Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 Lotus Notes Domino Connector ? Overview For Consultant

We have reworked the original material, dedicated to Microsoft CRM 1.2 and first version of the Connector, now we are very close to make it work with Lotus Calendar events and support Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0.

Microsoft Business Solutions CRM and IBM Lotus Notes Domino, being two groupware products from competing software development leaders, however could coexist within one organization computer network and even work together in collaboration. There maybe multiple reason why corporation would use both products: licensing, commitment to IBM Lotus Notes as legacy product, risk balancing ? staking on both Microsoft and Java/EJB/J2EE platforms, deploying Lotus advanced workflow to automate document management, etc. The need to synchronize MS CRM and Lotus Notes Domino databases is dictated by the ERP market and the connector is available. In this small article we?ll answer on the frequently asked questions.

? Messaging. Can MS CRM use Lotus Domino instead of Microsoft Exchange? Yes. MS CRM Lotus Domino connector allows you send messages from MS CRM objects: Lead, Account, Contact and all the future object, including Sales and Service modules

? Outgoing Messaging. When Microsoft CRM send email from Account, Contact, Lead ? connector takes control over and sends email through Lotus Domino server. It has Java Agent at the Lotus side and MS CRM SDK custom piece at the MS CRM side. If you compare outgoing messaging with standard MS CRM Exchange connector, then mechanism is slightly different. Microsoft CRM Exchange connector places GUID in the message header and uses this GUID to identify the object in the responding email to push it back to CRM and attach. MS CRM Lotus connector doesn?t use GUID ? instead it scans MS CRM objects (Accounts, Contacts, Leads) in smart cached way

? Incoming Messages. When Lotus Domino server receives email ? Java Agent side of the connector triggers checking with MS CRM if addressor email matches with any Contact, Lead or Account email. In the case of the match ? email is transferred into MS CRM in the form of activity of email type. Again ? please note that connector doesn?t use GUID mechanism. We found that matching is better approach and we have Microsoft CRM Exchange advanced connector ? which works with matching, without standard GUID mechanism.

? Microsoft CRM & Lotus Notes Events synchronization. Future version of the connector will synchronize MS CRM and Lotus Notes objects: Calendar, Appointment, Fax, Phone Call, etc. Please, note that Lotus has different objects ? we have the matching table, please check with us.

? Lotus & MS CRM Versions. Lotus should be version 6.0 or higher. The reason for this is simple ? version 6.0 supports Java Agent technology. MS CRM should be 1.2 or 3.0. Lotus could work in multiple hardware & OS platforms, such as Windows Server, AS/400, etc.

? Product Pricing. It is US$3k basic pack, including 30 users and then $75 each additional user. In Europe price is proportional in Euro.

? Support. Product is installed Worldwide and supported in Europe from German office, in the USA and Canada from Houston and Chicago, in South America, Africa, Australia, Asia, New Zealand from office in Sao Paulo Brazil.

Andrew is Great Plains specialist in Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.enterlogix.com.br http://www.greatplains.com.mx ) ? Microsoft Great Plains, Navision, Microsoft CRM Partner, serving clients in California, Minnesota, Illinois, Washington, Florida, Arizona, Texas.

Microsoft Dynamics AX-GP-NAV-CRM: Trends and International Recommendations

Microsoft Dynamics project ? or formerly referred as Project Green should unify and modulate all Microsoft Business Solutions ERP applications: Microsoft Great Plains/Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Navision (former Attain) Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft (Navision) Axapta/Microsoft Dynamics AX. The challenge of unification probably will result in quality change for the unified interface, such as Web/Business portal/Microsoft Outlook & MS Office integration, Deployment of new technologies, such as Microsoft Sharepoint with workflow automation. Plus the development platform for Microsoft Dynamics products should shift from proprietary tools, such as Microsoft Dexterity, C/SIDE, MorphX (no confirmation for Axapta yet ? but we guess it should follow) to C# and VB.Net with VisualStudio. In this small article we will try to orient IT managers in Microsoft Business Solutions MRP products selection for international and regional markets.

? Microsoft Dynamics GP. The regional markets for Great Plains 9.0 and following Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 version will narrow: United States, United Kingdom, Canada: both English and French speaking, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and other English speaking countries in Asia, Africa and Worldwide, plus Spanish Speaking Latin America. Microsoft Dynamics GP 10 will not be available for Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland ? the last version localized for these European countries will be 9.0 ? June 2006

? Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Currently Navision has very good presence in Europe, including East Europe: Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Slovakia. Microsoft also localized Navision for new markets, where it just moved in: Brazil for example ? it was interesting development in Brazil ? first Microsoft probed Solomon, then Microsoft Great Plains 7.5 and in 2004 replaced it with localized Navision

? Microsoft Dynamics AX. Microsoft Axapta, opposite to Navision or Great Plains where market shares are gained/divided and competition is based on renovations and product improvements, Axapta has great potential yet to be deployed, coming from its modern and very futuristic system design and architecture. Being targeted to upper mid-market and corporate clients Axapta shows very good progress on emerging markets: in Russia for example the number of Axapta installation is similar and comparable with the number of Navision installations. Plus, in 2005 large number of Microsoft Business Solutions gold certified partners rushed into Axapta consulting arena ? this is seen in the USA, UK, Australia and continental Europe. In Brazil currently MBS in local Portuguese Axapta launching mode ? localized for Brazilian tax code

? Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Is planned as front CRM solution for the majority of Microsoft Dynamics ERP system: integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP is available for GP 7.5, 8.0, 9.0 and CRM 1.2 and 3.0, Microsoft Navision ? through third party integrations, Axapta integration is planned. Microsoft has Microsoft CRM as worldwide product, so you should not have any doubts regarding your regional market.

? Competition. Oracle is on the way with Oracle Fusion project, aiming on Oracle Financials/Applications/E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards and potentially Siebel integration. SAP with the purchase of new mid and small market ERP: SAP Business One and Mendocino ? for SAP R/3 is catching up

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx http://www.enterlogix.com.br ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner. Please do not hesitate to call or email us: USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918 help@albaspectrum.com

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 Lotus Notes Domino Connector ? Overview For Consultant

We have reworked the original material, dedicated to Microsoft CRM 1.2 and first version of the Connector, now we are very close to make it work with Lotus Calendar events and support Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0.

Microsoft Business Solutions CRM and IBM Lotus Notes Domino, being two groupware products from competing software development leaders, however could coexist within one organization computer network and even work together in collaboration. There maybe multiple reason why corporation would use both products: licensing, commitment to IBM Lotus Notes as legacy product, risk balancing ? staking on both Microsoft and Java/EJB/J2EE platforms, deploying Lotus advanced workflow to automate document management, etc. The need to synchronize MS CRM and Lotus Notes Domino databases is dictated by the ERP market and the connector is available. In this small article we?ll answer on the frequently asked questions.

? Messaging. Can MS CRM use Lotus Domino instead of Microsoft Exchange? Yes. MS CRM Lotus Domino connector allows you send messages from MS CRM objects: Lead, Account, Contact and all the future object, including Sales and Service modules

? Outgoing Messaging. When Microsoft CRM send email from Account, Contact, Lead ? connector takes control over and sends email through Lotus Domino server. It has Java Agent at the Lotus side and MS CRM SDK custom piece at the MS CRM side. If you compare outgoing messaging with standard MS CRM Exchange connector, then mechanism is slightly different. Microsoft CRM Exchange connector places GUID in the message header and uses this GUID to identify the object in the responding email to push it back to CRM and attach. MS CRM Lotus connector doesn?t use GUID ? instead it scans MS CRM objects (Accounts, Contacts, Leads) in smart cached way

? Incoming Messages. When Lotus Domino server receives email ? Java Agent side of the connector triggers checking with MS CRM if addressor email matches with any Contact, Lead or Account email. In the case of the match ? email is transferred into MS CRM in the form of activity of email type. Again ? please note that connector doesn?t use GUID mechanism. We found that matching is better approach and we have Microsoft CRM Exchange advanced connector ? which works with matching, without standard GUID mechanism.

? Microsoft CRM & Lotus Notes Events synchronization. Future version of the connector will synchronize MS CRM and Lotus Notes objects: Calendar, Appointment, Fax, Phone Call, etc. Please, note that Lotus has different objects ? we have the matching table, please check with us.

