Lead nurturing is the process of building stable and beneficial relationships with customers at different stages of the sales funnel. An efficient lead nurturing and sales strategy would focus on marketing and communication efforts. Listening to the needs and wishes of potential customers and providing them with the information and answers they need are crucial to building trust, increasing brand awareness, and maintaining a connection with them.
Your most significant leads might not be ready for purchase yet; however, that doesn’t mean they won’t work in the future. That’s why you should nurture relationships with prospects with a strong lead scoring strategy.
Also, as you lengthen your sales funnels, your prospects will grow more independent, so you will be in need of lead nurturing programs in the long term.
Since you can get help from the latest software to nurture your clients, let’s define the term “lead nurturing software.”
What is a Lead Nurturing Software?
Lead nurturing software is a tool that helps sales representatives to cultivate relationships with their leads without extra effort. Many prefer to use it with customer relationship management (CRM) tools to provide extra personalized content to every potential customer according to specific actions such as subscribing to an ebook or clicking on a link in an email.
With the right lead nurturing and marketing strategy, you might even turn your cold leads into loyal customers and increase your response rate as well as conversion rate.
There are some key features of lead nurturing software. These are:
- Email Automation – You can automatically send emails to leads according to their progress in the sales process, then change their location in the pipeline according to their response.
- Lead Scoring – This feature is maybe the essential one. You can assign your leads a value to state how engaged they are with the sales process so sales reps can decide on their main lead in that period.
- Campaign Management – With lead nurturing software, you can create marketing campaigns across different platforms to engage with leads no matter where they are.
- Personalization – Level up your customer experience, change the type, register, tone, or details of relevant content based on a lead’s characteristics and preferences.
- Lead Segmentation – Form groups of leads according to their characteristics or behavior to provide them with the right content at the right time.
I prepared a list of marketing tools, including these features. Of course, as a business owner, you might only look for one specific feature or more; it doesn’t matter; there is an option for you in this list, for sure.
Without further ado, let’s begin.
The 15 Best Lead Nurturing Software Options
1. Pipedrive
Pipedrive is one of the highest-rated lead nurturing software on Capterra, but it doesn’t come packed with features. Surprisingly, it doesn’t matter since reviews are raving about this tool. Pipedrive is a classic CRM tool with some automated email capabilities built-in.
If you need to use some basic lead nurturing functions and only invest in a CRM tool, Pipedrive might be the best solution for you.
Pipedrive is an easy-to-use CRM with basic lead nurturing features, so if the learning curve is not steep and you can still send automated emails at every stage of the sales process. The tool also assigns a probability for how likely a lead will be successfully won so sales reps can focus on those accounts.
Unfortunately, Pipedrive doesn’t have a LinkedIn integration, and this is a crucial downside for B2B companies. Also, since the lead nurturing features are pretty lightweight, you cannot design unique campaigns based on lead behavior with Pipedrive.
Price: The plans with email automation features start at $25 per user per month.
2. HubSpot
HubSpot’s Marketing and Sales Hubs is the best marketing software duo for lead nurturing. With marketing automation, you can generate marketing emails, content, offers, and outreach that are personalized according to lead behavior. Sales reps can schedule custom emails that will find the prospect at the right time when it comes to sales.
The best part of this tool is that it comes packed with tools that will streamline your process of creating blog content, landing pages, and emails so your sales teams can optimize every step of a lead’s journey.
In addition, you can always know exactly how much you’re spending on each lead with the ad ROI tracking. Great right?
Well, that’s not all. Also, the tool tracks the email activity of leads so you can track your hot leads.
Unfortunately, the affordable plans don’t give all the best features, so you have to pay more if you want to all features. Hubspot’s marketing and sales hubs don’t identify and track anonymous visitors as well as LeadBoxer.
Price: HubSpot Marketing Hub and Sales Hub start at $50 per month, while a bundle starts at $112.50 per month.
3. LeadBoxer
LeadBoxer nurtures leads through its excellent lead scoring technology. The software gives every prospect a number that displays how likely they are to purchase your product based upon their behavior and interaction with your brand so far. With the visualized data, sales reps can decide who is worthy of their time and pay attention to top prospects.
The best parts of this tool are that its lead segmentation feature makes grouping and filtering very easy. Website and email tracking feature that gives you insights into which prospect you should target and what dynamic content you should deliver to them.
In addition, the tool can identify and track anonymous leads and opens the door of hidden possibilities.
Sadly, the software doesn’t include email automation, drip campaigns, or campaign management features.
Price: LeadBoxer starts at $195 per month.
4. Nutshell
Nutshell is actually a CRM that helps B2B businesses to manage their sales pipeline. However, I believe that it deserves its place in this article since it comes packed with tons of lead nurturing features like personalized email campaigns and automated messages for every stage of the sales process. Features such as these make Nutshell a good choice for small businesses that needs an all-in-one CRM.
