Siebel Systems and Vantive are both worldwide leaders in the front-office automation software market. They have developed superb SFA systems geared towards increasing sales, marketing and customer service effectiveness for field sales, service organizations, telesales, telemarketing, call centers and third-party resellers.

Siebel offers software that lets a company deploy customer, product and competitive information, as well as decision support, across its global computer networks. One of the main strategies is to grow by partnering with important players who also become investors. In 1994 Charles Schwab bought a small stake in Siebel, and Schwab’s brokers began using the software to access account information during sales pitches. Andersen Consulting also invested, having owned 8% of the firm. Siebel is strong in industries such as insurance, retail, finance and pharmaceuticals.

Vantive offers software that lets a company automate services including customer support, defect tracking, sales, marketing, field service, quality assurance and internal help desk functions. It’s not only Vantive’s strategy but also Siebel’s, the company targeted the Internet as a customer support tool, releasing software that lets sales staff on the road check customer shipments by accessing a database through the World Wide Web. Vantive has penetration in industries such as telecommunications and high-tech areas.

Sales Force Automation (SFA) can dramatically reduce selling cycles and facilitate closer relations with customers by integrating customer information, product information, competitive information and decision support systems for large companies that are reaching their customers through a multiplicity of overlapping distribution channels. Therefore, the big benefit of SFA is integrating the sales channels to provide one common view of the customer and the customer’s history no matter what the point of contact is call center, field sales force, interactive voice recognition, point-of-sale or the Internet.

However, there are some drawbacks in SFA project. According to Jeff Golterman, a research analyst with Gartner Group Inc, approximately 55% of SFA projects fail to see measurable return on investment. Primarily, there are two reasons why SFA has traditionally underperformed or failed to perform efficiently. First, SFA has relatively small vertical focus, which results in considerable customization. This customization requires high level of support and usually incorporate a sales methodology, as well as Internet / intranet functionality, extremely affecting the implementation time. Also, SFA is originally tailored more to the sales manager than the salesperson. This is likely to lead the refusal of use by salesperson, who should fully utilize the SFA system.

Even though there are some drawbacks, SFA outweigh the negatives. When implemented correctly automation can streamline a company’s entire selling process. It can save salesperson time, and thus allow them to focus on solving customers�Eproblems and providing value. It can help salesperson have information about customers when they need it most: at the point of sale.

Siebel installed "Siebel Sales Enterprise" to NationsBanc Montgomery Securities, an investment-banking firm. Siebel Sales Enterprise offered rich functionality and the ability to customize the system to meet the precise needs, which were allocation of resources with share of expertise across sectors to shorten the sales cycle and security to control access rights to client data to comply with company provisions. Due to the Siebel new system, Montgomery management personnel access to all information, including accurate reports about transaction pipelines, client coverage activities, staffing, revenue production and revenue attribution, while the individual bankers can access only their assigned companies or transactions. This satisfies the company’s security requirements, while allowing management to put sales resources where they can best identify and slash the sales cycle and handle an increased volume of opportunities. According to Montgomery CEO Thomas Weisel, the firm received $40 million in additional revenue directly as a result of using Siebel Sales Enterprise.

Vantive installed "Vantive Support" to Hewlett-Packard’s Products Support Division (PSD), which supports HP’s printer, fax, PC and handheld product lines. Customers service representatives wanted to have a way to track the progress of a customer’s issue throughout a series of calls or determining if the same issue had been resolved in a previously reported case. This was where Vantive could get in by providing Vantive Support, which enabled PSD to have quality, accuracy and consistency of response to customers. In addition to automating call tracking, problem resolution and service and support management, Vantive Support has allowed the PSD to minimize redundant support efforts, leading to as increase in staff productivity and decrease in labor costs.

As mentioned earlier in the first question, both companies have strength in different industries respectively. Siebel products are used by insurance, retail, finance and pharmaceuticals such as Glaxo Wellcome, Prudential Insurance, and Lucent Technologies. On the other hand, Vantive has strength in telecommunications and high-tech areas such as Federal Express, AT&T, Hewlett-Packard.

The another difference can be found in multilanguage system that each company can support. Vantive has an alliance with Mitsui Corporation, a Japanese multinational company and has some operation or distribution center in other place in Asia, supporting some Asian languages. Siebel products are filly localized for European languages and include support for Euro currency. Moreover, Siebel applications offer full support for Japanese and other Asian character, which gives Siebel more opportunities to penetrate not only in Asian countries but also in the world.