? Lotus & MS CRM Versions. Lotus should be version 6.0 or higher. The reason for this is simple ? version 6.0 supports Java Agent technology. MS CRM should be 1.2 or 3.0. Lotus could work in multiple hardware & OS platforms, such as Windows Server, AS/400, etc.

? Product Pricing. It is US$3k basic pack, including 30 users and then $75 each additional user. In Europe price is proportional in Euro.

? Support. Product is installed Worldwide and supported in Europe from German office, in the USA and Canada from Houston and Chicago, in South America, Africa, Australia, Asia, New Zealand from office in Sao Paulo Brazil.

Andrew is Great Plains specialist in Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.enterlogix.com.br http://www.greatplains.com.mx ) ? Microsoft Great Plains, Navision, Microsoft CRM Partner, serving clients in California, Minnesota, Illinois, Washington, Florida, Arizona, Texas

Microsoft Dynamics AX-GP-NAV-CRM: Trends and International Recommendations

Microsoft Dynamics project ? or formerly referred as Project Green should unify and modulate all Microsoft Business Solutions ERP applications: Microsoft Great Plains/Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Navision (former Attain) Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft (Navision) Axapta/Microsoft Dynamics AX. The challenge of unification probably will result in quality change for the unified interface, such as Web/Business portal/Microsoft Outlook & MS Office integration, Deployment of new technologies, such as Microsoft Sharepoint with workflow automation. Plus the development platform for Microsoft Dynamics products should shift from proprietary tools, such as Microsoft Dexterity, C/SIDE, MorphX (no confirmation for Axapta yet ? but we guess it should follow) to C# and VB.Net with VisualStudio. In this small article we will try to orient IT managers in Microsoft Business Solutions MRP products selection for international and regional markets.

? Microsoft Dynamics GP. The regional markets for Great Plains 9.0 and following Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 version will narrow: United States, United Kingdom, Canada: both English and French speaking, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and other English speaking countries in Asia, Africa and Worldwide, plus Spanish Speaking Latin America. Microsoft Dynamics GP 10 will not be available for Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland ? the last version localized for these European countries will be 9.0 ? June 2006

? Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Currently Navision has very good presence in Europe, including East Europe: Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Slovakia. Microsoft also localized Navision for new markets, where it just moved in: Brazil for example ? it was interesting development in Brazil ? first Microsoft probed Solomon, then Microsoft Great Plains 7.5 and in 2004 replaced it with localized Navision

? Microsoft Dynamics AX. Microsoft Axapta, opposite to Navision or Great Plains where market shares are gained/divided and competition is based on renovations and product improvements, Axapta has great potential yet to be deployed, coming from its modern and very futuristic system design and architecture. Being targeted to upper mid-market and corporate clients Axapta shows very good progress on emerging markets: in Russia for example the number of Axapta installation is similar and comparable with the number of Navision installations. Plus, in 2005 large number of Microsoft Business Solutions gold certified partners rushed into Axapta consulting arena ? this is seen in the USA, UK, Australia and continental Europe. In Brazil currently MBS in local Portuguese Axapta launching mode ? localized for Brazilian tax code

? Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Is planned as front CRM solution for the majority of Microsoft Dynamics ERP system: integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP is available for GP 7.5, 8.0, 9.0 and CRM 1.2 and 3.0, Microsoft Navision ? through third party integrations, Axapta integration is planned. Microsoft has Microsoft CRM as worldwide product, so you should not have any doubts regarding your regional market.

? Competition. Oracle is on the way with Oracle Fusion project, aiming on Oracle Financials/Applications/E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards and potentially Siebel integration. SAP with the purchase of new mid and small market ERP: SAP Business One and Mendocino ? for SAP R/3 is catching up

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx http://www.enterlogix.com.br ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner. Please do not hesitate to call or email us: USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918 help@albaspectrum.com

Microsoft Dynamics ERP: GP, AX, NAV, CRM ? which one to select

Being in MRP implementation, customization, integration, data migration/conversion business for many years, we would like to give you some orientation, in the case if you are on the way of ERP selection for your company. 

Being in MRP implementation, customization, integration, data migration/conversion business for many years, we would like to give you some orientation, in the case if you are on the way of ERP selection for your company.  In this small article we will be talking about Microsoft Business Solutions ERP brands only, you can check our future publication to get similar orientation on Oracle and SAP ERP products.

• ?Legacy? vs. ?Modern? ERP.  It might not be the focusing question, however we?d like you to look at the ERP products from this perspective: Java/EJB Sun Microsystems conception is less then 10 years old, and now Microsoft .Net/C# construction is in the process of getting market from Java.  Similar time test should be given to ERP system ? if the system has legacy architecture ? it might be candidate for replacement or be seriously re-written/renovated.
• International aspect.  If you think your company is and always be focusing on the US market and will do business with local folks only ? this paragraph might be skipped.  For the rest of us ? and we are in this cohort ? we should watch closes Microsoft Business Solutions international policies.  When Great Plains Software and Navision Software were independent software vendor and being forming their international policies completely independently from one another ? both had intentions to expand to all the world markets: USA, Europe, Australia, Asia, Africa, South and Central America.  Now, when Microsoft sells all former GPS and Navision ERP products ? it can choose one product over the other to promote on the regional market ? simply due to the fact that it has to invest into ERP localization.
• Microsoft Dynamics GP - Great Plains.  Great Plains Software pioneered in the earlier 1990^th with its graphical and DB platform independent product for Mac and Windows: Great Plains Dynamics.  The shell was written on C programming language and was named Great Plains Dexterity.  Currently with Microsoft Dynamics project initiative ? Microsoft renovated Dexterity ? it supports now COM object calls and so XML web services, but it is not pure .net application/shell ? Microsoft is investing in web interfaces for Microsoft Dynamics GP ? Microsoft Business Portal for GP is very good example.  Microsoft Dynamics GP incorporated all the best technologies from Microsoft Office to .Net, but its design was done more then 10 years ago.  Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 is available in English, Latim Americal Spanish and Canadian French, plus German, Dutch and French/France versions will be available for version 9.0 only ? they will not be supported for future version of Dynamics GP.
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV ? Microsoft Navision - Navision Attain.  Navision Software was established in 1994 and since then it gained European ERP mid-size and portion of USA market, especially for light manufacturing.  Navision success should be attributed to Denmark software development market miracle of earlier 1990^th.  Navision went even further into graphical and DB platform independence ? it designed its own database platform ? C/SIDE ? Navision separated SQL coding from the database itself.  Currently MBS promotes Navision on MS SQL Server platform and its database independence is losing its actuality.  Navision was localized by MBS to the majority of East European, South American and other emerging markets ? if you are in Europe, South America, Asia and looking for supported reliable solution on your regional market ? you should look at Navision first.
• Microsoft Dynamics AX ? Axapta.  Axapta was the newest ERP designed by Navision Software prior to its acquisition by Microsoft.  The architecture is dated at the end of 20^th century.  Axapta needed some time for Microsoft to get upper mid-market ground ? traditionally occupied by SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards.  Currently Microsoft is localizing Axapta to Brazilian market ? due in April 2006.  Very good chances are in East and Continental Europe, including UK.  In 2005 US Microsoft Business Solutions regional and nation-wide VARs invested into Axapta consulting practice ? training and certifying consultants, marketing campaign, etc.  Very good chances for Axapta for US mid-market and and upper mid-market clientele and prospects
• Microsoft Dynamics CRM.  Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 or simply Microsoft CRM 3.0 is promoted by Microsoft Worldwide.  So, do not question it from the international perspective ? you will have integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP, Navision (through third party integration), Axapta ? in progress, plus with IBM Lotus Notes Domino ? via Alba Spectrum Lotus Notes integration.

Please do not hesitate to call or email us: USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918 help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx http://www.enterlogix.com.br ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner, serving corporate customers in the following industries: Aerospace & Defense, Medical & Healthcare, Distribution & Logistics, Hospitality, Banking & Finance, Wholesale & Retail, Chemicals, Oil & Gas, Placement & Recruiting, Advertising & Publishing, Textile, Pharmaceutical, Non-Profit, Beverages, Conglomerates, Apparels, Durables, Manufacturing and having locations in multiple states and internationally.
We are serving USA Nationwide: CA, IL, NY, FL, AZ, CO, TX, WI, WA, MI, MA, MO, LA, NM, MN

 

Microsoft Dynamics ERP: GP, AX, NAV, CRM ? which one to select

Being in MRP implementation, customization, integration, data migration/conversion business for many years, we would like to give you some orientation, in the case if you are on the way of ERP selection for your company. 

