Microsoft Dynamics CRM holds a prominent place in the “leaders” quadrant due to its many strengths including its global reach and language availability, the user interface compatibility with Microsoft Outlook, the ability to create custom interfaces, the multitenant architecture, the vast partner network, and the integration with the Microsoft stack.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online was assessed as an individual product for the first time this year and was placed in the “visionaries” category.  In addition to all of the strengths of Microsoft Dynamics CRM, which it shares, the cloud deployment combines proven and committed service levels, flexible contracts and a low price ($44 per user per month at time of writing).

Sage SalesLogix was given a spot in the “challengers” segment.  It addresses the needs of sales professionals by leveraging its strengths including its choice of on-premise or cloud deployment methods, advanced mobility options, adaptability for varying deployment sizes, and proven customer support strategy.

SageCRM held onto its previous position in the “niche” quadrant due to its strong integration focus with Sage ERP solutions, providing an affordable end-to-end business management solution with effective opportunity management and an impressive vision for enhanced mobility.

Sage ACT! serves an important “niche” in the SFA market by providing an easy to use, inexpensive contact management system that is widely used by salespeople.

To help you decide which of these sales force automation solutions is the right fit for your organization, request a free business strategy assessment today!

Communicate more effectively with…

• Rapidly executed email campaigns leveraging a new 3-step e-marketing wizard
• 90+ eye-catching email templates
• Email statistic tracking including open, click-through, and bounce rates
• Seamless campaign management for social media
• Simple synchronization between Sage CRM and MS Exchange
• Bi-directional updates to appointments, tasks, and contacts

Collaborate internally better with…

• Consistent execution of campaigns through cloning
• Marketing workflows that leverage best-practices and enable consistency
• E-marketing templates that are shared across teams for maximum re-use
• Document storage and sharing capabilities
• Alerts when budgets are over-run

Compete in today’s marketplace with…

• Interactive dashboards that enable better business and priority management
• Flexible gadgets and real-time data drill down to show you what you need to see when you need to see it
• Company dashboards pre-built and available right out-of-the-box
• Visual charts that make an impact
• KPIs available at a glance for easy analysis that leads to better business management

Learn more about the latest version of Sage CRM then contact us to schedule your upgrade!

Oracle’s Siebel CRM

Sales Force Automation – Also positioned in the leader’s quadrant, this solution ranked just below Dynamics CRM for its ability to execute its vision but had a more advanced “completeness of vision”.

Customer Service – While both Forrester Research and Gartner agree that this solution offers stronger functionality for customer services organizations than Dynamics CRM, Gartner ranks them Oracle slightly ahead of Microsoft when it comes to the product vision whereas Forrester puts Oracle’s strategy significantly behind Microsoft’s.

For Midsized Organizations – This product is only considered a “strong performer” for this market, far behind the overall market leader, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, because it does have strong functionality that fits midsized business needs, it is too expensive to deploy in organizations this size.

For Large Organizations – While Oracle’s Siebel CRM narrowly beat out Microsoft’s current offer usability, Dynamics CRM’s strategy was determined to be significantly better suited for large organizations than Oracle’s.

Oracle CRM On Demand

Sales Force Automation – Also fell below Microsoft’s overall product strength but has a more innovative sales force automation strategy than Dynamics CRM.

Customer Service – Forrester indicated that Oracle CRM On Demand is on pace with Microsoft’s strategy, but far below them in terms of current product functionality.

For Midsized Organizations – As an affordable SaaS solution, this solution was close behind Dynamics CRM and the only Oracle owned CRM product that was deemed a “leader” in this market segment.

For Large Organizations – While it lagged behind Microsoft in both current product offerings and future product strategy, it did beat out its Seibel counterpart in terms of strategy.

Oracle E-Business Suite CRM and Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise CRM

Customer Service – Forrester ranked both products in their “strong performers” category, well behind Microsoft Dynamics CRM, while Gartner placed the E-Business Suite in their “niche players” quadrant, giving them the lowest ranking on “completeness of vision” of any product included in their study.

