--- title: "CRM Future Study 2026: how the industry sees what's coming. | snapAddy" url: https://snapaddy.com/nl/resources/blog/crm-survey-download lang: nl description: "AI in CRM: we asked 183 voices fromm the industry about the future of CRM. Our independent study covers the numbers, scenarios, and quotes, and is free to download." keywords: [voices, industry, coming, findings, glance] category: blog last_modified: 2026-08-03T08:54:48.079Z --- # AI in CRM: 183 voices from the industry on what's coming. [Alle blogposts](https://snapaddy.com/nl/resources/blog.md)Jule Hallmann op 3 augustus 2026 CRM Survey of snapAddy Nine out of ten sales reps still open their CRM's desktop interface, click through forms and required fields, and add notes by hand. How much longer will that last? snapAddy put the question to the industry itself, surveying 183 professionals from user organizations, consultancies, and vendors for its 2026 cross-industry study on the future of CRM. The result surprised even CEO Jochen Seelig, as he writes in the foreword. ## Key findings at a glance: - 183 CRM users, consultants, and vendors were surveyed. On average, they rate the expected magnitude of the change at 8 out of 10. - The change is not just about individual features. It raises the question of whether a CRM in its current form still needs an interface at all. - Of the six future scenarios presented, one comes out clearly ahead: it is considered the most likely and is also the most strongly desired. - The industry's biggest concern is not where you'd expect. Data protection only comes in second. - Small companies are already well ahead of large ones in actual AI usage, partly because their processes are leaner. ## From clicking to conversation. At 89 percent, the classic desktop interface is still clearly number one in day-to-day work. Ask how long that will last, though, and the answers diverge sharply. One form of interaction does surprisingly badly: the classic chatbot inside the CRM. The 2026 study on the future of CRM sets today's usage against expectations and personal preference, and shows what participants would prefer instead and how likely they think it is within five years. ## Where AI actually helps. Right now, day-to-day use is dominated by readily available functions such as automatic call summaries. When it comes to the greatest future value, however, participants clearly put data maintenance and data enrichment first, an area that sees far less use than its expected importance would suggest. The CRM Study 2026 puts the figures side by side and shows just how wide that gap between aspiration and practice really is. That's where the biggest leverage sits, and it's where tools like **[snapAddy DataAgents](https://snapaddy.com/en/products/dataagents.md)** come in: they handle data maintenance automatically in the background, so incomplete or duplicate records never become a sales problem in the first place. ## The co-pilot, not the autopilot. Participants rated six future scenarios, from the more cautious forecast to the radical vision of a CRM that becomes completely invisible. One scenario comes out ahead of all the others so clearly that the statistical tests behind it leave little room for doubt. Jochen Seelig sums up the result in the foreword: "What the industry wants is the co-pilot that supports, not the autopilot that decides alone." The scenario matrix in the study shows how the remaining five score on likelihood and desirability. ## Trust becomes the most important factor. If you assume data protection is the industry's biggest concern about AI in CRM, you're wrong. Something else tops the list, well ahead of every other reservation. Jochen Seelig puts it this way in the foreword: "In a world where AI will soon be able to compute almost anything, the scarcest resource won't be technology. It will be trust." The study's chapter on concerns spells out what role user acceptance and loss of control play, and why user acceptance in particular conceals a surprising tension. ## Small beats big. Actual AI maturity divides sharply along company size, and not in the direction most people would expect. Smaller companies already use AI in their CRM noticeably more often and more deliberately than large corporations, and leaner processes and faster decision-making are part of the reason why. The breakdown by company size in the CRM Study 2026 shows how wide that gap actually is. That's just a glimpse of 183 responses. All the charts, the full scenario assessment, and the participants' own voices are in the study on the future of CRM (2026). Curious about the full numbers, scenarios, and quotes? The study on the future of CRM (2026) is free to download. * * * ## Download the CRM study. Download the CRM Study 2026 for free to see all the results.