The following is a press release that goes out today and tomorrow. We are excited about this program since it helps us give our new CRM customers (Small Businesses) an easy low risk point of entry. It will also help us demonstrate our value, expertise and better understand where we can help our customers the most. The Launch pad program will provide in-depth information for a small upfront investment that can save customers a significant amount of money. The program begins with evaluation and works through to a rapid deployment process based on CNP's needs alignment process and value building methodology. Customers can either avoid purchasing the wrong technologies or failures from deploying infrastructures and new processes without clear focus on value to the organization.
We are looking forward to your questions and discussion as we continue to build success stories for growing small businesses.
CNP Integrations announced today the introduction of its new Small Business CRBM Launch Pad Program. Thisservice and consulting support bundle is built off of CNP's proven success model; The Value Builder Program (VBP), a strategic, tailored planning methodology for businesses integrating virtual technology, designed with proven practices for success. "Setting your priorities and focus up front will help you better manage the results and expectations of your technology implementations" says Chris Nielsen CEO/General Manager for CNP Integrations. The CRBM Launch Pad program is based on the concept that significant cost savings and increased sales, along with improved customer and market relations, equate to greater profits and business value. Defined as the SMB CRBM Launch Pad Program, CNP is offering blended learning/consulting/technical support programs that include consulting, software solutions and training. These programs are designed to offer small businesses a cost effective way to deploy CRBM Technologies. By evaluating and mapping business processes with organizational needs and technology features to create an optimized deployment strategy provides an opportunity for guaranteed success.
The program comes in three distinct flavors;
1. The CRBM Kick Start System,
2. The CRBM Jump Start System
3. The CRBM Rapid Deployment System.
Each of the three targeted technology alignment tracks is a tiered point of entry tailored to the needs of businesses eager to see rapid results with deploying Customer Relationship and Business Management solutions. This program pairs the human dynamics of your small business with the priority requirements to get your set up, configured and aligned with a proven success program. These programs can be delivered succinctly in a phased approach or as a standalone deployment launch program. It all depends on the size and expertise within your company. "We have found that CRM systems in general are often complicated in nature and companies often try to take on to much all at once when they deploy CRM. Essentially we have taken these lessons learned and turned them in to affordable solutions for business owners. We offer what SMB's need to launch a turnkey program that aligns the people with the technology successfully at a price point that maximizes their investment."
The Launch Pad Program is three unique deployment packages built around CNP's unique Value Builder Methodology. The VBM is a series discovery steps delivered in one-on-one workshops where clients and subject matter experts translate a proven methodology into a plan specific for the client's needs. The main goal is to build value and improve the return on investment for the targeted technologies. The strategic planning process will address an integrated approach including management consulting, IT solutions, product training and support services. Value Builder Program is a structured approach that will take your team through an in-depth evaluation and strategic planning process to define a solid roadmap. This is a hands on consulting experience tailored to a business's specific needs and goals which provides a working integrations plan. Based on this roadmap CNP configures a custom support contract based on your CRBM platform design, and offers this on a low cost monthly retainer fee vs. large upfront costs.
Well, for about a year now in our regional area, I have been trying to figure out how I could get a cohesive message out to the VC Community about why CRM is so important for them to think about. It just seems to me like a natural for the companies they invest in. After all it can save them money and help protect their investment. With a low cost of ownership CRM system in place, like our CRBM Platform, if a company goes south you still have all of the business intelligence assets. They own the assets which live in a virtual space that can easily get repurposed with a new front end opportunity. No need to keep starting from scratch and if you are successful you can clone it for your next venture. I have to say that Paul Greenberg's recent blog post helps reinforce my thinking path.
As a entrepreneur trying to grow our business away from a lifestyle model into a sustainable organization propelling the next best thing, I have been getting involved in a lot of networking groups where venture capital groups or "VC guys'" linger in hopes of finding bright entrepreneurs to help grow future opportunities. Unfortunately when I have tried in the past to get our CRBM Platform message out, which can often be very difficult to get into an elevator pitch, they just shrug me off as another software vendor trying to make a sale.
