Best QuickBooks CRM Integration (Desktop & Online Software)

Whether you are a professional accountant or just a QuickBooks novice, your business processes will benefit from integrating QuickBooks with a CRM software solution. 

This article will talk about why you should have a QuickBooks CRM integration, the criteria for choosing the right CRM, and some types of integrations. Then we’ll show you 5 amazing choices for a CRM QuickBooks integration.

Why QuickBooks CRM integration is a good idea

Let’s talk about the reasons for getting a CRM that integrates with QuickBooks.
 

Lead management

If you’re an accountant, QuickBooks alone won’t help you get new contacts and new leads to turn into paying customers. That’s what a CRM is for, it can help with marketing, lead generation, and then bringing in that data to create new QuickBooks accounts. 
 

Data entry

CRMs are great at saving your team members time and effort by taking over a lot of the manual typing and clicking work. This efficiency translates over into your QuickBooks activity by syncing everything in real time.
 

Data security

Because your QuickBooks data is so important to your customers, having a CRM integration can add a layer of data protection should you ever need to share any more customer information.
 

Sales automation

To ensure a prime customer experience all the way through the sales process, a CRM integration with QuickBooks is ideal. It can send automated follow ups to stay on point and use workflows to update the sales pipeline status.
 

Customer service

If your accounting business needs include offering customer support, there are many perfect CRMs which specialize in customer service. It can automate tickets from QuickBooks and create them in your CRM, and use workflows for faster resolutions.

Criteria to use when choosing a CRM for QuickBooks 

Here are some of the things you ought to consider before deciding on a CRM integration with Intuit QuickBooks. Everyone’s business needs are different, so don't skip these questions.

• What is your budget?

• Who will be using the CRM?

• Will you do manual integration or sync-based integration?

• Which data do you want to import?

• What data is already in QuickBooks?

• If you want QuickBooks Online or the QuickBooks Desktop version?

Type of CRM integration with QuickBooks

The two major types of CRM integration with QuickBooks are manual and sync-based. 

• With a manual integration, you’ll need to click on each row of data yourself that you want to sync. 

• With a sync-based system, you run the program which reviews and syncs all data according to your parameters.

However, with syncing, there are two categories of data flows: unidirectional data flow vs bidirectional data flow.

Unidirectional data flow

This is where data flows one way, from one platform to the other. For example, when you update a contact profile in your QuickBooks account, it will get automatically updated in your CRM, but CRM updates won’t affect QuickBooks.

Bidirectional data flow

As is obvious, bidirectional data flow is a two-way sync. Any changes or updates you make in either your QuickBooks or CRM systems will be automatically synced and updated in the other platform.

Top 5 QuickBooks CRM integration

Here is a quick overview of our top 5 integrations for QuickBooks and CRM.

What is the best CRM for QuickBooks? Here’s our top 5 list:

We’ve sifted through the myriad of topics for ways to integrate QuickBooks with a CRM, considering you may want more functionalities like marketing, sales, project management and customer support, and here are the 5 best CRM for QuickBooks. We trust you’ll find the top CRM for your specific needs.

1. Insightly (Best QuickBooks CRM integration capabilities overall)

Insightly gets the gold for having the best QuickBooks CRM integration abilities overall. Inside your customer relationship management dashboard with Insightly, you can now also see your contacts accounting information, like invoices, estimates and payments. You can get notifications inside Insightly for payment due dates and overdue payments. 

Pros:

Out of all of our CRM apps, Insightly just feels right due to its clean interfaces, ease of use, and all around solid QuickBooks integration.

This pair of apps saves time and effort by cutting down on almost all dual entry bookkeeping work.

Insightly has great automation and you can apply a lot of workflows between it and QuickBooks functionalities.

Cons:

Because this is our number one CRM platform integration with QuickBooks accounting software, we’ll refrain from making any negative comments. 

Pricing:

• Insightly Plus is $29 per user per month billed annually 

• Insightly Professional is $49 per user per month billed annually 

• Insightly Enterprise is $99 per user per month billed annually  

• The Insightly Outlook integration is free with any plan

Insightly CRM Review 

Visit Insightly
 

2. Zoho CRM (Best CRM with QuickBooks online)

Zoho CRM is a great company and maker of apps which are very popular among startups and small businesses. When it comes to a CRM integration with QuickBooks online, Zoho is tops. You will need to get Zoho Flow to run many of the automations, which include simple triggers as well as advanced workflow building tools. 

Pros:

Zoho Flow really helps connect Zoho CRM and QuickBooks, saving team members time on the data entry for creating estimates, invoices, sales orders, payment records, inventory items or other accounting data.

Some nice advanced tools include scheduled automations, decision-making workflows based on if-then, and other custom functions with their API.

