HR Solutions Provider Drake Augments CRM Solution using the AppExchange's Unique Business Apps

Challenge

• Global human resources solutions provider Drake International was using disconnected homegrown CRM systems.
• The company realized it needed to standardize its CRM operations.
• Drake also wanted the ability to extend beyond traditional CRM capabilities and support numerous unique business processes in a common platform.

Solution

• After putting several CRM solutions through the paces, Drake selected Salesforce CRM Sales because of its cloud-computing architecture, ease of use, and robust customization tools.
• The company quickly deployed Salesforce CRM to 100 users in sales, marketing, operations, finance, and leadership roles in Canada and the US; Salesforce.com partner Bluewolf Group assisted Drake with the implementation and training.
• Inspired by other solutions found in the AppExchange marketplace, Drake used Force.com to create four completely new applications.
• For the Finance division, the company built a collection application to manage account finances.
• The proposal team leverages Drake's proposal application for automating proposal processes. This application connects to the collection application to streamline communication between finance and the proposal team.
• A custom recruitment solution takes information from the company's legacy applicant-tracking system and builds a full view of candidate history.
• Drake further built a project application to streamline project management activities.

Results

• Drake benefits from a single common platform that consolidates numerous disparate systems and automates business processes.
• Management has real-time visibility into key sales and marketing metrics and can adjust priorities accordingly.
• The ability to build customized modules and solutions gives the company exactly the tools it needs to manage and build its business.
• Salesforce CRM now powers lead management for Drake, including email marketing and automatically capturing Web site leads.
• A single marketing resource administers the entire system, dramatically reducing IT costs.