Investors know what they don't want but they need CRM
Investors typically run from lifestyle businesses and from what I can tell are shy about businesses that only offer labor based services. As a guy that has build more than 20 small businesses, I think any great business can be built from a foundation of a service model if it includes some kind of residual income platform. However, it is important to get out of the coal mine mentality if you want to attract investors. In order to scale a company in the current Global Economy and build a business based on roles and processes, a CRM strategy and associated technologies are a must have. Well implemented and thought out CRM is a platform which can yield greater profitability to virtually any organization trying to climb this mountain to the top. To me it seems like a no brainer... If I had a boat load of money (and hope someday I will) and wanted to invest wisely in companies with the next big idea, I would look at the, grandness of the idea and talent for sure but equally as important is the infrastructure available for the company to scale, retain and manage it's knowledge assets.
Where this idea originated
I remember back to when I started down this path of CRM, I read Thomas Friedman's book "The World is Flat" and I got the light bulb on how the right CRM platform was the key to connecting a global team. Glue for a competitive service model that would meet the next generation of businesses. I also read Paul Greenberg's book on "CRM at the speed of Light" . This book was filled with endless statistics on how CRM has saved large companies tons of money and improved their efficiency across the enterprise. When I merged these ideas in my head and built our service and support platform, I tried to think who is going to be the perfect customer for our CRBM Platform ? I thought about how much we could save, how much more efficient we could be, how much more power we could have under the hood of our business. Then hey... if it works for our model why would it not work for other Small Business "Start-up's"? This idea of building a solid foundation first just screams out the loudest to me. The company I came from previous to starting CNP Integrations was struggling with tremendous pains of Change Management. Mostly because they did not have a CRM in place and they grew too fast with nothing to scale upon. If you can start from the beginning with technology platform built into the way you do business, right out of the shoot, you can jump leaps and bounds above your competitors while gathering and retaining better business intelligence to future proof your business.
Our new case for Value Building
Like any good marketing soldier when hit by a brick wall, I dust off and try to reinvent my message to find out how I can get our target audience to see the value. After endless round table discussions and our mini focus groups often filled with passion, we came up with the whole concept methodology of our "Value Builder Program" . While we know our CRBM platform very well and can tell if it is the right solution, often our potential customers are struggling to sort out the right tool for the right job as their first pain point. What we concluded was that customers needed more than just a needs assessment but a mapping of these needs to the right technology solutions and a real picture of the value and benefits they can bring to their business and associated processes for engaging with customers. Then as part of this they need a realistic action plan to implement this new technology within their means and over time. Our new Value Builder Program is just that. Though we explore our CRBM Platform as a model the VBP methodology is universal in concept and platform independent.
So now with the light bulbs having sparked in the Venture Community that this technology adds real value to protecting their investments and with our new found message and service model of building a value case first, I hope we will fare a good conversation that leads to new opportunities for everyone.
This initial IAH 6.0 release came out in January but after a bit of a rocky start there are some final touches just released this morning with IAH 6.0.3.6127 that clear up any of the minor hickups that have been identified. We are also excited about the new features in the 6.1.0 release currently in beta testing. For a full road map as of today look below the release. This release is really a milestone in our 3 year history of working with info@hand. It is a lot of software (bang for the buck) and when used and deployed with careful thought this really levels the playing field by offering an affordable solution for SMB's. This can be a big enabler to improve competetiveness with larger companies. Much of our consulting services are centered around helping you get the best value from this software and to help your people use the system features effecitively. If you do it right you can future proof you business by building it around processes and tracking it for real time business intelligence. This can allow you to respond quickly to your customers and trends in the marketplace.
