OpenCRM Zapier integrationAutomate OpenCRM with Zapier.
The OpenCRM Zapier integration gives you 0 triggers, 5 actions and 0 searches. Another app starts the Zap, then Zapier creates or updates a lead, a contact, a company, an opportunity or an activity inside your OpenCRM account.
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What the OpenCRM Zapier integration actually does
OpenCRM is a UK CRM that covers sales, customers, contacts, finances and projects. The integration lets Zapier, the tool that chains apps together, write into it: each of the five actions creates a record, or updates it when it already exists, from whatever happens in another app.
Leads that skip the copy and paste. New/Update Lead turns each website form entry into a lead in OpenCRM, so sales start from the CRM rather than from an inbox.
Accounts built from your other tools. New/Update Company and New/Update Contact keep the people and businesses you sign up in a billing or booking app in step with the CRM.
A pipeline and a history that fill in. New/Update Opportunity opens a deal when a quote request arrives, and New/Update Activity logs in OpenCRM a call, a meeting or an email that happened in another tool, so nobody retypes it afterwards.
What Zapier does not do here. Nothing that happens in OpenCRM can start a Zap: the app has no trigger, so a new lead or a won deal in the CRM cannot notify another tool. There is no search either, and no action deletes anything. Every Zap begins in another app and ends in OpenCRM.
Comparing tools before you build? See n8n vs Zapier and Make vs Zapier.
Zapier vocabulary in one minute
Eight words come back on every Zapier screen. Here is what each one means when OpenCRM is the last step.
- Zap
- The automation you build in Zapier: one trigger, then one or more actions that run each time the trigger event happens.
- Trigger
- The event that starts the Zap. OpenCRM has none, so it always comes from another app, such as a form, a shop or a calendar.
- Action
- What the Zap does once started. Here, each of the five actions creates or updates one record in OpenCRM.
- Task
- The unit Zapier bills: one action your Zap completes successfully. One lead written to OpenCRM is one task.
- Polling vs instant
- A polling trigger is checked by Zapier on a timer. An instant trigger is reported by its app the moment the event happens.
- Filter
- A step that lets the Zap go on only when what arrived meets the condition you set, and stops it otherwise.
- Search step
- A step that looks up something already stored in an app so later steps can reuse it. OpenCRM offers none.
- Connection
- Your OpenCRM account, linked to Zapier once, then reused by every action that writes to it.
What it really costs in tasks
OpenCRM is not a premium app, so it works on the free plan. Your bill is the number of records written, not the number of times Zapier looks.
- Trigger0 tasks
- Each record written1 task
- Free plan100 tasks a month
- Free plan Zap size2 steps
The trigger, in whichever app starts the Zap, never costs a task, and Zapier checking for new items costs nothing either. Each OpenCRM action that succeeds counts once; one that fails is not counted. The free plan gives 100 tasks a month and unlimited Zaps, each stopped at two steps: one trigger, one action. Writing a contact and then an activity, or adding a filter, makes it a multi-step Zap (anything beyond a trigger plus one action), which needs a paid plan. The interval grid below applies to the starting app when its trigger is a polling one.
Connect OpenCRM to Zapier in three steps
- 01
Open Apps and add a connection
In your Zapier account, open the Apps page and click + Add connection. You need an OpenCRM account, plus read or write access to any records you do not own yourself but want the Zap to create or update.
- 02
Pick OpenCRM
Type OpenCRM in the search box of the dialog, select it, then click Add connection. A new tab opens on the OpenCRM side so you can sign in with your usual login.
- 03
Sign in and grant access
Sign in to OpenCRM in that tab and grant Zapier access to the account. The connection is saved, then reused by all five actions in every Zap you build.
Your first Zap: each form entry as a lead, with a heads-up for sales
GoalCreate a lead in OpenCRM for every new form entry and tell the sales channel about it.
- 01
Set the trigger in your form
Start a new Zap, pick Typeform and the New Entry event, connect the account and test it. Zapier brings back the three most recent entries so you can map a real one.
- 02
Add the OpenCRM lead
Add OpenCRM as the action with New/Update Lead, choose your OpenCRM connection, and map the answers of the form into the lead.
- 03
Test the lead
Test the step once and read what came back before going further. Then open OpenCRM and check that the lead looks the way your sales team expects it.
- 04
Add the sales message
Add Slack as a second action and write the message from the same entry. The second action makes the Zap multi-step, so it needs a paid plan; on Free, keep only the lead.
- 05
Publish
Publish the Zap to switch it on. Entries received before that moment are not sent to OpenCRM, and each new one costs two tasks when both actions succeed.
The 5 OpenCRM actions
OpenCRM gives you 5 actions. For each one: what it does for you, when to reach for it, and what to watch out for.
New/Update Activity
ActionIn Zapier“Create or update an Activity in your OpenCRM system.”
Logs an activity in OpenCRM, or updates one already there, so the history of a customer includes what happened in your other tools.
New/Update Company
ActionIn Zapier“Create or update a new company in your OpenCRM system.”
Adds an organisation to OpenCRM, or refreshes it if it already exists, so contacts and opportunities have an account to sit under.
New/Update Contact
ActionIn Zapier“Create or update a Contact in your OpenCRM system.”
Creates a person in OpenCRM, or brings an existing one up to date, from the details another app passes in.
New/Update Lead
ActionIn Zapier“Create or update a Lead in your OpenCRM system.”
Writes a lead into OpenCRM, or updates it when the lead is already there. It is the usual landing spot for anyone who has shown interest but is not a customer yet.
New/Update Opportunity
ActionIn Zapier“Create or update an Opportunity in your OpenCRM system.”
Opens a deal in OpenCRM, or updates one that is already in the pipeline, from an event in another tool.
When it breaks
Zapier attaches no help article to OpenCRM, and no rate limit for the app is documented. What can go wrong comes from how Zapier works in general.
Four cases are worth knowing before the first record reaches the CRM. If a Zap still misbehaves after that, see Zapier troubleshooting.
Past entries never reach the CRM
A Zap only reacts to what happens after it is switched on. Leads, customers and meetings already in your other tools are not sent; bringing that backlog in is a separate job.A bulk import can be held back
When a huge batch lands in the starting app at once, after an import or a migration, Zapier's flood protection can hold it back instead of writing each record to OpenCRM.The second record on a free plan
The free plan stops a Zap at one trigger and one action. Writing a company and its contact, or a lead and an activity, needs two actions and so a paid plan.Several actions, several tasks
Each OpenCRM action that succeeds is counted on its own. A Zap that writes three records per event uses three times more tasks than one that writes a single record.
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