If you’re shopping for a CRM, HubSpot and Salesforce are the first two names you’ll meet. They’re famous for good reasons – and this comparison won’t pretend otherwise. The real question isn’t which CRM is “best.” It’s which one is built for the work you actually do all day.
If your work is running a sales pipeline with a team, at a desk, with forecasts and reports – the big names were built for exactly that. If your work is one person following up with prospects from their phone – between conversations, events, and errands – that’s a different job, and it’s the job Simple Prospect was built for. Here’s the honest breakdown.
Contents
The short version
| Simple Prospect | HubSpot | Salesforce (Starter Suite) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Built for | One person following up with prospects from their phone | Sales + marketing teams sharing one customer platform | Small businesses that want a full sales, marketing, and service suite |
| Paid price | $5.99/mo or $39.99/yr (Premium) | Sales Hub Starter $9/seat/mo billed annually ($15 monthly); Professional $90/seat/mo billed annually | $25/user/mo, billed monthly or annually |
| Free option | Free to download and use, with a free plan with core features | Free CRM tools, $0 for up to 2 users | – (Starter Suite is the entry paid suite on Salesforce’s small-business pricing page) |
| Where it lives | Native iOS + Android apps – phone only | Web platform with mobile app access | Web platform, built around accounts, contacts, and opportunities |
| Standout strength | Prospect follow-up workflow at a flat, low price | Free CRM that grows into marketing, service, and sales hubs on one system | Customization, reporting depth, automation, and the AppExchange ecosystem |
| Watch out for | No desktop or web app (see the honest limitation below) | The features most teams upgrade for – sequences, forecasting, custom reporting – sit in Professional at $90/seat/mo, plus a $1,500 one-time onboarding fee | Per-user pricing and a $100/user/mo step up to Pro Suite (billed annually, contract required) when you outgrow Starter |
Prices checked on the vendors’ official pages, Oct 27, 2026 – see Sources. HubSpot in particular runs promotional pricing, so confirm the current figure before you budget.
What HubSpot does genuinely well
HubSpot’s free CRM is a real product, not a demo. For up to two users it includes contact and deal management, a deal pipeline, task and activity tracking, Gmail and Outlook integration, and a meeting scheduler – at $0. For a small-business owner who wants sales and marketing in one place, that’s a strong starting point, and it’s why HubSpot shows up on every “best free CRM” list.
Its other real strength is the platform around the CRM. The same system grows into HubSpot’s Marketing, Service, and Content tools, so a business that starts with a free contact list can add marketing campaigns and customer service later without switching systems. And when a team is ready to pay for depth, Sales Hub Professional adds email sequences, forecasting, and custom reporting (100 reports) – serious sales-management tooling.
The honest catch is the step between “free” and “serious.” Sales Hub Starter is reasonably priced per seat, but forecasting, sequences, and custom reporting are Professional features: $90 per seat per month billed annually, plus a required one-time onboarding fee of $1,500. A five-person team that needs those features is looking at $450/month before onboarding. That’s not a rip-off – it’s a platform price. It’s just a platform price for a platform a solo network marketer will mostly never open.
What Salesforce does genuinely well
Salesforce is the reference point for CRM, and Starter Suite is its small-business on-ramp at $25 per user per month, billed monthly or annually. Salesforce positions it as a turnkey CRM to “automate sales, marketing, and service,” and the feature list backs that up: lead routing and built-in sales flows, email nurture campaigns with lead scoring, customizable reports and dashboards, a connected Slack workspace, and even payment links and an ecommerce storefront.
Where Salesforce really earns its reputation is headroom. Custom apps and objects, process automation with Flows, and – on Pro Suite ($100/user/month, billed annually) – quoting, forecasting, and access to AppExchange, its large marketplace of add-on apps and integrations. A growing small business with a real sales operation, multiple products, or a support team will rarely outgrow what Salesforce can be configured to do. If you have someone willing to set it up and maintain it, it’s a powerful system.
The trade-off is weight and per-user math. Salesforce is built around accounts, contacts, and opportunities moving through a managed pipeline – a model designed for teams selling to businesses, administered by someone. At $25 per user per month, a solo operator pays $300 a year for Starter; a five-user team pays $125 a month, and $500 a month if they step up to Pro Suite. None of that buys a tool designed around a personal prospect list and a follow-up rhythm – because that isn’t the job Salesforce set out to do.
Where the big CRMs don’t fit a network marketer
None of this makes HubSpot or Salesforce bad products. It makes them mismatched to a specific kind of work:
- The unit of work is different. Big CRMs organize deals and opportunities for a pipeline. Network marketing runs on a list of people – prospects at different stages of a conversation – and the daily discipline of following up with them. Simple Prospect is organized around exactly that: prospect and contact tracking, follow-up reminders and tasks, mass and group texting, and a goal dashboard.
- The work happens on a phone, not at a desk. Follow-ups happen in parking lots, coffee shops, and direct messages. Simple Prospect is a native iOS and Android app built for that. HubSpot and Salesforce are web platforms first; their mobile apps are companions to a desk-based system.
