Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Data Integration Solutions for SalesforceRe:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Software as a service (SaaS) is faster to deploy, simpler to upgrade, and 50 to 70 percent less<BR>expensive than on-premise equivalents, according to McKinsey Consulting.1 Yet SaaS still presents<BR>organizations with critical challenges:<BR>• SaaS applications such as Salesforce CRM are typically managed by line-of-business users in<BR>sales, marketing, human resources, and customer support organizations. In many cases, these<BR>end users are also responsible for implementing and supporting the integration solution.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
SaaS applications “in the cloud” must integrate seamlessly with on-premise business data and<BR>applications to be able to deliver operational effi ciency: providing end users with timely and<BR>accurate information when and as needed.<BR>• Although many SaaS projects start at a departmental level with simple integration requirements<BR>in their initial phase of deployment, it is common for the integration complexity to grow as<BR>end-user adoption increases and the SaaS application becomes part of a broad enterprise<BR>architecture.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
SaaS applications require specialized integration services to allow smooth, trouble-free operations<BR>across the corporate fi rewall. Yet end users, who have only the most basic IT skills, often must be<BR>able to use SaaS applications with minimal IT support.<BR>This white paper describes Informatica’s portfolio approach to SaaS integration and suggests<BR>a solution to these seemingly confl icting needs: a data integration approach that scales with<BR>customer requirements.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
The Growth of Software as a Service<BR>An growing number of companies are adopting SaaS offerings. Research fi rm IDC predicts that in<BR>2009, the SaaS market will grow more than 40 percent year over year. The same IDC report also<BR>predicts that by the end of 2009, 76 percent of all U.S. companies will use at least one SaaS<BR>application.2Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
As companies look for ways to contain costs on IT infrastructure in a struggling economy, three<BR>factors make SaaS a popular alternative to on-premise applications:<BR>• Rapid implementation. With no hardware or software to deploy and manage, SaaS minimizes<BR>the demand on IT resources and speeds time to production.<BR>• Pricing. Subscription-based services mean businesses pay only for the resources they use and<BR>readily monitor their use to quantify return on investment. This makes SaaS more affordable<BR>upfront and easily scalable.<BR>• Flexibility. Customizing SaaS applications to adapt to customer requirements takes place<BR>through confi guration, not coding—something end users often can handle with minimal training.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
The Importance of SaaS Integration<BR>Despite the potential benefi ts of SaaS, it can’t deliver on its promise if people can’t use it to<BR>access all their information on demand—especially if that information is poorly synchronized<BR>with corporate systems. In fact, Forrester Research reports that integration issues are software IT<BR>decision makers’ top concern about SaaS and the main reason they hesitate to adopt it.3Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
SaaS implementations often begin at a departmental level driven by a specifi c line-of-business<BR>need, later expanding to other departments or to an enterprise level. Because each department<BR>stores its own business-critical data in various back-end systems, small SaaS deployments<BR>typically have simple integration requirements that can be met with point solutions implemented<BR>by the application administrator or a systems integrator with minimal IT support.<BR>Larger SaaS deployments, on the other hand, have more complex integration requirements<BR>and must fi t into a company’s enterprise integration architecture. As a result, they require close<BR>collaboration between IT and the line of business, and must be implemented, integrated, and<BR>managed by IT using more sophisticated technology.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Typical SaaS integration use cases include the following:<BR>• Loading information into the SaaS system. Legacy back-end systems usually contain all the<BR>operational and historic data needed by end users; without such data, the SaaS application is<BR>not very useful.<BR>• Synchronizing the SaaS system and back-end systems. Even with SaaS applications,<BR>companies need to maintain current, accurate, real-time databases in-house to ensure secure,<BR>reliable visibility into critical data at all times. This is especially critical with data that changes<BR>every day, throughout the day, such as customer, sales, inventory, and product information.<BR>• Extracting information from the SaaS system. If companies have existing compliance and<BR>business intelligence applications, they must be able to transfer information into them from the<BR>SaaS solution to generate the wide range of operational and strategic reports those enterprise<BR>applications allow.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Different Approaches to SaaS integration<BR>Most mature providers of SaaS applications such as salesforce.com furnish customers and<BR>vendors with a Web service-based API for integration. Customers must then decide what approach<BR>to employ, based on factors including the size of their company, the availability and sophistication<BR>of in-house resources, the size and complexity of the SaaS deployment, and the data volumes<BR>they need to process.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