Long Reach Releases Version 6.0 of Flagship info@hand Customer Relationship and Business Management System (CRBM):
Key Additions Include Teams for Enhanced Data Access Control, All New AJAX'd Calendar, Project Gantt Chart, Partner Portal Support, New Dashlets, and Much More
ONTARIO, CANADA – (January 31, 2009) – The Long Reach Corporation has announced the release of the next generation of their flagship product, info@hand, a Customer Relationship and Business Management (CRBM) System for small and medium-sized businesses. (Try it here: Login using username=admin, password=admin.) The application is one of the first to blend first class Customer Relationship Management (CRM) features with extended business management capabilities for Accounting and ERP, e-Commerce, Project & Resource tracking, Customer Service, and Human Resources.
info@hand differs from conventional CRM products in that it offers key features that enable small and medium businesses to out-manoeuvre larger companies by capitalizing on their ability to react more quickly to client requests and changing markets. info@hand does this by eliminating common bottlenecks in finance and administrative areas. For example, it allows customer-facing personnel to create quotes or invoices quickly for clients, and then synchronize them later into the familiar QuickBooks accounting system for tracking by administrative staff - combining a quick response with a responsible audit trail.
Other features setting info@hand apart from the myriad of CRM products offered today include comprehensive project management capabilities such as timesheets, project costing and invoicing as well as the new Gantt module in version 6.0; fully integrated customer service management with an automatic assignment mode that pairs cases with the most qualified technicians; and strong international support including the ability to generate quote and invoice PDFs using the full UTF-8 character set needed for many languages including Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Thai.
Some of the key new capabilities of release 6.0 of info@hand include:
A completely new calendar module with more dynamic AJAX-based displays and operation. Click and drag to create a new meeting and set its duration. View all calendar-related information super-imposed on a single display, with optional filtering of Meeting, Call, Task, Project Task, and Event information. Also includes support for loading holiday packs - users can choose to see the public holidays for the region where they are located.
A new system for managing data access control within info@hand - Teams and Roles combine to manage User access to info@hand data with more flexibility and precision than ever before.
Mass invoicing for all Accounts of Cases and Projects with outstanding billable hours.
Support for Partner mode access within the Self-Service Portal - allowing sales channel partners to register new Leads, and check all Lead, Account, Opportunity and Invoice data associated with them in your info@hand system.
Added support for Safari browser.
Project Gantt Chart.
iCal synchronization.
Google Calendar synchronization.
eStore Integration Enhancements - Product Catalog items support HTML product descriptions, two-level categories, product attributes.
Support for pre-paid blocks of support time on service sub-contracts, and tracking hours remaining.
Report on Sales Taxes collected by Invoice range.
Report on Gross Profit generated by Invoice range and by sales person.
Report on Projects' Profitability.
Users may add multiple items to a quote/invoice at one time, via selected checkboxes on popup form.
Print multiple selected Invoices in a single operation.
Drop-shipment support for Purchase Orders.
New dashlets for Quotes, Sales Orders and Invoices.
Push-button copy of address information from an Account to selected Contacts at that Account.
Added client Phone/eMail information to Invoices and Packing slips to speed interactions with shipping suppliers.
Pricing for info@hand is simple compared to other CRM products. info@hand is sold for a one-time customer fee of 185 Euros (about $255 US) per user, which includes specific software for mobile access (info@hand Mobile) and the info@hand Self-Service Portal with eStore (which provides clients with access to automated sales and service 24/7). Also included in the standard price are the info@hand Plug-in for Microsoft Outlook, and info@hand PBX software for integrating with Asterisk/Trixbox/Fonality/Skype/X-Lite IP telephony solutions.
An online demo of info@hand is available via their website. A 30-day free trial of the info@hand On Demand (subscription) service is also available. Customers may then decide to implement info@hand as On Premise software running on the customer’s own server or at their ISP, or as an On Demand service.
About The Long Reach The Long Reach Corp. specializes in software solutions that equip small- and medium-sized organizations with integrated online business information while improving their cost model and streamlining their internal business processes. The company’s flagship product, info@hand, is a web-based system that blends best-of-breed CRM with extended business management features for Accounting, ERP and eCommerce. info@hand provides “Instant Business Information, Anywhere” at every desk within an organization, or remotely via PC, Mac or handheld devices. The privately held company was founded in 1997 and is based in Ottawa, Canada.
