CRM vs. Wiki for Sales & Marketing - where do you draw the line?

We have started pilot of a Conflunence Wiki for our organization's sales and marketing team.  Adoption and usage has been rampent thus far, but our users have started to raise a debates on what should be on the Wiki on what should be on our CRM tool.

A few specific items that have come up for debate on CRM vs. Wiki:

  • meeting notes (and subsequent discussion)
  • customer/project/bid files
  • lead tracking
  • account strategy/plan/discussions

What has your organization done to seperate or consolidate Wiki and CRM data?

Thanks for you insights and comments.

Doug 

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Comments (8)

 

  1. Oct 06, 2006

    Guy Fraser says:

    We tried using just Confluence on it's own but ran in to problems keeping track ...

    We tried using just Confluence on it's own but ran in to problems keeping track of outstanding tasks. As a result, we're now making more and more use of JIRA to keep track of tasks and embedding JIRA portlets in to Confluence pages where more verbose data is stored. JIRA is better at keeping track of things, Confluence is better at providing flexible content editing. Mix the two together and you get good results.

    1. Oct 06, 2006

      Bob Swift says:

      Totally agree with Guy regarding using a proper issue tracking tool (Jira!) for ...

      Totally agree with Guy regarding using a proper issue tracking tool (Jira!) for tracking work and customer requests instead of Confluence only. However, there are probably other things in your list, like lead tracking, that would be weaker than other CRM software without significant Confluence customization work (plugins, templates, etc...).

  2. Oct 15, 2006

    Gudjon Gudjonsson says:

    I have participated on meetings with the same subject. My company is using Sales...

    I have participated on meetings with the same subject. My company is using Salesforce.com for CRM matters.

    Now, I would like implement an integration project where I can do synchronization between Salesforce.com Accounts and Contacts into a CRM wiki space. I would like to use the Metadata Plugin for storing the key data from each CRM record, like Name, Email, Phone, Title, etc.

    1. Oct 16, 2006

      Douglas Ko says:

      Hi Gudjon, We are using Oracle/Siebel. A metadata plug-in sounds like a great ...

      Hi Gudjon,

      We are using Oracle/Siebel.

      A metadata plug-in sounds like a great idea.  Are you planning to develop this yourself, or are there others that are doing this?  Some issues that may come from this is seperating contact ownerships as some sales people may have exclusive access to their own lists of contacts (in which case they don't want to share anyway).

      However this still begs the question for other CRM specific features like lead tracking will be hard to implement in a wiki.

      Right now we have set a best practice policy to maintain contacts, lead tracking, all on the CRM.  Customers/lead related material/documents can be stored and managed on the wiki, but must be hyperlinked on the CRM page.

      Doug

  3. Jan 17, 2007

    Robert Castaneda[CustomWare] says:

    Hi, We've integrated Siebel, Salesforce.com and NetSuite to JIRA before - http...

    Hi,

    We've integrated Siebel, Salesforce.com and NetSuite to JIRA before -

    http://www.customware.net/repository/display/CustomWare/Case+Study+-+Polycom

    http://www.customware.net/repository/display/CustomWare/Atlassian+Plugins+and+Systems

    Adding to Dougs comment, i would want the information in my CRM, but allow the viewing of the data in the wiki. Single source of truth.

    regards,

    -Rob 

  4. Feb 16, 2008

    Matti Kiviharju says:

    I am used SugarCRM but its only tool for store sales things and meetings in cale...

    I am used SugarCRM but its only tool for store sales things and meetings in calendar and contacts. Its not good for Online Customer Service.

  5. Feb 17, 2008

    Ivo Verlaek says:

    Currently we are working on a PIX CRM Plugin. This will combine JIRA and Confl...

    Currently we are working on a PIX CRM Plugin.

    • This will combine JIRA and Confluence with Vtiger CRM. It will also be integrated with Astrisk (for your VOIP phones).
      • Workflows are using JIRA functionality stearing Vtiger.
      • Email / Folowup is in JIRA / Vtiger.
      • Email collection in Vtiger per company/contact
      • Information / Documentation can be held in Confluence or Vtiger
      • Customer and other CRM related things will be held in Vtiger and available in JIRA/Confluence.
      • Telephone Calls will Popup in Vtiger and will be registrated.
      • Finally Audio (Logging of phone conversations) will be made searchable within Confluence

    Might this be of any Interest for you?

  6. Nov 11, 2008

    Brett Taylor says:

    We've recently implemented a solution that ties Salesforce and Confluence togeth...

    We've recently implemented a solution that ties Salesforce and Confluence together, through JIRA (and with the help of our CRM Plugin. With the help of triggers and pollers from Salesforce, data flows through JIRA and is populated in Confluence, dependent on specific requirements. Of course, all the reporting power of JIRA remains while still providing Salesforce and Confluence folks to collaborate from within their own environments.

    In addition, the availability of the latest version of the CRM Plugin was announced this week and now includes SugarCRM integration.