Custom CRM vs Salesforce: when to stop paying the enterprise tax

Salesforce is the safe answer. It's enterprise-grade, it has every feature imaginable, and nobody got fired for choosing it.

It's also expensive, complex, and frequently over-built for what most businesses actually need.

What you're actually paying for

At €150+/user/month, a 10-person sales team is €18,000/year minimum. Add implementation costs (typically €10,000–€50,000 for proper setup), admin overhead (someone has to manage it), and training, and the real cost is significantly higher.

What do you get for that? Thousands of features, most of which you'll never configure. An admin interface that requires a certified specialist to modify. A system that takes months to implement properly.

Who Salesforce is actually for

Large enterprises with complex sales cycles, multiple products, hundreds of reps, and dedicated Salesforce administrators. At that scale, the investment makes sense.

A 10-person sales team selling a single product to SMBs does not need what Salesforce provides.

What a custom CRM gives you

A CRM built for your process does exactly what your sales cycle requires. If your team tracks seven custom fields and has a three-stage pipeline with specific automation triggers — that's what it does. Nothing more, nothing less.

Cost: €8,000–€20,000 to build. €0 per user per month forever. You own the data, the code, the roadmap.

The honest breakdown

Salesforce: right for large teams with complex needs and budget for proper implementation and administration.

Custom CRM: right for small-to-mid teams who know their sales process well and want software that fits it exactly.

HubSpot (free or paid): right for teams that need something in between, are growing fast, and want to defer the build decision.

The question is whether you're paying for enterprise infrastructure you don't need — or investing in something that actually fits how you sell.