Most "best AI sales tools" articles are written by companies selling you one of the tools on the list. You'll notice the company writing the article always ranks itself first, gives competitors a polite paragraph, and then drops a "start your free trial" button.
This isn't that article.
We build 60, which handles post-meeting admin automatically. That means we have opinions about our category, and we'll be upfront about them. But we also use other tools every day for the jobs 60 doesn't do. This guide covers what actually works, what's not worth your money yet, and where to start if you're a small team with a limited budget.
One thing before we start: small teams don't need the same tools as enterprise sales organisations. Most comparison guides assume you have 50 salespeople, a team just for sales operations and a sales training budget. If that's you, go read Gartner. If you're a team of 1 to 10 salespeople trying to sell more without drowning in admin, keep reading.
The 6 Jobs Your Sales Tools Need to Do
Before comparing tools, map your needs to jobs. Every small sales team has these six.
Pick a job to see the one tool we start with.
Job 1: Managing Your Deals
HubSpot CRM
The free customer-tracking system that grows with your team
What it does well
- Genuinely free - contacts, deals, tasks, and email tracking at £0
- Integrates with every other tool on this list out of the box
- Clean enough for a solo founder to set up in an afternoon
Where it falls short
- Free tier reporting is basic; paid tiers get expensive quickly
- Automated steps and email series require Starter ($15/seat) or Professional ($90/seat)
Pricing: Free. Starter from $15/month per seat. Professional from $90/month per seat.
Alt: Pipedrive ($14/month) if you want a simpler, visual view of your deals without the broader marketing tools.
Job 2: Find Prospects
Apollo.io
275M+ contacts, built-in email series, generous free tier
What it does well
- Free tier: 10,000 email credits/month - enough to start prospecting immediately
- Strong filters: role, company size, industry, funding stage, tools they use, signs they are hiring
- Built-in email series mean you don't need a separate tool for reaching out first early on
Where it falls short
- Phone number accuracy is inconsistent, especially outside North America
- The screen feels cluttered when managing several email series at once
- Credit-based pricing means high-volume lookups of contact details get expensive fast on paid tiers
Pricing: Free (10,000 email credits/month). Basic from $49/month. Professional from $79/month.
Alt: Graduate to Clay when you've outgrown Apollo's data sources and need several signs someone is ready to buy, looked up for each contact.
Job 3: Record and Transcribe Meetings
Fireflies.ai
Records, transcribes, and pushes notes directly to your customer records
What it does well
- Free tier: 800 minutes of storage with AI summaries - real value for testing the process
- Pushes summaries and action items directly into HubSpot deal records
- "Ask Fred" lets you query your meetings in natural language ("What did they say about budget?")
Where it falls short
- Transcribes but doesn't act - you still write the follow-up and update your customer records yourself
- The summary is useful for review, not for setting off automatic steps
Pricing: Free (800 min storage). Pro from $10/month per seat. Business from $19/month per seat.
Alt: Fathom or Otter.ai both compete well. Try two, keep the one that fits your meeting platform best.
Job 4: Do Post-Meeting Admin Automatically
60
Turns every meeting into a completed to-do list - without the manual work
What it does well
- Drafts follow-up emails that reference what the buyer actually said in the meeting
- Updates HubSpot deal records automatically from the conversation context
- Creates tasks, notifies Slack, and preps briefings for your next meeting
Where it falls short
- Not a system for tracking customers, a prospecting tool or a call-analysis platform - it does one job
- Earlier-stage than enterprise tools; built for 1-10 salespeople, not 50-person sales floors
Job 5: Look Up and Research Contacts
Clay
Combine 100+ data sources for outreach based on signs someone is ready to buy, that actually gets replies
What it does well
- Depth of contact detail is unmatched - Apollo + LinkedIn + Clearbit + 90+ sources in one table
- Ideal for going after named companies one by one: find the right people at the right time with the right reason
- Extremely powerful once your process is improved and your ideal customer is settled
Where it falls short
- Genuine learning curve - the spreadsheet-style interface takes time to master
- Credit-based pricing burns fast before you've improved the process
- Not a day-1 tool; overkill if you're still defining your ideal customer profile
Pricing: Free tier (limited credits). Starter from $134/month. Explorer from $314/month.