For Salesforce customers, these are the three most common integration approaches:<BR>1. Hand coding. Whether done in-house or by consultants, it may seem a quick fi x at fi rst, but it<BR>can rapidly become time consuming, error prone, and very expensive to maintain.<BR>2. On-premise integration platforms and tools. These are installed inside a company’s fi rewall<BR>on a server or an appliance provided by a vendor, then maintained by IT. For organizations<BR>where a skilled systems integrator or IT staffer will implement and manage the Salesforce CRM<BR>integration, this is a good choice.<BR>3. Integration as a service (IaaS) offerings. This refers to on-demand SaaS integration that<BR>itself takes place in the cloud and is maintained by the integration vendor. IaaS is ideal for<BR>organizations with limited IT resources and/or those relying on a Salesforce administrator or<BR>line-of-business analyst to perform and manage the integrationRe:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Informatica’s Approach to Salesforce Integration<BR>As the recognized market leader in data integration, Informatica has worked with salesforce.com<BR>customers of all sizes since 2005 and understands that no single approach to SaaS integration<BR>will meet every customer’s needs. Accordingly, we have created a complete portfolio of data<BR>integration solutions for Salesforce CRM and the Force.com platform. These solutions enable<BR>companies to ensure data accuracy, improve business decisions and operations, and derive<BR>maximum value from their Salesforce investment.<BR>For Salesforce administrators looking to quickly synchronize their Salesforce data with on-premise<BR>systems, Informatica offers several easy-to-use, self-service IaaS offerings called Informatica On<BR>Demand services.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
For organizations that are looking for an easy-to-use Salesforce integration offering that is<BR>designed for IT professionals, Informatica offers a powerful and affordable on-premise solution,<BR>Informatica Integration Pack for Salesforce CRM™ (iPack).<BR>For organizations that already use Informatica PowerCenter, our fl agship data integration<BR>software, Informatica offers a native Salesforce connector, Informatica PowerExchange® for<BR>Salesforce CRM™.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Informatica On Demand services have been deployed by more than 100 salesforce.com<BR>customers of all sizes and were recently voted “Best Data Integration Tool of 2008” by salesforce.<BR>com customers on AppExchange for their ease of use. Informatica’s on-premise data integration<BR>solutions are deployed at many of salesforce.com’s largest customers around the world. These<BR>solutions are often used to handle complex business rules in real time and process very large<BR>volumes of data.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Integration as a Service: A Simpler Choice for<BR>SaaS Integration<BR>Salesforce and other SaaS applications are most popular among small and midsized companies<BR>and individual departments that choose cloud applications for affordability and ease of<BR>management. Traditional integration options such as hand coding or on-premise integration tools<BR>tend to be a poor fi t for these users.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Furthermore, such solutions are far beyond the minimal expertise of the line-of-business<BR>employees who generally manage Salesforce and other SaaS applications. In an economy<BR>where IT already lacks the resources to respond to every request from the business, this delays<BR>data integration projects until an IT professional can squeeze them into an already overloaded<BR>schedule—which may take weeks or even months.<BR>As a result, IaaS is the emerging alternative to integrating cloud-based services with on-premise<BR>applications. As with other cloud-based applications, IaaS is fl exible, easy to use, and speeds<BR>time to value for a lower total cost and higher return on investmentRe:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Informatica On Demand Services: IaaS from the<BR>Integration Experts<BR>Informatica On Demand services are true cloud-based, multitenant IaaS offerings that automate<BR>moving, monitoring, and synchronizing data between back-end systems and Salesforce CRM. End<BR>users need only launch their preferred Web browser and log in to Salesforce CRM to integrate data<BR>from multiple databases and business applications.<BR>Informatica On Demand services fall into two categories:<BR>1. Powerful and fl exible IaaS tools. These tools are designed from the ground up to address the<BR>needs of line-of-business users. They allow a Salesforce administrator to quickly build any<BR>number of integration tasks to synchronize Salesforce data with corporate back-end systems.<BR>The Informatica On Demand Data Synchronization Service™, which synchronizes Salesforce<BR>data with on-premise, back offi ce databases and systems, is an example of an IaaS tool.<BR>Informatica plans to deliver a data cleansing service in the near futureRe:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Turnkey IaaS applications. These applications are designed for a specifi c integration task and<BR>require absolutely no training to use. They work “out of the box” and are the fastest way to<BR>accomplish such specifi c tasks as loading, replicating, or assessing quality of data. Best of<BR>all, they coexist with and complement any data integration tool or method that salesforce.com<BR>customers might have deployed. Informatica has developed three turnkey IaaS applications for<BR>Salesforce CRM:<BR>• Informatica On Demand Data Loader Service, which imports and exports data between<BR>Salesforce CRM and fi les or databases<BR>• Informatica On Demand Data Replication Service, which replicates Salesforce data to<BR>internal systems for analysis or archiving<BR>• Informatica On Demand Data Quality Assessment Service, which combines powerful data<BR>analysis, matching, reporting, and monitoring to ensure that data is complete, consistent,<BR>and accurateRe:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Over time, Informatica will enable partners to deliver their own process-specifi c integration<BR>solutions in a similar manner.<BR>Informatica On Demand services expedite time to value by eliminating hand coding completely.<BR>Based entirely “in the cloud,” these services are designed to integrate directly with both Salesforce<BR>and a variety of common on-premise systems and databases. Simple Web-based set-up wizards<BR>and drag-and-drop functionality empower Salesforce administrators to create their own complex<BR>automated data transformation tasks in a matter of hours—with minimal help from IT.Re:Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce
Informatica On Demand services are also fully automated. Once a Salesforce administrator<BR>creates and schedules a job, these services handle all the steps needed to keep data consistent<BR>and current. This minimizes errors while freeing the IT staff to work on other things. It also ensures<BR>results are precisely as timely as they need to be. Administrators can easily schedule jobs to run<BR>daily, hourly, or by minutes for near real-time synchronization, or less frequently for less timesensitive<BR>scenarios. They can even create sequences of jobs in which the results of one drive the<BR>next, for faster response to shifting business conditions.页:
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