When we started TekStack, one of the biggest risks we took was deciding to build our application on top of a Microsoft stack. As we serve B2B SaaS companies exclusively, the safer bet would have been to partner on top of Force.com or become part of the HubSpot partner system. After all, these two products have a significant market share in the SaaS world.
Many people in the tech world (the world we support every day), think of Microsoft as their grand-daddy’s software company. I mean, their launch parties were lit! Check out this one from 26 years ago!
When we started TekStack in 2019, Microsoft’s resurgence under Satya Nadella wasn’t quite complete. This was after all the years of Slack’s IPO and MS Teams running in a collaborative environment. So it was a bit of a gamble.
So why did we do it?
The Tech is Amazing
The stuff is just great. The last five years have been transformative from a technology perspective. Microsoft is now fully cross-platform, their user experience, Fluent UI, is modern and fresh; and their business productivity apps are in the ‘top right’ quadrant in every category; PaaS, CRM, Reporting, and collaboration.
We say this as long-time SFDC users and fans, and fans of software in general, but Microsoft is absolutely nailing the mix of product functionality, platform extensibility, and price point. Yes, SFDC now has Slack and Tableau, But just try to compare the entry point for the functionality you get. Microsoft offers way more functionality for way less investment, and the software actually talks to one another. More on that below.
Microsoft heavily invests in new products.
Microsoft is constantly investing big dollars to make their Software better for users. According to Statista, In the 2021 fiscal year, Microsoft has ranked second behind Google, with a record high of 20.7 billion U.S dollars in R&D (research and development) expenditure compared to SalesForce, which has invested 3.6 billion U.S dollars. Microsoft has always shown how invested they are in its research and development, and the results are reflected in their products.
The power of seamless app switching With Microsoft
The power of having your productivity tools like email, document storage, spreadsheets, and more sharing the same login as your CRM system seems minor. After all, isn’t that what SSO is all about? Well, it actually goes much deeper than just sharing credentials. How Microsoft has interwoven app security, data access, and user experience together can not be overlooked. In TekStack you can go from Outlook to CRM to Teams to Power BI back to Teams. The process is seamless, time-saving, and can increase work productivity.
Microsoft’s licensing and pricing policies
Microsoft licensing policies allow TekStack to be the business partner we want to be. Check out the price points on our pricing page. We are able to provide CRM, Sales Acceleration, Customer Success, Professional Services Automation, Subscription Management & Billing, Customer Helpdesk for about half the cost that SFDC charges for Sales Enterprise. So that’s like licensing SFDC, Outreach, Gainsight, Mavenlink, SaaSOptics, and Zendesk for under $80 a user. On top of that, Power BI which delivers all of our metrics is a quarter the price point of Tableau, and MS Teams is part of your Microsoft 365 bundle. It’s hard to ignore the value you get from the price points. Don’t you have better things to spend your money on?
Summary
Simply put, Microsoft enabled TekStack to create the amazing product we have at hand. If you want to learn how TekStack can help your company migrate to a CRM system designed specifically for your industry, don’t hesitate to contact us!
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