For Midsized or Large Organizations – In both categories, both solutions were deemed “strong performers” but only for organizations already leveraging the corresponding ERP suites.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Sales Force Automation – Dynamics CRM was deemed to have a stronger overall product, more viable strategy, more competitive pricing, and more satisfied customers than any of the Oracle CRM products.  However, it fell slightly short of Oracle in “completeness of vision”, although this study was published before full details about the then forthcoming release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 were available.

Customer Service – While a solid leader in this market segment with one of the most competitive product strategies for customer service functions; Dynamics CRM’s product capabilities do not match those of Oracle’s Siebel CRM.

For Midsized Organizations – Microsoft Dynamics CRM and its SaaS version, Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online were the obvious, overall leaders in all areas, thanks to their advanced functionality while retaining an ease of use, rapid deployment and time-to-value, competitive pricing structure, native integration with Microsoft Outlook and inter-operability within the Microsoft stack.

For Large Organizations – While not the most functionally advanced solution for large organizations, Dynamics CRM’s product strategy far out-paces the Oracle solutions for businesses this size.

View each of these Forrester Wave and Gartner Magic Quadrants to read the complete analyst reports on these products and how they address these market segments.

If you currently use an Oracle CRM product and are considering  making the switch to Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, do so before June 30, 2011 to pay only $34 per user per month and also receive a $200 per user pay-out for each Dynamics CRM Online user purchased (regardless of how many Oracle user licenses you own).

• Integration with other Microsoft Office products that you use every day
• Operating environment being within Outlook
• Ability to streamline data so that individual users see the information most relevant to them through the role-based views
• Easily personalized, Office-like user interface

All of these characteristics combine to make Microsoft Dynamics CRM the most usable CRM solution on the market today, according to a recent independent study by Nucleus Research. 

Nucleus identified Microsoft Dynamics CRM and SalesForce.com as the two industry leaders in their Technology Value Matrix for CRM, which assesses a solution’s usability and functionality. 

According to the Matrix and the accompanying research note, both of these leading software solutions have extensive, insightful, and well balanced functionality across their sales, marketing, and customer service capabilities as well as being suited to support a global customer base.  However, since functionality means nothing unless the product is used, the ability for people to easily use an intuitive system is incredibly important – and that is where Dynamics CRM outshines SalesForce.com.

Get started using Microsoft Dynamics CRM for your own business today with a 30-Day Free Trial!

The price of CRM software is typically determined on a per user license basis plus an annual software maintenance fee.  With an on-premise deployment, there are up-front server costs to consider as well.  For a hosted, or cloud CRM solution, the price is usually based on a per user per month fee.  If a CRM software company offers tiered packages, with variable functionality from package to package, they will reflect the difference in their per user pricing.

Microsoft includes all of their CRM functionality in a single package so that they can offer a single, standard price for a solution that can help you streamline and enhance communication and processes across your organization.  The standard pricing for Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online is $44 per user per month.  Now through June 30, 2011, new purchases of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online are only $34 per user per month for the first year of service.

But how does that compare with other market-leading CRM products like it?

The short answer is that the cost of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online is very competitive!  Companies save an average of 32%, or $21 per user per month by choosing Microsoft CRM Online over SalesForce.com.

To find out exactly how much you would spend on Dynamics CRM versus SalesForce.com or Oracle, Microsoft has created a cloud CRM price comparison tool that you can work with commitment free today!

If you are currently using SalesForce.com or Oracle and considering making a switch, you can receive a $200 per user pay out for every Microsoft Dynamics CRM user you purchase before June 30, 2011.  Contact us to take advantage of this offer before time runs out.

• How much will it cost?
• What kind of return on investment can we expect?
• What is the total cost of ownership?
• How much will it save us over time?
• And more…

As with any business purchase, what you put into and what you get out of a CRM software purchase depends largely on your organizational needs and processes.  However, Forrester Research has provided a way for you to get an idea of the costs and expected financial results from implementing Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011.

