In the ultimate CRM match who will come out on top? In the right corner, we have Dubsado, and in the left we have HoneyBook. Both CRMs are fierce competitors that allow business owners to send contracts, invoice clients, create workflows, and much more. But depending on your business needs, there may be a clear winner. 

What Even is a CRM?

A CRM stands for Client Relationship Management software. Essentially, it helps you manage all of your clients and lead interactions while being able to store all of their information and documents in one place. A CRM greatly simplifies your client process, improves client experience, and saves you time. 

What is Dubsado? 

Dubsado is a CRM that has a lot of automation capabilities. It is very customizable and really focuses on giving business owners the ability to save time and automate a lot of their administrative tasks. 

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What is HoneyBook?

HoneyBook is a CRM that is very user-friendly and allows business owners to easily send forms, emails, and invoices. 

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Which CRM is Better?

There is no right answer to this question. It ultimately depends on what you need your CRM to do, and how much customization you want to have control of. Let’s dig into some of the biggest differences I’ve found while using both.

1. Automations – Hands down if you are looking to automate a lot of your administrative tasks, Dubsado is the clear winner. While HoneyBook does have automation capabilities, they are extremely limited in comparison to Dubsado. Many items in a HoneyBook workflow will be task reminders, rather than actual tasks that the system can complete. For instance, follow-ups! Let’s say you send a proposal to a client and you don’t hear back from them – Dubsado can follow up automatically! HoneyBook cannot and can only remind you to follow up with that client. That means you still have to manually send an email.
2. Customization – Both CRMs allow for a lot of branding customization. Adding logos, brand colors, and fonts, as well as being able to white label your domain. HoneyBook has a wonderful thing called “Company Settings” where you can set your colors and fonts so with a click of a button you can make any form match your branding. Dubsado takes a bit more work to customize. 
3. Smart Fields – Smart fields allow you to take information from the client’s project and use it in an email or form. Think of things like the client’s name, phone number, address, or project date. They are a huge time saver! Currently, HoneyBook only offers a first name smart field for emails. Dubsado allows for a lot more smart field uses, and you are not limited to just using them in emails – you can use them in forms as well. This is particularly helpful when creating a proposal for someone and being able to easily customize the name without having to manually change the name in the form each time.
4. Appointment Reminders – While both HoneyBook and Dubsado offer their own schedulers, HoneyBook does not allow for customizations to be made to email reminders. Instead, it sends an email template reminding clients of their appointment time and date. In Dubsado you have the option to create your own email reminders. This is especially helpful if you want to remind clients not to tidy up before a consultation, or if you are asking for parking instructions. 
5. Invoicing – HoneyBook uses its own payment processing system to collect credit card and bank transfer payments. Dubsado allows you to use Stripe, Square, or PayPal as your payment processing system. This often means slightly less processing fees. HoneyBook has the ability to add tax, and other set percentages to invoices. Dubsado only allows tax. Any other fees have to be manually added to the price. 

Which CRM will you choose? 

As I mentioned before – there is no right or wrong answer. Both of these CRMs are great choices and can save you a lot of time. The quick and dirty answer from me would be if you want something user-friendly, has an app, and is easy to set up – choose HoneyBook. If you are looking to automate a lot of your administrative tasks, and customize your forms and emails – choose Dubsado. 

Here is a free quiz you can take to help you determine which would be the best for you.

TAKE THE CRM QUIZ

Both CRMs have a free trial so definitely sign up for each if you are really struggling to determine which is the best fit.