Roadmap for development as of today:
Recent and Future Releases:
info@hand Release 6.0: [Shipping Now!]
A completely new calendar module with more dynamic AJAX-based displays and operation. Click and drag to create a new meeting and set its duration. View all calendar-related information super-imposed on a single display, with optional filtering of Meeting, Call, Task, Project Task, and Event information. Also includes support for loading holiday packs - users can choose to see the public holidays for the region where they are located.
A new system for managing data access control within info@hand - Teams and Roles combine to manage User access to info@hand data with more flexibility and precision than ever before.
Mass invoicing for all Accounts of Cases and Projects with outstanding billable hours.
Support for Partner mode access within the Self-Service Portal - allowing sales channel partners to register new Leads, and check all Lead, Account, Opportunity and Invoice data associated with them in your info@hand system.
Added support for Safari browser.
Project Gantt Chart.
iCal synchronization.
Google Calendar synchronization: 2-way.
eStore Integration Enhancements - Product Catalog items support HTML product descriptions, two-level categories, product attributes.
Support for pre-paid blocks of support time on service sub-contracts, and tracking hours remaining.
Report on Sales Taxes collected by Invoice range.
Report on Gross Profit generated by Invoice range and by sales person.
Report on Projects' Profitability.
User may add multiple items to a quote/invoice at one time, via selected checkboxes on popup form.
Print multiple selected Invoices in a single operation.
Drop-shipment support for Purchase Orders.
New dashlets for Quotes, Sales Orders and Invoices.
Push-button copy of address information from an Account to selected Contacts at that Account.
Added client Phone/eMail information to Invoices and Packing slips to speed interactions with shipping suppliers.
Changes from the older SOAP API to the new json API for enhanced performance.
info@hand Finance for QuickBooks 1.4: May '09
Synchronisation of PO's, Bills, Outgoing Payments and Accounts Payable Balances to QuickBooks.
Synchronisation of info@hand Booking Categories to QuickBooks Service Items.
info@hand Release 6.1: May '09
Significantly Faster - Up to Twice as Fast on Many Screens. Optimized for Both High Latency and Low Bandwidth Situations
Improved Compatibility With Web Standards and Browsers (Safari 4, Firefox 3, IE 8)
Improved Integration With External Email Clients (e.g. Outlook, Google Email)
Integration with Google Contacts: 1-Way info@hand => Google
Integration with Google Maps
Integration with Google Docs: 2-way
Vacation Planner & Sick Days Record Integrated with Calendar and Employee HR Records. Tracks Employee Vacation and Sick Day Totals and Entitlement Automatically
Auto BCC Email Feature
Enhanced Bug Tracker: Supports Multiple Software Products, Each With Their Own Dropdown List of Versions
New Stocks Dashlet
info@hand Release 6.5: July '09
Expenses tracking: File general business expenses, or link them to customer Cases or Projects.
Time tracking enhancements: Book time to vacation or sick days, and general office activities. More familiar timesheet data entry format.
Project management enhancements, including sub-tasks.
Info@hand is the "Business Portal" and central application in our CRBM Platform. Depending on your perspective or roles played in your business processes, you will find a benefit and perhaps many that apply to you. If you are a manager or book keeper there are several features that can help you track assets, inventory and help yougather solid business intelligence. If you are a production manager or talent resource there are many tools for managing project and improving efficiency or collaboration of your team. If you are a system administrator there are many tools for managing roles, teams and other system wide configuration and customizations.
There are really 5 clear value propositions that make the CRBM platform a perfect choice for virtually any small to mid-sized business:
1. Consolidated business management with reporting, automations, HR, Project Management with project profit loss tracking, Timesheet, and more.
2. Seamless integration with the Joomla CMS for virtually unlimited expandability for front end customer portal, partner portal or social networking community.