Being in MRP implementation, customization, integration, data migration/conversion business for many years, we would like to give you some orientation, in the case if you are on the way of ERP selection for your company.  In this small article we will be talking about Microsoft Business Solutions ERP brands only, you can check our future publication to get similar orientation on Oracle and SAP ERP products.

• ?Legacy? vs. ?Modern? ERP.  It might not be the focusing question, however we?d like you to look at the ERP products from this perspective: Java/EJB Sun Microsystems conception is less then 10 years old, and now Microsoft .Net/C# construction is in the process of getting market from Java.  Similar time test should be given to ERP system ? if the system has legacy architecture ? it might be candidate for replacement or be seriously re-written/renovated.
• International aspect.  If you think your company is and always be focusing on the US market and will do business with local folks only ? this paragraph might be skipped.  For the rest of us ? and we are in this cohort ? we should watch closes Microsoft Business Solutions international policies.  When Great Plains Software and Navision Software were independent software vendor and being forming their international policies completely independently from one another ? both had intentions to expand to all the world markets: USA, Europe, Australia, Asia, Africa, South and Central America.  Now, when Microsoft sells all former GPS and Navision ERP products ? it can choose one product over the other to promote on the regional market ? simply due to the fact that it has to invest into ERP localization.
• Microsoft Dynamics GP - Great Plains.  Great Plains Software pioneered in the earlier 1990^th with its graphical and DB platform independent product for Mac and Windows: Great Plains Dynamics.  The shell was written on C programming language and was named Great Plains Dexterity.  Currently with Microsoft Dynamics project initiative ? Microsoft renovated Dexterity ? it supports now COM object calls and so XML web services, but it is not pure .net application/shell ? Microsoft is investing in web interfaces for Microsoft Dynamics GP ? Microsoft Business Portal for GP is very good example.  Microsoft Dynamics GP incorporated all the best technologies from Microsoft Office to .Net, but its design was done more then 10 years ago.  Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 is available in English, Latim Americal Spanish and Canadian French, plus German, Dutch and French/France versions will be available for version 9.0 only ? they will not be supported for future version of Dynamics GP.
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV ? Microsoft Navision - Navision Attain.  Navision Software was established in 1994 and since then it gained European ERP mid-size and portion of USA market, especially for light manufacturing.  Navision success should be attributed to Denmark software development market miracle of earlier 1990^th.  Navision went even further into graphical and DB platform independence ? it designed its own database platform ? C/SIDE ? Navision separated SQL coding from the database itself.  Currently MBS promotes Navision on MS SQL Server platform and its database independence is losing its actuality.  Navision was localized by MBS to the majority of East European, South American and other emerging markets ? if you are in Europe, South America, Asia and looking for supported reliable solution on your regional market ? you should look at Navision first.
• Microsoft Dynamics AX ? Axapta.  Axapta was the newest ERP designed by Navision Software prior to its acquisition by Microsoft.  The architecture is dated at the end of 20^th century.  Axapta needed some time for Microsoft to get upper mid-market ground ? traditionally occupied by SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards.  Currently Microsoft is localizing Axapta to Brazilian market ? due in April 2006.  Very good chances are in East and Continental Europe, including UK.  In 2005 US Microsoft Business Solutions regional and nation-wide VARs invested into Axapta consulting practice ? training and certifying consultants, marketing campaign, etc.  Very good chances for Axapta for US mid-market and and upper mid-market clientele and prospects
• Microsoft Dynamics CRM.  Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 or simply Microsoft CRM 3.0 is promoted by Microsoft Worldwide.  So, do not question it from the international perspective ? you will have integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP, Navision (through third party integration), Axapta ? in progress, plus with IBM Lotus Notes Domino ? via Alba Spectrum Lotus Notes integration.

Please do not hesitate to call or email us: USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918 help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx http://www.enterlogix.com.br ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner, serving corporate customers in the following industries: Aerospace & Defense, Medical & Healthcare, Distribution & Logistics, Hospitality, Banking & Finance, Wholesale & Retail, Chemicals, Oil & Gas, Placement & Recruiting, Advertising & Publishing, Textile, Pharmaceutical, Non-Profit, Beverages, Conglomerates, Apparels, Durables, Manufacturing and having locations in multiple states and internationally.
We are serving USA Nationwide: CA, IL, NY, FL, AZ, CO, TX, WI, WA, MI, MA, MO, LA, NM, MN

 

Microsoft Dynamics AX-GP-NAV-CRM: trends & international recommendations

Microsoft Dynamics project ? or formerly referred as Project Green should unify and modulate all Microsoft Business Solutions ERP applications: Microsoft Great Plains/Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Navision (former Attain) Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft (Navision) Axapta/Microsoft Dynamics AX. 

Microsoft Dynamics project ? or formerly referred as Project Green should unify and modulate all Microsoft Business Solutions ERP applications: Microsoft Great Plains/Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Navision (former Attain) Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft (Navision) Axapta/Microsoft Dynamics AX.  The challenge of unification probably will result in quality change for the unified interface, such as Web/Business portal/Microsoft Outlook & MS Office integration, Deployment of new technologies, such as Microsoft Sharepoint with workflow automation.  Plus the development platform for Microsoft Dynamics products should shift from proprietary tools, such as Microsoft Dexterity, C/SIDE, MorphX (no confirmation for Axapta yet ? but we guess it should follow) to C# and VB.Net with VisualStudio.  In this small article we will try to orient IT managers in Microsoft Business Solutions MRP products selection for international and regional markets.

• Microsoft Dynamics GP.  The regional markets for Great Plains 9.0 and following Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 version will narrow: United States, United Kingdom, Canada: both English and French speaking, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and other English speaking countries in Asia, Africa and Worldwide, plus Spanish Speaking Latin America.  Microsoft Dynamics GP 10 will not be available for Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland ? the last version localized for these European countries will be 9.0 ? June 2006
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV.  Currently Navision has very good presence in Europe, including East Europe: Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Slovakia.  Microsoft also localized Navision for new markets, where it just moved in: Brazil for example ? it was interesting development in Brazil ? first Microsoft probed Solomon, then Microsoft Great Plains 7.5 and in 2004 replaced it with localized Navision
• Microsoft Dynamics AX.  Microsoft Axapta, opposite to Navision or Great Plains where market shares are gained/divided and competition is based on renovations and product improvements, Axapta has great potential yet to be deployed, coming from its modern and very futuristic system design and architecture.  Being targeted to upper mid-market and corporate clients Axapta shows very good progress on emerging markets: in Russia for example the number of Axapta installation is similar and comparable with the number of Navision installations.  Plus, in 2005 large number of Microsoft Business Solutions gold certified partners rushed into Axapta consulting arena ? this is seen in the USA, UK, Australia and continental Europe.  In Brazil currently MBS in local Portuguese Axapta launching mode ? localized for Brazilian tax code
• Microsoft Dynamics CRM.  Is planned as front CRM solution for the majority of Microsoft Dynamics ERP system: integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP is available for GP 7.5, 8.0, 9.0 and CRM 1.2 and 3.0, Microsoft Navision ? through third party integrations, Axapta integration is planned.  Microsoft has Microsoft CRM as worldwide product, so you should not have any doubts regarding your regional market.
• Competition. Oracle is on the way with Oracle Fusion project, aiming on Oracle Financials/Applications/E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards and potentially Siebel integration.  SAP with the purchase of new mid and small market ERP: SAP Business One and Mendocino ? for SAP R/3 is catching up

Please do not hesitate to call or email us: USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918 help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx http://www.enterlogix.com.br ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner, serving corporate customers in the following industries: Aerospace & Defense, Medical & Healthcare, Distribution & Logistics, Hospitality, Banking & Finance, Wholesale & Retail, Chemicals, Oil & Gas, Placement & Recruiting, Advertising & Publishing, Textile, Pharmaceutical, Non-Profit, Beverages, Conglomerates, Apparels, Durables, Manufacturing and having locations in multiple states and internationally.

