Corporate Strategy Case Study

Salesforce.com’s Million Subscriber Dream

OR

Abstract:

The case study is about a US based on-demand CRM (Customer Relationship Management) solution provider company –Salesforce.com. The company’s flagship offering is Salesforce automation suite (SFA) which enables customers to manage their sales function

The case study is about the competitive strategy of Salesforce.com, which is based on the concept of SaaS (Software As a Service). SaaS meant offering software as a service on subscription basis and not as a product like a software package

The case study discusses the ERP industry to which Salesforce.com’s competitors originally belonged to and who have entered CRM arena also. The case analyses Salesforce.com vis –a –vis its competitors and discusses the initiatives launched by the company to grow beyond CRM to enter other business domains and achieve its million subscriber dream and achieve revenues of $1 billion by 2007.The case also discusses about the future potential of CRM and ERP industries

Pedagogical Objectives:

• To discuss strategies adopted by Salesforce.com vis-à-vis its competitors
• Discuss the initiatives launched by the company to grow beyond CRM and enter other business domains
• To discuss the future potential of CRM and ERP industries

Keywords : Salesforce.com-on demand provider; s/w as a service; end-of s/w slogan; CRM amd ERP industry; packaged player-SAP; oracle; Corporate Strategies Case Study; on demand players-sieble; netsuite; open source players-sugarCRM; business model-team edition; professional edition; enterprise edition; Appexchange platform; salesfroce.com extension beyond CRM; AppExchnage mobile; launch of unlimited edition; pertner edition; mashup with google; salesforce.com's geographical extention