TVision Technology Limited

Microsoft Dynamics NAV v Microsoft Dynamics CRM

The purpose of this paper is to explore the positioning of Microsoft’s CRM solution against the CRM functionality of its ERP solution, Microsoft Dynamics NAV (formerly Navision). As with all of these types of arguments, it is very difficult to reach a general conclusion. We hope this information will help inform your decision; at the end of the day, you may need to evaluate the products through demonstrations, which we would of course be happy to provide if you contact us. (link to contact page)

What do people mean by Customer Relationship System or CRM? The term is subject to interpretation and abuse. There are four aspects of CRM, the first three are mandatory for a system to claim it is a true CRM:

  • Contact Management: static details such as name, address, contact preferences
  • Sales Force Automation: process management such as interaction notes, forecasts, pipeline management and quote production
  • Marketing Information Systems: segmentation and campaign tools including campaign budgets, i.e. ability to specify target groups by static and transactional information and create activities
  • Service Management: Contract management and call logging / progression

Microsoft Dynamics NAV has had basic Contact Management since version one was released in the early 1990s. Initially this was the ability to hold multiple contacts against a customer, prospect or supplier and the ability to convert a prospect to a customer (or supplier) record. Over time this evolved to support Sales Force Automation (quote production, pipeline management, forecasting etc) and Marketing Information Systems (campaign management, segmentation etc). The addition of Service Management in version 3.7 meant that NAV could properly claim to provide a full CRM solution.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM was first released to market in 2003 and has grown rapidly, partly due to ease of adoption (low entry price and integration with Outlook client being key factors to its success). The functional areas include all four aspects of CRM (although detailed features differ between the two systems, NAV and CRM).

The key factor in determining whether to deploy Dynamics NAV or Dynamics CRM to meet your needs will depend on where the data is held that your CRM processes need to access. If your marketing is based on static data then Dynamics CRM will work well for you; if your marketing is based on transactional data then Dynamics NAV is likely to be the better choice.

The case is similar for service management processes; if your service desk needs to be continually accessing data that is held in your ERP system (products purchased, warranty periods etc) then it makes sense to keep everything in the one system, so your choice is likely to be Dynamics NAV.

In 2010 Microsoft released a standard connector to integrate CRM and NAV. This is fairly basic but can be further developed as required. However, it rarely makes sense to build complicated interfaces when the processes could be easily managed in the one system.

Prior to the release of Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009, there were valid points about the User Interface being preferable in Dynamics CRM. This is no longer the case and most users would not notice the difference between the two products. For a number of reasons, subscription based Dynamics CRM is substantially more popular than subscription based Dynamics NAV. This is because CRM tends to be a simple process, the pricing structure for subscription based Dynamics CRM is deliberately aimed at competing against Sales Force and therefore extremely cost effective and not forgetting the emotive hurdle of hosting ERP, i.e. we could do it but will your finance team feel comfortable about it? With true browser clients for Dynamics NAV (web and smart-phone compatible) now appearing on the market, this playing field is levelled.

So which one to choose? Where CRM is a standalone activity, Microsoft Dynamics CRM will suit you very well. Where your customer interactions draw heavily on data in your ERP system, deploying Microsoft Dynamics NAV is the better option.