CRM Budget: How To Bring Your CRM Project In On-Budget

It seems that having a project come in On-Budget is the and holy-grail of project management, especially when it comes to CRM projects. With their 70% failure rate, CRM projects represent a significant risk to a small business' financial health and warrants more "measure twice, cut once" consideration before beginning.

Coming in On-Budget does not mean you managed to squeeze your project into whatever arbitrary budget you came up with when you first started. It also doesn't mean that you started with an overly generous budget.

It does mean that you develop a budget that takes into account an analysis of 4 critical areas:

1. PAYOFF. You need to know exactly how your CRM system is going to generate ROI. This will help you focus your project on the right areas. By knowing how you expect payoff to be achieved, you can plan to achieve it.

2 RISK. You need to figure out where the risk is in your project because "risk=expense". By figuring out what can go wrong, you can take measures to minimize and contain that risk.

3. SERVICES. Be sure to fully account for the variety of services that will be required. A few often overlooked areas that can increase your services bill significantly include: meetings, testing time, debugging time and "while you're here..." time.

4. TECHNOLOGY. Choosing the wrong technology is can be a huge waste of money. From the worst case scenario of a totally failed project to having to spend extra money to make the wrong software do things it wasn't intended to do.

What makes putting together a realistic budget so difficult for small businesses is that it's not what they do and they don't have the experience of having done several before. It's not what they do. So, they rely on the Sellers of CRM who have their own vested interest in not scaring off their customers with numbers that are perceived to be too expensive.

By putting together a realistic budget, you may very well find that the project is going to cost much more than you were intitally prepared to spend. It's best to find this out now and before you "sign on any dotted lines".

If you do find out the project is going to cost more, here are a few ideas of what to do:

- WAIT & SAVE. Perhaps you need to wait 6 months until you have a bigger budget. Use this time to get prepared for the project: learn more about the software choices, make sure you're business processes are as fine tuned as they can be, and focus on how CRM software will generate ROI.

- GO AHEAD. It may be more money than you were expecting, but may still be within your budget. If you're clear on how the CRM system is going to generate ROI and you're otherwise ready, go for it!

- SCALE DOWN. If you have a very clear idea of how the CRM software is going to achieve ROI and you can't afford the full project, focus in a smaller area to begin with that will have a payback. Use this payback to help fund future projects. It's always a good idea to start with smaller, high-payoff projects first.

- FIND MORE ROI. If you have a really clear and compelling business case for how a CRM system is going to improve your bottom-line, it's much easier to find the necessary funds to implement it.

- DOUBLE CHECK. Make sure you're choosing the right technology. Cheap software can often be expensive to implement. Double check to make sure you're basing your budget on the right CRM software. You may find that a software that costs more in licensing, ends up being an overall more affordable solution.

Coming in On-Budget means you started with a realistic budget. The Insider's CRM Success System goes into great detail on how to develop a realistic budget and provides the control forms and worksheets you'll need.

About the Author

Scott Gingrich is the creator of The Insider's CRM Success Toolkit, the world's most complete and only guaranteed approach to successful CRM projects.www.thecrmcoach.com.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Customization Or Third Party Product ? Overview For Consultant

With version 3.0 MS CRM will be more exposed to end-user tuning, software development, customizations. Microsoft CRM SDK is becoming more sophisticated with post-call-out technology reconsidering, deprecating a lot of 1.2 CRM SDK methods, replacing Crystal Reports Enterprise with MS SQL Server Reporting Services, changing MS CRM Exchange Connector functionality, etc. Microsoft itself has to be very flexible and freed up to change/adjust development standards if required. In such situation end customer should be very knowledgeable and savvy to predict the future, when he needs to deploy custom solutions/modules. In this small article we will consider pros and contras of deploying third parties or just go ahead with customer specific unique customization.

Third Party Product.

? Pros: The cost is normally controllable, because product is already developed and ready to be implemented. Plus it is possible to get references on the reliability of the product from all the kinds of user groups, product reviews, etc. Also ? sometimes it is referred as weakness but it might be considered as the plus ? if product is developed and supported by the known vendor ? you should believe that it will be upgraded and available for future MS CRM releases.

? Contras. The first minus we would like to mention is usually not described in the textbooks ? this is the problem when, say product A is purchased by Microsoft itself and inaugurated as from now on ?official? solutions, and if you historically selected product B ? coming from the competitor ? you are in a problem ? you will see you software vendor to be weakened and slowly phasing out alternative product B

Unique Customization.

? Pros. You will have so-called source code, if you negotiate it right with the custom developer or custom development company ? then you can transfer version upgrade or product modification to the market leader (who will be giving you better price and quality assurance in the future). Other pluses might be cost saving, due to the fact that you are paying for required functionality only, not for something you will never use.

? Contras. Cost might be crossing the budgeted line, because you might not be able to select reliable software developer (all of them might be in the learning curve, because MS CRM is relatively young product) ? this is very strong argument, when you have just purchased the CRM and yet not know the players on the customization market.

Production Environment Challenges. When you are already in production ? be sure that MS CRM needs testing, if you introduce custom logic. You should try to isolate custom logic, and test it in the isolated space ? again MS CRM doesn?t have parallel test company environment ? opposite to what you have in ERP system, such as Great Plains/Dynamics GP.

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.greatplains.com.mx ) - Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, Navision, Axapta, MS CRM, Oracle Financials and IBM Lotus Domino Partner

Microsoft CRM in Brazil: implementation, customization, support overview for consultan

We expect substantial number growth of Microsoft CRM implementations across Brazil and the need for Microsoft CRM implementation, support, tuning, reporting, training services, especially in such business metros as So Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Porto Alegre, Curitiba, Belo Horizonte, Recife, Manaus. 

We expect substantial number growth of Microsoft CRM implementations across Brazil and the need for Microsoft CRM implementation, support, tuning, reporting, training services, especially in such business metros as So Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Porto Alegre, Curitiba, Belo Horizonte, Recife, Manaus. 

Microsoft Business Solutions CRM is present several years on the US software market plus it makes advances in Europe.  We expect substantial number growth of Microsoft CRM implementations across Brazil and the need for Microsoft CRM implementation, support, tuning, reporting, training services, especially in such business metros as So Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Porto Alegre, Curitiba, Belo Horizonte, Recife, Manaus.  In this small article we try to project US market lessons on Brazilian business climate.

• Sales.  Microsoft CRM in opposite to former CRM leaders, such as Siebel, Onyx, Saleslogix doesnt need hard pushing sales efforts.  It also should probably not be sold to the company top management, but rather to IT department enthusiasts, who are in charge for specific legacy business system support and data fixing.  Microsoft CRM is very simple from business logic and intuitively understood by IT group.  It is rather very simplified version of full-featured CRM, such as again Siebel.
• Installation.  Microsoft CRM should be either hosted or installed by in-house IT group.  And this is due to the fact, that MS CRM utilizes all the resent Microsoft technologies: MS Exchange Server 2003/2000, Active Directory, MS SQL Server, Crystal Reports Enterprise, MS Outlook client, Microsoft IIS, .Net components, etc.  This makes installation sensitive to existing setup of the above components
• Implementation.  The crucial in the implementation is Workflow design, which should be probably done by consultant with IT in-house specialist.  This process doesnt require a lot of business consulting knowledge and in our experience company middle management actually makes suggestions in the time of initial presentation.  In the case of MS CRM Sales module the workflow should organize leads processing up to the point of closing the deal and following invoicing.  When workflow is realized sales team works as excellent orchestra.
• Customization.  Usually MS CRM ties together existing legacy business systems and replaces large portion of them.  Typical case if you are freight forwarding client and have cargo tracking system you should more likely have lookup from the MS CRM account screen to the customer current shipments statuses.  This is usually made as small web application, created in Visual Studio.Net with MS CRM SDK and SQL queries to legacy database.
• Support.  Because MS CRM is web application it can be used by remote users and automate operations across the whole Brazil and even Worldwide.  The same should be said about MS CRM support your Microsoft Business Solutions CRM Partner can support your installation remotely from say office in So Paulo as if it is located across the street.

