Pipedrive vs Salesforce Essentials comparison

Pipedrive and Salesforce are both solutions in the CRM category. Pipedrive is ranked #22 with an average rating of 7.8, while Salesforce is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.2. Pipedrive holds a 0.9% mindshare in CRM, compared to Salesforce’s 0.6% mindshare. Additionally, 78% of Pipedrive users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of Salesforce users who would recommend it.

Pipedrive

Read 13 Pipedrive reviews

1,518 Views
1,063 Comparison Views

78% willing to recommend

Salesforce Essentials

Read 14 Salesforce Essentials reviews

842 Views
842 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Pipedrive

Salesforce Essentials

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

Pipedrive and Salesforce Essentials are strong contenders in the CRM market for small to medium businesses. Pipedrive is favored for its pricing and flexibility, while Salesforce Essentials is recognized for its advanced features and robust integration capabilities.

Features: Pipedrive provides valuable customization options, facilitating easy management of sales processes with a user-friendly interface. It supports defining custom data fields, applying automation, and delivering insightful reporting. Salesforce Essentials offers a comprehensive platform with Sales Cloud and Service Cloud, integrating finance and customer support seamlessly while leveraging AI for enhanced customer segmentation and management.

Room for Improvement: Pipedrive could enhance its integration capabilities and offer more comprehensive documentation, particularly for reporting. Its automation, especially in campaign management, could also be improved. Salesforce Essentials users point out a need for better integration with complex ERP systems, improved reporting features, and more flexible licensing options for small teams, along with a UI better suited for non-native English speakers.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Pipedrive offers deployment in Public and Private Cloud environments with generally positive user feedback on its technical support, despite some noted delays. Salesforce Essentials supports On-premises deployments and multiple cloud options, providing solid customer service, though response times can be inconsistent. Both platforms have effective customer engagement, although initial interactions via chatbots may be less satisfactory.

Pricing and ROI: Pipedrive is celebrated for its cost-effectiveness, presenting competitive features at a lower price, ideal for smaller companies. Salesforce Essentials is perceived as more expensive, offering extensive features that may justify the cost for larger teams. However, its pricing model, while reflective of premium features, may deter smaller businesses due to higher costs.

To learn more, read our detailed Pipedrive vs. Salesforce Essentials Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Pipedrive vs. Salesforce Essentials

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Pipedrive

Ranking in CRM

22nd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Local Government CRM (9th), Opportunity Management (4th), Sales Force Automation (10th)

Salesforce Essentials

Ranking in CRM

12th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the CRM category, the mindshare of Pipedrive is 0.9%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Essentials is 0.6%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

CRM Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Salesforce Essentials	0.6%
Pipedrive	0.9%
Other	98.5%

CRM

Featured Reviews

Willem Lambrechts

Managing Director at Drebbel

Offers the ability to create multiple pipelines and the flexibility in filtering and reporting

We do a lot of analytics and reporting ourselves. We don't necessarily use all the features that Pipedrive provides, but it's very helpful at least. It has streamlined our deal-closing process. We use it for everything. When we create a lead, we put it into Pipedrive. That lead can be converted into an opportunity, which we manage through our whole pipeline. This includes having all data related to the opportunity in one place. Once the deal is closed, we use Pipedrive to follow up on the invoices until they are paid. We also manage sales commissions and payments to our salespeople through Pipedrive.

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Attila Aranyos

Head of Commercial Excellence at Sartorius AG

Has provided a reliable service with responsive support and offers valuable features, though pricing could be more affordable

We are a large organization with 14,000 people. As a user, Salesforce Essentials is extremely easy to use. The complete rollout from minimum viable product to final acceptable product took two years for our global deployment. The business operations for our 14,000 people are managed by approximately 10 people on the business side. These business admins are responsible for sales operations, troubleshooting, training, and driving features and requirements from the sales and marketing organizations. Additionally, we work with product owners on the IT side and a team of programmers. Daily operations require about five people for IT work, security programming, system connections, and development execution. For day-to-day user support, we need eight to ten people in the business. We operate on Microsoft Azure private cloud infrastructure. On a scale of 1 to 10, I rate Salesforce Essentials a 9 out of 10.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The most useful thing is the ability to create multiple pipelines and the flexibility in filtering and reporting."

