Market Perspectives

ISG Research is happy to share insights gleaned from our latest Buyers Guide, an assessment of how well software providers’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements. The CRM Platform: ISG Research Buyers Guide is the distillation of a year of market and product research by ISG Research. This research is part of a portfolio of ISG Buyers Guides in CRM covering marketing, sales, customer service, partners, digital commerce and sales engagement.

CRM platforms are a comprehensive technology designed to facilitate and optimize interactions between an enterprise and its customers throughout the entire customer lifecycle. CRM platforms give enterprises the flexibility to integrate applications such as marketing, sales and service, along with the support of digital commerce and the operations and management of partners. This integration is crucial because customers often interact through multiple channels, and having a unified platform simplifies the process of tracking these interactions and information.

ISG defines CRM Platform as a set of applications that support the processes and tasks for managing and operating customer relationships across core areas of marketing, sales and service. The evolution of AI and machine learning in CRM platforms include the use of generative AI (GenAI) and can provide a modern digital experience through agents and digital assistants. 

The ability to share information across various activities is a key advantage of such platforms. The more data needs to be transferred between teams, the higher the likelihood of errors or omissions, which can lead to customer frustration. By enabling seamless information sharing, these platforms help reduce such risks, ensuring a smooth and reliable flow of data. Additionally, the platform enables workflow processes across teams and ensures data normalization, which includes integrating third-party data into the CRM system. This data normalization supports the goal of improving transaction efficacy between buyers and sellers.

CRM platforms play several key roles in managing customer interactions, one of which being customer data management. CRM platforms store and organize detailed customer information, including contact details, interaction history and purchase records to create a centralized data repository provides a 360-degree view of each customer, enabling personalized and informed interactions.

CRM platforms should be able to support physical retail operations just as they can serve to support digital commerce. Many customers now prefer to conduct their shopping entirely online but no matter where they shop, information related to the customer should be available. The focus in CRM platforms has been on understanding the customer, including gathering information that can be used to help guide their interests and the propensity to purchase specific products and services. The more businesses know about their customers, the more effective they can be in promoting relevant products and services. Unlike a physical retail store that may not know who a customer is and cannot offer personalized promotions, a CRM can provide tailored offers based on a customer's specific interests that can be provide to commerce, marketing and customer service channels.

The benefits of CRM platforms are numerous and impactful. They improve customer relationships by providing a comprehensive and organized view of customer interactions. Operational efficiency is enhanced through the automation of routine tasks and the centralization of data, streamlining business processes and reducing manual work and errors. CRM platforms can support facilitated collaboration across departments to better align the goals of marketing, sales and service teams. Additionally, the insights provided by CRM analytics allow businesses to identify trends, track performance and optimize resource allocation.

Ideally, in a well-constructed CRM system, these functionalities would be integrated as modules within the platform. A modern CRM platform should have shared services for various processes, such as providing product information and computing prices. Whether conducting a commerce transaction or generating a quote, the pricing calculation should be consistent across different channels, be it through commerce, partners, or direct sales representatives.

A unified platform allows for the standardization of various processes. There should be a single, consistent definition of a product across the entire enterprise, however, many companies struggle with multiple product and price lists scattered across different spreadsheets for various groups within the enterprise, leading to inconsistencies and inefficiencies. Master data management (MDM) and product information management (PIM) can address this issue by centralizing and standardizing product and pricing information on a single platform. This centralized data can then be utilized by different departments such as marketing, sales, post-sales service, commerce and partners.

Instead of ingesting data multiple times for different purposes, a unified CRM platform allows for a one-time data ingestion process. Once normalized, the data can be made available to all relevant departments through the platform. This approach simplifies data management and reduces redundancy. The platform can then support the use of AI and machine learning in a more governed manner, as well as support the range of applications and interactions with the workforce and customers.

Platforms should also be extensible, allowing businesses to adapt and grow their systems through workflows or point integrations. Regardless of whether the integration is for marketing, sales or commerce, it should follow a standard procedure. Unified workflows can traverse multiple groups, eliminating the need for separate workflow activities for each department. By using a platform with low-code or no-code workflow capabilities, businesses can streamline their operations and ensure that all departments are aligned in their processes.

The ISG Buyers Guide™ for CRM Platform evaluates products based on capabilities that facilitate the use of an integrated and extensible platform that can help orchestrate activities across all teams involved in marketing, sales and servicing customers. In addition, the data and data model should be accessible using a set of standard reporting and analytic methods. The CRM platform should also support the innovation of AI and machine learning. Finally, CRM platforms should allow customers and third parties to develop applications that can work co-operantly to enable functions not necessarily offered by the primary application. The included providers offered capabilities in all or most of these areas.

This research evaluates the following software providers that offer products that address key elements of CRM platform as we define it: Creatio, HubSpot, Microsoft, NetSuite, Oracle, Salesforce, SAP, SugarCRM, Zendesk and Zoho.

This research-based index evaluates the full business and information technology value of CRM platform software offerings. We encourage you to learn more about our Buyers Guide and its effectiveness as a provider selection and RFI/RFP tool.

We urge organizations to do a thorough job of evaluating CRM platform offerings in this Buyers Guide as both the results of our in-depth analysis of these software providers and as an evaluation methodology. The Buyers Guide can be used to evaluate existing suppliers, plus provides evaluation criteria for new projects. Using it can shorten the cycle time for an RFP and the definition of an RFI.

The Buyers Guide for CRM Platform in 2024 finds Salesforce first on the list, followed by Oracle and HubSpot.

Software providers that rated in the top three of any category ﹘ including the product and customer experience dimensions ﹘ earn the designation of Leader.

The Leaders in Product Experience are:

• Oracle
• Salesforce
• HubSpot

The Leaders in Customer Experience are:

• Salesforce
• HubSpot
• Oracle

The Leaders across any of the seven categories are:

• Salesforce, which has achieved this rating in seven of the seven categories.
• HubSpot and Oracle in six categories.
• SAP and Zoho in one category.

The overall performance chart provides a visual representation of how providers rate across product and customer experience. Software providers with products scoring higher in a weighted rating of the five product experience categories place farther to the right. The combination of ratings for the two customer experience categories determines their placement on the vertical axis. As a result, providers that place closer to the upper-right are “exemplary” and rated higher than those closer to the lower-left and identified as providers of “merit.” Software providers that excelled at customer experience over product experience have an “assurance” rating, and those excelling instead in product experience have an “innovative” rating.

Note that close provider scores should not be taken to imply that the packages evaluated are functionally identical or equally well-suited for use by every enterprise or process. Although there is a high degree of commonality in how organizations handle CRM platform there are many idiosyncrasies and differences that can make one provider’s offering a better fit than another.

ISG Research has made every effort to encompass in this Buyers Guide the overall product and customer experience from our CRM platform blueprint, which we believe reflects what a well-crafted RFP should contain. Even so, there may be additional areas that affect which software provider and products best fit an enterprise’s particular requirements. Therefore, while this research is complete as it stands, utilizing it in your own organizational context is critical to ensure that products deliver the highest level of support for your projects.

You can find more details on our community as well as on our expertise in the research for this Buyers Guide.