Now a number of trends are converging to force such vendors to provide their applications on practically an out-of-the-box basis -- either through stripped-down versions of systems that already have been pared down for the mid-market space or through new services that position their products as easier than ever before to use.

Fast, Not Furious

Pivotal is the latest vendor follow this trend with the rollout of its new services program called "FastPath," which enables companies to deploy its CRM products in as little as 20 days.

"With this new offering, mid-sized enterprises have the opportunity to get started quickly and achieve fast CRM wins, at a lower cost than competitive quick start programs," CEO Bo Manning promised.

Pivotal FastPath for Pivotal Sales and Pivotal Service costs US$70,000 for professional services for each product, plus application and license fees. Pivotal FastPath for Pivotal MarketFirst costs $35,000 for professional services, plus application and licenses fees.

The FastPath menu of offerings follows on the heels of a product introduced last month by competing vendor Onyx -- a fixed-fee package called "CRMExpress," which includes 50 seats of the Onyx Employee Portal application license and implementation services for $199,000.

Total Cost?

To be sure, SMBs must be reveling in the ongoing competition among vendors to provide sophisticated products and services at lower-end costs. "The mid-market wants less risk at a lower price," Yankee Group analyst Sheryl Kingstone told CRMDaily, stating the obvious, as she put it. But in many instances, these deals bear further evaluation to determine whether they are truly cost-effective in the long run.

It can be very difficult to itemize costs before a project is under way. Also, much of the final cost will depend on the integration points of the project and the customer's existing IT infrastructure . Siloed data is always a problem; integrating disparate sources can add considerably to the costs.

Laissez le Bon Temps Rouler

Despite these drawbacks -- which, to be fair, play a role in any IT project, regardless of size and special price deal -- SMBs can expect the good times to continue to roll. "Everyone is going after the mid-market because it's where the money is. Mid-market companies haven't committed yet to ERP and CRM systems," Erin Kinikin, vice president and research leader, Forrester Research, told CRMDaily.

The players competing for this space are well known. There are the suite vendors, such as SAP, Oracle PeopleSoft and Siebel, which are scaling down their applications. Meanwhile, the ASP model, once considered a one-trick pony, is beginning to give the mid-market space a serious run for its money. NetLedger, for example, recently rolled out NetERP, an online ERP application that includes CRM as well as back-office functions.

And then there are the original vendors that used to dominate this space, such as Onyx and Pivotal. Each vendor has expanded its service offerings with new mobile apps and enhanced feature functionality. Now they are attacking the implementation and cost issues. Says Pivotal CEO Manning: "[We are] taking the lead in the industry by offering innovative services, such as Pivotal FastPath; low cost, India-based professional services; fixed-price contracts; and risk/reward agreements."