Sage CRM

Sage CRM for Android We received the Sage CRM News e-mail today including the announcement of Sage CRM for Android. Of course, I was excited, but now I'm like a very disappointed child that didn't get what he wanted for Christmas. It's not compatible with the Android version on my Samsung Note and it's not compatible with my Google Nexus 10 tablet. This is typical Sage, and it's things like this drive customers away from Sage to other products, like Acumatica. Installed on the same tablet is Acumatica, done as quickly and simply as what was demonstrated at MOTM. For now, all I can do is pout! ??

I think this is a key reason why xKzero is staying away from the Android platform and only focusing their resources on iStuff...

@JohnHoyt where did you find which devices it worked on?

I'm with Jeff on this. CRM Android is for Android v4.4 (KitKat) or later. new phones are now shipping v5 (Lollipop). There was a huge amount of OS development bringing early Android into a more reasonable dev environment. My read on that industry is that we'll see less sensitivity to versions in the future. Mobile Developers have hard choices. The easiest is to release HTML5-based apps for phones/pads. Those run on apple or Android regardless of version. BUT it doesn't produce integration with most of the messaging subsystem, so these CRM apps don't produce capture of SMS and phone. Infor CRM (SLX) took this route. The other route is to develop specific app for Apple and/or Android devices. These are harder to develop and require much more effort just to keep running. That extra effort gets in the way of adding CRM functionality within the app. There are very few Android-only apps, and one reason that Apple has done a much, much better job of controlling version-related maintenance. As Android market share continues to rise, and as the Android OS is now much more mature, we'll see more in the Android side. Companies using Mobile must spend a little effort over how they want to handle all this. Today, if they standardize on Apple, they don't have to worry too much about versioning, but Apple can be more expensive, and it's not obvious that Apple will still be the functionality leader 3 years from now. Way too many people have Android as personal devices, so employers can't count on that to rely on BYOD. Android has the old-phone issues I described, so BYOD isn't good there either. (I am finally replacing my htc this week, which Android v2.3.5. This is so old, even Starbucks' app will no longer load on it ...) If employers want to go cheap and rely on BYOD, then they can really only use HTML5 apps, which limit their functional options. John, while I have sympathy with your situation, IMO, Sage made the best decision out of some lousy options. As consultants we need to advise our customers that the current world of Mobile apps still generally requires employers to purchase some hardware.

Jim, the details are in the blog post linked to the email.

@JimWoodhead There are specs on the app in Google store - version 4.4 or above and screens of 3.5 - 5.5"" are listed. So the Note is not that version and a 10"" tablet is out of spec. @JeffSchwenk I understand the xkzero approach, but customers do not when they can find solutions that work with their devices.

Hmm - shows as compatible on my Nexus 6 - 5.9"" screen. At least the Google Play Store seems like it would let me download to the phone via the web.

Understand completely. Believe it or not, my clients EXPECT that the various Sage flavors (Sage 100, Sage CRM, Sage Inventory Advisor and Job Ops work together flawlessly and are AMAZED when 99.9999% percent of the time they DON'T. Not sure how their expectations are being set so highly .............. Oh wait, it is all of the marketing that Sage invests in to give them the expectation.

The size limitation seems really odd. there isn't really on on the CRM iphone app. I did post a q on their blog about it; we'll see. If it's real, that is a stupid, stupid limitation.

@JeffSchwenk I've said before that I think Sage overselling these integrations is a GOOD thing for us better partners. I think we want our customers to view us as the Reality Checkers of the industry. I don't find it hard to remind a prospect/customer that Corporate Marketing in the tech business generally over promises and airbrushes out important details in order to make the underlying message more memorable. So, we have the opportunity to pickup a call, and remind our customers how valuable we can be. What DOES get me PO'd is when customers buy one of these half-baked products directly from Sage and Sage never bothers to adjust customer expectations to Reality.