[From nobody Thu Jan 28 23:21:43 2010
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 15:13:22 +0200
From: "=?UTF-8?Q?Daniel=20B=C3=B6hmer?=" <db@klopfer.com>
To: <vtigercrm-developers@lists.vtigercrm.com>
Subject: Fwd: Getting vtiger working with our company / development possible
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Hello mailing list,

this is my first posting here and I'd like to ask some basic questions in =
order to consider if vtiger is worth spending more time looking for the =
right CRM system.

I am working for a general system house in Germany which is currently =
looking for a new system for managing contacts and articles. Most =
important points are MS Office integration and integration into an =
existing software for managing articles, offers and bills. At this time we =
are discussing several possible solutions including MS Dynamics CRM, an =
upgrade for our existing software or something else.

Yesterday I found out about vtiger. Its integration in Outlook catched my =
interest and makes it unique along all those free CRM which are mostly =
web-based.

Now I consider implementing a test environment with vtiger and want to =
make clear some basic points. I have done this with MS CRM before -- it =
promised everything (including buzzwords like "raise your productivity", =
"lower your costs" etc.) and didn't work at all... Therefore I am pretty =
happy having found a free CMS based on programming languages I speak. Now =
please help me by answering the following questions:

(1) Will we be able to run vtiger with MS SQL-database in order to sync =
contacts between vtiger and existing database? Alternative would be =
PostgreSQL, but MySQL is not considered to be a serious DBMS by my =
company.

(2) Can vtiger interact with an Exchange server for mail besides generic =
IMAP and SMTP?

(3) Are there any translations for the CRM integration for Outlook or =
Office? I already have a German web interface but buttons in Outlook are =
in English per default and I didn't find any language files...


To point out which workflow we want to implement I will describe it in =
short:

Potential customers are stored in the CRM and get marketing mails and =
individual offers. One the day or the other a customer decides to accept =
one offer and calls a random employee at our company. Now this employee =
must be able to see all communication with that person in the past, =
especially the offer the customer wants to accept. Once a potential =
customer becomes a real customer we want to port him to the existing =
(ERP?) system in order to manage bills etc. For this step we image a =
single button in the CRM like "open this customer in ERP". When clicked =
this should copy the dataset to the ERP and afterwards we can handle this =
customer there.


I am able and motivated to implement DB porting and data transfer as well =
as new GUI elements. The big question is whether vtiger meets our general =
needs. Please help me to give my boss a general outlook on what advantages =
vtiger offers and how long work will take. If our goals match I apply as =
free developer for implementing missing features and publishing code =
afterwards.

Thanks for reading this long posting. I apologize for uncertain questions =
and spell as well as grammar mistakes -- it's Friday afternoon here and I =
had some pretty frustrating week with MS CRM:-)


Kind regards
Daniel B=C3=B6hmer
klopfer datennetzwerk gmbh, Germany

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