Analyst firm Forrester recently released new reports that evaluate and rank CRM business applications. I was very happy to see that Forrester ranked Microsoft Dynamics CRM as a "leader" in both the enterprise and mid-market space. Even better, Forrester gave Microsoft Dynamics CRM a better ranking than Salesforce.com. Very nice!

Forrester summarized Microsoft Dynamics CRM with the following:

Over the past five years, Microsoft has established itself as a major CRM player thanks to deep capital investment, a formidable strategy, and strong branding. Theproduct is strong in SFA, internationalization, and usability.

Arguably its greatest strength is its native Microsoft Office user experience. The solution is set up to look, feel, and function like Outlook. Sales analysis tools, opportunity management, and setup and configuration capabilities are the application’s key SFA strengths.

The product also is available in multiple deployment options and is attractively priced below many of the alternative products in the market. The solution is built on the Microsoft .NET framework and integrates seamlessly with other Microsoft productivity tools, like Office, Outlook, and SharePoint.Where the solution is weaker, however, is in support for eCommerce and industry business process support.

The product does not possess deep industry vertical capabilities, and offers minimal partner relationship management (PRM) capabilities natively, forcing buyers that want deeper PRM capabilities to augment the application through integration to BLUEROADS. Microsoft Dynamics CRM is best suited for organizations that are Microsoft-technology-centric for their business applications and technology

You can download the full Forrester reports if you want read all of the details:

• Forrester Wave Midmarket report: click here.
• Forrester Wave Enterprise report: click here.