Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 aims to break down sales-marketing silos

Microsoft plans to release its next version of its Dynamics CRM offering in the fourth quarter of this year. That much we knew, thanks to a recent revelation regarding Microsoft's CRM roadmap, including information on CRM 2015, codenamed "Vega."

But there's lots we didn't know about CRM 2015 until last week when Microsoft officially announced its plans for the on-premises and online versions of its next CRM release. Alongside CRM 2015, Microsoft also will make available updates to its Dynamics Marketing and Social Listening social analytics components in the fourth quarter, as well.

At the highest level, the goal of CRM 2015 is to break down silos between sales and marketing. Marketing will get a new Sales Collaboration Panel, and new capabilities like graphical email editing, A/B testing, and integrated offers and approval workflows. Lync click-to-call is enabled in this release, along with a new interactive marketing calendar.

Social Listening gets more location filters and supported languages/geographies in the Q4 2014 wave. Across the board, the 2015 releases also get enhanced search capabilities and enhanced business rules.

Here's the Dynamics CRM 2015 Release Preview Guide, available for free download.

And here's the "Get Ready for the next release" page, which includes a list of the new features, technical changes, information on how to get updates and more.

In other Microsoft Dynamics news, Microsoft will make the Dynamics NAV 2015 release available for download on October 1, 2014. The company released new Dynamics NAV ERP client apps for iPads, Android and Windows devices last week.