‘Jack of all trade and master of one,’ Advanced Business Solutions (ABS) always preferred to be the master of one, which in this case, is CRM (customer relationship management). CNME met up with Ashok Sharma, CEO, ABS to understand why they choose this path for business.
Focusing on CRM
“When I did not have to worry about day to day existence, I decided it was time to start my own business,” says Ashok Sharma, CEO of Microsoft gold certified partner ‘Advanced Business Solutions (ABS)’.
Sharma was involved in customer relationship management (CRM) for 15 years, most of it as a Microsoft employee. “I was also responsible for setting up Microsoft’s contact center in the region. When I decided to roll up my sleeves and do business on the Microsoft platform, it was not new to me.”
ABS kicked off business in 2003, and spent the first three years understanding the market demands. It was also difficult working away from the Microsoft platform, “In the beginning we wanted to work on our own platform, but customers would always ask us ‘who has made this product’, but it was difficult to keep away from Microsoft’s brand name.”
According to Sharma, Microsoft has the experience with the technology, a brand name, R&D and a large team involved in the building the product. ABS on the other hand had just 8 people at that point when they started making their product. They discovered it was the wrong way of dealing with it, as taking care of debugging and creating a knowledge base like Microsoft’s was extremely difficult.
ABS has now specialized on Microsoft CRM and focuses on specific vertical markets. This mainly includes government, publishing houses and targeted sales/marketing campaigns. It has also expanded its team to 12 people including sales and technical.
Innovations in CRM
ABS’ competition has come from the likes of salesforce.com, another online CRM specialist. But Sharma believes that the product he works on is flexible to adapt to a number of delivery models, including a Web-based one. “Microsoft CRM offers a wide scope and is not limited to the Web for delivery. We can offer the solution as a Web-based offering as well,” he adds.
At a time when models like SaaS (Software as a Service) are gaining momentum in the market, Sharma believes that the concept has already been in use in a variety of ways. Sharma opines, “Every bank offers its software (banking software for example) as a service. Customers today prefer to use their service on-line, so SaaS in its essence has been in existence.”
So how does the uptake of this model change the dynamics for on-premise software, especially in the case of CRM? “An enterprise customer requires customization of applications. A pure vanilla solution often does not make sense. Microsoft CRM offers easy customization, whereas a SaaS provider will typically not offer too much choice,” he says.
ABS claims its USP and value add is its broader offering which includes comprehensive marketing solutions for customers, e-mail shots, response tracking, follow-ups, sms related marketing, etc. The best example is the Government of Dubai. ABS has worked with the Dubai Government to create solutions that will facilitate better interaction for e-governance.
Sharma also adds that although customers in the region are adopting CRM, the industry is only scratching the surface. “The biggest USP is to relate the challenges that customers have with the features of the CRM, without opting for extensive customization of the product itself,” he says.
The government, distribution and publishing sectors are ideal candidates for CRM automation. Today, specialized products through a variety of delivery models like hosted CRM, automated SaaS, SaaS-based CRM are available to help organizations target the needs of their departments including the sales team.
Moving Forward
Looking ahead, Sharma is looking at markets outside of Dubai and believes its strong reference of customers will help the company grow.
The next big potential business area for ABS is the SMB segment especially catering to the needs of the investment advisors. He also notes that the next trend to watch for in the CRM space will be one of specialization.
“Customers want specialization and don’t want to be sold just another box,” he notes. Times ahead will certainly be worth watching.
