Hello, just joined here - looks like a very worthwhile place to be.
Might anybody here be interested in collaborative creation of a lightweight commercially oriented CRM system (on Drupal of course)? The final objective could be a commercial package, open source, hosted service or some combination depending on individual opinions & requirements.
Some years ago I was the architect of such a system (not web-based) which we sold to several hundred clients in the UK and Europe, 3Com (US Robotics) and ING Bank among others. It's pretty much dead now (I'm talking 1992-2002) and now that I've been Drupal-oriented for a few years I keep thinking it would be great to re-create the whole thing as a web application.
Feel free to reply here or private-message me.
Comments
CRM as Drupal module?
I was also looking for a Drupal CRM module. After considering various pors and cons, I decided to build an independent free and open source CRM product. I have started working on the product and I intend to release it to public on September 30 2008.
I still look forward for a CRM product on Drupal. Can you post your ideas in detail? What would be the features of the CRM module? Who would be the target audience?
Target audience etc
Interesting... presumably you rejected civicrm as an option?
Post my ideas in detail.... I could write a full spec, but it would be a lot of writing! I'm talking about I system that existed (and evolved) over a period of some 10 or 12 years. It stood up very well to real customer needs. The typical use case was B2B, medium-sized suppliers dealing with small to medium-sized customers, the majority in the IT industry in some form - e.g. software houses, dealers and distributors, in a few cases hardware manufacturers. That said, there were many exceptions - for example B&Q used the system for around 5 years. B&Q are a major retail chain in the UK with large "DIY" stores in most major towns. Their use of the system was Customer Service and Complaints handling, so they were not B2B and not IT. There was at least one other large user that were non-IT and B2C rather than B2B. The system also worked reasonably well as a Sales Contact management system (like Salesforce, Goldmine, etc) but was probably not ideal in that application area.
So anyway, target audience: SME, B2B primarily, but no particular industry focus. The big guys will already have something else.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
CRM Options
I have tried many CRM software - CiviCRM, SugarCRM, vtiger, etc. SugarCRM open source edition does not contain user groups feature. Lot of SugarCRM modules are not free. I encountered lot of technical issues with vtiger. Also vtiger license is not OSI approved, I think. After few SugarCRM and vtiger deployments, I decided that I met a dead end with these projects.
After deploying CRM solutions to few customers, I have come across these frequent feature requests
1. Products, quotes, customer service, billing and finance
2. HR - leave, recruitment, time sheet
3. Branch office and warehouse management
More or less, businesses want ERP+CRM in one place.
Thus I decided to start a new project. I am very much interested in integrating my project with Drupal via a connector module.
http://civicrm.org
http://civicrm.org
Thanks for the pointer
Thanks for the civicrm pointer - I already knew of it, though I haven't investigated in any detail. I get the impression it's neither commercially oriented nor lightweight (slow, apparently?). Probably the main reason why my CRM was successful was it was fast and easy to use - it seems civicrm is not, but I'd be keen to hear of first hand experience.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
Drupal + CRM
I haven't attempted to do any CRM integration, but I am interested in such a project because it would be another integration solution that would benefit us as consultants. I would probably be most interested in an integration with SugarCRM or something else open source.
It would probably be beneficial to talk about the pros & cons of building a complete drupal solution (modules &/or install profile) from scratch versus integration with an existing system like Sugar, etc...
Here are some additional links & resources to ponder:
Drupal Group: Enterprise CRM Integration (can this post be cross-posted there? I don't know how to do that)
http://groups.drupal.org/enterprise-crm-integration
Here is a project that aimed to integrate Drupal & Sugar, but it looks like it never made it past a test release phase...
http://www.sugarforge.org/projects/sugarondrupal/
here is a short thread on g.d.o. concerning the above 'SugarOnDrupal'...
http://groups.drupal.org/node/4960
and finally here is an advanced search on d.o. for Sugar OR CRM projects
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
SugarCRM
I was originally thinking about building a lightweight CRM in Drupal, but obviously integrating with something like Sugar is another way to go. If you know Sugar already, any chance that you could give a quick run-down of strengths and weaknesses? Looks like I need to add SugarCRM to my list of things to learn about.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
Not a CRM guru...
