Can you really save on IT costs with Salesforce.com? You bet!
One of the questions I get asked a lot by folks who are just getting acquainted with Salesforce.com is “does it really save you money?”
Fair question, because obviously they have seen the pricing chart. Anybody can tell that Salesforce/Force.com licenses are anything but cheap.
But my short answer is always: “Yes it does.”
You see, when you talk about cost, it is not always the license fee that burdens you. On-premises infrastructure consisting of disparate systems with different hardware/software requirements, different upgrade cycles and the necessary logistics is almost always going to cost you more money in the long run.
Don’t believe me? Take a look at what IDC found:
Having built custom applications on various platforms, both on-premises and cloud, I can tell you that it is way faster to build applications on salesforce/force.com. If you have questions or want to know more about Salesforce.com, let us talk!
Why is it faster? why, no one says why its faster they just say that ‘it just is’
Ed
March 2, 2011 at 11:55 am
Ed,
If you have an application development background, I’m sure you would know that the effort it takes to build an application depends on things like tools available for that platform, the IDE, the coding language, UI design capability, available reusable components, deployment method, etc. On some platforms it takes less effort/time than some other platforms. Remember the time when IDEs for Visual Basic, Power Builder, and even Lotus Notes came to the market touting themselves as Rapid Application Development (RAD) tools?
Think of force.com as the next-generation RAD platform. What is really great about developing on force.com is that a lot of things that you previously had to program can be ‘built’ by clicks, and drag & drops. The basic and common components that you would need in any and every application don’t really challenge the developers — they just take up their time. This is one of the areas where force.com saves you time.
Others include:
1. The API is very well integrated into the platform
2. Easy to integrate with other systems
3. The platform prevents you from making stupid mistakes and enforces some kind of coding integrity.
4. Sandboxes, and quick and easy deployment method.
5. The usual benefits of cloud that relieves you from worrying about the servers and such.
I guess this topic requires a separate blog entry! But till then, hope this helps.
bedathur
March 2, 2011 at 9:59 pm
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