Earlier Salesforce CRM was very similar to any other CRM software. After its acquisition of RelatelQ (now its salesforceIQ) it becomes modern CRM tool with almost all features which has put salesforce into direct competition to Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Oracle and SAP CRM and it leads in the CRM market across globe.
What I like most about Salesforce CRM
- I like its unique integration with Google adwords which helps in lead tracking and calculate ROI at micro level for adwords in much better way.
- Salesforce.com provides an integration component for Microsoft Outlook called Salesforce for Outlook where you can directly sync all your email data.
- The offline edition keeps SFA users connected to their account even when they’re not connected to the Internet.
- In combination with Salesfroce automation, it’s most powerful marketing tool and its feature like digital prospect tracking, lead scoring, progressive profiling, nurture campaigns and marketing analytics make it unique tool.
Industry it serves
Salesforce vertical market solutions are available for communications, financial services, healthcare and life sciences, high tech, manufacturing, media, government and retail industries
Pricing
Salesforce.com pricing is based on per user per month subscription model and it starts from $5 and goes upto $250 based on type of CRM in combination with add on.
Strength
- The most recent CRM market share analysis report shows Salesforce as the clear market leader in neck to neck competition with Microsoft Dynamic CRM.
- Combination of Salesforce1, Force.com, PaaS tools and AppExchange lead the cloud CRM industry in terms of CRM integration, software customization, third party extensibility and ecosystem.
Weakness
- Its primary competitors such as Oracle, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, SAP CRM, SugarCRM and others offer both choice in deployment (on-premise, on-demand or a hybrid combination) as well as choice in cloud platform (vendor cloud, private cloud or public cloud), Salesforce.com does not support public clouds (i.e. Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure, Rackspace, etc.) which limits hosting options, prevents portability, threatens IT investment.
- The Salesforce customer base is predominantly B2B. The CRM software is not well oriented to the B2C industry.
- Unlike competitors such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Salesforce does not permit users to have multiple roles. This can cause both security management and user experience challenges for companies with multiple lines of business or geographies accessing the same CRM system.
Deployment
Salesforce offers professional services depends on business partners for the vast majority of CRM implementation projects. Salesforce.com business partner programs fall into the two broad categories of ISVs and consulting partners. Most consulting partners are then categorized into Registered, Select or Premier programs. Premier partners (Accenture, Deloitte) and global system integrators (Capgemini, Fujitsu, Hitachi Data Systems, HCL, IBM, Infosys, Wipro) generally assist with larger or more complex implementations.