"It is a stable platform."

"Pipedrive's most valuable feature is reporting and insights. The CRM shows the database and lets the salespeople arrange their daily activities. The insights are essential from a management point of view because it helps the sales staff improve or adjust their whole sales cycle, activities, and quality."

"The solution is very stable."

"It's very flexible and we can really fit it into our business model."

"The usability of the solution is its valuable feature."

"The most valuable feature is the ability to create timelines and custom fields."

"The solution is pretty easy to use and intuitive."

More Pipedrive pros

"Salesforce provides the best they have with the current version. Most of the features we need are already there, and it's very easy to use."

"Salesforce Essentials is a reliable and powerful application."

"The CRM system has SAP Sales, SAP Service, and SAP Billing, with everything integrated into an on-premise SAP CRM system. Salesforce Essentials replaced this on-premise system, bringing all functionalities onto the cloud platform."

"High availability is really important for us when getting our reports as a vendor."

"We use Salesforce Essentials for everything we do on the sales side."

"Their reporting and analytics features have a very significant impact on my company's operational efficiency."

"The most important feature is how Salesforce Essentials brings together information from multiple channels. The nature of our complex custom product data has been challenging due to our manufacturing nature. Salesforce also allowed business processes like finance, credit lines, customer complaints, and quality issues to integrate seamlessly. I haven’t used the mobile app functionality, because we haven't fully utilized because of our preferance of more personal interactions over using mobile apps."

More Salesforce Essentials pros

Cons

"In future releases, I would like to have a highly intelligent integration service where you can easily connect PipeDrive with other tools, even if you are not a developer."

"We are using the lowest version of it. As we become more sophisticated, we might outgrow the tool, but there are features that are available in the higher-level versions, which I'm unfamiliar with, that might be able to meet the needs we would have in the future. They can maybe add some of the features to the basic version or make it more reasonably priced or free."

"The integration possibilities with other systems could be better as well. We use it in connection with Octopus CRM, and there's room for improvement."

"Pipedrive has some weaknesses against Salesforce. The documentation of Pipedrive could improve. They need more qualified documentation because I had to fix my colleague's work to correct the reports because they did not find how they can do it, or develop reports. There are some misunderstandings about how to do reporting."

"New features sometimes seem bolted on rather than being smooth."

"The platform could be even more robust."

"Reporting capabilities of the solution could be improved."

"The product is expensive."

More Pipedrive cons

"The product's reporting area has certain shortcomings, making it an area where improvements are required."

"When we use mixed languages, it can be uncomfortable because there seems to be no consideration for right-to-left speakers. It feels like these tools were developed by people who only speak left-to-right languages and didn't consider other language types' needs."

"The primary area for improvement in Salesforce Essentials is its pricing. There are other competitors, like Zoho CRM, that offer similar features at a lower cost."

"Less integration would be better. It should work independently."

"I have seen Salesforce evaluate a lot of AI and analytics into that. But as an end user, I don’t have that much input."

"The cost of running Salesforce Essentials is significant. The licenses are expensive, and the operational costs are considerable, including the necessity to maintain a team of approximately 15 people to run the system."

"Areas that could be improved or upgraded in the next release include analytics, automation capabilities, and stability."

"Salesforce should encourage new users by offering smaller license packages, such as packages for three or two users."

More Salesforce Essentials cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"On a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price, two or three. For us, everything is expensive because this is a startup, but for a normal company, it should be peanuts."

"Pipedrive is relatively more affordable than other solutions."

"The solution's pricing is excellant. It costs 65 dollars a month for top tier plan."

"The solution is affordable."

"Pipedrive is the most cost-effective in terms of the balance between cost and features. I would take Pipedrive over HubSpot or Zoho CRM. It's well-positioned on the market."

