CRM/Sales Automation for early stage (pre-growth) startup

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By way of background, I'm a Salesforce guy. Probably done 10 implementations (both new installs and fixing broken ones). Prior to that SalesLogix and prior to that Goldmine & Act! (yea, been around a while). But Salesforce is total overkill for my current need.

I've got a very simple startup business (service based) with two or three products. Heavily dependent on cold-outreach for sales right now. I've got one part-time SDR doing cold outreach and follow-ups to get meetings and then a closer to convert the meetings to business (which then needs to be scheduled and delivered). Billing via quickbooks

We literally JUST started generating revenue, so not much budget, but I need to quickly put together a system to manage the list of 2,000 or so contacts we've developed and want to nuture and track meetings, etc. For now, deal management is less important than managing my list to make sure I have segmented lists that are getting targeted messaging via email, calls, LinkedIn, etc.

I'm leaning toward something like Outreach or Salesloft, but worried I'll be painting myself into a corner when I get to the point where I really need robust deal management. I'm really unfamiliar with the SMB side of the CRM market, so hoping to get some tips/suggestions as to what to look at. I've talked to a lot of people about Hubspot and the one thing I universally hear is "watch out for hidden fees that will creep up on you very quickly and become very expensive" so I'm leery.

Bottom line, I want something cheap (or free) to get started that I can build on/upgrade as we generate revenue and prove out the model and add more SDRs and eventually a FT marketing person.

submitted by /u/sbh2oman
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