3. eCommerce synchronization for a ful transaction life cycle management and ERP inventory management capabilities with Sipping and Receiving
4. One time licensing fee on premise model and low cost of entry
5. Close integration and two way synchronizations with QuickBooks and Microsoft Outlook
This article will explore many of the features and capabilities of info@hand CRM. However for a full product feature review please contact us for a FREE 30 Day trial version and a one on one product demo. You can also visit www.learningcrm.com where you can find online training, documentation, product module reviews and a Live Demo. You can sign up here for a FREE 30 Day trial for your business any time.
Some of the key CRM capabilities of info@hand include:
Salesforce automation - including lead capture, and the promotion of leads to Opportunities;
Opportunity tracking with sales stage and percentage likelihood;
Sales pipeline tracking, with graphical charts that offer drill-down from the bar or segment of the chart to the data that underlies it;
Definition of sales teams and territories, to manage information sharing and track sales performance by territory;
Sales forecasting, and comparison of forecasts to quotas and actuals, by team or by individual;
Lead source analysis of sales and opportunities;
Flexible reporting, to extract precisely the information you want to see;
Corporate calendar management, for arranging calls and meetings; and
Integrated Inbound and outbound Email, which is automatically added to account and contact history.
Email & Letter Mail Marketing Campaigns:
Marketing campaigns may be conducted with email templates for automatically customized emails, management of prospect lists, and tracking of campaign click-through rates.
A target list for an email campaign may be assembled from a mixture of prospects plus pre-existing contacts and leads. You may create a target list as the output of a report, facilitating the targeting of prospects or existing clients with specific characteristics. A special Quick Campaign feature makes it quick and easy to perform spur of the moment email campaigns.
You can also import lists of prospects (in either Comma Separated Values (CSV) or Tab Separated Values (TSV) formats).
A mail merge feature enables the execution of letter mail campaigns, and target lists may also be exported to MS Word for a variety of purposes.
Project & Resource Management: info@hand tracks the performance of current projects, and organizes a history of all project-related documents, status reports, tasks and contacts. Utilization, and time booked to project tasks, are also tracked for resources assigned to the project.
Within info@hand, a project is modeled as:
A main panel containing summary information about the project
A financial information panel containing a summary of expected and actual costs and revenue for each month of the project
A number of sub-panels linking in related information
Document Management: info@hand enables the sharing of business documents - from HR claim forms and Marketing collateral to Engineering designs.
Multiple revisions may be stored ensuring only approved documents are used.
Documents in any format can be filed, and may be searched by title, description, file type, status, department, keywords and owner.
Documents may be associated with Projects, Accounts, Contacts, Leads, Opportunities, or Service Cases.
A project can have all of the project's documentation attached to it. An account, lead or contact can have all related documents attached. And supporting documents for a service case can be attached to it.
Inventory Management:
info@hand includes a full inventory management capability. Two key modules perform the bulk of inventory management - Shipping and Receiving. In addition, the Sales Orders and Purchase Orders modules, as well as the Invoices module, evolved to support the tracking of partially received Purchase Orders, and partially shipped Sales Orders or Invoices (depending on how your business operates).
Receiving: The Receiving module lets users in shipping/receiving document the receipt of a shipment, list the items and quantities received, and link to the related Purchase Order (and Sales Order if any). It documents the inbound shipping provider, number of packages and weight, the supplier's packing slip number, and the date received.
The easiest way to create a received goods record is to locate your related Purchase Order, and click on the Receive It! button, Then just adjust the quantities and items received if they differ from the PO, and save. Partial quantities received are recorded on the PO, and if a PO has been completely received, it is marked Closed.
For businesses with multiple warehouses, each goods received record will be linked to the warehouse where the goods were received, and inventory is adjusted appropriately for that location.
Shipping: The Shipping module lets users in shipping/receiving record the shipments they send out. As well, it links to the FedEx and UPS shipping and tracking web services to automate those activities when using these shipping providers. It documents the outbound shipping provider, number of packages and weight, the packing slip number (it can also produce PDFs of packing slips), and the date shipped.
