Transparancy is indeed a very important aspect, but saying something about the number of customers you have or gained over the last year doesn't say so much to me. What does 16.000 new customers exactly mean? How does this number compare to the total market of newly sold CRM solutions? Besides, it is easy to say something about competitors of which you already know they won't respond. It does not mean that the competition is less transparant. If Salesforce.om would be a truely transparant company, then they would also dare to say something about customers who changed from CRM supplier and for what reason.
Recently I have read a comparison between Salesforce.com and Salesboom (http://www.salesboom.com/salesboom_salesforce_compared/9-reasons-to-leav...). Of course I don't accept those claims immediately, but I tried to search for a counter article. So far I haven't found any. Then I ask myself: why does Salesforce.com not respond to such articles? Or why doesn't Salesforce.com order an independant research on functionality / service / stability / etc. among several CRM solution vendors. Transparancy is a great word, but imho companies are never fully transparant, because of competition. So they apply marketing techniques and tell stories how good they are to further enhance their market position (and Salesforce.com seems to do that job very well, but maybe others do it as good or maybe better...I can't say). If you are really transparant you would not only talk about the good things, but about the less good things as well. So I am eagerly waiting for the second article.
My answers
Transparancy is indeed a very important aspect, but saying something about the number of customers you have or gained over the last year doesn't say so much to me. What does 16.000 new customers exactly mean? How does this number compare to the total market of newly sold CRM solutions? Besides, it is easy to say something about competitors of which you already know they won't respond. It does not mean that the competition is less transparant. If Salesforce.om would be a truely transparant company, then they would also dare to say something about customers who changed from CRM supplier and for what reason.
Recently I have read a comparison between Salesforce.com and Salesboom (http://www.salesboom.com/salesboom_salesforce_compared/9-reasons-to-leav...). Of course I don't accept those claims immediately, but I tried to search for a counter article. So far I haven't found any. Then I ask myself: why does Salesforce.com not respond to such articles? Or why doesn't Salesforce.com order an independant research on functionality / service / stability / etc. among several CRM solution vendors. Transparancy is a great word, but imho companies are never fully transparant, because of competition. So they apply marketing techniques and tell stories how good they are to further enhance their market position (and Salesforce.com seems to do that job very well, but maybe others do it as good or maybe better...I can't say). If you are really transparant you would not only talk about the good things, but about the less good things as well. So I am eagerly waiting for the second article.
Marcel Wiedenbrugge