Microsoft doesn't have a good internal CRM solution ?
When will Intuit offer a real customer relationship management (CRM)
solution that works with Quickbooks? Does anyone else think they should
just buy Goldmine and custom integrate it with Quickbooks?
ACT is generally considered to be a real customer relationship
management package. It and Outlook synchronized with QB (or QB
Pro) some time ago. Intuit will offer better integration & joint
marketing to hundreds (possibly thousands) of Add-ons by January.
Why should they risk developing their own contact manager when
it costs nothing to integrate many?
NetLedger followed the same route, though it markets a closely
linked CRM product as part of its program.
I think they must offer their own because the market is starting to demand
integrated solutions. Even the best CRM guys like Siebel will start to feel
pressure as Oracle and SAP start to get serious about their own solutions in
that segment, and Microsoft is going to start pressuring Intuit at the
mid-range once it starts integrating Great Plains with various Microsoft
applications. CRM is just too important to leave to only third parties.
Microsoft doesn't have a good internal CRM solution today, so Intuit should
grab the best player available before Microsoft sweeps that same player up.
And I think you misunderstand Intuit's strategy in its new API, or maybe you
are just buying their sales pitch. The purpose of such an API is to buy
time before you can develop or buy and integrate your own solution. That's
the same pitch Microsoft has used successfully for two decades to "partner"
with the many application vendors it then turns around and methodically
destroys by building its own solutions and discarding the former partners.
APIs just let other application vendors make you look good in the short
term, until you have an opportunity to offer your own integrated solution in
the long term.