Entellium, Savvis Agree on Hosted CRM Deal

St. Louis-based Savvis, Inc., a vendor of IT infrastructure services for business applications, has announced that it has teamed up with Entellium to run that company’s suite of hosted customer relationship management (CRM) products.

Under the agreement, Savvis will provide a fully managed hosted computing infrastructure that underpins the delivery of Entellium’s CRM products, featuring service level agreements. Entellium data will be protected by Savvis’ managed security services and audited and tested by Savvis’ Professional Services.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Entellium, which pitches its products mainly to SMBs, claims a comprehensive service level agreement with all customers, including a money-back system availability guarantee. "Unlike many CRM providers that primarily target large enterprises," Entellium officials say, the company "has tailored its offering to meet the sales force and customer management needs of the vast mid-market."

In August Entellium announced that ELK Promotions, Inc. deployed Entellium's hosted CRM suite to "help it anticipate client needs and open up new marketing and business opportunities," according to Entellium officials.

Columbus, Ohio-based ELK Promotions specializes in products in the awards and promotion industry, including pens, coffee mugs, apparel and many other items that bear a company logo.

"With Entellium, our salespeople now have immediate access to a client's order history," said Scott Wieclaw, vice president of sales for ELK Promotions. "What's even more exciting is that we no longer have to wait for clients to call -- we keep track of their ordering patterns from the previous year and call them before their next big event."

Based on 50,000 hours of usability research, Entellium’s eSalesForce and eCustomerCenter help users to manage sales opportunities and customer service incidents. Entellium CRM products also allow businesses to automate many routine tasks such as filling out forms, tracking results and creating reports.

Paul Johnston, Entellium's CEO, said Savvis's partnership allows Entellium to focus on developing CRM products "while they manage the critical elements of our IT infrastructure."

And in July Entellium announced that OutClick Media and ABI Digital Solutions selected Entellium's hosted CRM suite to deliver online and outdoor marketing and media services. OutClick Media develops online marketing engines for clients, and ABI provides large-format digital graphics.

Both companies opted for a hosted CRM model that delivered features of a full-blown CRM product at what officials of both companies describe as "a fraction of the cost."

OutClick Media officials say a major factor in the decision to adopt Entellium was free 24X7 customer support, according to Mark Cheong, vice president of sales and business development.

David Sims is a contributing editor for TMCnet. For more articles please visit David Sims’ columnist page.

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