiment.
• Cleaner data. Say goodbye to manual entry; AI automatically fills in missing information and flags duplicates or outdated records.
• Sales forecasting. Predictive models enable teams to identify pipeline risks before they arise.
• B2B data enrichment. AI gathers details like company size, job titles, LinkedIn profiles, and contact information to complete lead records swiftly.
• AI-powered sequences. Personalized cold emails are generated and scheduled automatically, tailored to deal stage, persona, or interaction history.

With AI deeply integrated into a CRM, reps can focus more on selling and less on administrative tasks, distinguishing a good CRM from one that truly accelerates revenue!

What is Hubspot?

HubSpot's Breeze AI suite integrates generative copilot tools across Marketing, Sales, and Service Hubs. Breeze Copilot quickly drafts emails, social media posts, and blog content, while Breeze Intelligence enhances predictive lead scoring, forecasting, and data enrichment—all within your CRM. With Agents for Content, Customer, and Social, routine tasks such as note-taking, follow-ups, and report generation are automated. ChatSpot’s conversational interface allows you to query your database in plain English, providing instant insights without any context switching.

What is Pipedrive?

Pipedrive’s AI Sales Assistant resides within your pipeline feed, displaying win-probability scores and next-best-action suggestions, enabling reps to concentrate on the most promising deals. It crafts personalized outreach emails, condenses lengthy email threads into concise summaries, and alerts you when deals begin to stall. You can interact with the Assistant through chat or voice for context-aware answers about your performance, and it recommends useful integrations and features to address any gaps in your tech stack. All insights and reminders are consolidated into a single feed—eliminating guesswork and promoting guided selling.

Feature comparison of Hubspot and Pipedrive

AI Follow-ups

HubSpot Copilot swiftly drafts your follow-up emails by extracting context from recent calls, notes, and CRM records. You’ll receive suggested subject lines, opening hooks, and CTAs directly in your sequence editor—just adjust the tone and hit send. It also schedules your emails for optimal engagement, ensuring you never miss an opportunity. For conditional branching, like “send this if the prospect doesn’t open,” you can utilize Workflow AI Actions or a Zapier integration to implement multi-step logic.

Pipedrive’s AI Sales Assistant keeps an eye on your deal activity and recommends the best times to follow up. After each call or email, it generates a follow-up task with a suggested date and can even propose initial email lines based on past interactions. You can modify the copy or timing before the task is added to your pipeline. For multi-step branching—such as sending one template if the prospect replies and another if they don’t—you can use Pipedrive’s Workflow Automation to manage those scenarios seamlessly.

Automated Contact Enrichment

When a new lead arrives in your inbox, Breeze Intelligence instantly matches it against a database of over 200 million profiles, automatically filling in essential details such as job title, company, phone number, and website—eliminating the need for manual imports. This ensures your lists remain accurate, current, and ready for outreach. For specialized data like technographics or funding rounds, you can seamlessly integrate third-party enrichers like Clearbit from the App Marketplace. It's a hands-free approach to maintaining data hygiene that keeps your sales efforts on track.

Pipedrive’s Smart Contact Data also streamlines the process by auto-filling key fields through the scanning of email signatures and public web records. As soon as you add a new contact, you'll see their company name, website, location, and social profiles appear within seconds—no manual research needed. For more comprehensive firmographic or technographic insights, such as tech stack or funding details, simply integrate a Marketplace enrichment app (like Clearbit or FullContact) to enhance your records in real time.

Smart Fields

Instruct Copilot to “build a 5-step outreach for [your persona],” and it will generate a complete sequence, including subject lines, body copy, and send cadences tailored to the deal stage and engagement history. Within minutes, you’ll have ready-to-send templates that feel personally crafted. Simply drop them into Sales Hub, and let Workflow AI Actions automatically trigger next steps based on opens, clicks, or property changes—achieving full-funnel automation without the hassle of copywriting.

While Pipedrive may not label them “Smart Fields,” its Web Forms and Chatbot Builder allow you to dynamically show or hide questions based on visitor inputs. Known contacts receive shorter forms, whereas new leads are presented only with essential fields. Additionally, you can map responses from forms or chatbots to custom fields in Pipedrive, ensuring that every piece of data is captured seamlessly—merging simple logic with effective data collection.

