Case #1: Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 was a major, important and smart step forward for Microsoft. When they announced it at the Worldwide Partner Conference in Denver in 2007, they also announced their software + services initiative and their “single code base” approach for the on premise and on demand version of Dynamics CRM. Additionally, at the same time, they announced aggressive pricing for the on demand version that was so aggressive that it could catapult them into competition with salesforce.com. It was exciting. Very exciting. Brad Wilson, a 4-time winner of CRM Magazine’s award for one of the most influential in CRM, drove the initiative and remains one of the smarter leaders in the field. The momentum was there. Then it died. Case #2: I sit/sat on the Board of Advisors of Microsoft Surface, the multi-touch technology platform and device that Microsoft announced at the end of 2007. This was innovative, valuable technology and at the time they were planning it, Apple, via the iPhone and a couple of others were in the arena, but not many else. They had some real possibilities of momentum here. Then it died. Case #3: The push around Social CRM/CRM 2.0 is in full swing. Microsoft was positioned well with 1. their cash 2. their entry into cloud computing with Microsoft Azure(see ZDNET blogger par excellence Mary Jo Foley on this) 3. the software plus services on initiative; 4. a very strong CRM ISV program - with some remarkably cool and useful 2.0 applications built on the Dynamics platform from their ISVs. They had a great chance to seize some serious market momentum around CRM 2.0. They didn’t. Case #5: At the 2007 Copenhagen Microsoft Convergence last year, they announced an aggressive focus on industry specific applications for their Dynamics CRM efforts with aggressive support for their partners. Unlike anyone else in the industry that I’ve found, any partner that developed an industry specific on demand CRM application and hosted it, would be able to keep most of the revenue from that. No one else does that. NO ONE. What’s happened to that? I don’t know. What I hear about innovation at Microsoft, for example, is either through conversations I initiate or by reading a Fast Company article on the iconoclastic Gary Flakenstein, from Microsoft Live Labs. Or something on Ray Ozzie leading Microsoft into the promised land. That’s about it. This is a company who could be at the top. They have a solid application with Dynamics CRM 4.0 - aimed at the small and mid-sized business market - with SFA and customer service as functionally good as you can get. Marketing functionality is average but is as good as anyone else’s - marketing automation 1.0 or 2.0 is weak for the most part when part of a CRM suite. They have a terrific operations guy with some strategic smarts in Brad Wilson. They have a great staff. Their PR agency is good. The strength of their partner ecosystem and ability to manage the most complex and largest partner ecosystem (not a channel in their eyes) in the world - over 600,000 partners of varying stripes and hues is superb. They are the best at this bar none.But they seem to lack two things - and they are severe lacks. They have NO apparent coherent vision whatever. My complaints about SAP in that regard pale by comparison here. If you can give me a clear CRM vision, - a semblance of any CRM vision, please comment somewhere on it. I scratch my head to baldness on this one. Not only that, they have no real CRM 2.0 strategy that I can see. They claim collaborative “stuff” with Sharepoint. Let me say this. Big installed base or not, Sharepoint is NOT, I repeat is NOT, a very good product and lacks the elegance and flexibility that is needed in the collaborative platforms of this era. No more on that now. The second problem is their constant long standing one - one arm has no idea what the other is doing. I always hear “oh, well, they’re a very big company.” Nonsense. So is Oracle and SAP and that isn’t the universal complaint about those companies. This is something that needs to be addressed.They have a great foundation to succeed and as a person who has been a supporter of theirs always, I hope that 2009 is the year they get it together. They’ve made themselves a player in CRM over the last few years. They’ve even started to catch up in the on demand side and made a firm commitment, rightfully to the cloud. Now is the time for them to step up with a vision - and make sure that other parts of the company, the industry and the general public knows about it. I’m presuming that there will be a Microsoft Dynamics CRM 5.0 this year with some social features integrated and community-based functionality. Just don’t claim that Sharepoint integration is the answer to that. They’re better than that.
Source:blogs.zdnet.com/crm