The best part of Nutshell is that it helps companies deal with pipeline management and help with basic lead nurturing. The tool has an intuitive and straightforward interface and includes a reporting function that analyzes how lead nurturing activities are performing statistically.
On the other hand, Nutshell doesn’t have as many automated marketing features as HubSpot or SharpSpring. I will give more information about these tools later in my article.
Sadly, Nutshell’s starter plans don’t include all email automation features, so you have to purchase higher plans if you want more features.
Price: Nutshell’s plans start at $19 per user per month.
5. SharpSpring
If you’re looking for one single tool that will handle everything you need when it comes to lead nurturing, SharpSpring might be the best option for you. In addition to having countless features, SharpSpring nurtures leads by sending perfectly timed emails at every stage of the sales process so you can ensure that your brand catches the attention of your leads.
However, if you ask me what’s the unique point of SharpSpring, its features like the visual marketing automation builder and VisitorID, for sure. In addition to these cornerstone features, SharpSpring is a great CRM tool. It sends personalized emails in response to lead behavior, and its marketing automation streamlines processes with its visual builder.
Although I believe that the more features, the better software, it might be too complex and confusing for smaller businesses and startups; also, SharpSpring is not affordable as Hubspot since the starter plan costs nearly five times more than HubSpot’s software.
Therefore, I think SharpSpring is an excellent option for enterprises but not for small businesses.
Price: The smallest plan for small businesses starts at $550 per month.
6. Keap
Keap is a lead nurturing tool that assists you from the moment a lead fills out an info form till the end of the process. The platform forms different groups for leads as soon as they fill out the contact forms and sends them perfectly-timed messages based on the actions of leads – like downloading an ebook or clicking on a demo link.
All these features are included in Keap’s CRM so that you can manage all your sales and marketing processes in one single place.
Keap allows you to manage to lead capturing, nurturing, pipeline management, invoicing, and payment processes all in one platform, and although it’s packed with features, it’s still easy to use. I must give props to Keap’s customer support team; according to reviews, they’re very good at what they’re doing.
However, some reviews stated that emails go to the spam box, and Keap sometimes doesn’t save the progress if the software freezes or logs out of nowhere.
Price: Keap starts at $79 per month.
7. Autopilot
Do you find it hard to grasp the idea of the customer journey? Autopilot will help you to visualize everything, so don’t worry. The tool makes it super easy to run multiple drip campaigns with various triggers for various lead segments according to user reviews. The software doesn’t include CRM, but it has several integrations so you can connect it with other tools you prefer.
Use the visual builder to create personalized emails and work with Autopilot’s countless templates to level up your messages. The tool is easy to use, and just like Keap, it offers great customer service.
Unfortunately, Autopilot’s integration with Salesforce and other CRMs caused some issues and did not work as well as it’s expected. Sometimes, Autopilot might load too slow for your liking.
Price: Autopilot’s basic plan starts at $49 per month.
8. Act-On
Act-On is a lead nurturing solution for larger enterprises. The tool integrates with almost any CRM on the market. With the software, you can automate your email marketing, track website visitors and their activity, then prioritize leads accordingly so sales reps can figure out which lead is worth prioritizing.
If ı have to compare it with one of its competitors, I must say that its interface is easier to use than Marketo’s.
Act-on has automated campaign templates that are effortlessly customizable to fit your buyer journeys. Its other features, such as lead scoring and list segmentation, will help you target leads at different stages of engagement. Also, using Act-on, you can generate different lead scoring rules for every audience group,
Unfortunately, Act-on doesn’t have lead attribution functionality, so you can’t see how people reached your brand. In addition, although Act-on has an easy-to-use interface, it’s still packed full of features, so the learning curve may be too steep unless your team has someone who has used the software before.
And last but not least, Act-on is not affordable for many small and medium-sized businesses.
Price: Act-On starts at $900 per month.
9. Karta
Karta is probably the best overall all-in-one marketing and sales solution. Whether it’s creating landing pages or handling lead tagging and scoring, the software makes everything so easy and streamlines every process with its numerous features. You don’t need to have any other tools if you’re using Karta. Since you can generate automated emails based on certain lead behaviors, Karta basically lets you nurture your leads with your eyes closed.
You don’t need any integrations to manage your business tasks if you have Karta. Also, if you want to build your own startup, Karta will accompany you along the way with all the features and tools you need.
Although it’s a great program, its learning curve might be steep for the most. Also, the documentation and video tutorial features can be improved.
Price: Karta starts at $99 per month.
