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Salespeople have to stay on the move to make the deal, and now have more freedom than ever to do so. Mobile devices can come with tools to help at every moment of the sales process, from pulling up important lead information from CRM systems to displaying business statistics. Here are four innovative sales applications to step up your sales team.

Proposable.com

Through this website, you can create online sales proposals to send to your clients. Proposal templates can be customized and saved. Because the proposal is delivered online, you can now monitor and analyze much more information about the deal. You can check which client viewed the proposal and for how long. Instantaneous notifications inform you even about which section of the proposal is most seen. This allows you to focus on the right customer in real-time as soon as the potential buyer views or adds a comment to the site.

Packages start at $19 per month and go up to $79 per month, each with a 30 day free trial.

Sybase Mobile Sales

This is a CRM app that allows access to SAP sales data from a mobile at any location. You can receive all SAP alerts or notifications. The app works on iPhones and Windows mobile phones, while a version for Blackberry will be released later this year.

The app is $15 per user per month, or $405 for a perpetual license.

Mimiran Sales Compass

This software organizes and analyzes your business sales statistics. Your sales representatives are provided with all the necessary market information. Selling prices can be optimized among the sales team with the software’s analysis of historical pricing data and competitor’s rates. Sales decisions can be made more quickly and efficiently with Sales Compass Target Pricing; it can dramatically reduce the time needed for back-and-forth deal approvals.

The app costs $99 a month for the first user, and $49 for each additional user.

Salesforce Chatter

Salesforce.com’s customer relations management solution, as released today at Salesforce’s Cloudforce 2010 conference, is now available for Salesforce’s 77,300 customers. The application allows employees to maintain business profiles, make status updates, and collaborate. Client information can also be kept and updated. Indeed, it is Facebook for business. The uses of Chatter may expand further into business needs through the ChatterExchange category of AppExchange, where apps can be downloaded. Some 50 apps are already available, such as FinancialForce Accounting Chatterbox (accounting software), and Cloud Apps Carbon ’10 (helps to find ways to reduce operation costs).

Salesforce Chatter access is free to all existing Salesforce customers. Otherwise, Chatter-only licenses are available for $15 per user per month.

Today, InsideView Inc., a leading social media and CRM solutions provider, announced the integration of their revolutionary SalesView software into The Customer-Driven Company’s (CDC) Pivotal Social CRM 6.0 module.

CDC Software is an enterprise software provider whose new application will integrate a variety of sites and applications so that companies can acquire the leads and sales intelligence that they need to prosper. InsideView’s SalesView software is included in the application. Salesview helps businesses find sales leads through discovered sales opportunities from social media and other sources.

The new CDC Pivotal Social CRM 6.0 will integrate sites including Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn, and BlogSearch. The goal of the application is to allow users to view all of the social media information within one application, instead of having to access several different applications or websites. This will increase simplicity and productivity, thereby improving social customer relationship management (CRM).

The CDC Pivotal Social CRM 6.0 will also help users track relationships between a company’s prospect or current customers. Also, companies can see their complete social network in one click, allowing them to process customer feedback faster. Businesses can manage corporate events through Facebook and they can collaborate with their customers and employees through Twitter.

“Our new solution can also help our customers find new sources for high quality leads, provide key sales intelligence to help personalize and target sales marketing programs, facilitate the closing of more deals and ultimately help them deliver better customer service,” said Jason Rushforth, president of CDC Software’s Front Office product line business.

InsideView’s software will help with the sales intelligence aspect of CDC’s product. Marc Perramond, director of product management at InsideView, commented on the integration of SalesView with the CDC Pivotal Social CRM 6.0. He said, “Tapping into social media insights for sales productivity is a key tenet of any Social CRM deployment. Knowing the most about your leads and prospects is imperative in today’s sales profession…We are pleased to be a part of the new CDC Pivotal Social CRM 6.0 module.”

CDC launched their social CRM module today.

Even South Africa, where only 10.8% of the population uses internet, needs to be operating in the cloud. With the influx of 300,000 soccer fans for the 2010 World Cup, South African Tourism, the lone customer service company catering to the masses, has turned to Salesforce.com for a CRM solution.

The government-licensed office had in place an aged, legacy CRM system built on Microsoft technology. The call center was clearly unprepared to handle the estimated increase from 1,000 – 2,000 calls per week to 15,000 per week during the World Cup, with customer requests ranging between travel logistics, accommodations and ticket availability. William Price, global manager of e-marketing at South African Tourism, thought to turn to cloud computing, and the agency chose Salesforce.com. The company’s CRM application was one of seven considered.

“When the world comes here for the games, we want to create amazing, life-changing experiences,” says Price. “With travel being a social experience unlike anything else, we want to provide amazing customer service with relevant, real-time, and easy-to-access information that helps people find the best there is to see and do in South Africa. Service Cloud 2 lets us not only leverage social media platforms to engage visitors in a way that is familiar to them, but also quickly reorients our organization and operations to meet that opportunity without the cost and complexity of software.”

