“War of words” brewing over new NetSuite / Google product?

Now this could get interesting. Today (or yesterday, depending on whose press release you read), NetSuite, Inc., today announced “the first and only solution to provide complete tracking and management for search engine marketing campaigns.” Just one problem: Salesforce.com introduced their own search engine marketing campaign software, Salesforce for Google AdWords on Monday.

The NetSuite keyword marketing module sounds quite similar to the Salesforce product, and includes a search engine keyword campaign creation wizard, keyword campaign management capabilities and a pre-built reports for managing Google AdWords or Yahoo! Sponsored Search purchases.

Like Salesforce’s product, NetSuite’s solution also promises order management and tracking through to final sales revenue, providing that ever-popular 360 customer view. Of course, since Google doesn’t really care too too much about potential conflict (hey, for them, the more the merrier, eh?), a joint webinar has been produced by Googlers to assist NetSuite customers a bit.

The Google / NetSuite Webinar (available at www.netsuite.com/KeywordSeminar) features NetSuite marketing VP Jay O’Connor and Google senior sales manager Chris Valle. Given the growth in search engine usage by business and consumer purchasers, managing the placement, tracking, and bidding on hundreds if not thousands of keywords can challenge marketing organizations of any size. Just handling the logistical aspects of placing keywords can often span several systems, making this aspect of marketing highly repetitive and prone to error.

Driving home a disputable point, NetSuite product management vice president Mini Peiris stated that “…we have created the industry’s first and only solution to truly provide closed loop marketing analysis — the Holy Grail for any marketer.” said Mini Peiris, VP of Product Management at NetSuite. Though the products have been reviewed as “similar” throughout online tech geek cliques, the NetSuite module would appear to have one overwhelming advantage: price. While Salesforce for Google AdWords is available for free for thirty days for all Salesforce customers as of Monday, the regular price for the product will be US $300 per month. NetSuite? Well, they say it’s “available now in NetSuite and NetSuite CRM+ at no additional cost.”

We’ll be sure to keep watching what some media folk are already punningly calling “the war of words” between NetSuite and Salesforce.com. Thus far, the nastiest shot fired came from one Salesforce rep who stated “I’m sure we weren’t concerned with what NetSuite was doing.” NetSuite, Inc. is billed as the leader in on-demand business software suites and the fastest-growing software company in North America, according to the Deloitte Fast 500 study. NetSuite seeks to enable management of accounting, enterprise resource planning, CRM, and e-commerce.