Close CRM vs Monday CRM: quale CRM è il migliore per l'automazione?

When deciding between Close CRM and Monday CRM, the crucial question is: which one truly saves time through automation rather than adding to administrative burdens?

For teams that prioritize simplicity, folk provides one of the most efficient and powerful automation features available in any CRM, enabling users to automate emails based on predefined conditions and to execute actions using the API.

Why Automation Is Essential for CRM in 2026

In today's landscape, automation has become the cornerstone of modern revenue teams. Sales and marketing must manage an increasing number of leads, diverse channels, and intricate buying journeys, all without expanding their teams or compromising on personalization. A CRM that relies on manual data entry, sporadic follow-ups, and outdated spreadsheet reporting saps time, energy, and focus from meaningful customer interactions.

Here are the main reasons why automation is indispensable:

• Buyers demand quick, relevant responses across email, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, and calls.
• Pipelines move swiftly; any overlooked follow-up can lead to lost revenue.
• The surge in data volume makes manual updates both impractical and unreliable.
• Leadership requires real-time insights into performance rather than end-of-month speculation.

The true value of a CRM lies in how much it alleviates the workload for the team, not in the number of fields it can accommodate. The most effective platform automatically captures activities, maintains clean records in the background, and prompts the appropriate next steps at the right moment, allowing reps to concentrate on nurturing relationships and closing deals instead of managing the system.

What is Close CRM?

Close CRM is a powerful sales platform tailored for high-velocity inside sales teams, featuring integrated calling, SMS, and email capabilities. With its two-way email sync, sales representatives can send, receive, and track messages directly within the Close interface, where every conversation is automatically associated with the relevant contact and opportunity. Tools for bulk emailing, sequencing, and performance reporting transform email into a structured outreach channel, moving beyond the limitations of a standard inbox.

What is Monday CRM?

monday sales CRM is built on the versatile monday.com work management platform, providing teams with a visual approach to managing pipelines alongside their projects. The Emails & Activities app seamlessly connects with Gmail and Outlook, allowing users to send, receive, and log emails directly from their boards while tracking opens and replies within the context of their work. With templates and automation features, follow-ups can be standardized, ensuring that lead statuses, tasks, and email histories remain synchronized.

Feature comparison of Close CRM and Monday CRM

Integration Capabilities

Close’s email integration is incredibly straightforward: simply connect your Gmail or Outlook account, authenticate through OAuth, and every message linked to a matched contact automatically populates Close’s timeline. Although Close doesn’t support native calendar event syncing, you can easily bring meetings into the CRM using Zapier or Google Calendar integration, ensuring your schedule is in sync with your sales pipeline.

Monday CRM’s Emails & Activities app allows you to connect up to six Gmail or Outlook accounts for seamless two-way synchronization, enabling both sent and received emails to appear as items on your boards alongside calls and tasks. While it lacks native calendar syncing within the CRM, you can create simple automations or utilize Monday’s Calendar view to visualize your scheduled events.

Sync Frequency and Reliability

Close’s email integration offers instant two-way sync by utilizing OAuth-based connections to both Gmail and Outlook. When a contact emails you, Close logs it immediately—eliminating the need for polling intervals or manual BCCs. Outbound emails sent from Close are reflected in your email provider in real time, and the same applies in reverse. For calendar events, you can integrate Google Calendar via Zapier for automatic updates; however, these triggers activate every few minutes based on your Zapier plan.

On the other hand, Monday CRM’s Emails & Activities app syncs your inbox every few minutes by default, polling Gmail and Outlook for new messages to convert into board items. Although this introduces a slight lag compared to push-based systems, updates typically appear within two to three minutes. If you require quicker updates, you can modify polling intervals or implement custom webhooks for near-instant responsiveness.

Two-Way Email and Calendar Sync

Close doesn’t provide a traditional mail merge interface but allows you to create multi-step drip campaigns through its Workflows engine, integrating email, calls, and SMS into a cohesive sequence. You can enroll leads, customize messages using templates, and let Close automatically dispatch steps at your preferred pace, all while logging every interaction in its unified Inbox. However, Close does not feature a visual campaign builder or in-depth email campaign analytics, meaning you won't have access to open-rate trends or A/B testing insights within the UI.

