Salesforce.com Leaves Channel Wanting More

Eric Berridge, founder of Blue Wolfe, a New York-based solution provider, praised salesforce.com's new "sforce" development platform but said the software services company could do more to support solution providers as a way of capturing incremental business.

"Salesforce.com is going to need to identify where they are losing business. Their tools might have the functionality to create 'X' and 'Y' applications, but salesforce.com needs [solution providers] to create 'Z,' the missing piece," Berridge said. "It would help if they could support us with free product through a more formalized program that would give us the running room to grow their business and ours."

San Francisco-based salesforce.com mainly targets ISVs, developers and end users, but several months ago CEO Marc Benioff told CRN he was mulling new programs to attract more solution providers. At the sforce launch in New York last week, however, Benioff was uncommitted and instead referred solution providers to the company's existing Joinforces Ready Partner and Certified Partner programs.

The sforce Developer Program also provides sample code, technical support, development tools and other services.

Sforce provides services for building business applications over the Web using traditional development tools. Salesforce.com has partnered with Microsoft, Borland, BEA Systems and Sun Microsystems to spur developers to use sforce to create Web-based applications such as data and document management and authentication for PDAs, PCs, smartphones and other devices.

Using sforce, Blue Wolfe created a Web-based insertion-order application for media companies at a fraction of the cost and time it would have taken using other methods, Berridge said. "You can do a lot more with sforce than you can with traditional systems," he said. "It helps smaller companies like us deliver greater functionality."