The simplest way to create a packing slip is to locate the related Invoice, and click on the Ship It! button, Then just adjust the quantities and items shipped if they differ from the Invoice, and save. Partial quantities shipped are recorded on the Invoice and on the Sales Order if there is one. If an Invoice has been completely shipped, it is marked Shipped, and if a Sales Order has been completely shipped it is marked Closed.
For businesses with multiple warehouses, each packing slip will be linked to the warehouse from which the goods were shipped, and inventory is adjusted appropriately for that location.
Note: Serial numbers are tracked from receiving, through the Sales Order and Invoice and on to the Packing Slip. Additionally, Supported Products are linked to client accounts, and also track product serial numbers.
Corporate Calendar: info@hand offers full group calendaring features:
Set meeting time and duration by simply clicking and dragging your mouse.
Check for schedule conflicts when planning calls and meetings.
Send invitations to colleagues and customers.
View the calendar by Day, Week, Month, or Year.
View Calls, Meetings, Tasks that are due, Project Task Assignments & Company Events - for yourself, for the whole company, by department, or for specific employees.
Check Resource and Meeting room bookings.
Create recurring meetings.
Email Management:
info@hand lets you compose and send email (text or HTML format), plus receive email from one or more accounts per user.
Create custom email folders to hold your mail for filing.
The system automatically links all mail to Contact and (optionally) Account history.
info@hand can also organize and perform outbound email marketing campaigns
Email addresses are auto-completed if you just type in a few letters of first or last name (see image of composing email).
Full text email search finds information in email body, not just email subject.
Each user specifies retention period for different types of email, reducing clutter of irrelevant emails.
Email signatures are provided as a convenient time-saver.
Personalized News Pages: An RSS News page delivers personalized daily news for each employee. See the top 5 stories for each news feed you select - and click to open them in a separate window. info@hand is supplied with hundreds of standard news feeds, and you can add your own quickly and easily.
Company Directory: A photographic company directory displays telephone extension, department, email, mobile phone number, and SMS address for all employees.
A handy indicator LED shows which users are currently online.
Report Designer & Generator: As businesses get larger and their data becomes more complex, a capable reporting system is a fundamental requirement.
Within info@hand the reports module shows a list of available reports. You may click on the name of a report to run that report, or to see the archived results of previous runs of that report. Each report listed shows its name, the principal module on which it reports, when it was last run, when it was last modified, and if it is set to run manually, interactively or automatically on a timed basis. Scheduled reports may be automatically emailed to a distribution list. Just imagine - your business tells you how it is doing without being asked!A number of predefined standard reports are included with the system, and new report designs may be easily developed and saved for repeated use in future. Try our online demo to see how easy it is to design your own reports.
Reports can include multiple sort keys, grouping, filters, and may relate data in multiple modules. Acrobat PDF documents may be created from any report, and report data may also be exported to several common file formats including CSV and HTML.
Reports may also generate charts of their data, and these charts may then be added to your Personal Dashboard.
Graphical Dashboard Charts: The system provides graphical dashboards for Sales, Service, Financials, and Projects. As well, a Personal Dashboard allows you to assemble and re-order a list of your key charts, including charts created from your own custom reports. When the system is initially created, these dashboards include the following charts:
Sales Dashboard:
Fiscal Year Booked Sales (Horizontal bar chart: Shows the 12 months of the current fiscal year, and the value of sales booked for each of those months.)
Weighted & Gross Opportunities by Month (Horizontal bar chart: Shows, for the 12 month period starting last month, the gross and weighted (by probability) value of the opportunities for each month - the sales pipeline.)
Pipeline by Sales Stage (Horizontal stacked bar chart: Shows the total value of potential sales at each stage of the sales pipeline.)
All Opportunities by Lead Source by Outcome (Horizontal stacked bar chart: Shows a stacked bar of the total opportunities for each lead source. Each bar is made up of multi-colored segments which represent the outcome proportions for that lead source.)
Pipeline by Month by Outcome (Vertical stacked bar chart: Each bar shows the total sales pipeline for each month. Each bar is made up of multi-colored segments which represent the outcome proportions for the pipeline in that month.)
