Pipedrive vs Zoho CRM: quale CRM è il migliore per l'automazione?

Deciding between Pipedrive and Zoho CRM ultimately hinges on one critical question: which CRM truly optimizes time through automation rather than burdening you with extra administrative tasks?

For teams that value simplicity, folk provides one of the most efficient and powerful automation solutions available in any CRM, enabling users to automate emails based on their defined conditions and utilize the API for action automation.

Why Automation Is Essential for CRM in 2026

In today's landscape, automation has become fundamental for modern revenue teams. Sales and marketing departments are expected to manage a growing number of leads, diverse channels, and intricate buying journeys without increasing headcount or compromising on personalization. A CRM that still depends on manual data entry, sporadic follow-ups, and outdated spreadsheet reporting gradually siphons time, energy, and focus away from genuine conversations with customers.

Here are the main reasons why automation is now indispensable:

• Buyers anticipate prompt, relevant responses across email, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, and calls.
• Pipelines move swiftly, and any overlooked follow-up can result in lost revenue.
• The explosion of data makes manual updates impractical and unreliable.
• Leadership requires real-time performance visibility instead of relying on end-of-month extrapolations.

The true value of a CRM lies in its ability to alleviate the team's workload, not merely in the number of data fields it can accommodate. The most effective platform is the one that automatically tracks activities, maintains clean records behind the scenes, and prompts the appropriate next steps at the right times, allowing representatives to concentrate on fostering relationships and closing deals rather than managing the tool itself.

Cos'è Pipedrive?

Pipedrive is a sales-oriented CRM designed around a visual pipeline that enables sales representatives to monitor deals from initial contact to closing. Its email synchronization feature connects seamlessly with Gmail, Outlook, and other IMAP providers, automatically logging every message to the appropriate contact and deal. With a built-in sales inbox, tracking capabilities, and basic campaign management, teams can centralize their outreach and pipeline updates without the hassle of multiple tools.

What is Zoho CRM?

Zoho CRM is a versatile, all-encompassing CRM perfect for businesses seeking extensive customization and an integrated suite of applications. It offers email integration with Zoho Mail, Gmail, Outlook, and other IMAP services, allowing teams to send, receive, and store messages directly within the CRM. Featuring shared inbox views, basic tracking, and automation, Zoho CRM incorporates email activities into a broader omnichannel engagement strategy.

Feature comparison of Pipedrive and Zoho CRM

Integration Capabilities

Pipedrive seamlessly syncs with Gmail and Outlook (with IMAP support for other email providers), ensuring every inbound and outbound message is accurately logged against the appropriate contact or deal record. With the Smart Email BCC option, you can log messages directly from your email client by simply adding the dynamic BCC address, allowing Pipedrive to handle the rest. Additionally, native calendar integration with Google and Microsoft calendars ensures that all your meetings automatically populate on contact timelines, providing a comprehensive view of all customer interactions.

Zoho’s Email Insights add-on enables direct syncing with Gmail, Outlook, or any IMAP provider, automatically logging messages and attachments to the corresponding records. You have the flexibility to select which folders to sync, filtering out irrelevant threads while capturing every email that drives opportunities. Furthermore, Zoho Calendar offers two-way syncing with Google, Office 365, or iCal, ensuring that meeting invites and updates are reflected in both your personal calendar and the CRM timeline.

Sync Frequency and Reliability

Pipedrive’s email sync with Gmail and Outlook operates every few minutes, striking a balance between immediacy and system performance. Outbound and inbound messages are captured and matched to contacts or deals in under five minutes, ensuring that you rarely face missing or delayed logs. The IMAP fallback adheres to standard IMAP IDLE protocols for push notifications, providing near-instant updates for compatible providers.

Meanwhile, Zoho’s Email Insights add-on establishes a live connection to your mail provider through IMAP IDLE or OAuth, enabling messages to sync in near real-time. Expect emails to show up in the CRM timeline within seconds of receipt, complete with attachments and metadata. Additionally, two-way calendar sync occurs instantly for Google Calendar, Office 365, and iCal, while Zoho’s retry logic effectively handles any intermittent failures.

