BPI OnDemand: Brings Oracle CRM On Demand to Customers in Growing Midsize Market

No matter how big a business is, its success ultimately depends on how it attracts, manages, and retains customers. Customer relationship management (CRM) tools have long been used by large enterprises, but now midsize businesses want to gain the benefits of CRM without breaking the bank. Oracle Gold Partner BPI OnDemand Ltd., based in the U.K., is achieving success by bringing enterprise-class CRM to the midsize market with its attractively priced and scalable Oracle CRM On Demand–based solution. The company was recently named Applications Partner of the Year for the 2010 Europe, Middle East, and Africa region in Oracle PartnerNetwork’s Partner Specialization Awards.

BPI OnDemand is unique in the market because it partners with customers, configures Oracle CRM On Demand, customizes the application to fit specific customer business requirements, provides support, and trains end users for the duration of the contract—all with no upfront costs. Customers simply pay a low monthly per user subscription fee. Fred Wilkinson, BPI OnDemand managing director, says, “There’s nobody else, as far as I can see, that delivers this sort of service without upfront cost. Oracle CRM On Demand is a substantially better value than the rest of the competition out there—at least a 40 percent better value.” He adds, “There’s no messing around with regards to the application itself. You get the whole suite for one fixed price.”

BPI OnDemand’s strategy echoes a trend identified in the 2010 Forrester Wave: CRM Suites for Midsized Organizations report. The report finds that midmarket companies are displaying renewed interest in CRM investments, with projects getting started that were deferred because of economic uncertainty in 2009. However, midmarket customers are particularly interested in easy-to-implement software projects.

BPI OnDemand also emphasizes business process improvement as part of its solution when implementing Oracle CRM On Demand for customers. Wilkinson says, “A common mistake is that an IT manager is told to go out and buy a CRM application, and then the company works out how to use it. BPI OnDemand is different because we go in with the customer and first understand what business processes need improvement. Only then do we customize the application to deliver CRM automation to that company.”

BPI OnDemand already boasts numerous customer successes. Olympus Security Ltd., which provides security services to VIPs, retail outlets, and offices, implemented BPI OnDemand’s Oracle CRM On Demand’s solution in 30 days. Within one month after going live, the company automated management reports and improved the security of customer data, generating a 20 percent improvement in efficiency. Heal’s, a British department store chain, signed up for BPI OnDemand’s Oracle CRM On Demand solution to migrate 250,000 client records and seven years of customer data. It went live in six weeks with a profitable, scalable Oracle CRM On Demand system that reduced the cost of ownership compared to its former legacy system by 50 percent.

Wilkinson says, “We work with customers after implementation, which is a rarity for companies delivering CRM. What we offer is full, end-to-end, continuous improvement so that customers start to adopt the CRM implementation and it becomes the DNA of the business.”

BPI OnDemand was founded in 2007 and achieved more than 1,500 percent growth in its first fiscal year of operation, a rate that Wilkinson largely attributes to the global credit crunch. “Customers were able to take advantage, save, make the automation efficiencies, and implement Oracle CRM On Demand during the credit crisis when the last thing small businesses wanted to do was spend a lot of money upfront.” Moving forward, BPI OnDemand is excited about new marketing enhancements in Oracle CRM On Demand 18.0. It also hopes to gain additional business thanks to recently having earned Oracle PartnerNetwork Specialized status in Oracle CRM On Demand. Wilkinson says, “Achieving Specialized status is a real benefit for us to get our staff trained up to the highest quality level of certification. Specialization is also about having expertise and referenceable customers, showing that we are delivering and proving our capabilities.”

For more information on BPI OnDemand visit: www.thebpiway.co.uk.