Freshsales与Close CRM对比：哪款CRM最适合自动化？

Deciding between Freshsales and Close CRM boils down to one key question: which CRM genuinely saves time through automation instead of adding to 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 streamline actions via the API.

为何自动化对2026年的客户关系管理至关重要

In today's landscape, automation has become the foundation of effective revenue teams. Sales and marketing professionals are tasked with managing a higher volume of leads, navigating multiple channels, and addressing increasingly complex buying journeys—all without expanding their teams or compromising on personalization. A CRM that continues to depend on manual data entry, sporadic follow-ups, and outdated reporting mechanisms can silently drain time, energy, and focus away from meaningful customer interactions.

Here are the main reasons automation has become indispensable:

• Buyers expect swift, relevant responses through email, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, and phone calls.
• Pipelines operate quickly, and any missed follow-up can lead to lost revenue.
• The volume of data has surged, making manual updates both impractical and unreliable.
• Leadership requires real-time insights into performance, rather than relying on end-of-month estimates.

The effectiveness of a CRM lies in its ability to alleviate the workload for the team rather than simply storing data fields. The superior platform is the one that automatically captures activities, maintains clean records in the background, and prompts the appropriate next steps at just the right moment, enabling sales representatives to concentrate on fostering relationships and closing deals instead of managing the tool.

What is Freshsales?

Freshsales is Freshworks’ user-friendly sales CRM tailored for small and mid-sized teams seeking robust automation. Users can seamlessly connect their Gmail or Microsoft 365 accounts, opting for one-way or two-way sync to ensure consistent communication between their mailbox and the CRM. Coupled with templates, bulk emailing, and activity timelines, email becomes an integral tool for reps managing leads and opportunities.

什么是Close CRM？

Close CRM is a sales platform designed for high-velocity inside sales teams, featuring integrated calling, SMS, and email. With its built-in two-way email sync, reps can send, receive, and monitor messages directly within Close, linking every conversation to the appropriate contact and opportunity. The platform’s bulk emailing, sequences, and performance reporting features transform email from a standalone inbox into a coordinated outreach channel.

Feature comparison of Freshsales and Close CRM

集成能力

Freshsales provides seamless Gmail and Outlook plugins that display email threads, scheduling tools, and relevant contact information right within your inbox. Once connected, Freshsales automatically scans incoming emails for recognized contact addresses, logging conversations to minimize clutter while allowing you to select which folders to sync.

Close simplifies email integration: just connect your Gmail or Outlook account, authenticate via OAuth, and every message from a matched contact instantly appears in Close’s timeline. Although Close doesn’t natively sync calendar events, you can easily connect meetings back to the CRM using Zapier or Google Calendar integration, ensuring your schedule is in sync with your sales pipeline.

同步频率与可靠性

Freshsales seamlessly connects to your Gmail or Outlook account through native plugins, ensuring a constant link that syncs your email and calendar events in real time. Incoming messages from known leads appear within seconds, while outgoing emails logged from the CRM are instantly reflected in your email thread. Calendar events are also updated immediately, guaranteeing that meetings scheduled in Freshsales are promptly displayed in your personal calendar without any delays.

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

双向电子邮件和日历同步

Freshsales features a comprehensive Marketing Campaigns module—simply go to Campaigns > Email to launch email blasts or automated journeys based on user behaviors. With its drag-and-drop templates, dynamic segments, and analytics dashboards, you can easily track delivery rates, opens, clicks, and unsubscribes. The built-in retry logic and ISP throttling enhance deliverability. However, keep in mind that more advanced functionalities, such as heat-map click analysis and AI-driven send-time optimization, require an upgrade to Freshmarketer.

Close offers seamless two-way email integration using IMAP/SMTP: after authenticating your Gmail, Google Apps, or Microsoft account, Close automatically logs every sent and received email, linking conversations to the appropriate contact without the need for manual BCCs. Although Close does not natively sync calendar events, its “Emailing” setup indicates that it allows you to sync both your work email and calendar.

邮件合并与营销活动

Freshsales features a comprehensive Marketing Campaigns module—simply go to Campaigns > Email to set up blasts or automated Journeys based on user behaviors. With drag-and-drop templates, dynamic segments, and analytics dashboards that track delivery rates, opens, clicks, and unsubscribes, you have everything you need at your fingertips. Additionally, built-in retry logic and ISP throttling enhance deliverability. However, be aware that more advanced features, such as heat-map click analysis and AI-driven send-time optimization, require an upgrade to Freshmarketer.

Close may not provide a traditional mail merge interface, but it 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 with templates, and let Close automatically send steps at your preferred cadence, while meticulously logging every interaction in its unified Inbox. Despite these capabilities, 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.

打开和点击追踪

Freshsales allows you to enable “Track opens and clicks” in Settings > Email Settings, ensuring that every email sent through the native plugin logs open events and link clicks in the contact timeline. You'll find delivery, open, and click metrics displayed in both the Deal dashboard and the Campaigns module. Keep in mind that open tracking relies on image-based pixels; if a recipient blocks images or views links in preview panes, the statistics may be underreported.

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

收件箱内CRM体验

Freshsales offers native Gmail and Outlook plugins that embed your CRM sidebar directly within your inbox, displaying lead profiles, deal values, and previous email threads as you write or read messages. You can log emails, schedule meetings, and start sequences effortlessly, all with a one-click sync back to Freshsales. The plugin also integrates calendar events into the same view, providing a seamless combination of messages and appointments. However, if you prefer a different email client, you will need to use IMAP sync instead of enjoying the full plugin experience.

On the other hand, Close lacks a native sidebar for Gmail or Outlook, but you can utilize the Missive integration to manage contacts, leads, and opportunities directly from your inbox. Emails sent or received in your mail client automatically appear in Close’s unified activity stream without the need for manual BCCs, maintaining context. You'll still have to switch tabs to access pipeline overviews or dashboards, meaning it’s not a complete in-inbox CRM—merely a well-synced companion.

folk CRM：自动化领域的最佳客户关系管理解决方案

folk CRM is a cutting-edge, AI-driven CRM designed for teams eager to streamline their deal automation without the hassle. It brings together all relationships—leads, clients, partners, candidates, and investors—into adaptable views that fit any workflow.

folk caters to automation-focused teams. With built-in email and calendar synchronization, teams can efficiently automate follow-ups and outreach on a large scale. The new conditional email automations allow you to send emails triggered by real-time data in folk; for instance, onboarding or handoff emails can be sent automatically when a contact becomes a client or a deal is marked as signed.

Fueled by AI, folk enhances data, crafts icebreakers, composes personalized emails, and recommends the next best actions. Its open API and webhooks easily integrate with platforms like Zapier and Make, facilitating advanced workflows across email, WhatsApp, Slack, billing, and internal systems.

With one-click contact capture through the folkX Chrome extension and collaborative pipelines, folk provides teams with a lightweight yet robust CRM to scale their automation efforts while maintaining complete control.

结论

In conclusion, Freshsales excels in user-friendly email integration and robust automation for small to mid-sized teams, while Close CRM offers powerful email sequencing and integrated communication tools for high-velocity sales teams. However, folk stands out as the superior choice for teams prioritizing seamless email integration, advanced automation, and customizable workflows. Its AI-powered features and adaptable views make it ideal for managing complex outreach efforts and scaling automation without losing control. Experience folk CRM for free.

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