"The product is expensive but provides valuable services."

"As of now, the pricing and value are quite good."

"We pay $1000 a month for the tool."

More Pipedrive pricing and cost advice

"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution."

"Salesforce Essentials is quite expensive, almost 10 out of 10. I don't have the exact cost, but we found it to be very expensive based on our budget constraints."

"The pricing is a bit on the expensive side."

"The tool is moderately priced."

"The pricing is on the higher side, especially with additional costs for professional services like consultants."

"I rate Salesforce Essentials' pricing an eight out of ten."

"It's a perpetual license, and the subscription can be expensive."

"We chose quarterly payments."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Outsourcing Company

12%

Retailer

Comms Service Provider

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	3

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	7

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pipedrive?

The most valuable feature is the ability to create timelines and custom fields.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pipedrive?

The pricing is satisfactory.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pipedrive?

New features sometimes seem bolted on rather than being smooth.

See all answers

What do you like most about Salesforce Essentials?

Salesforce provides the best they have with the current version. Most of the features we need are already there, and it's very easy to use.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Salesforce Essentials?

Salesforce Essentials is very expensive, but it delivers exceptional value. It is a good platform to have if you can afford it because it has numerous add-ons and modules. Anything that Salesforce ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Salesforce Essentials?

The mobile access can be improved in several ways. Salesforce Essentials operates in a table format where the entire user interface is based on tables, more specifically pivot tables. This is not v...

See all answers

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pipedrive

January 2026

Download Pipedrive product report

Buyer's Guide

Salesforce Essentials

January 2026

Download Salesforce Essentials product report

Overview

Pipedrive CRM, a SOC 2 Certified Service Provider, is built around activity-based selling. It ensures total visibility through its Pipeline Management tool with a clear visual interface that prompts you to take action, remain organized and stay in control of a complex sales process, Sales Reporting that provides visual report, understands pipeline metrics, tracks and tests sales process and shows sales split by product. Pipedrive CRM boosts productivity, optimizes the Sales Process, It has an import/export feature that safeguards against human error. It is fully customizable, has multiple usage possibilities and can automatically creates contacts in your pipeline.

Pipedrive

Salesforce Essentials is a cloud-based CRM tool for businesses seeking flexible, scalable, and customizable solutions to enhance sales and customer support processes.

Designed for seamless integration across multiple channels, Salesforce Essentials includes Sales and Service Cloud to simplify sales tasks and customer management. It enhances finance, credit, and quality processes with user-friendly AI capabilities and predictive analytics. Despite its strengths, there is room for improvement in SAP integration, interface simplicity, and report generation. Cost-effectiveness and support for diverse languages are also potential upgrade areas. Businesses use this CRM solution for lead management, opportunity tracking, and automating sales workflows, transitioning from paper-based methods to digital efficiency.

What are the essential features of Salesforce Essentials?

Scalability and Flexibility: Accommodates growth and customization needs.
Multiple Channel Integration: Enhances finance and quality processes.
User-Friendly: Easy navigation with AI capabilities.
Cloud Deployment: Includes Sales and Service Cloud features.
Predictive Analytics: Improves productivity and tracking.
Mobile App Support: Facilitates on-the-go access and management.

What benefits or ROI can users expect from Salesforce Essentials?

Improved Productivity: Automation features save time and streamline tasks.
Enhanced Customer Management: Centralizes interaction and data handling.
Ease of Transition: From manual to automated workflows.
Performance Monitoring: Standardizes processes for better oversight.

In the retail industry, businesses employ Salesforce Essentials for customer data management and transparency in order processing. Healthcare providers use it for patient engagement and streamlined communication. Financial services utilize it for billing management and compliance, harnessing automation tools for efficient data handling.

Salesforce

Sample Customers

Samsung, Amazon, SkyScanner, TDW, Vimeo, ReMax, Festo

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Pipedrive vs. Salesforce Essentials

December 2025

Free Report: Pipedrive vs. Salesforce Essentials

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