Salesforce VS Netsuite – Who Wins This Battle?

Salesforce VS NetSuite is a significant comparison when it comes to choosing the perfect CRM software that suits your requirements and preferences. Both of them have their unique features and benefits.

Salesforce VS Netsuite

Customization Options 

NetSuite provides great customization options of the business processes with its toolkit, Suitescript. It allows the users to operate the businesses system according to their own ways that makes it very convenient as one can use a system in a certain way to suit their particular needs. Built on industry standard JavaScript, SuiteScript has been built on the industry standard JavaScript and it is capable of customizing very complex business processes as well as it automatically retains and manages the customizations when any upgrades are made. Salesforce.com doesn’t offer such compatibility options.

NetSuite is much more customized in terms of user functions and its role-based dashboards features 15 pre-designed roles giving each user an individual access to the right tools and information, reporting and functions of the system. This makes NetSuite very productive to its users. The dashboard also comes with drag-and-drop layout capabilities and point-and-click content selection. But, the dashboard of Salesforce.com is locked down, comes with limited visibility and is not role-based.

This limits the productivity of the user. Salesforce.com has a dashboard tab that features only graphics derived from the saved searches and is not the home page for its users. The administrator is required to create the item areas on the dashboard of Salesforce.com. An administrator is required to give permissions and definitions for everything. As a result, it doesn’t provide the user with system flexibility by their choice as well as it reduces the efficiency of the operations.

In the search tools, NetSuite features all the forms, custom fields, and tables. Whereas, Salesforce.com keeps the custom tables invisible to search. It limits the user access and doesn’t provide a view of critical data.

Integration Options 

The Salesforce integration with accounting is very complex and seems simple only when marketing collateral is concerned. The integration is quite limited and the user cannot see all the information of the back-office. The user is not allowed to prepare detailed and efficient cross-application reports. It doesn’t offer seamless integration. On the other hand, NetSuite doesn’t need to be integrated with an accounting application in order to have a true 360 view. It provides built-in order management and the user can see detailed back-office information. NetSuite offers a completely seamless integration for both CRM and accounting.

When it comes to Salesforce, the initial costs of integration can be very high and the maintenance is also very expensive. Whenever the software changes, it may require to perform the integration again with the new version.

Salesforce. com employs AppExchange to work as a solution when it comes to extending its functionality and to overcome its drawbacks. A lot of core functions that are supposed to be a part of the CRM solution are provided as bolt-ons. The day-to-day functions carried out by the sales such as placing orders are required to glue separate applications together. AppExchange has many drawbacks for the user as it only provides simple features.

Every individual application that is added needs to be purchased, implemented, evaluated as well as renewals. One has to pay the Salesforce seat licenses as well as extra payment to the AppExchange partners. This is inconvenient as well as complicated for the users. Whereas all this comes standard with NetSuite.

Salesforce has no automatic upgrade system for AppExchange. The user has to uninstall the software and re-install it to get any new versions. Also, it doesn’t let the user manage the business processes end-to-end. The add-ons of the software provide only point-to-point connections. The user cannot manage order to fulfillment, order to cash, shipment to tracking, returns as well as any issues related to resolution.

Business System Options 

A CRM system needs to provide wide options and functionalities for the complete business processes in order to be effective.

NetSuite gives a complete view of the customer data as well as interactions about sales, services, marketing, back office information as well as complete online e commerce visibility. Whereas, Salesforce.com does not support a 360 view of the customer. Sales and service representatives can’t get a view of the invoices, tracking status, order status, e commerce transactions and a number of other essential things.

Salesforce.com has huge drawbacks for the companies selling products as it cannot provide representatives with inventory visibility, volume pricing, discount management, order commitment, landed cost, sales tax, order status, shipment tracking, backorders, issue management, returns management and upsell/cross-sell automation. But, NetSuite comes with seamless back-office integration, delivers a real-time visibility and complete business processes.

NetSuite can manage the complete workflow concerning client relationship right from campaign to service delivery. This is significant for the companies that provide services as after a deal is closed, it’s time to manage the true relationship with a customer. On the other hand, Salesforce.com doesn’t deliver core functionality including project status, project assignment, time tracking, project staffing, issue management, billing and account management that is a drawback for service companies. It doesn’t provide a service history.

NetSuite provides ecommerce functionality and about 2000 companies operate their website or web store on Netsuite whereas Salesforce.com lacks the same. The complete view of the customers in the present scenario must extend online as the internet is rapidly growing as the channel of choice for the customers.

Salesforce.com cannot run an entire business as it doesn’t have a back office operationality unlike Netforce.

Conclusion

According to the aforesaid comparisons between the features of Salesforce and NetSuite, it can be clearly concluded that NetSuite provides some amazing intricate options leading to a better customization of the business system as well as a much more convenient and simple integration of the different functionalities. NetSuite proves itself to be the undoubted winner of this Salesforce VS NetSuite  comparison.