In order to complete “The Total Economic Impact of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011” report, Forrester interviewed several companies implementing the new release of Dynamics CRM and conducting their own financial analysis on the information.  They then applied their research to a composite company and determined that an organization similar to their composite could anticipate:

• A ROI of 243%
• A payback period of only 4.1 months
• A three-year NPV of $665,086 (risk-adjusted net benefits)

In addition, they were able to quantify on a benefit-by-benefit basis the extent to which Microsoft Dynamics CRM delivers productivity gains and cost savings through both people and processes.  Throughout their findings, Forrester demonstrates how Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 can provide your organization with a solution that simplifies your processes and makes you more agile, all while delivering a great value.

For an in-depth look at this research and analysis, download “The Total Economic Impact of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011” report here.

But mobile CRM isn’t just about “gee whiz” technology.  By improving convenience and access to CRM data, you’ll also improve user adoption which is critically important to a successful CRM strategy.  Simply put, your mobile employees will actually use and benefit from CRM and not view it as an unnecessary administrative burden.

Introducing SalesLogix Mobile
Sage SalesLogix Mobile extends CRM to your mobile device delivering up-to-the-minute customer data through the convenience of wireless connectivity.  And we’re not talking about a watered-down “light” version of Sage SalesLogix CRM … it’s full-featured with all the functions you’d see if you were sitting in front of a PC in the office.  SalesLogix Mobile maintains the same look and feel of the desktop version which shortens the “mobile learning curve” and increases user adoption.

Stick Sage SalesLogix CRM in Your Pocket
Sage SalesLogix Mobile allows you to view, edit, and add contact and account details, take notes, schedule meetings, and update opportunities.  Having CRM in your pocket improves the quality, timeliness, and perhaps most importantly, accuracy of CRM data.  No more customer data on Yellow lined notepads or chicken scratch on the back of a napkin that may not make it to your CRM system.  Even during a meeting, you can discretely pull out your mobile device, enter notes and schedule follow up meetings and to-do’s right on the spot which ensures timely and accurate follow up.

Another important aspect of mobile CRM is that large sets of data can be stored locally on your device.  Whether you’re in a meeting, on a plane, or in the middle of a cornfield in Iowa, you remain productive and can perform all CRM functions without having to connect and reconnect to exchange data with the server.

The Technical Stuff
It’s next to impossible to standardize on a single platform as different devices will appeal to different users.  That’s why SalesLogix Mobile Offers support for today’s leading mobile devices including BlackBerry®, Windows Mobile Smartphone®, and Pocket PC®.

Clearly, security is a key consideration when you’ve got sensitive CRM data on mobile devices.  To address these concerns, SalesLogix Mobile supports the security services provided by RIM and Microsoft to ensure that data is securely transferred and stored on your mobile device.  In addition, data encryption and password protection are supported.

Extending CRM to mobile devices is quickly becoming a necessity and not an option if you want to remain efficient and competitive.  Read more about the benefits of mobile CRM in this white paper: “Mobile CRM:  Harness the Competitive Advantage of Your Mobile Workforce through Sage SalesLogix Mobile”

Marketing
For many businesses, customer relationships are considerably more profitable after the initial sale.  Implementing marketing programs aimed at current customers can be an important advantage in building customer loyalty and mutually beneficial relationships.

SageCRM Marketing empowers your marketing team with tools to plan, execute, and evaluate the performance of targeted marketing campaigns.  You can segregate campaigns aimed at new business vs. those that are targeted to existing customers as well as track and measure every phase of a given campaign.  SageCRM Marketing also allows you to build a detailed profile of your customers over the course of your relationship to ensure that marketing communication is highly relevant.  With the right information, your marketing team make can design effective promotions based on a customer’s previous purchases, product preferences, and other important characteristics of your relationship.

