Salesforce Debuts Mobile Tools For Government

8 Ways An SMB Makes Most Of Salesforce.com

Cloud-based customer-relationship management vendor Salesforce.com on Wednesday launched four mobile products designed specifically for the government. The General Services Administration (GSA) is among Salesforce.com's largest federal customers, having developed more than 100 apps using its mobile platform.

The four products are Rapid Response 311, Mobile Communities for Government, Government Social Command Center and Platform Mobile Services for Government. This is the first time that Salesforce.com has created a mobile package optimized specifically for the government's needs, the company's senior VP for government transformation Daniel Burton said in an interview.

"There's a huge adoption rate by citizens, but the government is still weighed down by legacy systems when it comes to mobile," said Burton. "These solutions give the government the ability to connect with citizens, and deliver new services using the cloud, social and mobile capabilities."

[ AWS passes the fed's cloud security test. Read more at Amazon Cloud Gets Federal Stamp Of Approval. ]

Rapid Response 311 is based on a customer service app called Salesforce Service Cloud. Local governments can deploy a 311 portal that functions as a single point of entry for residents who file reports or requests via the phone, email, Web or social media like Twitter. Agents at call centers get a unified console on their desktops, where they can view and manage information on current cases. The City of Elgin, Illinois, has been using Rapid Response 311 at its call centers to manage snow cleanups by locating severely impacted areas across the city.

Mobile Communities for Government is designed for agencies that want to create communities to connect with other departments, agencies and external organizations. Built on Salesforce.com's flagship CRM product, Mobile Communities for Government measures interactions with people using built-in reports and dashboards, which helps agencies stay on top of compliance regulations. Communities can interact through social networking features -- including real-time feeds and trending topics -- on any device. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is currently piloting the application to simplify the approval process for drugs and medical devices.

New Jersey Transit has integrated Government Social Command Center, based on Salesforce Radian6, with its customer service operations. The transportation provider receives customer feedback through various channels -- eight customer service field offices, email and phone calls -- and needed a way to get the feedback to a central location. Using Government Social Command Center, agents monitor the social Web for conversations. Posts or tweets are imported into a contact center queue as a service case, and an agent is assigned to resolve each inquiry.

The last component, Platform Mobile Services for Government, allows government IT departments to build and deploy applications on any device. In addition to the GSA, NJ Transit used the platform to create dozens of apps for ticket sales, undercover fraud investigations, civil rights enforcement and emergency response teams.

Salesforce.com has more than 500 federal, state and local government customers using its cloud services. They include the U.S. Census Bureau, Colorado Statewide Internet Portal Authority, Michigan Health Information Network (MiHIN) and Texas Department of Information Resources.

Urban transformation requires IT innovation. Here's how five U.S. cities are forging ahead. Also in the new, all-digital Future Cities issue of InformationWeek Government: Video surveillance provided valuable clues to the Boston Marathon bombings, serving as a lesson to other cities. (Free registration required.)