Loopfuse integrates open-source demand generation into CentricCRM
Loopfuse and CentricCRM announced today a partnership that brings tight integration of Loopfuse's demand-generation software into CentricCRM's Customer Relationship Management suite. I'm a big believer in what Loopfuse is doing, as I've written. This is a logical next step for Loopfuse as it seeks to broaden the reach of data-driven marketing for companies that do business online (which is pretty much everyone).
I like the combination:
[Loopfuse] has an open source solution that allows organizations to track customer activity on websites and via emails; score sales leads based on detailed data about customer behavior; handle lead-nurturing capabilities such as outbound communications; segment prospects along a variety of dimensions; and integrate marketing processes with major CRM solutions, including CentricCRM. This enables LoopFuse to provide the capability to score prospects for the sales team and measure ROI within marketing and sales activities.
If you're doing business online, and maybe especially if you're an open-source company trying to turn all those downloads into dollars, you must get a demand-generation solution. If you want to go with Eloqua or some other proprietary solution, fine. But get something. You can't afford to not use demand-generation software.
Don't believe me? Ask Larry Augustin. He saw the power of it at JBoss, and invested in Eloqua. This is a big market waiting to happen because it helps companies manage the big market of users of their products (or browsers of their websites) and help to market to them to create paid customers of those products.
Linking this into CRM systems is an important step for Loopfuse. Eloqua hooks into Salesforce, (and nothing else, of which I'm aware) Oracle/Siebel, Microsoft Dynamics, NetSuite CRM, and Saleslogix [Matt's note: I added these other CRM systems based on the comment below], while Loopfuse hooks into Salesforce.com, SugarCRM, and CentricCRM (It's CRM-agnostic). Both companies need to expand their CRM offerings, as it's in conjunction with a CRM system that the value of this software really hums.
Good move for both CentricCRM and Loopfuse.
Full disclosure: I am an advisor to Loopfuse.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
Great piece(s) on this emerging space. There's no question that these tools represent the future of internet and even integrated offline/online marketing.
Full disclosure, I work for none of these companies, but I just completed a vendor selection and initial implementation of Market2Lead, another leader in this space. While these tools are still relatively young, they are rich in functionality and being able to do trigger-based automated email alone is HUGE. One quick thing on Market2Lead, they have incredibly rich web forms functionality that allows us to gather new information at every customer touchpoint...first whitepaper: name, email and company, second: title and zip, third: business vertical and time to buy...it's easy and has already begun to improve conversion...ahh, the future is bright.
Thanks again.
Marko Z Muellner
www.measurechange.com
- Depth of CRM integration is important, and differs
- by DavidCummings September 13, 2007 7:33 AM PDT
- One other point to note is that the level of integration with the different CRM vendors is likely to differ. For example Pardot, a demand generation provider, has integration with salesforce.com and SugarCRM, but the salesforce.com integration is more sophisticated. That's an important point when evaluating providers.
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(4 Comments)Full disclosure, I'm with Pardot (http://www.pardot.com).