Good luck implementing, customizing and reports designing and if you have issues or concerns we are here to help!  If you want us to do the job - give us a call in So Paulo: 55-11-3826-3449, 55-113825-2586! help@albaspectrum.com

Author is MS CRM Specialist in Microsoft Business Solutions Partner Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com ) Navision, Great Plains, Microsoft CRM customization company, serving client in Brazil, USA, Lisbon, Porto, Madrid, Barcelona, Toledo, Malaga, Seville, Buenos Aires, Mexico and having locations in multiple states and internationally

IT Strategy for Large Corporation: ERP/MRP/CRM, Unix/Linux/Windows, Microsoft/Java

Combining Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains ERP with non-Microsoft Business System or CRM: Lotus Notes Domino, Oracle, DB2

There are multiple opinions on building your established large business IT system.  Some companies prefer to be Microsoft shop, others prefer to stick to Java world.  In our opinion large company should try balance its ERP in several layers: Hardware, Operating System, Database Platform, ERP/CRM software vendor.  The history always proofs that staking on one thing statistically has a chance to fail, remember Windows/Mac battle in the middle of 1990^th?  Then Java resurrected UNIX world in the end of the 20^th century.  All these facts just tell us that any prediction of the future should not be accurate, because the factors we could consider in the prediction formula will be superceded by new conceptions.  Good example would be C cross-platform programming language however now we are crazy about thin client so where is C longevity?  So, in 2004 we merged several companies to serve large corporate businesses, positioning us as cross platform integrators and the company, envisioning harmony between multiple computer platforms and conceptions.  Let us give you our bullets below:

• Microsoft Business Solutions pluses old conception that OS should be separate from the DB platform and from your accounting application doesnt work when we consider modern Microsoft: it now offers all in one: Microsoft Great Plains/Navision/Axapta/Solomon/Microsoft CRM/Small Business Financials ERP, based on MS SQL Server DB platform and all this nice suite is working under Microsoft Windows 2003 Server.  This is very nice to have and the price would be lower, however you are in the business space and conceptions of Microsoft corporation, which really deserves you to consider either ERP or CRM solution to be trusted and handled into Microsoft guys
• ERP/Accounting/MRP - we suppose that the old days of expensive ERP application are going to the history.  Nowadays we see the trend to use reasonably inexpensive and functionally sufficient applications, based in decent SQL platform.  So, our suggestion is do not pay for high end ERP/Accounting system and rather consider reliable budget solution as a platform for light customization
• Business System/CRM CRM market should be considered a mature one in 2010, when such pioneers as Siebel will cross 15 years of the existence.  Again in our opinion youd rather pay for small or moderate customization to budget CRM solution to have work done.  Microsoft CRM or SalesLogix would do the job
• Oracle Financials we are supporters of the companies who decided to go with Oracle Financials or SAP and have their CRM/Business Management System to be placed on the Microsoft Windows platform.  Microsoft CRM would integrate with Oracle smoothly
• Microsoft CRM in our opinion large publicly traded company should consider using Lotus Notes Domino for document workflow and CRM and when adopting MS CRM it should consider using Domino as primary email server see our MS CRM Lotus Notes Domino email connector description.

Good luck and you can always seek our help in customization, implementation, integration and support.  Call us: 1-866-528-0577 or 1-630-961-5918, help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew Karasev is Chief Technology Officer in Alba Spectrum Technologies USA nationwide Great Plains, Microsoft CRM customization company, serving Chicago, California, Arizona, Texas, Florida, Georgia, New York, Australia, UK, Canada, Germany, Continental Europe, Russia and having locations in multiple states and internationally ( http://www.albaspectrum.com ), he is Dexterity, SQL, C#.Net, Crystal Reports and Microsoft CRM SDK developer

3 Reasons Why CRM Strategies Fail

Customer relationship management (CRM) is one of the most effective tools for improving customer relationships and therefore increasing revenue, customer satisfaction, and customer retention. Unfortunately, some CRM strategies fail. This leaves CRM vendors and their customers baffled, but there a few common reasons why a CRM strategy will fail.

1. Too much focus on the CRM vendor and technology. Some companies get too caught up in having the best possible CRM strategy out there. Some companies want entire call-centers, On-Demand CRM, Web-based, and Blackberry devices which allow their IT people to enter customer information wirelessly. While these technologies are extremely helpful, too much emphasis on them can lead any company astray. It is naturally very important to select the best CRM vendor for your company, but best does not always mean flashiest.

2. Not enough focus on the customer. Companies can focus too much on technology and strategy, and not enough on what is at the core of CRM: the customer. The first letter in CRM stands for Customer and so the customer should be first when thinking about any CRM strategy. A call-center can be wonderful if it is customer friendly. However, some call centers are too complicated and alienate the customer from the company. Alienation is the exact opposite of what companies want to achieve when implementing CRM. The real ROI of CRM is found in customer retention and the acquisition of new customers. In order to have success with CRM, a company must work towards building a strong relationship with its customers. CRM is the path through which the customer and the company can understand each other. Focusing on technologies and ignoring the basics of customer service will cause even the most technologically advanced CRM strategy to go wrong.

3. Rushing into CRM adaptation. Sometimes, company presidents get the idea of CRM into their head and decide that their entire company must be CRM-ready as fast as possible. Rushing into CRM is a recipe for disaster. IT workers need to understand the concept of CRM. Someone who understands the importance of CRM will be better suited to deal with customers and reach the companys goals concerning CRM. Rushing into CRM does not allow ample time for all IT people to be briefed on the basics of CRM and how it will be implemented within the business. Some companies implementing CRM have to create entire departments that never existed before. The greatest care must always be taken when creating an entire new section of a company. CRM should generally be implemented across the entire company. If this is rushed, it can lead to all sorts of compatibility issues, customer confusion, and even employee confusion. Data collected must be viewed across many applications, and ample time must be given for networks to be set up. Companies using CRM technology such as Blackberry devices, or Call-centers must be even more careful when implementing CRM for the first time. Technology is not perfect, and problems can occur at any time. Any company that sends their sales force out into the market with unchecked technology is asking for disaster.

Some say that it is impossible to determine whether CRM is a success or a failure. The true ROI of CRM lies with the customer. A company that avoids the pitfalls of CRM implementation will notice a dramatic increase in customer satisfaction, retention, and acquisition. CRM can help any company significantly if it is used correctly, carefully, but still efficiently. CRM technology can also help companies if it is used thoughtfully and timely. The entire company must be prepared for CRM when it is implemented. A company cannot expect exact numbers immediately after putting CRM into effect. CRM is a long-term strategy that will help achieve long-term goals of a company. Customer focus is essential and will help any CRM strategy to become a success.

Matt Hogansworth enjoys writing about CRM topics and CRM software vendors such as Salesforce ( http://www.salesforce.com)

CRM Offshore Software Development

CRM stands for Customer-Relationship Management, and adopts the basic of self-service channel such as the Internet.
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) is a business strategy built around the concept being "customer-centric". The main goal is to maximize revenue through improved customer satisfaction and focused interactions at each customer touch point.
The above can be achieved by understanding the needs of the customer that based on their purchasing patterns.
Customer-Relationship Management Customer-Relationship Management follows the principal of customer interaction,
allowing each customer to let you know how he or she wants to be treated.
CRM is a mechanism to make the supplier more aware of customers' buying habits and frequency at which he/she buys.
CRM solutions can improve efficiency of sales, marketing and services by making the supplier more attuned to the needs of the customer.
Some features to be recognized while achieving the customer satisfaction are:
1) Customers own their own information
2) Customers need total accuracy and at times won't understand the viewpoint of the supplier
Advantages of CRM Solutions.
CRM solutions provide a technology to enable your customer services, sales and marketing efforts by allowing a 1st-time visitor to visit the site again,
repeating the visitor to subscribe to a newswire so that we can tell him/her what we're doing to the site, subscribers and commentators to submit contributions
so that we broaden and deepen the content we provide and subscribed members of the site to purchase product and services
and provide us with funds. Typical CRM functionality includes the following:
1)Visitor login and account maintenance
2)User profiling and user agendas
3) Customer tracking and unique customer record
4) User reporting
5) User feedback and suggestions
6) Site relevance and content optimization
For more information log on to www.a1technology.com , an offshore outsourcing company

The author of the article is John Parker, A-1 Technology, Inc, an offshore outsourcing company

Microsoft CRM Conversation Gateway: VOIP - Implementation & Customization

Microsoft CRM is winning market share step-by-step from such the traditional CRM providers as Siebel, Saleslogix. In this article well show Microsoft Business Solutions CRM potential in the VoIP direction.