On the other hand, Monday’s Emails & Activities app offers native two-way email sync for Gmail and Outlook with straightforward integration recipes—new messages and replies automatically transform into pulses on your boards, ensuring your communications are easily trackable alongside deals. Calendar items are synchronized through Monday’s Calendar Sync feature: date or timeline columns align with Google Calendar, Outlook, iCal, or any external calendar, allowing events to appear on both your board and calendar within minutes.

Mail Merge and Campaigns

Close doesn’t provide a conventional mail merge interface but enables you to create multi-step drip campaigns using its Workflows engine, which integrates emails, calls, and SMS into one cohesive sequence. You can enroll leads, customize messages with templates, and allow Close to automatically execute steps at your preferred pace, capturing every interaction in its centralized Inbox. However, Close does not feature a visual campaign builder or comprehensive email campaign analytics, meaning you won't have access to open-rate trends or A/B testing insights within the interface.

On the other hand, Monday CRM’s Emails & Activities app allows synchronization of up to six Gmail or Outlook accounts and includes a Group Emailing action that facilitates sending bulk messages to board items and contact lists. You can automate follow-ups using monday.com automations or integrate with Mailchimp for complete email marketing features. However, remember that without Mailchimp or a similar add-on, you won’t have access to native campaign analytics beyond basic send logs on your boards.

Open and Click Tracking

Close automatically tracks email opens from its unified Inbox, displaying open counts and timestamps beneath each message.

In Monday’s Emails & Activities app, message opens are logged when you send emails directly from the board interface; however, it does not natively track link clicks. To obtain click-through rates, you'll need to embed links with UTM parameters and either pull the data into your board using automations or integrate a marketing tool like Mailchimp.

In-Inbox CRM Experience

While Close doesn’t offer a native sidebar in Gmail or Outlook, you can utilize the Missive integration to manage contacts, leads, and opportunities right from your inbox. Emails sent or received in your mail client appear seamlessly in Close’s unified activity stream, eliminating the need for manual BCCs and maintaining context. However, you'll still need to switch tabs for pipeline overviews or dashboards, making it more of a tightly synced companion than a complete in-inbox CRM.

On the other hand, monday.com’s Emails & Activities app operates directly on your boards rather than within your inbox. By connecting Gmail or Outlook, your emails transform into pulses linked to relevant items, allowing you to reply or add notes directly from monday.com. This setup is perfect for visual teams that organize everything on boards, but it doesn’t provide an in-inbox sidebar—you’ll find yourself working in monday.com rather than your mail client.

folk CRM: The Best CRM for Automations

folk CRM is a modern, AI-native solution designed for teams eager to automate their deals with ease. It centralizes all relationships—leads, clients, partners, candidates, and investors—into adaptable views that cater to any workflow.

folk is tailored for automation-first teams. With native email and calendar synchronization, teams can effortlessly automate follow-ups and outreach on a larger scale. The introduction of conditional email automations allows you to trigger messages based on real-time data in folk; for instance, onboarding or handoff emails can be automatically sent when a contact becomes a client or a deal is marked as signed.

With the power of AI, folk enhances data, generates icebreakers, drafts personalized emails, and recommends the next best actions. Its open API and webhooks facilitate seamless integration with tools like Zapier and Make, allowing for sophisticated workflows across email, WhatsApp, Slack, billing, and internal systems.

Featuring one-click contact capture through the folkX Chrome extension and collaborative pipelines, folk empowers teams with a lightweight yet robust CRM that scales automation while maintaining full control.

Conclusione

In summary, Close CRM excels in integrated communication for high-velocity sales teams, offering robust email capabilities and instant synchronization. Monday CRM provides a visual approach to pipeline management with decent automation features, making it ideal for teams who value project integration. However, for teams focused on email integration, automation, and sequencing, folk stands out as the superior choice. Its AI-driven automation, seamless workflows, and comprehensive tool integration empower teams to scale their outreach effectively. Try folk CRM for free

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