Two-Way Email and Calendar Sync

With Advanced plans and above, Pipedrive’s Group Emailing allows you to select up to 100 contacts from any list to send bulk messages featuring merge tags and reply tracking. Additionally, the Pipedrive Campaigns add-on offers a dedicated module for creating email journeys, segmenting audiences, and analyzing open and click rates. All replies are automatically linked back to the corresponding deal or contact. However, it's important to note that the Campaigns add-on comes with an additional cost, and its reporting capabilities are more limited compared to standalone email marketing platforms.

Zoho CRM enables email synchronization through POP/IMAP or OAuth for Outlook, Gmail, and any IMAP provider. Once set up in Settings > Channels > Email, both inbound and outbound messages are automatically attached to the related lead or contact record.

Mail Merge and Campaigns

With Advanced plans and higher, Pipedrive’s Group Emailing allows you to select up to 100 contacts from any list to send bulk messages that include merge tags and reply tracking. The Pipedrive Campaigns add-on offers a dedicated module for crafting email journeys, segmenting audiences, and analyzing open and click rates, ensuring that all replies are automatically linked to the correct deal or contact. However, it's important to note that the Campaigns add-on comes with an additional cost, and its reporting capabilities are more limited than those of standalone email-marketing platforms.

On the other hand, Zoho CRM's Mass Email tool enables users to send up to 1,000 emails daily, utilizing customizable templates and merge tags for personalization. For larger campaigns, Zoho Campaigns integrates smoothly, providing advanced segmentation, a drag-and-drop design interface, and analytics on delivery, opens, clicks, and unsubscribes. However, since Zoho Campaigns is a distinct product, managing billing and user permissions across two systems may introduce some administrative complexity.

Open and Click Tracking

Pipedrive offers “Track email opening” and “Track link opening” toggles that allow you to capture opens and clicks for every sent message, complete with counts and timestamps available in the Mail tab. You can easily toggle tracking on or off for each email and view exactly who clicked which link directly in the deal view. However, keep in mind that Pipedrive’s reporting is limited to basic open and click rates, lacking built-in funnel visualization or heat-map insights unless you export the data to a BI tool.

On the other hand, Zoho CRM’s basic Email Insights automatically track opens when you send emails through Gmail or Outlook connectors, with link-click tracking available via the ZeptoMail integration for comprehensive click-through data. Without ZeptoMail, CRM users can only see open rates; accessing full click analytics requires the separate transactional email product, which involves additional costs and configuration steps.

In-Inbox CRM Experience

Pipedrive’s Gmail Add-on seamlessly integrates a side panel into your inbox, allowing you to access contact and deal information, update stages, and add new activities—all without leaving Gmail. With instant access to Smart Email BCC, templates, and tracking toggles, you can create new leads or deals with just a click, effectively transforming your mailbox into a Pipedrive cockpit. However, this in-inbox functionality is limited to Chrome or Edge, as there's no comparable add-on for desktop Outlook.

Similarly, Zoho’s eWidget appears as a sidebar in Zoho Mail, Gmail, or Outlook, enabling you to add leads, view contact details, and log emails without stepping outside your mailbox. You can see deal stages, tasks, and meeting notes inline, and with a click, you can send predefined templates or create new records. Nonetheless, the sidebar is restricted to these specific mail clients—if you use Thunderbird or another service, you’ll miss out on this convenient in-inbox feature.

folk CRM: The Best CRM for Automations

folk CRM is a modern, AI-native CRM designed for teams eager to simplify their deal automation process. It consolidates all relationships—leads, clients, partners, candidates, and investors—into adaptable views that cater to any workflow.

folk is tailored for automation-first teams. With seamless email and calendar synchronization, teams can efficiently automate follow-ups and outreach at scale. The newly introduced conditional email automations allow you to trigger emails based on real-time data within folk—for instance, automatically sending onboarding or handoff emails when a contact transitions into a client or when a deal is marked as signed.

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

With one-click contact capture via the folkX Chrome extension and collaborative pipelines, folk provides teams with a lightweight yet robust CRM for scaling automation with complete control.

Conclusione

In conclusion, while Pipedrive excels in visual pipeline management and reliable email syncing for sales-focused teams, and Zoho CRM offers extensive customization and integrated applications for broader needs, folk stands out as the ideal solution for teams prioritizing email integration, automation, and sequencing. With its AI-driven features, seamless workflows, and robust automation capabilities, folk empowers teams to optimize their outreach and collaboration effortlessly. For those ready to enhance their CRM experience, folk is the best choice. Try folk CRM for free

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