All Opportunities by Lead Source (Pie chart: Shows a simple pie visualization of the proportion of total sales opportunities for each lead source.)
Cases by Status by User (Horizontal stacked bar chart: Shows the breakdown of cases by status, for each user.)
Cases by Priority by Month (Vertical stacked bar chart: Shows the breakdown of cases by priority, for each month.)
Bugs by Status by User (Horizontal stacked bar chart: Shows the breakdown of software bugs by status, for each user.)
Bugs by Priority by Month (Vertical stacked bar chart: Shows the breakdown of software bugs by priority, for each month.)
Financial Dashboard:
Fiscal Year Invoiced Sales (Horizontal bar chart: Shows the 12 months of the current fiscal year, and the value of sales invoiced for each of those months.)
Fiscal Year Booked Sales (Horizontal bar chart: Shows the 12 months of the current fiscal year, and the value of sales booked for each of those months.)
Project Expected Revenue by Month (Vertical stacked bar chart: Shows the forecast income from Projects. The various colour bar segments are used to represent projects which have different status. The six months starting last month are represented.)
Projects Dashboard:
Project Expected Revenue by Month (Vertical stacked bar chart: Shows the forecast income from Projects. The various color bar segments are used to represent projects which have different status. The six months starting last month are represented.)
Each chart may be customized by clicking on the Edit button by the top right corner of the chart. This will bring up a small dialog area which permits you to specify parameters of the chart.
A remarkably powerful feature of the Dashboard is that the charts allow for drilling down into the actual underlying data. This means that each distinctively colored area on every chart is actively linked to the set of opportunities it represents - simply click on an area to see those opportunities.
The info@hand plug-in for Microsoft Outlook is available free of charge for all info@hand users, and utilizes the info@hand web services SOAP interface to integrate CRM functionality into Outlook. No server components or modifications are needed to use the plug-in. The plug-in is simply installed and configured on each client PC or notebook that needs this capability, and enhances the Outlook client installed on that computer.
CNP Integrations is value added reseller (VAR) for the info@hand software solutions and supports a fully integrated CRBM Platform with Joomla CMS, Info@hand CRM and QuickBooks. We provide the value building consulting and technical expertise to help you deploy these systems and integrate the human and business dynamics with the technology for targeted results.
In the coming weeks we are spending a lot of time trying to see where our company can fit into the Platform as a Service model (PaaS). We have so much tooffer our customers by offering a complete technology solution and complimentary consulting, support and training services. In addition to a great network of consultants, powerful hosting infrastructure and technical team we have a complete eCommerce/Social Networking CMS -to- Full featured CRM -to- Accounting and ERP for a full transaction life cycle management system. The Customer Relationship Business Management (CRBM) info@hand leverages powerful connections to the Joomla CMS and synchronization integrations with Inuit's QuickBooks and Microsoft's Outlook. Since Info@hand is based on the open source SugarCRM project and the Joomla CMS has over 4600 extensions the technology side of this platform is virtually unlimited with configuration, extendibility and scalability options.
We have found he hard part of all of this is communicating the vast power of such a technology platform "Integration" or "System Consolidation" combined with our expertise into a nice easy to understand message that folks can swallow in a single sound bite.
I think Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) is getting close to a model we can go after as we shape CNP Integrations to meet the challenges in the ever changing and crowded marketplace.
Here is an article we found that explores this concept a little further;
The success of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) has inspired a new generation of Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) players to emerge, seeking to gain a higher ground in a rapidly evolving ‘cloud computing' environment.
Growing acceptance of adoption of SaaS alternatives to legacy on-premise software applications has created a new competitive battlefield among a combination of established software vendors and upstart SaaS providers.
Salesforce.com, a pioneer in the SaaS market, was among the first to recognize the opportunity to resell its internal SaaS development and delivery capabilities to third-party software developers and enterprise customers via its Force.com PaaS portfolio. Google Engine and a wide array of niche players have also followed suit. And, now the line of demarcation between PaaS and cloud computing vendors, such as Amazon's EC3, is quickly blurring.
