CRM Blog

CRM as a Platform (Part 1)

by Bryan Van Antwerp 01.30.08
Opinions differ on whether CRM is, can be, or should be an application platform.  The points of contention are typically terminology and technology.  Rather than focus on semantics, I want to focus on the possibilities the MS CRM application provides – based on my past experience.    

In addition to the term Application Platform, I have also heard Solution Platform, Development Platform, Application Framework, Solution Framework and Development Framework.  I’m sure there are many more.  We could debate why one term is more appropriate than another, but to me the objective is not the “term of the month”, but the ability of the tool; the ability of the tool to quickly and easily solve a business need.  I realize quickly and easily are relative, but this blog is based on my opinion – from many years of developing, architecting and implementing custom solutions compared to designing and extending CRM.  

Rather than create another feature list of what CRM as a platform can provide, I will describe the possibilities through examples.  Let’s start with a very simplistic example.  Our example business need is for a “Suggestion Mailbox” application; a means to allow employees to record recommendations on how to improve the business and submit them to management for review. 

Five business requirements for this application are: 
  1. Managers should be able to see all suggestions, users should only see suggestions they created.
  2. A suggestion needs to be related to a department, beginning with 3 options (HR, Finance & IT), however the ability to add more departments needs to be incorporated.
  3. When a suggestion is created, the manager from the department selected needs to be sent an email.
  4. Managers need to be able to set the status of a suggestion (New, In Review, Approved and Denied).
  5. When a manager changes the status of a suggestion to Approved or Denied, the user that created the suggestion should receive an email notifying them of the outcome.


These 5 business requirements imply many technology requirements including a robust security model, data management (including a database to store the information), workflow (to trigger and send emails), forms to view lists of records (users, departments, statuses, suggestions), forms to create and update records and more.  The intent here is not to list every requirement in detail but rather highlight that a basic application still requires a lot of foundational functionality to exist in order to complete the application.    

This is where CRM as a platform steps in to give us a hand.  CRM provides all of these foundational needs out of the box – meaning that time is spent on configuration of the business requirements and not on technical development.  The configuration becomes defining the metadata to make up our new entity, security and processes.  This consists of: 
  1. Construct what a “Suggestion” is – what do we call it and what are its attributes (fields). 
  2. Define security specifically for a “Suggestion”.
  3. Workflow needs to be configured to send the emails based on the requirements defined. 
All of these can be completed through the standard configuration tools.  

To custom develop a working prototype of the “Suggestion Mailbox” ready for users to experiment with and test would take an experienced developer a few days to create (this is also assuming some reuse of existing code).  However, creating this within CRM would take an experienced CRM admin or power user a couple of hours (including testing).  These are just ballpark estimates for a very simplistic example, but the purpose is to show that CRM provides a lot more benefit out of the box than just Customer Relationship Management.  It can become a platform for related and extended business processes. 

As I wrap this post up, I would like to throw out some caveats.  Do I think CRM should become the platform for all development and therefore companies should go out and purchase CRM for this purpose – no.  Custom Development will always have its place and for some requirements it is the better choice.  However, if you have MS CRM or are considering MS CRM I think you should consider and evaluate the business solutions it can provide from your Customer Relationship Management investment.  In other words, if you have a development platform (or whatever term you prefer) that comes along with your CRM investment, why not take advantage of it. 



In subsequent posts, I will discuss some real world examples to show more insight on the possibilities.

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