Both Epicor and Microsoft have addressed Web services' security concerns. As we poked around their APIs, we concluded that without appropriate authentication, you can't mess with the product. On the other end of the spectrum, after we pored over the ACCPAC's WSDL (Web Services Definition Language), we couldn't determine how ACCPAC handles security. The functionality is severely limited to basic operations.
We were pleased that all the products handle general data security gracefully. We prefer the easy integration with ADS offered by Soffront and Microsoft. Soffront's method of applying access rights to specific customer records via queries made it easier to group customers into territories based on existing data, such as state of residence. Microsoft and ACCPAC do a good job of applying territory-based security to records, but we had to configure records into territories manually. None of the vendors provide authentication or access via LDAP, but LDAP is less important than ADS for the midmarket.
Immediately after we installed each product, we attempted to import our customer data into the SQL Server each product uses as primary storage. (None of the vendors support DB2 directly.) We met with varying degrees of success. All but Epicor let us import existing contacts in different ways, but the nomenclature used for primary contacts varied from "customers" to "people" to "contacts."
Epicor requires the use of DTS (Data Transformation Services) within SQL Server to import data--a truly tortuous process. After spending several hours trying to develop DTS scripts, we decided to move on. Epicor offers professional services to assist with this initiative, and it would be wise to use those services despite their additional cost.
There is no way to just dump data into the databases that support a CRM system. Although most use straightforward table and column names, the linking between tables and the unique identifiers in each table will trip you up. The web of primary and foreign keys, identifiers and sheer number of tables that must be modified is sticky. You'll have to use the software tools that come with the product, hire professional services to assist or, if you're masochistic, enter the data manually.
When a CRM vendor says its product is "out of the box," you should immediately translate this to, "It installs quickly, and if you do things our way, you can be running within hours." Only Soffront CRM does not claim out-of-the-box functionality. While that may sound like a detraction, it's a benefit. Soffront's requirements make the customization so flexible that you can support any business model without getting a migraine. This model takes longer to deploy than the rest, but we liked having full control of the layout and being able to define the forms based on our own database schema.