Cons:

The fact that you need a third tool, Zoho Flow, is not ideal for everyone, though it’s really not a hassle for this CRM for QuickBooks online. 

Pricing:

• Zoho Flow Standard plan is $14 per user per month billed annually 

• Zoho Flow Professional plan is $24 per user per month billed annually 

• Zoho CRM Standard plan is $14 per user per month billed annually 

• Zoho CRM Professional plan is $23 per user per month billed annually 

• Zoho CRM Enterprise plan is $40 per user per month billed annually  

• Zoho CRM Ultimate plan is $52 per user per month billed annually 

Zoho CRM review

Visit Zoho Flow
 

3. Salesforce (Top CRM for QuickBooks enterprise)

If you are a user of the upper end versions of QuickBooks, then Salesforce is likely the best CRM integration, especially for large businesses and enterprises. Salesforce is a leader in leveraging customer data for better marketing and sales. The data sync between Salesforce and QuickBooks will be a boon to your sales team.

Pros:

When combining Salesforce customer information with QuickBooks, you can track your revenue and expenses as they are associated with everyone in your network.

This integration also makes preparing for tax season a much smoother experience due to more organized financial information. 

Cons:

With Salesforce you get a QuickBooks enterprise CRM, and this puts a lot of startups out of range to take advantage of the best tools.

Pricing:

• Salesforce Small Business Solutions Essentials is $25 per user per month billed annually 

• Salesforce Small Business Solutions Sales Professional is $75 per user per month billed annually 

• Salesforce Small Business Solutions Marketing Cloud is $1,250 per month billed annually 

Salesforce Review

Visit Salesforce
 

4. Nutshell (Great QuickBooks CRM software if you need sales automation)

Nutshell is one of the best sales automation CRM systems and they have their own native Intuit QuickBooks integration. 

Pros:

Migrating your customer records from QuickBooks is a very speedy and easy process, you’ll love it.

Easily communicate with your QuickBooks contacts through Nutshell, as well as do invoice creation.

This is a very good way to integrate QuickBooks with a CRM for better use of sales process workflows, one of Nutshell’s specialties.

Cons:

While this is a Nutshell-made integration, there is also a Zapier one that might have some tools you’ll be missing here, like automated billing and invoicing based on Nutshell lead creation or new customer entries.

Pricing:

• Nutshell costs $16 per user per month billed annually 

• Nutshell Pro costs $42 per user per month billed annually 

Nutshell Review 

Visit Nutshell
 

5. Method:CRM (Good QuickBooks integration if you want new contacts)

Method CRM bills itself as one of the top QuickBooks online integrations and they even say it on their landing page. It works well at converting new customers in your CRM to new contacts in your QuickBooks. 

Pros:

Method has some sweet workflows which can take over some of your QuickBooks tasks like data entry and reminders.

Add data from your QuickBooks accounts to your CRM profiles like purchase orders or payments. When updates occur, there’s no-fuss real-time sync between the two platforms.

Cons:

Many users praise the online pairing, but there have been some complaints about this integration with the QuickBooks Desktop version.

Pricing:

• Contact management plan is $25 per user per month billed annually 

• CRM Pro plan is $44 per user per month billed annually 

• Enterprise plan is $74 per user per month billed annually 

Method CRM Review 

Visit Method CRM 

Our conclusion on choosing a CRM software for QuickBooks that is compatible with your needs

Now that you know about how CRM is compatible with QuickBooks, the next step is to integrate. If you are still not sure which CRM integration is most compatible with your business needs, visit the CRM websites, and often there are free trials for which sometimes you don’t even need to enter a credit card. 

In case you still don’t have QuickBooks, and you’re just exploring the Internet, make sure to read our QuickBooks online review and QuickBooks checking account review to be fully equipped with information before you make any purchase decisions.

FAQs

Is QuickBooks a CRM?

QuickBooks, made by Intuit, is an accounting software, and therefore it is not a CRM, or customer relationship management. QuickBooks is used by businesses, freelancers or professional accountants. CRMs, which can integrate with QuickBooks, are used for managing one’s network of contacts and getting new leads.  

Does QuickBooks have a CRM module of its own?

QuickBooks does not have its own CRM module. QuickBooks has tools for invoicing, payroll management, expense tracking, time tracking and payment processing. You can get CRM functionality with QuickBooks by using an integration. Many CRMs have QuickBooks integrations, or you can use a connecting tool like Zapier.

Does QuickBooks have an API?

Intuit QuickBooks does indeed provide their API to developers to add extra functionality on top of ther QuickBooks platform. The QuickBooks Online Accounting API is based on the REST framework and uses HTTP methods and JSON input and output. It can be used for transactions, transfers and journal entries.