Customer Care
Sales and marketing bring new customers to your business, but your Customer Service department keeps them with you for the long haul.  SageCRM Customer Care provides your customer service personnel with fast access to service requests, call and escalation history, recent customer communications, support cases, email communication,  documents sent and received, and much more.  Plus, all service and support activities are captured in SageCRM so that you start to build a knowledgebase of common issues and resolutions.  Your service reps can then use that knowledgebase to quickly resolve common challenges.

Whether you sell products that require technical support or offer service agreements that continue well beyond the initial sale, SageCRM Customer Care provides the tools you need to manage resources, quickly resolve issues, track customer requests, provide high quality service, and build long-lasting and loyal relationships.  And with all of that information at their fingertips, your customer service reps will have a better opportunity to cross-sell complementary products and services.

Mobile Access
If you have service personnel that work in the field, then all that great customer information stored in SageCRM is rendered useless unless you can provide access to your field personnel.  That’s where SageCRM Mobile Solutions comes in.  Using a PDA, your field service reps have real-time access to customer contact information, account history, and can schedule follow up activities and appointments.  Or you can use the web to access the same features … even if you’re not connected, you can work offline and synchronize with the SageCRM database later.

By enabling sales and service personnel to securely access SageCRM using the web or mobile device, you’ll ensure they have information available to resolve customer issues quickly, place orders efficiently, and keep customers happy.

Try SageCRM free for 30 days!

What’s New in SageCRM v7.0?

A Quick Look in the Clouds Reveals Clear Benefits

The term “cloud” is used as a metaphor for the internet and involves delivering business applications that are hosted online.  That way, you don’t have to worry about managing the infrastructure, hardware, and other technology that supports those applications.  As such, the primary objective of cloud computing is to shift the burden of computer hardware support and IT service to the service provider (in this case, Sage and Amazon) thus reducing your ongoing support costs.

A deployment model that has gained popularity as an option “in the cloud” is Software as a Service, or SaaS.  The SaaS model offers a variety of nice benefits including rapid implementation, lower up front costs (instead of buying software, you’re renting it), and relatively pain-free upgrades (which are handled by your SaaS service provider).  However as SaaS matured, customers discovered a few of the common drawbacks which include disputes over data ownership (if you decide to migrate to another product), limited ability to customize the software (because you don’t actually own it), and overall lack of control (security, ownership, etc).

Introducing The Best of Both Worlds

SaaS or On-Premise CRM? … the debate rages on.  But why choose when you don’t have to?  Sage SalesLogix Cloud offers the best of both worlds with full ownership and control of your CRM software and data, hosted online access 24 x 7, flexible subscription options to keep capital expenditures down, and complete hardware and infrastructure support from Amazon – a world-class technology provider.  Let’s take a look at just a few of the many benefits:

Data Ownership & Upgrade Control – you retain ownership of all your SalesLogix CRM data and processes, for peace of mind.  Plus, you choose when to upgrade to the latest version rather than having to adhere to your SaaS provider’s schedule.

Integration & Deployment Flexibility - Sage SalesLogix Cloud is built on a standards-based platform allowing you to integrate with your other business management solutions.  Plus you’ll get your data back in a standardized, usable format should your needs change and you decide to bring SalesLogix in-house for an on-premise implementation.

Buying Options – you can choose from a variety of payment, subscription, and traditional license options giving you the flexibility to use SalesLogix CRM in a way that fits your financial goals.

Test drive the Sage SalesLogix Cloud today with a 30-Day Free Trial

• Rapid access to specific customer information can help differentiate a company’s products or services in the minds of potential buyers.
• Investments in new tools and services need to focus on the underlying issues rather than the symptoms to be truly effective in increasing productivity.
• Sales tools need to reduce time spent on administrative tasks and give sales people more time to focus on selling.
• Involving senior management and consulting with key employees are critical factors to the success of productivity enhancing initiatives. 

Read the complete research report: “The Empowered Sales Team: Enhancing productivity through the better use of information”

Implementing the right CRM solution can help your organization accomplish all four of these keys to enhancing sales productivity.