What we know
Tools we've used properly, not just watched a demo of.
Anyone can list logos. Here's the same list with an honest opinion attached to each one, because knowing when not to use something is the useful part.
CRM
Salesforce
Salesforce can model almost any business, which is exactly why so many orgs end up with something nobody can explain. The platform is rarely the problem. The decisions made in year one usually are.
What it's good at
- Complex sales processes with real approval, territory and permission rules
- Reporting that stands up when finance starts asking awkward questions
- An enormous ecosystem, so someone has usually solved your edge case
- Scaling to large teams without falling over
Where it gets awkward
- Cost climbs quickly once you add seats, sandboxes and add-ons
- Validation rules and old automation fight each other silently
- Changes often need a specialist, which slows small improvements down
- Legacy customisation makes even simple work feel risky
Our experience with it
We tend to meet Salesforce as the system everything else has to talk to. Our job is usually to get data in and out cleanly, simplify what's grown wild, and stop teams keeping a spreadsheet on the side because the CRM is too painful.
Things we've built or connected
Integrations that push clean data into Salesforce instead of duplicate contacts
Reporting pulled out into somewhere non-technical people can actually read it
Tidy-ups of automation nobody had touched in years
Usually in the same conversation