Why is there no CRM with native AI insights out of the box?
Existing platforms lack comprehensive integration for advanced automation, native AI capabilities, and cross-platform communication without requiring expensive custom development. This forces users to abandon all-in-one solutions and struggle to piece together multiple disconnected tools.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1Self-hosting and chaining multiple modular tools together using automation platforms like n8n or Make.com
- 2Building custom solutions with AI coding assistants or hiring developers
- 3Accepting partial feature sets or separating marketing automation and customer management into different platforms
- 4trying multiple different tools and platforms
- 5hiring consultants to customize complex software
- 6searching through list websites and forums for recommendations
- 7Sticking with older existing software even though product quality is diminishing.
- 8Using Outlook calendar to track all work
- 9Building custom solutions using Microsoft Lists and Power Automate
- 10Sifting through hundreds of pages of results from other grantmakers
- 11Checking if Microsoft’s Booking pages can handle the requirements, though the Salesforce integration remains unverified.
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“Want to find grants the Irvine Foundation made to AI research? Too bad! You'll have to sift through hundreds upon hundreds of pages of results from other grantmakers instead of limiting your search to one specific organization.”source ↗
“That's just today's Candid Search annoyance, but there seems to be a new one every day. I miss FDO.”source ↗
“I have tried zoho, salesforce, they are like too complex and difficult for customization.”source ↗
“Would love a CRM with real-time AI insights.”source ↗
“No single CRM can do all you mentioned out of the box.”source ↗
“i have checked clickup, notion and rootcx, but i need more options to compare the features and also the pricing”source ↗
“Foundation Directory was incredible. Operative word: was. They're torched it.”source ↗
“I am looking for a tool that integrates with Salesforce to allow customers to book meetings with our team using a zoom meeting that then integrates to our calendar and enables a round robin distribution of the meetings depending on calendar availability.”source ↗
“We need to store the zoom id and the booking event data so that we can easily reference them together.”source ↗
“I haven’t been able to find a product that does this so far so hoping someone else has some ideas.”source ↗
“I'm more interested in the client tracking. I want to track jobs, but also have a system that reminds me when a client is due for an annual job. Currently just using Outlook calendar to track all work, which works fine for that purpose, but has no way of tracking clients.”source ↗
“An org I support recently went down the rabbit hole of looking for self-hosted ticketing for an IT service desk. Time accounting was a requirement and a deal-breaker with nearly every product they looked at, both free/open-source and commercial.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 17How to understand a confusing legacy software system you inherited
- 3How to find a product online when you don't know the name
- 5How do I find a place to stay that doesn't have hidden review issues?
- 18Should customer support live inside our CRM?
- 3Why can't accountants open Apple Numbers files?
- 3Why does software installation fail on secure systems?