Microsoft CRM is winning market share step-by-step from such the traditional CRM providers as Siebel, Saleslogix. In this article well show Microsoft Business Solutions CRM potential in the VoIP direction.

Nowadays VOIP-based technologies and Instant Messaging Systems are getting wider and wider spread. Each work desk or each personal computer has one or another instrument of information exchange, belonging to the VOIP or instant messaging systems. Currently the mostly presented information exchange systems are:

Skype (http://www.skype.com). Revolution system of sound compression the tolerance to the bandwidth of the channel enabled VoIP amusement features to the general internet world-wide user with microphone and headset, Windows/Linux/Mac OS X operating systems, internet access and free registration with Skype. Plus Skype application has instant messenger between skype users. New features and services SkypeOut and SkypeIn allow you not only to call to the regular phones from your computers with very low rates, but also accept the calls on your skype phone number in the SkypeIn system.

MSN Messenger (http://messenger.msn.com). Quite successful attempt of the Microsoft open the door to the instant messengers market. MSN Messenger gained market with the speed of light, due to the tight integration with Microsoft Windows. Every new version adds new functionalities MSN Spaces integration, audio and video transfer etc.

Yahoo! Messenger (http://messenger.yahoo.com). IM system of the Yahoo! portal, has standard set of features for communication, including audio and video stream transfer.

AOL Instant Messenger (http://www.aim.com). This is one of the veterans of the IM system market. Considering the popularity of AOL as internet provider AOL instant messenger holds substantial market share.

ICQ (http://www.icq.com). Yes we do not have to give you additional comments, we are targeting this article to IT professionals who were working in the Clinton era of American internet miracle and booming. Let us just add that with the release of version 5 ICQ introduced new features of the audio and video conversation.

VoIP & IM systems are popular not only in the home office environment, but are gaining popularity in the corporate market. One of the proves is the release of Microsoft Live Communication Server, which allows messages streams coordination and control. Natural idea should we enable VoIP and IM conversation with automatic protocol? It is always good to have paper copy of the MSN conference, related to the project, product, in the form of MS CRM Activity. Or, from CRM interface to call your potential customer via Skype. Or accept the incoming call via SkypeIn and record the call to the CRM database to be accurate with the following negotiations. The usage is really unlimited and is currently restricted only by human conservative nature.

Now, lets consider the schema of MS CRM extensions to enable such a system:

The main component is Albaspectrum Media Core for MS CRM the module, providing media streams saving in the special database, interaction with the specializing connectors to IM/VoIP systems. Its function is also Activity creation in the Microsoft CRM system.

The second important component is modification to these forms: Contact, Account etc. Modification is adding phones, addresses, Skype, MSN, AOL, Yahoo identifiers. Also we have to add SkypeOut phone calls service. In the future we plan PBX/PSTN support via MS Office Communicator 2005

Planned addition - Answering Machine module, controlling incoming calls and messages from clients and saves them in Media Database. If manager is out of his desk, system will save the message and will create Activity in personal queue you will not miss no one customer call! Plus all the calls from non-registered clients/prospects might be associated with one or another Account, Contact, Lead, etc.

Lets consider the process of the phone call/receiving or message recording:

CRM User opens client form and reads telephone or skype ID to place the call. If she/he would like to talk to skype user Skype application must be installed of the local machine and she/he needs to be skype online user. If she/he calls to another Skype user, then we dont have additional requirements. In the case when call is placed on PSTN number, CRM user needs to have SkypeOut active account. In both cases when user picks up the phone or is absent CRM activity will be created with the relevant status. If the call was accepted, automatic call recording will be switched on, activity will be created with the indication on the phone duration. For MSN, Yahoo!, ICQ audio conversations all the mentioned above is relevant, except PSTN support (currently skype only).

The above described process is similar for instant messenger conversations, recorded by MSN Messenger, ICQ, Yahoo! Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger.

CRM User could appeal to Full-Text Search upon the saving to Media Database of text talks directly from the MS CRM interface.

For the users, who are accessing CRM over the internet we envision IM system support (as http://webmessenger.msn.com) in the MS CRM forms.

Good luck with integration! If you want us to do the job - give us a call 1-630-961-5918 or 1-866-528-0577! help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew is Software Developer in Alba Spectrum Technologies USA nationwide Great Plains, Microsoft CRM customization company, serving clients in Chicago, Houston, Atlanta, Phoenix, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Miami, Denver, UK, Australia, Canada, Europe ( http://www.albaspectrum.com )

Some Of The Benefits Of A Microsoft Customer Relationship Management System

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems provide a formalized system gathering, organizing, maintaining and manipulating customer and contact information. With an effective Microsoft Dynamics CRM in place, business owners are provided with a powerful tool to successfully manage and develop their business.

Why a business should adopt and implement a Microsoft Dynamics CRM can be readily appreciated by considering some of the benefits provided. An effective Dynamics CRM, properly implemented and adopted will greatly help to maximize sales and reduce costs and time while management who have a better view of what is actually going on a lot faster than without a Dynamics CRM, are far better placed to manage the risk to their business.

Managing the sales cycle is expensive and time-consuming, so knowing where you are with a contact or set of customers is important if you intend to maximize the results of your business generation activities. A Microsoft Dynamics CRM will provide accessible information at your fingertips which means that a business owner can look at the ?Big Picture? or macroscopic view while at the same time break business performance down to see what activities and customers are contributing to the bottom line. This allows business owners and managers to see where to concentrate their efforts to maximize sales and minimize costs.

Generating new business is the most expensive part of the sales cycle, and because a Microsoft Dynamics CRM system provides the ability to categorize contacts and identify which are suitable prospects for a particular sales and marketing campaign, a business can most effectively deploy resources. Knowing which prospects are likely to buy, when they are likely to do so and where the prospects are geographically will help your sales team to maximize their efforts, reduce wasted time and money, and provide a greater return on the investment of time and money in acquiring that customer base.

Existing customers are most likely to buy from you again, and because a Microsoft Dynamics CRM system will provide a business manager with the ability to manage, maintain and develop the client relationship this means that a business is likely to generate greater revenues from understanding a customers requirements better and produce overall cost savings as a result of improved customer retention rather than chasing new ones.

As a Microsoft Dynamics CRM software solution provides a repository for all your client information, including sales history, seasonal variations in sales, and improved ability to forecast turnover from repeat sales, business planning and goal setting is simplified and there is an additional benefit in saving staff and management time searching for information which is readily available. Reducing the time required planning your business activity and development allows more time to be spent on generating business and managing activity where the sales revenue is actually created - with your customers.

A Microsoft Dynamics CRM will provide a business owner with the ability to see at a glance what is happening with their sales and customers. We live and operate in a fast changing world where trends and tastes change, sometimes overnight, and the ability to see how these variations affect our overall business performance allows management to quickly adapt to changes in trading conditions which under more traditional reporting methods may not be observed for some time. With a Microsoft Dynamics CRM providing accurate and up-to-date business information on results and activity, business management is better placed to take advantage of trading opportunities while also minimizing business risk by alerting management of adverse trading conditions.

Finally, an often overlooked benefit of all Customer Relationship Software is found when looking at implementing such a solution to begin with.

Implementation of a Microsoft Dynamics CRM solution invariably forces business owners and management to reconsider their business and how they are managing it, not to mention the benefit that is derived from a thorough review of the overall business goals and objectives. Often this has not been done for some time, if at all, and considering how a solution will be tailored to fit the business frequently breeds the realization that things could be managed better.

This doesn?t derive from the customer relationship software itself, but from planning how to implement and adopt such a solution; owners and management are compelled to confront their current business practices and perhaps revise them. This is probably the greatest insidious benefit to be derived from a Customer Relationship Management solution for a business.

Syed Ali, is the lead CRM consultant for a Toronto based company. His company offers, Microsoft CRM 3.0 Syed can be reached at Tel : (905) 815- 1995 ext 22, email: asyed@cqsolutions.com

How to Build Customer Relationships

Building a lasting relationship with your customers is a vital marketing strategy in ensuring the existence of your business. Making your customers unhappy even once can impact their likelihood of ever revisiting.

