Hi Jacques, You are on the money there. I think that the ecommerce solution in OfBIZ can be regarded as Best in Class. And with a little effort the CRM/SFA module can be the same. Most of the functionalities, as you pointed out, are already in place. It is just bringing it together. Having that it will drive the acceptance of a good CRM/SFA solution for customers and can/will lead to having a better acceptance of OfBIZ as a whole (both from customer and developer (SI) point of view).
Therefore I would also advice to split up the Marketing module in a MARCOM application (which is more about marketing and communication - with their own business processes) and a CRM application (which is by most perceived as SFA). In my opinion the CRM/SFA should be the starting point for getting all the info of an account/prospect/customer regarding: Opportunities, Request Orders Contacts etc. When the page of an account is shown the focus should also be on how to contact the account (contact mechs) and the associated contacts (showing phone and email contact mechs). The SFA officials should be able to create, read, update and delete from there. But also security solutions should be up to specs. I also think that the starterpage of SFA should have some charts showing the pipeline of all account opportunities (maybe that is some BI-functionality). This functionality could then also be shown on the profile of the account., including showing total value of sales of YtD, and last year. It's the simple things that make it (life also) better to bear. Regards, Pierre PS Could you (and others) also comment on my email regarding Market Segment & Sales Segment? 2009/10/20 Jacques Le Roux <[email protected]> > Hi Pierre, > > Yes it sounds like a reasonnable requirement to me. Some of the problems we > get when trying to convince prospects to use OFBiz is > that they want something like SugarCRM. Almost all is there, but not as > easy as in SugarCRM... > I guess that's why Opentaps was created in the 1st place, because Si > quickly identified the need and filled it. BTW, I think we miss > after sales features in OFBiz (like tokens in SugarCRM). This could > certainly be implemented using what exists already in OFBiz (ie > we don't need much changes in the data model if any, using workeffort for > instance) but has still to be done at the UI level. > > A prospective customer (French international enterprise of middle size) > told me recently that he would prefer to have an easier to use > SFA/CRM than an accounting module, because he has already his own accouting > system and do not want to change. > Also he wondered how much changes would be implied if ever he would like to > change, because he think the accouting module is > formated to US practices. I don't think so (I think it's general enough and > may be quickly adapted) but as I have not worked much > with the OFBiz accouting system yet, I had not much arguments to expose, > and was not even quite sure of them. So I ask accouting specialists : what > is your point of view on this aspect ? > > My 2cts > > Jacques > > From: "Pierre Smits" <[email protected]> > > Hi All, >> Shouldn't requests, quotes and the like be visible from the SFA Manager? >> And >> should users be also able to create new requests, quotes e.a. from there? >> >> Regards, >> >> Pierre >> >> > >