Job 6: Analyse Conversations
Gong
Deep analytics and coaching - for teams that have grown past 8-10 salespeople
What it does well
- Deep analytics from a large base of real sales interactions - pattern recognition no smaller tool can match
- Surfaces which questions lead to closed deals, which competitors get mentioned, which salespeople need coaching
- Forecasting is strong when you have enough deals to show meaningful patterns
Where it falls short
- Expensive: $100-150+/user/month with annual contracts and minimum seat counts
- Primarily intelligence and coaching - it doesn't handle what happens after the call automatically
- Price-to-value ratio only makes sense at 8-10+ salespeople with a coaching-focused manager
Pricing: Custom pricing. Typically $100-150+/user/month, annual contracts required.
Alt: Chorus (now ZoomInfo) if you're already paying for ZoomInfo - it's bundled in.
What each tool costs a month
First paid plan against the next plan up, in dollars as the article prices them. Hover a row of the table to compare.
| Tool | First paid plan | Next plan up |
|---|---|---|
| HubSpot CRM | $15 per seat | $90 per seat |
| Apollo.io | $49 | $79 |
| Fireflies.ai | $10 per seat | $19 per seat |
| Clay | $134 | $314 |
| Gong | $100-150+ per user | Custom pricing |
The Recommended Tools by Stage
Not every team needs every tool. Here's what to prioritise based on where you are.
What would you run at your size?
Slide to your team size. The stages and thresholds are this section’s own.
Solo founder or team of 1-2
Mostly free tiers
Prices and thresholds are the ones printed above: the tools by stage, plus the “skip until you’re bigger” list. Nothing here is a quote.
Solo founder or team of 1-2: HubSpot Free, Apollo Free, Fireflies Free and 60. Mostly free tiers.
A system for tracking customers, a prospecting database, meeting transcription and automated follow-ups, mostly on free tiers.
Growing team of 3-10 salespeople: HubSpot Starter, Apollo Basic, 60 and Clay Starter shared across the team.
Gong enters the conversation once you're past 8-10 salespeople with a dedicated manager coaching the team.
Skip until you're bigger
- Gong: Wait until 10+ salespeople with a coaching-focused manager
- Salesloft / Outreach, Email series for large companies. Overkill below 15 salespeople.
- ZoomInfo: Minimum contracts ~$15K/year. Wait until you need to reach far more people.
- Clari: Revenue forecasting for 20+ salespeople with a lot of deals in progress.
Frequently Asked Questions
What's the cheapest set of AI sales tools for a small team?
HubSpot Free + Apollo Free + Fireflies Free gives you a system for tracking customers, a prospecting database and meeting transcription at zero cost. Add 60 for post-meeting admin done for you and you have a complete AI-assisted sales process, mostly on free tiers.
Do I need a sales copilot or AI assistant?
If your biggest bottleneck is post-meeting admin (slow follow-ups, out-of-date customer records, missed tasks), yes. If your bottleneck is elsewhere (not enough leads, poor call quality, no clear view of your deals), fix that first. The right tool depends on the problem, not the category.
Is Gong worth it for a small team?
Not usually. Gong's value grows with team size. Under 5 salespeople, the coaching and analytics insights don't generate enough data to be actionable. Start with Fireflies for transcription and revisit Gong when your team grows past 8-10.
Should I use one tool that does everything or specialise?
Specialise. All-in-one platforms make compromises in every category. A focused customer-tracking system (HubSpot) + a focused prospecting tool (Apollo) + a focused post-meeting tool (60) will outperform any single platform trying to do all three. How well they connect matters more than having a single tool.
What about AI for cold email outreach?
Tools like Instantly, Lemlist, and Saleshandy handle cold email well. Most small teams should nail their follow-up and keeping track of their deals before reaching out to lots of new people. If you're ready for it, Instantly is a strong starting point.
How do I know if an AI sales tool is worth the cost?
Calculate the time saved per week, multiply by your hourly rate, and compare to the tool's monthly cost. If 60 saves a salesperson 5 hours per week on post-meeting admin, and that salesperson's time is worth £40/hour, that's £800/month in recovered selling time against the tool's monthly cost. Apply the same logic to every tool you consider.
Is it worth the cost?
The article’s own test: time saved per week, times your hourly rate, against the monthly cost.
Recovered selling time, every month£800
Formula: hours saved per week x hourly rate x 4 weeks. The article’s example: 5 hours at £40 an hour is £800 a month.