Small, local stores, retailers, and companies, can sometimes offer more personable service because of their focus on the quality and uniqueness of their products not sold anywhere else. Honoring the customers' needs is what brings them back for more. The customers who approach you will not necessarily be a part of the local crowd--therefore it is important that you take the time to make a good impression to improve business. Running a small or local venture can be mixed with challenges all in its own, but with effective marketing you can overcome all the odds. What better place to promote that concept than on your web site?

Before you have your web site up and running, first develop a marketing plan as to what you would like to achieve through it. As an extension of your philosophies and style, you will want a web site that reaches out to your customers and lets them learn about you at the same time. Once you have that together, then you can plot out the components of your site. Here are some tried-and-true ways to offer optimum results:

* List sales dates, and offer deals, discounts, or coupons/vouchers for customers to print off and use. * Use your web site to offer email or postal mail updates to all customers who choose to be on your mailing list to which they can subscribe online. * Offer free or discounted shipping on orders processed via your specifications. * Offer to include a small free gift as a thank you to customers for their business. * Suggested features to include on your web site for customers to view are a pictorial catalogue, biographies of key contacts, employees, or owners/managers, and map and pictures of your business. * Include a Frequently-Asked-Questions (FAQ) section for self-help in case customers are experiencing trouble browsing or shopping online. * Clearly explain your products or services, including all applicable fees so customers are not unpleasantly surprised when they obtain a quote or make a purchase with your business. * State your policy of returns, damaged goods, or refunds where applicable. * Vary your selections by season, holiday, or event. Marketing yourself as a novelty producer in your industry will help you come out on top. * Make sure your web site is well-maintained at all times, where technical difficulties experienced on your web site are kept to a minimum to avoid losing impatient customers. A small, local business that is not prepared to handle an influx of customers will lose to a larger competitor. * Provide a feedback section for customers to offer suggestions and rate their overall satisfaction. You can also opt to email a survey to customers who shop online with you.

With careful planning, your small business can be well on its way to surpassing local recognition and make its way to the top of the list for successful ventures!

Jennifer McGroary is a WAHM who has been operating her own home-based web design and consulting business since 1999. Jennifer helps local small businesses, family-owned, & home-based businesses maximize their profits without spending money on advertising. To learn more, visit http://www.cssites.com

Customer Service: Stop Sabotaging Your Customer Relationships

 by: Lora J Adrianse

If you've called for customer service recently you're familiar with this recorded message "This call may be recorded or monitored for quality purposes." I immediately think to myself, "Oh great, here comes the game of 20 questions."

Now don't get me wrong. I spent many, many years training Customer Service Reps. (CSR's). I'm all for making sure customers receive the best possible service. What I'm not for is the pre-scripted list of questions CSR's are required to ask, regardless of whether they are applicable to the situation at hand. I've seen some checklists with as many as 25 pre-scripted "call quality" standards that CSR's are required to use. If they don't, and someone happens to monitor the call, they get marked down. Ludicrous I say!

Let me give you a few highlights from a recent call I made to my well-known auto club:

CSR: What is the year, make and model of your vehicle?

Me: 2000, GMC, Yukon, Denali

CSR: There is no 2000, GMC, Yukon, Denali (obviously it couldn't be found in her list of computer options so she needed to tell me I was wrong)

Me: Yes there is, I drive it every day

CSR: What's wrong with your vehicle?

Me: I don't know. It won't start.

CSR: Does it need to be towed or jumped?

Me: I don't know. I don't know what's wrong with it.

CSR: Well do you think it needs to be towed or jumped?

Me: I have no clue.

CSR: Where is your vehicle?

Me: In my garage.

CSR: Can you push it out of the garage into the driveway or the street?

Me: No. It's a full size SUV. I can't push it anywhere.

CSR: Is there another way you can get it out of the garage?

Me: No. It won't start.

Eventually, after I'd jumped through enough hoops, the call finally ended.

Chances are it wasn't the CSR's idea to get her laughs for the day by asking me stupid questions. Instead, her own company sabotaged her ability to quickly and efficiently take care of her customer, by requiring she use a scripted questioning process.

What Could Have Gone Better? For starters, rather than telling me that the make and model of my vehicle didn't exist, she could have said that she was having trouble finding it in her database, and then asked for verification. Next, instead of asking me twice about whether the truck needed to be "jumped or towed", she might have asked if I had any ideas about what could be wrong with it.

And finally, considering that she already knew the vehicle wouldn't start, asking a woman to push a truck out of a garage seems a little unreasonable.

What Needs To Change? First, re-think your call quality standards. You may have too many standards; they may be too focused on internally created "shoulds", with very little focus on what matters most to your customers. Involve your CSR's and customers in the process.

Secondly, empower and train your CSR's to think, act and personalize service to best accommodate the given situation. One size does not fit all, or even most! Teach your CSR's how to recognize different communication styles, and then how to adapt their personal style so they can best relate to the customer as an individual. In other words, teach CSR's how to treat customers how THEY want to be treated.

And thirdly, continually ask for feedback from CSR's as well as customers. Make time to find out what's working and what's not working. Pay attention to what they have to say. Make ongoing improvements that benefit everyone. Repeat the cycle.

Companies spend thousands, if not millions of dollars each year to acquire new customers, yet sometimes they forget about how to best take care of the customers they already have.

Everyday your customers and your CSR's make decisions about whether to stay with your company or go to your competitor. Loyalty is built on good, solid relationships. Your company relies on the loyalty of your CSR's to service your customers. And great customer service can set you apart from your competition. Take action now! Stop sabotaging those relationships with unnecessary standards that don't really matter to your customers. Your customers and your CSR's will love you for it.

As the owner of Essential Connections, Lora Adrianse is a catalyst for clients who aspire to create dynamic business relationships with their colleagues and customers. She authors a free monthly newsletter, "Relating@Work". Go to her website to subscribe now! www.connectionscoach.com

coach@connectionscoach.com

How to Build Great Customer Relationships Via Phone

Business is about creating and maintaining customer relationships.
But what is a relationship? It means communication. If you ask
people in a work setting, "What would improve work, profits and
customer service the most where you work?" the answer is almost
always "Better communication!" Communication plays a vital part
in success or failure of any business.

But what communication tool is used most frequently in the world?
Internet, e-mail, TV, radio? Definitely not! The most essential
communication tool is a phone and hardly any business works
without a phone. And whenever you are in contact with people by
a phone regarding your business, it is also a representation of
your business.

Sounds good, huh? But the important question occurs,
"What is the effective way to improve communication via a phone?"
The computer-based answer (I am a programmer, not a psychologist)
is personalization of your customer with call center.

Learn Something New about Your Customer Constantly.
A successful marketing campaign starts with a keen understanding
of your customers. When you are curious (not snoopy!) about the
people who call you, you are giving them respect. People love to
be respected! Find out how their family is doing, or more about
their favor hobby. If you know your customers more personally
than employees of your competitor know their customers, it's
easier to delight them.

Build a Customer Database.
A centralized database is essential to delivering a unified view
of customers and contacts. That is goal number one. Create a
personal data warehouse about your customers on your PC. Keep
track of your contacts made with customers via a phone. If you
know when your customers called and what information they
searched for or how many times they've called about a particular
product, that lets you track customer behavior. If you know this,
you can respond to your customers effectively and efficiently.

Transmute Your Computer and Phone into Call Center.
Have you ever heard about call center?
I suppose you automatically think that it is something extra
expensive and complicated. And it is just for the "big boys"
like Sony, SAP, Dell and other Fortune 100 companies. But what
is a call center (I prefer the term "contact center")? As a rule
this service includes contact management tools, telephony
integration and tools personalizing every customer interaction.
Great! You have the same: a phone, a customer database and
contact manager software (see below). What hinders you to make
your own small contact center right now, which is increasingly
at the heart of your company's day-to-day interface with its
customers. By recording and analyzing the calls and other
interactions between your contact center and its' customers you
can listen to and act on customer feedback to improve you skills
and business processes, leading to improved customer service -
and hence customer loyalty.

Discovering Value Hidden in Your Data.
Effective customer experience management solutions must capture,
store and replay all live interactions between the customer and
your contact center. Capturing this live information and
embedding it within your customer database gives you the
opportunity to share the information collected in the contact
center with other parts of your business. If you fail to do this
you are missing out on a big opportunity to make every profitable
customer feel that you care about them personally and help
establish a new business relationship with them.