I'm not terribly familiar with Sugar or other options, even CiviCRM. Just that for me, the open source options bump to the top of my list by default.
I just looked for a "comparison" wikipedia page, but didn't find it. Here is the main CRM wikipedia entry, from which we could extract the bulleted lists as at least an initial basis for evaluating existing CRM's like Sugar; and/or for selecting a few of the high-demand, high-value CRM features that most folks might want to have.
Like project management or any other business area, everyone will have their own thoughts about the ideal feature-set, so I think maintaining an emphasis on your original target of a lightweight solution would be beneficial... to keep things moving.
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
SugarCRM seems to stand out
I took a quick look (hardly in-depth research!) but Sugar does seem to stand out. Some interesting facts according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SugarCRM ...
Looks like a product that a "consultant" ought to know at least a little about, so now it's definitely high on my never-ending list of things to investigate.
But, back to the CRM-lite idea, and I'm not sure that Sugar qualifies, I originally imagined something based on Views, CCK and Workflow, with custom logic where needed. Messaging, to receive emails and record them correctly against cusomer contact. Much, perhaps all of it can be done with standard modules. Again, I'm talking about re-creating an existing and well-proven design, not designing a CRM system, light or otherwise, from scratch.
A lightweight system would obviously leave scope for adding extra functionality as required by individual cleints.
Since I started typing this I've now seen Boris's input http://groups.drupal.org/node/13602#comment-44563 below - I agree.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
CRM module, lightweight, maybe an install profile
OK, I'll jump in...
The most IMPORTANT thing to do is to define where you want to go. Drupal's mode of solid core / extensible contrib is a good design pattern to follow.
It's about a year old, but I think Allie Micka had the right idea with CRM module -- http://drupal.org/project/crm
Basically, CCK + Views + some glue code. Define contacts / people, companies, and layer on status, comments, invoices, workflows, whatever -- through extension modules.
I myself have built CRM-light multiple times, using just CCK and Views.
So, something that might be interesting would be a CRM "install profile".
CRM "install profile"
Yes, that might a good approach. Certainly Views and CCK provide much of what's needed, but I think only enough for a "featherweight" CRM.
A lot of the key functionality in our original system was about ease/speed of use. Here's an example of something that I think would be pretty hard to do, but was a common real-life requirement in our original system...
In the case of a known company and known contact, the whole process of logging an issue took less than 10 seconds, that included recording who (company, person) and the subject of the issue from a pre-defined set of codes. These features were very important for companies who received incoming phone-calls, and although now it's just as likely that they'll get IM or email, people still call, especially when they've got an urgent problem.
In the Windows-based system, everything was virtually instant (pop-up lists etc.). A web-based system will need ajax everywhere to even get close to the same speed (probably feasible on a LAN.)
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
SugarCRM Isn't Magic Either ;)
SugarCRM is also a PHP/MySQL web-based system like Drupal, so I wouldn't look to it to provide what you describe above.
Also, in my experience, while Sugar has a lot of features, it's underlying architecture is decidedly less elegant than Drupal's. First time you look under the hood, you'll tear your hair out.
Unless your requirements suggest a need for the highest end of enterprise CRMs (ie, not Sugar), I agree with Boris that a (mostly) feature-complete CRM could be built in Drupal, and it would improve with Drupal over time. Plus, you'd get all the other features of Drupal as gravy (eg, integrate your CRM with your website? done. OpenID authentication? done. Captchas? done. etc etc etc). Like others in this thread, I've built a light-weight Drupal CRM tools in minutes using stock Drupal. A solid DrupalCRM install profile alone would go a long way toward addressing this need.
And let's not forget the work already done in Drupal with CivicCRM.
Agreed
I attempted to install SugarCE 5.0.0 the other day right after I mentioned it here, and it kept hanging on the final step of creating tables in the DB. I suspect the problem likely had more to do with me and my less-than-optimal shared hosting account, but yes, I peeked under the hood and did get a bit frightened!
