Over the last two weeks, SYSPRO and SugarCRM have both revealed significant product updates. This week, they announced a partnership that will see them cross-selling their solutions. At the heart of this initiative is the strong integration between the SYSPRO ERP solution for mid-market manufacturers and SugarCRM’s leading mid-market CRM solution. SugarCRM is now a SYSPRO ISV partner and has a listing. However, the reverse is not yet true.
The combined solution will provide manufacturers and distributors with a tightly integrated solution. That will enable organisations to align the front and back office.
The integration offers the following benefits:
- Increased sales revenue: By understanding what products or services a customer has purchased in the past, businesses can make targeted, personalized recommendations that are more likely to result in a sale.
- Improved customer service: See every customer interaction, including past purchases and number of orders. Having this information readily available helps the service team resolve issues faster and provide better customer service.
- Better decision-making: Make better decisions by giving them access to real-time data analytics. When a business’s core operations are integrated into one system, it becomes easier to track key performance indicators (KPIs) and identify trends.
- Enhanced collaboration: A single source of truth for all your customer data. In one place – including contact information, purchase history, support tickets, and more. When information is shared between departments in real-time, everyone can work together more effectively towards common goals, such as improving customer relationships.
Bi-directional integration
While SYSPRO is not (yet) listed on SugarOutfitters, the SugarCRM Marketplace, it seems likely that this will happen. The integration between the solutions is two-way. Sales and Service teams can check product availability, drawing information from the SYSPRO platform and presenting it within SugarCRM. It allows them to provide customers with more accurate lead times.
In addition, the AI-infused SugarCRM platform can analyse data held within SYSPRO. It can help identify which products customers may buy from the product catalogue and also assist sales reps with cross-selling suggestions and step-by-step actions for them to take. These features can help organisations increase revenues from existing and new customers.
Clint Oram, SugarCRM’s Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer, commented, “SugarCRM is thrilled to partner with SYSPRO ERP to bring newfound productivity gains to sales, marketing, and customer service professionals. Powerful CRM and ERP integrations fulfill the need for a complete ‘business operating system’ spanning across the back-office and front-office to realize maximum productivity and efficiency within the business.
“Together with SYSPRO ERP, the Sugar platform will do the work to unlock customer insights, improve the experience by providing a 360-degree view of the customer, enable better decision-making with real-time analytics, and enhance collaboration with a single source of truth for all customer data.”
There is only one CRM
To date, this is the first partnership that SYSPRO has with a CRM vendor. Sanjay Ejantkar, Vice President of Global Alliances, SYSPRO Americas, said, “When looking for a best-of-breed CRM partner who understood mid-market manufacturing and distribution, SugarCRM was the obvious choice. We already have several customers seeing enormous benefits even prior to launch. We look forward to continuing that momentum through this strategic partnership.”
Those customers include Adhesive Applications, a manufacturer of custom pressure-sensitive adhesive tape solutions. Petra Schaefer, President of Adhesive Applications, said, “We’ve been using SYSPRO ERP to automate our back office for several years and were looking for the right complementary CRM in the front office. We chose SugarCRM so that we could get earlier visibility into our sales pipeline and deliver a better customer experience.”
Enterprise Times: What does this mean?
This is a partnership that seems destined for success. There is definitely an opportunity; there are already several integrations between SYSPRO and SugarCRM. These are already sold by third-party ISVs. Commercient has a listing on SugarOutfitters for its SYNC between the two applications. There are also IPaaS vendors such as Alumio and Magic.
One question is whether SYSPRO will add another CRM partner over time, perhaps Hubspot. The other is that details of what the integration includes and, importantly, whether the firms will continue to develop it are scant. If the partnership is successful, is there a case for a closer relationship or even an acquisition or merger between the two firms?
For some, this announcement is long overdue. The relationship has built over time. At the Australian Manufacturing Week show at the start of this year, Adam Frank of SugarCRM, speaking with Paul Bounds of SYSPRO, said, “Now, CRM and ERP, a marriage made in heaven.”
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