NSO, Network Solutions, France
NSO, Network Solutions is a French VAR specialized in network and security. We have an office near Paris but there is virtually no one there as we are all at various customer premises. We never spend the same week in the same building. Keeping each other in touch at NSO is a big issue. Knowing each others agenda is not critical - it's vital for the company.
We use cell phone and email a lot. We also have lunch altogether once a week but this is definitely not enough. We needed a CRM with some fundamental features like a “Contact Manager” and an “Agenda”. We were looking for some software that was: Web based. We want the software to be available from anywhere (our office, our customer's office, home). Simple to install, to maintain and to use. We are a small company. We can't afford to buy consultant to install the product. Affordable. Scalable. We intend to get bigger and we want a software which can grow with us. Secure. We're talking about customer data here. This is our most valuable data and we don't want to mess with it.
We looked on the Internet for all the CRM solutions, from bare bone software to the most sophisticated one. We set our choice to Browser CRM. It met all our requirements plus some extras features: Emails, Intranet, Memos, Forums, localized version in French… I won't say that we use all the possibilities of Browser CRM (far from that!) but this doesn't matter. We can track down every call, every mail, every meeting we had with our customers. Everyone in the company knows where everyone is and what he is doing. There is no way we can miss a customer today. It is excellent value for money.
We installed Browser CRM on Linux Mandrake. The web server is hosted on a DSL line (128k upstream) and it's fast enough. For security reasons we activated SSL and we even added X509 personal certificates on our web browser for enhanced authentication.
People at Browser CRM were eager to help us. They provide good support and they want to know how they can improve their software best. This is rare enough to be mentioned.
This very morning, one of my customers asked if my boss and I were available in two weeks. I confirmed in front of him using my laptop on his network. Tonight, at home, I'll check if no new tasks have been assigned to me in Browser CRM.
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Jean-Luc Dupont
Network & Security Engineer
http://www.nso.fr
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