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
shared hosting alternative
Quickly off-topic Generally pleased with my vps - vpsland.com for $20/mth, entry level (192MB/6GB) even cheaper at $16. Don't think I would ever go back to shared hosting.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
UX challenges
Usability is a consistent challenge in any app like this... any web app really. I can build a good UI/UX, but only after a good UI/UX designer tells me and shows me what it should be! Usability might drag it's feet here initially, but if solid core CRM functionality is established, the usability will come along.
I think down the road it would be clever & fun to build Adobe AIR/Flex front-ends to a drupal-powered CRM system, project management system... etc.
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
This might be off topic
But is there such a solution for project management tools like ala 'Basecamp'. Basecamp isn't CRM but those kind of project management tools. Maybe I need a whole new topic for that. We've thought ab building our own lightweight CRM tool in the past.
Follow me on twitter: @drupalninja
PM group & issue tracking group
@jaykali
see:
http://groups.drupal.org/projectManagement
http://groups.drupal.org/issue-tracking-and-software-releases
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
interesting!
wow this storm deal might be the ticket
Follow me on twitter: @drupalninja
agreed STORM looks very
agreed STORM looks very nice, perhaps it could be used as a example for the CRM module ?
we actually took the
we actually took the sugarondrupal connector, cleaned it up and made it work for us. it works pretty well for our specific use case (put trial users into sugar). I will have a chat with our CEO this weekend, and the guy who cleaned up the module -- so he can clean it some more ;) , and look at releasing this cleaned up version.
sugarondrupal cleaned up
I'd definitely be interested in knowing more. So are you a SugarCRM user? If so could you give us a quick micro-review?
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
Multiple Approaches
All of these ideas & approaches have merit for different scenarios. As consultants, each client we meet with is going to have individual needs. If your target market is SMB's & small mom & pop shops, then a simple, extendable, pure drupal solution such as Boris promotes would fit just right. For ourselves as budding or experienced consultants, it would also likely work well. Other clients will have some form of CRM in place and are going to require either an integration or a migration project/solution.
In following with that suggestion, and drupal's design model... For integration projects, that "Core CRM" package could be architected such that it could be extended with say, that sugarondrupal connector. So now "Core CRM" is configured/instructed to use a Sugar instance... or a Salesforce instance, etc for it's primary CRM data store. I'm thinking 'aloud' here, criticism welcome.
I'm just cutting my teeth as a consultant/service provider, and still figuring out my own strategies (http://webjax.net). My own marketing & customer relations efforts are paltry... phantom projects! So I'm excited to get started with the type of pure Drupal solution discussed here.
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.
So back to the original question...
Lots of good comments here, but just to try and keep some direction, the original question was whether anybody would be interested in a collaborative development of such a thing (i.e. some unpaid work with a longer term perspective.) I think the conclusion is that "light" CRM could be done with not much more than standard Drupal (Views, CCK) and there's probably a market need for such a thing. With a good modular design, it could be extended to meet more specific requirements (good, consulting opportunity.)
Conclusions?
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
...that you need to do some
...that you need to do some of the following:
1) define some rough goals of functionality that you want to enable
2) work on snapping together CCK, Views, Workflow, etc. to see how far you get today. There is also the old CRM API that you might want to look at (http://groups.drupal.org/crm-api).
You might want to start by creating a wiki page with a module and feature list.
After a week on CiviCRM
I've decided that NIH is in play.
CCK and views does go a long way but I'd like my contacts to have "profiles" where they could be easily converted from propects to customers
Being hcard/vcard compatible seems reasonable, perhaps even RDF/SPARQL.
What is the current vision of a "lightweight" approach?
Jim
Sorry for not contributing
Sorry for not contributing here for a while, been mega-busy (with this: http://drupal.org/project/mailman_groups) and now about to go on a well deserved holiday for three weeks.
Currently part of the team at https://lastcallmedia.com in a senior Drupal specialist role.
CiviCRM, Sugar, vTiger...my opinion
I like CiviCRM. It's got a lot of good features, but most of my paying clients are not non-profits. Also, the fact that CiviCRM is not pure Drupal means you have to switch mental gears between Smarty and Drupal, something I find annoying. Also, depending on how you implement things, Smarty apps have the tendency to mix too much code in the templates, which is REALLY annoying.
