Offline Business - CRM

11 replies
Hi All,

Does anyone have any experience with CRMs? I was looking at Act! by Sage, but am worried about backing the data up and the implications when I grow my team.

A web based CRM seems like the solution, has anyone used one? I'm interested to hear your thoughts
#business #crm #offline
  • Profile picture of the author childtalent
    i have used sugarcrm and they are powerful and it is FREE !!

    it is an open source software
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  • Profile picture of the author Lou Diamond
    Hello,
    using a web based crm can lead to trouble down the road.
    Companies go out of business,servers crash,you name it.
    Control your own destiny and be responsible about it.
    Signature

    Something new soon.

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  • Profile picture of the author TomBond
    I take your point Lou, but I'm sure it's possible to take period downloads of all web based CRM data.

    I don't think the risk is any greater than storing all my data in my spare room without taking offsite back ups
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  • Profile picture of the author MichaelHiles
    Tons of experience.

    I am a huge fan of salesforce.com, and I have done integration as a consultant with clients.

    I appreciate Lou's concerns, but for most small businesses, the barrier to entry on price for an application that's as robust as sfdotcom is pretty high. Do some costing on Siebel (now owned by Oracle) or even Microsoft CRM.

    The data export capabilities far exceed the risks inherent to any cloud computing apps... and exported data is open.

    ACT suffers from the usual, locked, proprietary database formats endemic to Sage Software's suite of applications (Peachtree, et al).

    Stay off proprietary data if at all possible, because as the business grows, you're going to want to add ingetration with other applications (like... oh, i dunno... accounting, order processing, etc...)
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  • Profile picture of the author joshril
    SugerCRM works well for free... there is also a something called Avidian Prophet that plugs in to Microsoft Outlook. It's obviously not web-based and also pretty inexpensive.
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  • Profile picture of the author mydexconsults
    Banned
    [DELETED]
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  • Profile picture of the author Mohsin Rasool
    Last time I tested two winners come to mind: SugarCRM..TigerCRM aka Vtiger vtiger Open Source CRM

    Checkout their sites and you will see all the features they do have...

    Regards,
    Mohsin
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  • Profile picture of the author MichaelHiles
    Here's the thing with CRM.

    Getting a CRM "in a can" doesn't really support your marketing and sales process if you've put any effort into engineering it.

    You get the "made up" process of communication at the pre-defined intervals that the s/w developer gives to you.

    I'm a fan of salesforce.com because it allows a business to map it's CRM to their developed sales process in SUPPORT of the marketing and sales effort... as opposed to having to structure the things you do throughout your marketing and sales activities around some theoretical process that's pre-defined in the CRM.

    So when shopping for a solution, be sure to find something that meets your needs as you develop a prospect nurturing system.
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  • Profile picture of the author Scott Ames
    I have experience with CRM, but the ones I'm familiar with make SalesForce.com look like a toy. I'm talking multi-million dollar in house systems. SalesForce.com would prob. do what you need.
    Signature

    Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm. -Winston Churchill

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  • Profile picture of the author jacktackett
    I've used several but like others can recommend Salesforce and another web based system called zoho (Zoho CRM Pricing Information, Free, Professional, Enterprise Editions). I like open source immensely, but have to say sugar can be a pain to install and configure. We're a small company with 3 full time folks and 2 part time sales folks and the 3 person zoho works well. Congrats on realizing the need and usefulness of a CRM system.

    Good luck!
    --Jack
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    Let's get Tim the kidney he needs!HELP Tim
    Mega Monster WSO for KimW http://ow.ly/4JdHm


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