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Just a Personal Point of View
On the Road to Customer Tracking Software
16-Jan-2006      by Susan Pichotta

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Part 3
THE SEARCH, DOWNLOAD.COM

My first stop in the search was Download.com . I chose "Business" from the left menu, then... I decided to look under "Personal Info Managers". This isn't a personal info manager, it's a business info manager... but oh well, that was the closest. And the primary category was "Business".

There were 404 (really!) items listed. Roboform was #1. Huh? Log onto online accounts and have things auto-filled? I guess that's a personal info manager... ReadytoPrint Organizer was #2, it prints calendars. Wrong. This is why I don't have any software for tracking my customers!

The next two are for "personal information" and "private information". I thought I'd selected "Business" as my category?

I decide to try "applications". 1140 items, too many. I'll do a search, thanks... CRM, Windows. 109 results. OK, maybe we're getting somewhere.

The first two results don't apply. The third, "NetSuite" looks possible... but their website says "Schedule a demo". I'm sure I can not afford anything that requires scheduling a demo.

Next is FTrack, which says "Handle all your customer information and improve your service quality." Sounds good, but it's web-based. I'd rather not - I want something that will run on my PC. I don't want to put my CRM software on a web server and have to access it via the internet.

I'll spare you the details of the other losers, but I will say that I don't need a team-based solution, since my cat and my 4-year-old won't be using the software. I don't need software for a handheld device. I don't need a document manager. I refuse to consider software that has a website created in the 80s (or looks that way, anyway).

I finally did a search for "sales". Any software to track sales should have "sales" somewhere in the description, don't ya think? Yea. There were 484 items on this list. On page 2, I found my first possibility.

RegKeeper looks like it might work, and at $99, it's in my price range. But honestly, at this point, an old lady with a pencil and notebook is starting to look good.

Page 3 looks as dismal as page 1. Entrepreneur 1.5 deserves a mention, though, because it's amazing. The description says only, "Wage a marketing war." Now, I'm a fan of Trout & Ries as much as the next marketer, but I have no clue what this software does, if it will track customers, or just marketing campaigns - and you don't deserve a click for me to find out. If you're that cutesy and/or lazy in the most important text you have on Download.com, the #1 software archive on the planet, how can I trust you to write decent documentation or provide worthwhile support?

I looked through page 10 of the results, then gave up. The problem is, I need to track actual product sales, not just prospects and customer interactions. I don't have inventory, and I'm not interested in an accounting program. Customers and sales. How hard is that?