10. Marketo Engage
Another great lead nurturing software is Marketo. Marketo offers ad experience as well as email campaign features so that leads are targeted with the right content at the right time across any possible platform. Marketo can help you to view experiences through mobile push messages or according to lead behavior on social media platforms.
With Marketo, you can create and schedule email marketing campaigns by tracking lead behavior such as web visits, social shares, or checking in for an in-person event. In addition, the tool matches a lead score based on numerous characteristics of your leads so sales representatives can decide whom to prioritize and the right moment. All you have to do is to engage with your leads through personalized advertisements and mobile push messages and nurture them.
Marketo is a great option for many businesses, but even its starter plan can be quite expensive for some. Also, Marketo’s interface lacks the email design functions of its competitors and feels old-fashioned.
Price: Marketo starts at around $1000 per month.
11. EngageBay
EngageBay’s all-in-one tool delivers one of the best, if not the best, marketing automation, pipeline management, and customer support. Its excellent customer profiles allow sales reps to decide on the most efficient follow-up activities and whether or not now is the right time to take action.
- With EngageBay, you can generate automated messages to nurture leads across social media, email, SMS, and the web. The tool comes with lead scoring and prediction features, and advanced segmentation helps you to provide your leads personalized experience.
On the negative side, EngagBay’s email templates aren’t as easy to use or attractive as its competitors. The same goes for its design options as well. While creating sign-up forms to attract new leads, you have limited options to customize.
Price: EngageBay has a free version. Get a basic contract for $9 per user per month.
12. Clickpoint
Clickpoint Software offers a lead nurturing solution for companies that mostly rely on phone calls to reach their target customer. The tool is equipped with the email automation features that you can come across in the most lead nurturing solutions.
Clickpoint comes with features like SMS nurturing and call routing so you can ensure that the right rep will always connect with the right client. Its interface is user-friendly, so even if your marketing team uses CRM for the first time, they won’t struggle. Clickpoint’s customer support is always available and truly attentive to the needs of their customers.
Unfortunately, like Pipedrive, Clickpoint offers limited integrations. Also, its reporting function is lacking compared to its competitors. Nevertheless, if you’re looking for a solution that will help you streamline the lead nurturing process on calls, then Clickpoint might be a good pick for you.
Price: Clickpoint Software starts at $46 per user per month.
13. Pipeline (formerly PipelineDeals)
Pipeline (formerly PipelineDeals) is a lead management platform that comes with various functions such as sales tracking, email, and content engagement. With Pipeline, you can track data and add the said data right into your CRM. The platform has an interface that focuses on the sales cycle and keeps sales reps informed so they can get the latest updates and notifications.
All reps can have access to a collective database where they can add documents, cadences, templates, and workflows. Pipeline’s sales-focused integrations include Gmail, WebMerge, Quickbooks, and more.
On the other hand, according to some reviews on Capterra, if you don’t manage your customer profiles regularly, Pipeline can become cluttered with unnecessary information and business profiles.
With all of these integrations, your reps can easily manage the lead nurturing process and prioritize the right customers to reach their goals.
Price: Pipeline is custom priced.
14. AWeber
AWeber is actually an autoresponder and email marketing platform; however, its features and connections to other apps and tools make it an excellent choice for lead nurturing. Although this tool has fewer features than many others on this list, if your small business does most of the lead nurturing via email, it’s a great alternative.
AWeber comes with autoresponders that help you connect with your leads quickly, while its built-in app connections generate a contact list. You can tag customers to segment them into groups and assign autoresponders to each tag so you can trigger the action corresponding to the tags. You can also easily personalize your contacts’ journey by customization feature according to your contact details.
Price: Pro plan starts at $16.15 per month (billed annually) up to 500 customers
15. LeadSquared
LeadSquared is a conversion platform that combines sales enablement and lead nurturing. Its built-in CRM with marketing automation helps sales reps to make the right decisions. The software comes with a conversion prediction tool that generates scores for your sales leads and keeps you from wasting time on unqualified and unwilling prospects.
LeadSquared uses machine learning to fuse real lead behaviors with recorded data to comprehend the probability of conversion. These features allow your sales team to concentrate on qualified leads, while marketing automation nurtures your potential customers at the same time. If you want to increase your conversion rates, LeadSquared is a great pick for you!
Price: LeadSquared’s plans are starting from $15.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a lead nurturing system?
The lead nurturing system focuses on building and reinforcing meaningful relationships with your customers and prospects at every stage of the sales funnel to offer them a meaningful journey.
What is lead nurturing in CRM?
Lead nurturing is building effective and long-term relationships with your potential customers throughout their journey of purchase. To turn your prospects into customers, you must nurture them.
What is the best software for lead sales?
Monday.com, Pipedrive, Keap, Hubspot Sales, and Freshsales are some of the best software for lead management.