Finding the Right Software.
What difficulties are in selection of the right software for your
small business call center?
The biggest one is chaos. Obtaining a complete understanding of a
company's customer requires the ability to store and manage a
myriad of different information from a variety of sources. In
addition your demands to kept data level can be varied from day
to day. Yesterday you were satisfied if your customer database
stored their names, phone numbers, addresses, birthdays. Today's
demand is to keep customers' emails, webs, credit cards. Tomorrow
you maybe wish to store in the database data about customers' cars,
their favorite colors or birthday of their grandmothers.
But as a rule similar contact management software have only
strictly fixed (structured) numbers of fields in their databases.
If your selected computer application is too small and simple it
will not be enough for you. Or these data fields will not be used
completely if an application is too big and complicated
(and expensive!).

iReferent - Aim to End Result.
iReferent is an contact solution for small and home business that
decide the foregoing problems. It provides a strong feature set
that stands up well against other similar programs on the market.
However, iReferent's real achievement is its unique database
structure: at any time you can input into the database any (!)
number of the description fields, from name of your customers to
their car marks. But for all that you might fill only those
specific fields in every record, which are really necessary. Also
this contact manager gives you the opportunity to keep the detail
phone call history.

Want to know more? Visit our web site at
http://www.sitex.com.ua/en/products/iReferent or contact me via
e-mail to sergkruts@yahoo.com.
You can also download your personal Call Center from here
http://sitex.com.ua/download/CallCenter_e.zip
(file size is 981 Kb, 30 days free trial) and estimate it
yourself.
But what is a relationship? It means communication. If you ask
people in a work setting, "What would improve work, profits and
customer service the most where you work?" the answer is almost
always "Better communication!" Communication plays a vital part
in success or failure of any business.

But what communication tool is used most frequently in the world?
Internet, e-mail, TV, radio? Definitely not! The most essential
communication tool is a phone and hardly any business works
without a phone. And whenever you are in contact with people by
a phone regarding your business, it is also a representation of
your business.

Sounds good, huh? But the important question occurs,
"What is the effective way to improve communication via a phone?"
The computer-based answer (I am a programmer, not a psychologist)
is personalization of your customer with call center.

Learn Something New about Your Customer Constantly.
A successful marketing campaign starts with a keen understanding
of your customers. When you are curious (not snoopy!) about the
people who call you, you are giving them respect. People love to
be respected! Find out how their family is doing, or more about
their favor hobby. If you know your customers more personally
than employees of your competitor know their customers, it's
easier to delight them.

Build a Customer Database.
A centralized database is essential to delivering a unified view
of customers and contacts. That is goal number one. Create a
personal data warehouse about your customers on your PC. Keep
track of your contacts made with customers via a phone. If you
know when your customers called and what information they
searched for or how many times they've called about a particular
product, that lets you track customer behavior. If you know this,
you can respond to your customers effectively and efficiently.

Transmute Your Computer and Phone into Call Center.
Have you ever heard about call center?
I suppose you automatically think that it is something extra
expensive and complicated. And it is just for the "big boys"
like Sony, SAP, Dell and other Fortune 100 companies. But what
is a call center (I prefer the term "contact center")? As a rule
this service includes contact management tools, telephony
integration and tools personalizing every customer interaction.
Great! You have the same: a phone, a customer database and
contact manager software (see below). What hinders you to make
your own small contact center right now, which is increasingly
at the heart of your company's day-to-day interface with its
customers. By recording and analyzing the calls and other
interactions between your contact center and its' customers you
can listen to and act on customer feedback to improve you skills
and business processes, leading to improved customer service -
and hence customer loyalty.

Discovering Value Hidden in Your Data.
Effective customer experience management solutions must capture,
store and replay all live interactions between the customer and
your contact center. Capturing this live information and
embedding it within your customer database gives you the
opportunity to share the information collected in the contact
center with other parts of your business. If you fail to do this
you are missing out on a big opportunity to make every profitable
customer feel that you care about them personally and help
establish a new business relationship with them.

Finding the Right Software.
What difficulties are in selection of the right software for your
small business call center?
The biggest one is chaos. Obtaining a complete understanding of a
company's customer requires the ability to store and manage a
myriad of different information from a variety of sources. In
addition your demands to kept data level can be varied from day
to day. Yesterday you were satisfied if your customer database
stored their names, phone numbers, addresses, birthdays. Today's
demand is to keep customers' emails, webs, credit cards. Tomorrow
you maybe wish to store in the database data about customers' cars,
their favorite colors or birthday of their grandmothers.
But as a rule similar contact management software have only
strictly fixed (structured) numbers of fields in their databases.
If your selected computer application is too small and simple it
will not be enough for you. Or these data fields will not be used
completely if an application is too big and complicated
(and expensive!).

iReferent - Aim to End Result.
iReferent is an contact solution for small and home business that
decide the foregoing problems. It provides a strong feature set
that stands up well against other similar programs on the market.
However, iReferent's real achievement is its unique database
structure: at any time you can input into the database any (!)
number of the description fields, from name of your customers to
their car marks. But for all that you might fill only those
specific fields in every record, which are really necessary. Also
this contact manager gives you the opportunity to keep the detail
phone call history.

Want to know more? Visit our web site at
http://www.sitex.com.ua/en/products/iReferent or contact me via
e-mail to sergkruts@yahoo.com.
You can also download your personal Call Center from here
http://sitex.com.ua/download/CallCenter_e.zip
(file size is 981 Kb, 30 days free trial) and estimate it
yourself.

 

Top Ten Benefits of Sales Force Automation (SFA)

SFA saves you time & money
The advent of automated sales force technology allows businesses to subscribe to already built, on-demand, customizable services without the high fees for maintenance and other costs associated with the large, daunting process and time involved in creating a large, corporate version of sales force automation.

SFA allows you to concentrate more on your business
The architecture of sales force automation allows for a decrease in total ownership cost, risk reduction, less wasted time, and the ability to concentrate on business and management instead of technology. This means that you have more time and energy to give to the success of your business.

Contract management comes with SFA
Essentially, it allows companies to manage a contract's lifespan by shortening approval cycles for contracts, renewing contracts sooner, and reducing administrative costs. This Sales Force Automation component improves tracking and management of contract information, such as terms, conditions, and evaluations.

SFA is easy to use
Sales force automation is easy and intuitive. It makes jobs easier for users like professional sales representatives by giving them quick access to data (online, offline, mobile devices) links to tools like Microsoft Outlook and Office.

SFA offers real-time analytics & reports
Sales force automation offers a comprehensive analytics program that allows you to track ROI on marketing campaigns, traffic levels, lead conversion ratios, content effectiveness, and more. Users can access information to evaluate their company's past performance and point out its strengths and weaknesses with the intent to repair those deficiencies. It allows you to customize reports based on the data processed by the analytics program. All the information you get is in real-time and fresh, so that you never have to handle or see old data unless you want to.

Up-to-date information via SFA
Sales representatives get more time to sale and convert leads as they can avoid the hassle of administration and other similar duties. Because the information they have access to is always current, the leads are more qualified and easier to sell. The don't have to go through lines of other sales reps to find what they're looking for; all they have to do is get on the computer and access their company's central database to get the information they need, wherever they are.

SFA mobile capabilities
Sales force automation is now available with mobile capacities. This means that the application is compatible with any mobile device, such as a laptop or cell phone. Thus sales representatives or marketers have access to the information they need any time, any where, both offline and online.

Broad range of uses for SFA
Sales force automations can work for any company, from the largest corporation to the smallest boutique. It offers a number of uses, from sales management, analytics and forecasting to product information, workflow and integration.

SFA is Customizable
The sales force automation application is completely customizable, down to the color of bar graph you want on your analytics report. Many websites, like Salesforce.com, offer to work with you to develop the unique application you want.

SFA is Understandable
Unlike many CRM programs that abound on the web, sales force automation is a relatively simple program to implement and is easily understandable for the majority of users.

Salesforce.com is the world's first on-demand application service and a giant in the field of CRM. With over 24,000 customers, over 500,000 subscribers, and a 97% customer satisfaction rate, Salesforce.com continues to lead their field. To find out more about them, please visit www.salesforce.com .