I've also used vTiger for some clients, which is a decent system also based on Smarty, but for developers, it's code is not easy to figure out. I eval'd SugarCRM, and they have some good features too, but their code is really a challenge to figure out, and they're using both Smarty and XTemplate depending on which page you're on. Fugettaboutit.
In short, I'd prefer a pure Drupal solution. I'm not sure that CCK and Views is the proper way to go about creating a CRM web app (thoughts?). I like writing the modules. More control. Cleaner.
I'd be interested in knowing more about this, and contributing depending on what direction it takes. I've developed a few custom CRM web apps, mostly in Smarty/PHP.
I also have experience in QuickBooks (QBXML) and QB WebConnect, for what that's worth. I was thinking it would be cool to use the built in estimating/sales order/invoicing/etc functions that QB already has rather than try to duplicate all of that in a web app. But then my customers are all English speaking and reside in the US. I don't even know if there is a Spanish language version of QB or the QBSDK. I guess there are some parts that you'd have to duplicate regardless.
Also, do we try to design for use with Ubercart/Ecommerce/Whatever now, or after we get the 3,000,000 requests for it? ;-)
A Half Baked Drupal Solution
I started with a three year old database, content_profile and node_import and wound up with over 700 "contacts" as profiles all owned by "webmaster". I adopted a modified SIC taxonomy and beat my head against taxonomy_menu, dhtml and pathauto. The latter three did not play well together on D6. I commented out the "only one profile" restriction in content_profile and can now enter new contacts as profiles.
My contacts can take charge of their own profiles by signing up as users. Reactions have been favorable, the hostile contacts are not good prospects in any case and I am now in the face of local businesses. Not bad.
The site is still a work in progress but I've turned it up anyway.
http://downtowngalax.com
Interested!
I am not a consultant for CRMs but in the need of CRM myself for my small company. I looked into Sugar and vtiger and both are already too big for my needs. So, I'd really appreciate a clean 'the-drupal-way' CRM based on views, cck and glue. Just my few cents...
ditto on rick's comment.
ditto on rick's comment. I've tested a few popular CRMs (sugar/vtiger/zoho) but found they were just too bloated for a small business.. there's definitely a need for a simple crm, in the form of a drupal module, that manages customer relationships (ideally using cck & views). This, with a the new project management solution that's finally come to drupal (STORM) would make a great combo as an all-in-drupal solution.
STORM:
http://drupal.org/project/storm
Integration with the Quickbooks API would be a nice add-on as well. Ubercart has already begun a slight integration using the development code.
Quickbooks API
http://drupal.org/project/qb
Ubercart / Quickbooks Integration
http://drupal.org/project/uc_qb
Drupal based CRM for micro-verticals/SMEs
I have some experience in SugarCRM. In my opinion, the real open source (i.e. free) version of SugarCRM has limited appeal that seems to be diminishing over time and open source community does not seem to be thriving - particularly after the change of hat as commercial open source and company going after Enterprise space.
IMHO, SugarCRM's real open source (free) does have a lots of bells and whistles. The email campaigns is super but the account management for sales teams has some holes - journalizing each call was bit of a kluge. These functionalities may not be be hard to implement leveraging from CCK, Views and other modules. There is lot of other infra available in Drupal (Asterisk integration, CDR data) to make such entirely Drupal based light-weight CRM feasible - targeting not the Enterprise requirements but the SME requirements.
If it this CRM is implemented as a loose set of modules, it makes it possible to mix modules to client's taste and whip up the custom CRM in few days. If extra add-on modules are custom for that specific vertical (construction, real estate, travel), then it will be sure winner.
- Rajeev
Drupaler in Cupertino, SF Bay Area
any movement behinda the scenes here?
or is this a stale topic?
I haven't spent time with
I haven't spent time with this concept -- busy, time is precious, yada yada -- but I would like to hear more about the experiences of any folks who have used/tried the drupal CRM 'recipe' with views, cck, glue... and/or http://drupal.org/project/crm mentioned earlier.
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Matt J. Sorenson (emjayess)
d.o. | g.d.o. | WEBJAX'd! | twitter
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matt j. sorenson, g.d.o., d.o.