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06

 

MICROSOFT DYNAMICS CRM

 SALESFORCE.COM

One-price-for-all Functionality 

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online is offered at one-price-for-all functionality. Partner solutions are an additional cost, but often cost customers significantly less than Salesforce.com and can provide far more value.

Starting at $44/user/month3

High Price and Hidden Charges

Salesforce.com CRM editions are priced at a premium relative to the other vendors in the CRM industry.  In fact, customers should beware of additional charges as terms are negotiated, and they should also know that lower priced editions often do not have needed functionality.

Starting at $125/user/month2 

 

 

99.9% Service Level Agreement (SLA)

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online offers a financially backed, 99.9% uptime SLA.  Microsoft has consistently delivered an extremely high rate of uptime since the service was launched in April 2008, and we’re accountable to customers if the service does not meet SLA standards.

No Service Level Agreement (SLA) 

Salesforce.com does not offer a service level agreement.

SharePoint Sites Interoperability 

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online provides license holders with 5GB of storage (as opposed to the 1GB that Salesforce.com offers), allowing businesses to store much more content directly within the product.  Additionally, Microsoft Dynamics CRM interoperates well with SharePoint, giving businesses a fast and simple way to leverage their existing investments in Microsoft SharePoint.

Limited Content Access 

Salesforce.com offers a content library within its CRM solution, but only users that have Salesforce.com licenses can access its files.  Additionally, Salesforce.com charges approximately two times the extra storage fees compared to Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, making an external file repository, like SharePoint, a necessity for many customers.  And to make things more challenging, Salesforce.com does not have SharePoint integration out of the box.

Orders & Invoice Tracking 

Microsoft Dynamics CRM automates the Quote to Invoice business process and helps reduce clerical errors by sharing product, discount, shipping, taxes, and contract terms with other systems (e.g. ERP).  With Microsoft Dynamics CRM, we’ve made it possible to improve visibility of important information across the business, in turn helping drive sales productivity and improving customer service excellence.

Doesn't Close the Loop 

For all organizations, the customer lifecycle is inextricably linked to other functions across a business, most notably the processes of taking orders and invoicing customers.  Salesforce.com customers who need order and invoice tracking are forced to build both objects and processes themselves, and that all takes time and money.

Strong Offline Productivity 

Microsoft Dynamics CRM can access offline data through Microsoft Outlook.  And Outlook users can keep an entire copy of their CRM information locally on their computer, allowing them to be productive when they’re working without internet connectivity.

 

Incomplete Offline Solution

Salesforce.com allows users to access some CRM data through an offline client with some Salesforce.com editions—for a premium price.  In fact, the lowest list price available with offline access to CRM data is $90/user/month1 – more than double the regular list price ($44/user/month) of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online.

Office Fluent User Interface

Microsoft Outlook users intuitively know how to use Microsoft Dynamics CRM because of its interoperability with, and functionality within, Microsoft Outlook.  As a result, users are able to adopt it more readily and companies quickly capture value from their Microsoft Dynamics CRM deployments.

Counter Intuitive Processes 

Salesforce.com offers a Microsoft Outlook add-on that behaves as a simple synching engine on some, but not all, CRM information.  As a result, Salesforce.com forces redundant activities (e.g. copy, paste) and counterintuitive processes on users, increasing probability of errors and negating productivity gains that could otherwise be accomplished.

Note: The functionality items discussed above are delivered and supported features with the offering, not vendor or third-party provided unsupported add-ons. 

1 Salesforce.com Professional Edition ($65/user/month) + Salesforce.com’s offline client ($25/user/month)
2 Salesforce.com Enterprise Edition (priced at $125/user/month) offers comparable CRM functionality to Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online ($44/user/month).  http://www.salesforce.com/crm/editions-pricing.jsp
3 Note that Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online promotional pricing of $34/user/month is valid through June 30, 2011.

Posted in: CRM

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