Salesforce.com’s CRM solution is expected to improve the company’s customer service visibility and analysis. Calls can be more easily categorized so that they are directed to the right representatives. Trends in repeated requests can be picked out and resolved.

A particular point of interest was using the CRM application for social networking analysis. South African Tourism wanted to monitor online buzz generated from World Cup tourists on sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Salesforce.com was able to set this up for the agency and provide integrated management for their Twitter and Facebook profiles.

And though the World Cup is fleeting, South African Tourism plans to retire its old CRM system (still in operation for calls from outside of South Africa) in favor of Salesforce’s cloud CRM. The company will take this opportunity to modernize its systems.

Viridity, an energy consumption management software provider, plugs for Hubspot inbound marketing integrated with Salesforce.com.  The small company of 11-25 employees saw enormous lead generation growth in the 8 months of using Hubspot Large. Jason Bailey, Viridity’s multimedia specialist, states that the company’s lack of integrated marketing tools was a hindrance. Now, on their website, Hubspot and Salesforce.com tout the company’s growth as a case study in the product’s success.

Bailey lauds Hubspot for its easy, clean interface and fully integrated tools. Hubspot’s CMS is a content management platform, which allows employees to work on company websites without HTML knowledge. Advertising content such as blog posts, press releases, and landing pages is readily produced. Marketing analytics helps organize incoming traffic that may come in from various sources. The lead tracking tool checks on any developments from prospective or already obtained leads.

The integration with salesforce.com sales (Hubspot-Salesforce closed loop marketing) also made for an efficient sales process and dynamic between marketing and sales. Hubspot marketing sends its generated leads from white paper or forms over to Salesforce.com in an automated system. The system checks for duplicate leads and converts those into automated updates for each lead. Status can also be changed from the Hubspot or Salesforce.com dashboard. Potential customers are monitored for “lead strength,” the sources they came in from (showing the advertising tools that have the greatest ROI), and any additional data available that may be helpful for the Salesforce.com sales representative.

Viridity

Viridity in particular claims to have increased organic traffic seventeen-fold in the past 6 months, attracted 350 leads in the past 6 months, developed a stronger email marketing campaign, and achieved an almost 15% conversion rate for landing pages. Bailey attributes this sales success to the different, integrated functions of Hubspot.

As announced last week at America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) conference in Las Vegas, Microsoft will release its Health Plan Sales Solution for Microsoft Dynamics CRM. This is a customer relationship management (CRM) tool that would allow health insurance plans to move online.

The Health Plan Sales Solution is described as a platform allowing for a full CRM strategy across company management while still maintaining current company investments in data technologies. Microsoft Dynamics CRM can be used through Microsoft’s cloud computing or through some hybrid of on-premise software.

The release is driven by the recently passed health care legislation that will expand insurance to 32 million Americans by 2019, as estimated by the Congressional Budget Office. The push toward universal health care will force health insurance companies to become all the more competitive very soon. “In light of changing regulations, health plans must now focus on winning share and loyalty through adaptive and efficient sales processes and exceptional customer experience while preparing to integrate sales and service processes with each health insurance exchange in 2014,” said Dennis Schmuland, director of U.S. Health Plans Industry Solutions at Microsoft. Taking note of this, health insurance companies have shown interest in CRM technology.

With the application of CRM, health plans can become more efficient and organized. Insurance companies can operate on state health insurance exchanges, and sales and customer service can be better managed. Who knew health insurance companies would ever want that.

This is a welcome development for the health care world. It bodes well that health insurance companies are looking to improve their efficiency and customer care, as opposed to lording over their marketplace like modern railroad barons. Any step toward making health care a competitive industry is a good one. Wisely, Microsoft is trying to be one of the first with a hand in this change.

Android is quickly catching up to its competitors in the Applications arena. Salesforce.com’s has launched a Chatter Developer Challenge, and programmer Jeff Douglas has created a Chatter Android App. The Salesforce.com Chatter application for Android was built on the Force.com platform and uses Force.com Remote Access Applications with 3-legged OAuth for security.

With the Salesforce.com Chatter Android Application, users can:

• Display Chatter NewsFeed
• Update Chatter Status
• Store Chatter NewsFeed in local SQLite database
• Customize a project or object that you are following and view its Chatter Feed
• Store project Chatter Feed in local SQLite database

Jeff Douglas has also posted a video to show the functionality of the Salesforce.com Chatter Application for Android:

Salesforce.com Chatter Android Application

The Android Chatter application uses Google App Engine to tie the application together as a security model. The application uses OAuth to authorize access to Force.com and for access to Chatter feeds the application uses Force.com Remote Access Application.

For more information about the Salesforce.com Chatter Android Application by Jeff Douglas, visit: http://blog.jeffdouglas.com/2010/06/06/salesforce-chatter-for-android/#

The financial sector has new CRM sheriffs in town…

ByAllAccounts Inc, an account aggregation service company, will be partnering with Ebix CRM. ByAllAccounts is used by several financial advisors for their services because of the software’s ability to aggregate all client data and integrate seamlessly with management platforms. Ebix CRM provides CRM solutions for the insurance and financial services industry. The collaboration will provide users with advanced account aggregation through ByAllAccounts software and valuable financial advice from Ebix’s CRM software. The partnership has yielded in a product called SmartOffice Premier Edition which is designd to address every need of growing advisory firms.

