Wrike

It's flexible and there are multiple ways to look at projects/task depending on how users like to see things. For example as a list, Gantt chart, table or Boards which is really handy as we have designers and programmers who work very differently.

The decision to go with Wrike was also skewed by the ability to have external collaborators join the team.

The ability to add custom fields makes it easy to add information required.

Different views enable tasks to be seen by project, person, folder etc.

Being able to track time on each task is also really useful and easy for everyone.

New features are being rolled out frequently and Wrike is fast catching up on the areas I thought were lacking initially.

The flexibility and customisation makes it a bit confusing to start with, and I also found that the initial set up we had was not optimal. This was the first time we used a Project Management system to this extent, so this may be more of a user error issue.

The "CRM" workaround I don't think is worth the trouble.

The pricing model is the one that I think lets Wrike down the most. I understand the reason for a minimum of 5 seats, but every increment after this is in 5 seats as well. For a small business, this is a real issue in my view. This is also the case for additional features, many of which are only used by Admin, but are invoiced for each seat.

The ease of use, the UX is quite good and you can start using it without having to go trough some long training.

They upped their pricing considerably, but this was couple of years back they might have made it to be more affordable again, it's been a while since I used it.