AI-Powered Message & Sequence Generation

Simply instruct Copilot to “create a 5-step outreach for [your persona],” and it will generate a complete sequence, including subject lines, body copy, and sending schedules, all customized to fit the deal stage and engagement history. In just minutes, you’ll have polished templates ready for sending that sound like your own writing. Upload them to Sales Hub, and let Workflow AI Actions automatically trigger the next steps based on opens, clicks, or changes in property. Experience full-funnel automation without the hassle of copywriting.

When you ask Pipedrive's AI Sales Assistant to draft your outreach, it will produce a cohesive email sequence that aligns with your brand: subject lines, body text, and sending intervals specifically designed for your deal stage. Within minutes, you’ll receive email templates that are ready to use, which can be saved in Pipedrive or integrated into Smart Email BCC for automated delivery. Need follow-up triggers? Just incorporate those steps into your Workflow Automation, and let the system take care of everything else.

Next Best Action

Sales Hub’s AI-Guided Selling evaluates deal health, engagement signals, and historical win patterns to suggest your most impactful next step—be it a call reminder, a personalized content share, or a LinkedIn nudge. These recommendations can be displayed directly in your sales workspace or integrated into your pipelines and workflows. The outcome? Reps always have clear guidance on what to do next, removing guesswork and increasing success rates.

Pipedrive’s AI Sales Assistant assesses your pipeline health, historical win patterns, and engagement signals to highlight the most effective next step—whether it’s making a call, sending a personalized email, or sharing a proposal. These suggestions appear seamlessly in your deal view or as task prompts, and you can even sync them to your calendar or integrate with Zapier, ensuring reps are always informed about their next actions and timing.

folk CRM: The Best AI CRM

folk serves as the sales assistant that every team dreams of having. This intuitive, integrated, and proactive CRM handles the busywork, allowing sales reps to concentrate on cultivating genuine relationships. With a commendable 4.5/5 rating on G2, folk stands out as one of the most trusted AI-powered CRMs tailored for lean teams.

Specifically designed for startups, agencies, and sales teams, folk makes AI accessible and practical instead of overwhelming.

Extract Intel from Calls and Emails

Among Folk's standout features is its AI-driven call transcript analysis, which empowers sales and investment teams to pinpoint key insights from recorded conversations. By integrating with dialers like Ringover and Aircall, as well as call recording tools like Grain for Google Meet, users can seamlessly import transcripts into Folk. From there, they can utilize Magic Fields, a built-in AI function that allows you to set prompts for extracting specific information from transcripts. For instance, sales teams can automatically gather vital details such as contract value, user count, decision-makers, budget, or next steps without the hassle of manual note-taking. Investment teams can extract insights like founder background, fundraising stage, or startup goals. These fields are fully customizable: simply create a prompt, map it to the transcript, and let Folk's AI handle the rest. The outcome is a structured, searchable CRM enriched with valuable data from your calls, streamlining follow-ups, qualification, and reporting.

AI-Powered Follow-Up Reminders

folk's AI Follow-Up feature is crafted to ensure no opportunity is overlooked. Built directly into the platform, this intelligent assistant evaluates your email conversations to determine when a follow-up is necessary. For example, if you posed a question in an email and your lead hasn’t responded, Folk will automatically recognize the lack of reply and remind you to follow up at the appropriate time.

But it goes further; this feature also uncovers leads you may have overlooked or conversations that have cooled down. By reviewing past interactions, Folk aids you in prioritizing the right contacts to re-engage and advance deals. This intelligent, contextual follow-up system saves you time, minimizes manual tracking, and enhances your chances of closing more deals.

AI Features in folk CRM Summary

• Suggested actions: Receive proactive reminders and AI-driven suggestions based on recent activities or deal stages.
• Extract intel from calls: Utilize AI to pull next steps, decision-makers, your leads' budget, and essential information.
• AI-generated messages: Save time with context-aware outreach suggestions customized for each contact.
• Duplicate management: AI identifies duplicates and cleans up messy contact lists to keep your CRM organized.

folk starts at $20 per user per month, accompanied by a 14-day free trial with no credit card required!

Conclusion

Both HubSpot and Pipedrive excel in AI-driven CRM functionalities, with HubSpot emphasizing comprehensive automation and content creation, while Pipedrive focuses on actionable insights and guided selling. However, for teams seeking a straightforward, clutter-free experience, folk provides a remarkable alternative. Offering robust AI integration that automates follow-ups, extracts crucial data from calls, and enhances contact management, folk empowers sales teams to prioritize authentic relationships without the overwhelming complexity of traditional CRMs.

Start your 14-day free trial or book a demo today.