“As investors demand more transparency from their advisors, we’re seeing related demand from RIAs for new ways to deliver timely, accurate advice and streamline reporting,” said President of ByAllAccounts, James Carney. “By partnering with Ebix, we’re answer that demand by integrating powerful account aggregation within a familiar workflow that advisors already know, trust and use every day.”

“Thousands of advisors use SmartOffice to manage and grow their practive. a ByAllAccounts data aggregation service adds further value by bringing client asset information into SmartOffice,” said Senior VP at Ebix, Dale Okuno.

SmartOffice gives users the ability to manage multiple lines of business and a large number of clients from anywhere, anytime. The hybrid CRM and account aggregate software also increases the personal level of service that clients expect from their financial advisor. SmartOffice is easy-to-use and facilitates relationships between businesses, people, processes and systems.

The partnership of ByAllAccounts and Ebix CRM will help both companies provide their users with solutions that optimize business processes and foster strong client relationships.

For more information visit: www.byallaccounts.com/

HubSpot Inc. announced their launch of HubSpot Leads, currently in beta mode, that is a customer relationship management (CRM) tool. HubSpot is a provider of internet marketing software that helps businesses build up their client base and online presence. HubSpot has tools in their CRM software that facilitate lead generation, search engine optimization, blogging, analytics and social media.

HubSpot API, the company’s newest CRM tool, enhances the interoperability between HubSpot’s lead capture and any CRM software to create a closed loop marketing initiative. This is the first platform in a family of HubSpot Application Programming Interfaces (HAPI) that will give developers the ability to create innovative marketing applications.

HubSpot users can already enjoy closed loop marketing analytics with Salesforce.com, but the new CRM tool will help customers extend the option to other CRM systems. With HubSpot Leads API, users can streamline their marketing and sales processes which will increase ROI.

HubSpot Leads API CRM tool has plans to develop integrations for SugarCRM, NetSuite and Microsoft Dynamics CRM as well. The CRM systems will be part of HubSpot’s Certified Partners program. HubSpot Leads API are also developing a mobile leads application for the Android that gives users remote access to leads and contact information.

“The availability of this API is going to open things up for all our clients who have been eager to connect the dots between their marketing and sales efforts,” said HubSpot partner, Daniel Lynton. “We’ve already implemented the beta API for three clients using Microsoft Dynamics CRM. It is working great so far and will solve a lot of workarounds that marketers have traditionally used, giving them visibility into marketing ROI.”

HubSpot Leads API gives users the ability to rely on one consistent source of data for their marketing initiatives. Developers can use HAPI to create unique applications that are relevant to their specific business. HubSpot’s CRM integration tool will also expose other applications and data sets to existing content and blogging systems.

“At HubSpot, we are building marketing stars who must have full visibility into the sales return on their marketing investments,” said CEO of HubSpot. “The Leads API is how we can give this critical business intelligence to our entire customer base, regardless of their choice of CRM. HAPI extending the entire product will ultimately provide a foundation for marketers to transform their entire marketing exosystem.”

Hoover’s Inc. announced updates to its Access Hoover’s 3.0 thanks to Salesforce.com’s AppExchange 2. Hoover’s will be expanding their database of enterprises from 65 million to 85 million. Hoovers is a business solutions provider that provides its users with insight and information about companies, industries and key decision makers.

“Access Hoovers is one of the most popular applications on Salesforce.com’s AppExchange 2,” said Chief Marketing Officer at Salesforce.com, Kendall Collins. “The new features and functionality contained in Access Hoover’s 3.0 will help customers who need greater depth of insightful business information and more time-saving functionality.”

Hoover users now have access to more companies and people, thereby enhancing their CRM initiative. Hoover’s can now also map industries as well. Hoover customers will be able to optimize their sales strategy thanks to the Salesforce.com database. Along with an extended customer base, Hoover users will be able to generate more leads and close sales faster.

Hoover’s 3.0 with Salesforce.com has updated duplication alerts so that customers can duplicate records that are identified by exact name match. With enhanced organizational tools, sales team can focus on unique leads instead of sifting through duplicates.

The new CRM tool has improved prospecting capabilities, giving users the ability to import one or more records directly from Simple Search results.

“With the release of Access Hoover’s 3.0 we’ve listened to our customers and responded to their needs by arming sales teams with quicker access to more of the right data and tools in one place,” said VP Marketing for Hoover’s, James Rogers. “With Access Hoover’s for Salesforce CRM, clients can now generate stronger leads, deepen existing relationships and boost retention, ultimately driving more growth for their business.”

Hoover 3.0 on Salesforce.com’s AppExchange will help sales teams optimize their sales strategies and have greater access to valuable lead generation information. For more info on Hoover’s 3.0 visit: www.hoovers.com.