Newbie looking for a simple and easy-to-use CRM for free or cheap

I've been tasked with integrating CRM software with my company's sales and customer service departments. I started doing research and was kind of overwhelmed by how many options there are. Right now, all of our sales and customer service is done via gmail or phone calls. We'd like to start logging these correspondences so we can refer to them in the future.

We currently use Thryv. However, when you send an email out through Thryv CRM, the customer then gets a link to Thryv that they have to follow. I would rather have it look like a regular email to them if that makes any sense.

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We don't need anything fancy. so far, I like how easy it is to integrate Copper CRM since we use Gmail, but it's hard to justify $23 per month per person for such basic needs. I took a look at Zoho, and it seems way too complicated for me to teach to a team. Especially with how little we need. Does anyone have any other suggestions? I'm thinking we need 6-10 agents onboarded tops. Some of them will be in sales, and some of them will be in customer service (we don't necessarily need help desk software because we don't work with support tickets.