In just the past few weeks, three more companies-Jaspersoft, ExpenseWatch.com, LongJump-have announced new platform strategies and solutions. These follow previous offerings from SaaS vendors like Bungee Labs and SpringCM, as well as established software and system vendors such as Oracle, Progress Software and IBM.
Microsoft also recognizes the opportunity and is trying to play catch up by promising its own development platform, Azure, in the next year or so.
Here's a quick list of the essential ingredients which a platform player has to have in place in order to win a meaningful share of the market,
Easy to use, 'standards' oriented development code
Reliable and secure development environment
Automated and flexible procurement capabilities
Name recognition and brand equity
Customer base and channels to market
Developer/Partner network
Put these assets together and the PaaS vendor can help third-party vendors and enterprise developers accelerate their SaaS development cycles, consolidate their go-to-market requirements, and reduce their overall costs. The PaaS vendor also gains a powerful competitive advantage by reinforcing the value of their core SaaS solutions by surrounding them with a wider assortment of third-party enhancements and complementary enterprise deployments.
However, if a platform player can't offer a combination of these attributes they have little hope of survival. The most recent example of this Darwinian reality is Coghead, which was an early entrant into the PaaS arena that failed to win sufficient market penetration to stay afloat. As a result, its intellectual property was recently acquired by SAP which is hoping that it can use these assets to accelerate its success in the SaaS market.
Given that a further shakeout of the PaaS market is inevitable, just as it is in the broader SaaS and cloud computing industry, it is essential for software vendors and enterprise developers to carefully consider which PaaS supplier to select to meet their needs.
Marketing 101 suggests that there are four P's that are critical to success-packaging, pricing, positioning and place. In the PaaS market, I believe there are five P's which will determine the survival and success of today's suppliers, and their customers.
Primacy - Is the PaaS vendor's offering pivotal to their overall success?
Proprietary - Is the PaaS vendor's development environment open or proprietary?
Portability - Can you migrate your solution from one PaaS environment to another?
Positioning - Does the PaaS vendor's sales and marketing efforts enhance your position in the market?
Profitability - Does the PaaS vendor have a sustainable business model to ensure their long-term success?
Keeping these questions in mind will help you determine which PaaS vendor is best suited to satisfy your corporate objectives, whether you are a software vendor or enterprise developer.
Jeff Kaplan is Managing Director of THINKstrategies (an independent consulting firm focused on the business implications of the on-demand services movement). He is also the founder of the SaaS Showplace.
Our core team of service and support technicians,
configuration specialists, project managers, Sr. CRM Consultants, creative content designers and subject
matter experts all share a common thread with our "Value Builder Methodology".
We make sure the chosen web solutions align with your top
priority business goals.
Our proven integration process assures expectations are realistic and clearly defined.
We are committed to deliver Superior Value and Return on Investment
People, process and technology
all have to live in harmony.Whether you are implementing a
complex business management platform, a simple web site or e-commerce portal they
all must target your intended business goals.
Testimonials...
“Throughout the past year, I have had the pleasure of working with
several members of your staff as we designed our corporate website.
Each associate displayed a high degree of integrity, responsibility, competence and ambition. Their good judgment and
experience ensured a logical and practical approach to our endeavor
which resulted in the completion of our project ahead of schedule –
exceeding our expectations.
The services which CNP
provides are a force multiplier for any organization, and I am happy to
give them my wholehearted endorsement.”
The following is a press release that goes out today and tomorrow. We are excited about this program since it helps us give our new CRM customers (Small Businesses) an easy low risk point of entry. It will also help us demonstrate our value, expertise and better understand where we can help our customers the most. The Launch pad program will provide in-depth information for a small upfront investment that can save customers a significant amount of money. The program begins with evaluation and works through to a rapid deployment process based on CNP's needs alignment process and value building methodology. Customers can either avoid purchasing the wrong technologies or failures from deploying infrastructures and new processes without clear focus on value to the organization.