- The price model is different. HubSpot and Salesforce charge per seat, and their deeper features sit in tiers priced for businesses with staff and budgets. Simple Prospect Premium is $5.99/month or $39.99/year – one flat price for the follow-up workflow, with no seat math and no onboarding fee. On value for this specific job, that’s the case: not the most powerful CRM, but the best value for a person whose CRM work is following up with prospects.
Two other names you’ll see in this price range follow the same desk-pipeline pattern: Zoho CRM (free for up to 3 users; Standard at $14/user/month billed annually, with forecasting and multiple pipelines) and Pipedrive (Lite at $14/seat/month billed annually for pipeline management; Growth at $39 adds full email sync and automations). Both are legitimate small-business tools – and both are still per-seat pipeline systems, which is the contrast above.
The honest limitation
Simple Prospect is phone-only – there is no desktop or web app. If you want to run reports on a big screen, build custom dashboards, automate a team’s pipeline, or integrate your CRM with the rest of your business software, Simple Prospect is the wrong tool, and HubSpot or Salesforce will serve you better. It also doesn’t try to be a marketing platform or a support desk. It does one job – helping one person keep track of prospects and follow up on time – and if your business grows into needing a full customer platform, moving up to one of the big names later is a reasonable path, not a failure.
Who should choose which
- Choose HubSpot if you want a genuinely capable free CRM, you run (or are building) a small business where marketing, sales, and service should share one system, and you can accept that the advanced sales features live at $90/seat/month plus onboarding.
- Choose Salesforce if you have a growing sales operation, need customization, reporting depth, and integrations, and you have the budget – and ideally a person – to set it up and keep it tuned. Starter Suite at $25/user/month is a fair entry for that.
- Choose Simple Prospect if you’re a network marketer, direct seller, or solo small-business owner whose real bottleneck is follow-up: keeping every prospect organized, getting reminded to reach out, texting a group without losing the thread, and seeing your goals at a glance – all from your phone, for $5.99/month or $39.99/year. Get started free, put your real contacts in, and see whether the workflow fits before you pay anything.
FAQ
Is HubSpot CRM really free?
HubSpot’s free tools cost $0 for up to two users and include contact and deal management, one deal pipeline, task tracking, and email integration (per HubSpot’s Sales Hub pricing guide, checked Oct 27, 2026). The limits are real, though: HubSpot branding, basic reporting only, and no automation or sequences – those are paid-tier features.
How much does Salesforce cost for a small business?
Salesforce’s small-business entry is Starter Suite at $25 per user per month, billed monthly or annually, covering sales, marketing, and service basics. Pro Suite is $100 per user per month billed annually (contract required) and adds quoting, forecasting, deeper customization and automation, and AppExchange access.
How much does Simple Prospect cost?
Premium is $5.99/month or $39.99/year. The app is free to download and use with a free plan with core features – prospect tracking, follow-up reminders and tasks, mass/group texting, and a goal dashboard – so you can run your real list on it before deciding.
Can Simple Prospect replace HubSpot or Salesforce for a team?
Honestly, no – and it isn’t trying to. It has no desktop app, no custom reporting engine, and no marketing or service platform. For a team that needs those things, choose the big platform. For one person following up with prospects from their phone, the big platform is more than the job needs, at per-seat prices.
Simple Prospect is the simplest CRM for network marketing – track prospects, stay on top of follow-ups, and grow from your phone. Get started free.
Sources (checked Oct 27, 2026)
- HubSpot Sales Hub pricing guide (HubSpot’s own blog): Free Tools $0 for up to 2 users; Starter $9/seat/mo billed annually or $15 monthly; Professional $90/seat/mo billed annually plus $1,500 one-time onboarding; Enterprise $150/seat/mo plus $3,500 onboarding; free-tier features and limits; Professional forecasting, sequences, and custom reporting. HubSpot pricing guide Note: HubSpot also shows promotional/list pricing on its main pricing pages (captures in late Oct 2026 showed a $7/seat new-customer offer for Starter with $20 also listed), so HubSpot prices should be re-confirmed at purchase time.
- Salesforce small-business pricing (official): Starter Suite $25/user/month billed monthly or annually, with sales flows, lead routing, email nurture campaigns and lead scoring, customizable reports and dashboards, Slack connection, payment links and storefront; Pro Suite $100/user/month billed annually, contract required, with quoting, forecasting, greater customization and automation, and AppExchange access. Salesforce pricing
- Zoho CRM editions comparison (official): Free for 3 users; Standard $14/user/month billed annually ($20 monthly). Zoho CRM comparison
- Pipedrive pricing (official): Lite $14/seat/month billed annually; Growth $39/seat/month billed annually, adding full email sync and automations. Pipedrive pricing
- Simple Prospect pricing and features: from Simple Prospect’s own verified product facts ($5.99/mo, $39.99/yr Premium; free to download and use; iOS + Android; prospect tracking, follow-up reminders/tasks, mass/group texting, goal dashboard; phone-only).