12.04.03
 By
Lisa Picarille
Senior Editor, destinationCRM
Not long after launching Siebel OnDemand and acquiring hosted CRM
provider UpShot, Siebel Systems has set it sights on surpassing incumbent
hosted CRM darling Salesforce.com. OnDemand, a $70 per seat per month
hosted CRM solution, aims to be a rapidly deployable full-strength
CRM solution with integrated analytics and built-in connectors to
traditional enterprise Siebel software. Legacy UpShot customers will
continue to be supported in a special branch of the OnDemand software.
Forrester Research Vice President Erin Kinikin says that
Siebel's latest foray into hosted CRM is a much-needed effort to get
revenues back on track, but will be dead in the water without support
from the sales force and reseller channel. "This is a market Siebel
has to be in strategically, but Siebel is not oriented to reaching
the midmarket," Kinikin says, adding that OnDemand partner IBM is
equally ill-equipped. |
Even
so, CEO Tom Siebel predicts that in 2004 Siebel will be the world's
leading provider of hosted CRM. This is a heady goal considering that
Salesforce.com now has more than 120,000 seats and has launched the
Winter '04 edition of its solution, adding numerous features, including
team sales management and improved workflow tools to the suite.
"Salesforce.com has created a market, now the [company] gets to see
if it can hold on to it," says Kinikin. The company's customer retention
is not as impressive as the raw subscriber numbers, she says. "Salesforce.com
is vulnerable if someone else can come in and say 'Not only can we
give you this software for $70 per month, but we can help you make
it successful.'"
"Our customer retention approaches 99 percent, up from the midnineties
about a year or so ago," says Cary Fulbright, CSO and senior vice
president, new market and brand development, at Salesforce.com. "We've
put in place a number of programs to help retain customers. Most of
our customer loss has been from customers going out of business."
Competitor Salesnet has focused on expanding its reseller channel
in recent months to companies with proven success making inroads with
the small to midsize companies that traditionally might purchase a
one-time, light-duty product such as ACT! or GoldMine. "Salesnet has
carved out a niche as being the most flexible and process-centric
of the hosted vendors," Kinikin says. "I think Salesnet is in a good
position to go after some verticals to try to take CRM to the next
level of value."
Rather than design a new online product, PeopleSoft has opted to offer
professional hosting services for its existing solutions, via either
full-service hosting or remote management of customer-premise equipment.
While the company is offering solutions for as few as 100 users, Kinikin
says that the mid-market is unlikely to be compelled. "People are
buying hosted CRM partly because it's different than traditional CRM.
PeopleSoft just putting its Web screens up on a server is not going
to attract the same kind of interest that a true hosted offering [would.]"
But according to Steve Earl, PeopleSoft's director of hosting strategies,
its customers are looking for more than just vanilla hosted CRM. "PeopleSoft
has been offering hosted CRM solutions since 1999. But we see it more
as a process than just a CRM product line," he says, citing the companies
offerings in CRM, financials, human capital management, and supply
chain management. According to Earl, PeopleSoft customers want to
automate and customize their complete business processes, for example
order-to-cash. "We support that," he says.
Midmarket companies have processes similar to enterprise companies,
although the level of customization may not be as much, Earl says,
adding that PeopleSoft's approach works will for that set of requirements,
as well. Its hosted offering is scalable and can grow with a company,
he says.
"Our architecture allows people to 'eat in or take out,' if you will,"
Earl says. "We can support both outcomes."
All the hosted solutions aim to help companies do more with their
sales forces with less up-front investment. "It's almost like CRM
on training wheels," Kinikin says. "Let's just pay for it month-by-month
and see how they do. If the sales force hates it, we haven't lost
a lot of money."
*Originally published at destinationCRM
About the Author:
Lisa Picarille is a 14 year veteran high tech journalist, who started
out as beat reporter with PC Week. She has also been a Senior Editor
at InfoWorld, MacWeek and ComputerWorld. Lisa also has extensive experience
running online high tech new sites. She was the managing editor of
CRN.com., the online site for Computer
Reseller News, before becoming the executive editor of TechWeb.com
and the night news editor for Wired.com. Most recently she was the
executive producer of TechTV.com.
In addition, Lisa has freelanced for many print and online publications
including Iconocast.com, Wired,
Rolling Stone Magazine, CNN.com, Schwab.com. A graduate of Northeastern
University, Lisa began her career as a sports writer and working as
a producer and voice over artist in Boston radio. Picarille can be
contacted at 415-642-1863 or lpicarille@destinationcrm.com
Read
this newsletter at: http://www.crmnewz.com/2003/1204.html |
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