What are your recommendations for a CRM system?

To counter that and show balance you have to consider Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

When used in combination with an eMail marketing platform such as Clickdimensions a solution would provide everything you ask for for a mid sized organisation.

It is based on Microsoft Office and Outlook and particular and is available in a low cost hosted version in the form of CRM Online.
Just Bing or even Google it and you will be able to get a 30 day demonstration at no cost.

Well, since SF and Microsoft have been mentioned, I'd be remiss to not mention SugarCRM. They also are able to fill all the criteria you mentioned. My company sells Microsoft Dynamics and services SalesForce, but I think you may want to have a look into SugarCRM. If you and your team are interested in a free demo of SugarCRM (or any of our other CRM products) please reach out! 978-887-3870 ext 207

Amy, it's a good question and thanks for providing a bit of context. The main CRM solutions have been outlined. however based on what you are describing, a better fit might actually be something relatively simple like InfusionSoft.

There are also several marketing automation vendors or even email marketing solutions that may provide everything that you are looking for.

Some additional questions that come to mind are:

- Who are the customers/prospects?
- What are the products/services you are interested in selling?
- What does the buying (sales) cycle typically look like?
- How will you measure success?
- Why won't sales people be using it?
- What are you using today?
- What are the shortcomings of your existing solution(s)?

Feel free to answer here, or send a private message if this is still a pressing question for you.

I am going to have to agree and say Salesforce.com. I use SFDC for marketing and lead management myself. And my company is a SFDC Consulting Partner focused on Customization and Systems Integration solutions. My opinion may be biased but I have worked with other CRMs and find SFDC to be the strongest in terms of customizing around business processes.

In SFDC we've also added Data.com (partnered with D&B) native to generate complete lead lists, populate them as leads and contacts, and then we designate them to a campaign within SFDC.

We then leverage Vertical Response (Get It on the Salesforce Appexchange - I love it!) to automate our email campaigns native within Salesforce. We simply create an HTML email in VR, link the campaign list to the email, and schedule the email to send! We track all campaign analytics within VR - It is great to see exactly who opened, clicked, responded, or even the bounced contacts. Then you can simply click an update button so to link these analytics to each individual campaign member - this will update directly on the lead/contact for a full view of campaign influence. Salesforce tracks your campaign history for reports and dashboards.
Vertical Response also partnered with Roost for free social media monitoring ,scheduling, and analytics. Radian6, a SFDC company is more robust for social but is also an expensive tool.

Feel free to reach out to me to brainstorm 732.212.0800.

Amy:

One key aspect of this decision that you haven't shared with us is your budget. All of the products already mentioned/suggested, along with the rest out in the marketplace, have varying costs associated to them, both to utilize/purchase the software, and to implement.

And another key question is your timeframe to both purchase and implement. Some systems are easier than others to implement, and this needs to be a factor in your decision. All of the systems will allow you to add custom fields to be able to filter/categorize your data however you need to. But it's the more advanced things like integration with a robust email marketing system, marketing campaign usage, and the like that begin to differentiate the systems from one another a little bit more.

I'm a vendor-neutral CRM consultant, so I'm not going to suggest one product over another at this stage in the game, as I don't have quite enough information from you to begin taking that road with you. But if you'd be interested in going down that road, I'd be interested in taking it with you.

I would recomend that you look at BusinessMan CRM from Computech IT Services LTd in the UK.
The application is multi platform and offers the user true CRM capability with all that you listed with so much more. An online Demonstration is available that is conducted by the developers this will guide you around this truly E2E application. They can be contacted on the following numbers.

UK (Freephone): 0800 848 8400
US/CA (Toll Free): 1-888-888-9659
International: +44 1752 841 800

or emailed at sales@computech-it.co.uk

The main website is;
http://www.businessmancrm.com/

Regards,

Brian

Hi Amy,
CRMnext offers the most advanced and ultra scalable codeless configuration capabilities of a flexible Customer Relationship Management solution. All the requirements that are listed by you is catered by CRMnext. This comprehensive and easy-to-use CRM software offers hosted customer relationship management (CRM) solution that can easily evolve and implement customer facing strategies, using industry best practices, without any upfront cost.
Explore CRMnext..
http://www.crmnext.com
http://www.crmnext.com/us/product/socialcrm.aspx

I strongly prefer lean and mean agile approach. Many organizations want a custom fit lean system that does just do X,Y and Z. The commercial offerings do A-Q. Either work with the best of breed by doing a good business req analysis of JUST the core requirements. If it does not fit 90% with existing stuff - either assemble a solution that extends the SaaS provider offerings or build it yourself! With model driven development you can have a CRM in a week or two. Use Mendix to build - and something like Bonita to do the BPM if absolutely required.