New Microsoft Dynamics CRM release adds social capabilities to enable amazing customer experiences

REDMOND, Wash., Oct. 21, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- With the new release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM now available worldwide, Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq "MSFT") on Monday announced a strategic alliance with InsideView Inc. that brings new Social Insights to the cloud-based Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online service. Microsoft on Monday also announced the availability at the end of the month of a new set of industry-focused business process templates as part of the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM release, delivering customers step-by-step process guidelines designed to improve performance in specific industries.

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The new solution, which is now available online in 42 global markets, will be available for on-premises and partner-hosted deployments on Oct. 31. It is designed to offer customers an enhanced user experience that promotes end-user productivity and demonstrates the better together value of Microsoft technologies. This includes interoperability with Yammer, Lync and Skype — delivering sales, service, marketing and industry professionals a seamless and customizable experience.

"CRM today should be an enabler that detects trends, facilitates decisions and suggests actions that lead to successful outcomes and relationships," said Bob Stutz, corporate vice president of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. "This major new release delivers on this promise of customer centricity by bringing together Microsoft technologies in a way that helps businesses and organizations better engage and nurture their customers."

New social insights

The first phase of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM alliance with InsideView, a leading social intelligence provider, is the introduction of Social Insights capabilities embedded into Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online. Social Insights puts real-time company and contact information from 30,000 sources into Microsoft Dynamics CRM, helping marketing, sales and account management professionals engage more effectively with prospects to win more deals as a result of less time spent researching and more time selling. Social Insights will be available at no additional cost to Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online customers in the United States with Professional licenses on Oct. 30, 2013, with broader global rollout coming later in 2014.

New industry templates

The new Microsoft Dynamics CRM release offers customers pre-defined and configurable processes where each stage of a process is clearly outlined, identifying the recommended steps to completion. Building on this design element, Microsoft is introducing new templates for a number of specific industries, such as professional services, manufacturing and financial services, as well as processes for event management and solution selling. These completely configurable business processes incorporate best practices from industry experts and give customers a starting point to build a solution to fulfill their specific industry requirements. In addition, these templates flow onto all mobile devices supported by Microsoft Dynamics CRM, meaning customers can get the benefits of these processes on their favorite supported mobile device. These templates will be available for customers to download at no charge by the end of October 2013.

Designed to help customers match, engage and nurture customer relationships

In addition, the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM features new capabilities to enable sales, marketing and customer care professionals to match customers and prospects to the products and services they want, engage customers at the right moment, and nurture customer relationships. These personal experiences are delivered through the following:

• A beautiful, new people-first design that offers a simple and immersive layout where all customer information is on one screen, helping people easily see everything they need to know about their customer interactions in one place.
• A new outcome-driven user experience featuring guided processes that help customers reach their desired outcomes. These processes can be tailored to accommodate particular business requirements that enable people to deliver an experience that matches their customers' expectations. The benefits to organizations include shorter sales cycles, increased win rates and less ramp-up time for new hires.
• The ability to stay pervasively connected to customers and resources by putting social tools in the context of what people are doing. With Yammer, customers can quickly comment on posts or start contextual conversations from within Microsoft Dynamics CRM on-premises and online. Yammer extends across an organization, bringing everyone into the conversation, including nonlicensed CRM customers from within Yammer.

With the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM release, customers get access to new mobile client applications on Windows 8 tablets and iPads, as well as touch-enabled experiences on Windows Phones, iPhones and Android phones coming within the next month, giving customers powerful functionality and analytics on the go, without a separate license fee. These new tablet experiences keep people connected to their data, their team members and, most important, their customers, allowing subject-matter experts to be a click away.*

Over the past few months, Microsoft partners from 48 countries participated in the most highly subscribed-to release preview program to date for Microsoft Dynamics CRM and provided feedback on the new release. Select participants and their stories will be featured in a Global Premiere Event scheduled for Nov. 4, which will stream live at http://aka.ms/dynamicsglobalpremiere. More about the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM release can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics/crm.aspx.

For more information on Microsoft Dynamics CRM Social Insights integration, a news release from InsideView is available at http://www.insideview.com/press/insideview-and-microsoft-raise-bar-crm-sign-strategic-oem-agreement-integrate-insideview-sales.

Those interested can follow and engage with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM community on Twitter at @MSDynamicsCRM, hashtag #MSDynCRM and #CRM2013, and Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/msftdynamics.

About Microsoft Dynamics

At the heart of every successful business are the people who make things happen. Microsoft Dynamics designs modern business solutions that empower individuals with intuitive tools that allow them to do their best work. Our proactive, easy-to-use business applications adapt to the way people and systems work, enabling businesses to rapidly deploy and be forward-looking in an ever-changing world.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

* Some functionality requires Wi-Fi, Internet connection or mobile data plan (fees may apply).

SOURCE Microsoft Corp.