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CRM · Migration guide

Moving from Salesforce to Pipedrive

Reviewed by Switchpoint Editors ·

Why teams switch

The honest reasons

What's wrong with Salesforce

  • Painful for sub-50 teams
  • Requires an admin or partner to run well
  • Sticker price rarely matches the final bill

What Pipedrive does better

  • Simple to learn
  • Affordable

Switching cost

What it actually takes

Contacts, deals, and activities export cleanly. Automations and custom fields rebuild manually. HubSpot, Salesforce, and Close all have official Pipedrive importers — typical migration is 1 week.

Step by step

A safe cutover plan

  1. 1

    Audit

    Inventory every workspace, project, or asset in Salesforce you actually use. Most teams discover 30-40% is dormant.

  2. 2

    Export

    Run Salesforce's official export. Note exactly which fields, relations, or attachments lose fidelity — those are your manual rebuild.

  3. 3

    Rebuild structure in Pipedrive

    Set up Pipedrive skeleton (workspaces, teams, permissions) before importing. Importing into an empty workspace creates a mess.

  4. 4

    Import cleanest layer first

    Bring in the data that maps 1:1. Defer custom fields, automations, and integrations.

  5. 5

    Parallel run for 1-2 weeks

    Keep Salesforce read-only. Anything you find missing in Pipedrive, fix during this window.

  6. 6

    Cut over integrations

    Switch every webhook, Zap, link, and bookmark. This is the longest part — budget for it.

  7. 7

    Archive, don't delete

    Keep Salesforce archived for 90 days. You will need it.

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