folk vs HubSpot: Which CRM for startups wins?

Early-stage startups rarely lose deals on product. Deals slip because follow-ups scatter across inboxes, spreadsheets, and Slack threads. A CRM for startups fixes one thing: every interaction, next step, and owner stays visible, fast.

In the crowded landscape of customer relationship management, folk and HubSpot emerge as two distinct players with unique offerings tailored for startups. folk prioritizes simplicity and speed, providing a streamlined experience for teams that need to manage relationships without the complexities of traditional CRM systems. HubSpot, on the other hand, delivers a comprehensive suite designed to support every aspect of the go-to-market strategy, boasting advanced automation and marketing capabilities.

This comparison breaks down what changes day-to-day: contact capture, pipeline hygiene, automation depth, reporting clarity, and total cost as the team grows.

Che cos'è il folk?

folk is a CRM designed specifically for startups that seek clean contact data without the burden of administrative tasks. By connecting directly to Gmail and Google Calendar, it ensures every interaction is linked to the appropriate record. Teams can effortlessly organize relationships through flexible views, enrich their contacts, and automate follow-ups with minimal setup. This tool is perfect for early-stage teams that prioritize speed, clarity, and high user adoption. As the team expands, folk scales seamlessly into structured pipelines, dashboards, roles, and API access.

Cos'è HubSpot?

HubSpot is a comprehensive go-to-market platform that integrates CRM, marketing automation, sales tools, and customer service. It caters to startups seeking a single system to manage their funnel from acquisition to retention, featuring robust segmentation and reporting capabilities. The CRM is user-friendly at the outset and evolves into advanced workflows and attribution as requirements grow. Widely adopted across the US, it also integrates seamlessly with most modern SaaS tools. However, costs can escalate quickly when transitioning to multiple hubs and higher tiers.

Feature comparison of folk and HubSpot

Sincronizzazione di e-mail e calendario

With folk, you can connect to Gmail and Outlook effortlessly, capturing both inbound and outbound emails on each contact's timeline automatically. The calendar sync feature supports both Google and Microsoft calendars, ensuring that meetings are linked to the associated email threads. This creates a seamless interaction history that remains updated without the need for manual entry, keeping sales, partnerships, and success teams informed with the latest context. It's an ideal solution for startups that rely heavily on their inboxes and require a CRM that reflects actual activity.

HubSpot integrates with Gmail or Office 365 inboxes via the HubSpot Sales integration, enabling email logging from the inbox and tracking of opens and clicks. Calendar sync is compatible with Google Calendar and Outlook Calendar, allowing meetings created in the calendar to appear on the corresponding record timeline when the invited contact is in the CRM. Additionally, meetings can be scheduled directly from HubSpot and synced to the connected calendar. This results in a unified activity history for emails and meetings, maintained with minimal manual logging.

Pulizia dei dati di contatto con arricchimento e deduplicazione

Folk enhances new contacts by adding valuable company and profile data, ensuring records remain useful as your database expands. Its built-in enrichment minimizes missing fields that can hinder routing, segmentation, and follow-ups. The duplicate handling features include intelligent merge capabilities along with duplicate detection during imports and data entry. Prompts guide users in merging or skipping duplicates before the CRM becomes cluttered, helping to maintain clean lists across various sources and preventing fragmented account context.

HubSpot also offers integrated data enrichment that automatically fills in company and contact information, reducing incomplete records and the need for manual research. Its enrichment and buyer intent features operate on a credits model, utilizing HubSpot Credits for specific premium data functionalities. The duplicate management system flags potential duplicates and facilitates the review and merging of records, keeping your database organized and minimizing fragmented activity histories across multiple contact entries. Cleaner data enhances segmentation, routing, reporting, and the reliability of automation.

Pipeline e viste flessibili

folk enhances collaboration by keeping all discussions within the record, ensuring that context isn't lost in Slack threads or separate documents. Shared pipelines enable teams to effectively coordinate ownership, next steps, and status updates without the risk of duplicating efforts. Calendar-synced meeting events can be displayed as timeline entries, helping everyone stay informed about past activities and upcoming schedules. All relevant conversation history and details are maintained within the same contact record, which minimizes handoff errors—a crucial feature for startups where multiple team members engage with the same account within a short timeframe.

HubSpot facilitates pipelines across various CRM objects, including deals, offering customizable stages and the ability to create multiple pipelines per object when processes vary. These pipelines can be configured in settings to standardize handoffs, define stages, and enhance forecasting. Records remain filterable and reportable across pipelines, providing visibility at scale. This framework is ideal for startups with diverse processes, such as new business development and renewals or sales and onboarding. Additionally, internal pipeline names facilitate consistent integration mapping.

Collaborazione di gruppo

folk centralizes collaboration within each record, ensuring that important context isn’t lost in Slack threads or separate documents. Shared pipelines enable teams to coordinate ownership, next steps, and status updates without duplicating efforts. Meeting events synced from calendars can be displayed as timeline entries, helping everyone stay informed about past discussions and upcoming schedules. The same contact record retains conversation history and essential details, minimizing handoff errors—ideal for startups where multiple team members engage with the same account in a short timeframe.

HubSpot also consolidates collaboration within each record through various activities like notes, tasks, calls, emails, and meetings. Tasks can be created directly within a record as part of an activity workflow, ensuring next steps remain clear and assigned. Mentions in activities or comments notify teammates, facilitating quick handoffs without losing context. Activity association settings determine which linked records share the same activity history, promoting consistent visibility across contacts, companies, deals, and tickets, thus enhancing cross-team alignment as workload increases.

Automazione leggera e integrazioni

folk seamlessly connects to external tools via Zapier and a comprehensive API, allowing workflows to operate across the entire stack without the need for custom administrative overhead. With Zapier triggers and actions, you can push contact and group updates to other systems or create and update records in folk based on external events. This functionality supports typical startup processes, such as lead routing, form syncing, Slack notifications, and list consistency. For more tailored solutions, the API facilitates custom integrations that adhere to your internal guidelines, ensuring that automations remain manageable as your stack evolves.

HubSpot enables automation through workflows that span marketing, sales, and service processes, featuring a visual builder for triggers and actions. The platform also integrates with external tools using Zapier triggers and actions for contacts, companies, deals, and custom objects. For advanced customization, HubSpot offers developer APIs to create bespoke integrations and data synchronization logic. This combination allows for lightweight automations at the outset, gradually progressing to more sophisticated orchestration as your stack grows. Centralized governance is maintained through CRM settings and automation controls.

Conclusione

folk stands out as the ideal CRM for startups, offering simplicity and speed without the administrative burden. It provides seamless email and calendar integration, ensuring all interactions are captured effortlessly, while its robust data enrichment and deduplication features keep contacts organized. In contrast, HubSpot, while comprehensive, may become complex and costly as teams grow. For startups prioritizing agility and clarity, folk delivers the best of both worlds, supporting immediate execution and scalable growth.

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