Sales software provider Salesforce.com's (News - Alert) platform and customer relations management, or "CRM," applications have revolutionized the way companies collaborate and communicate with their customers.

According to a press release, Salesforce.com has been offering the fastest path to customer success with cloud computing technology.

Some of the offerings of Salesforce.com include the Force.com platform, AppExchange, Sales Cloud, Service Cloud and Chatter.

Salesforce is web-based platform that hosts the CRM platform, but itself is not traditional CRM software. Provided that it is web-based, it enables employees to access it from anywhere, thereby facilitating them to get access to an expanding set of tools, information on leads, customer records, and reporting - all in a single web browser.

The Force.com is an enterprise platform designed for building and running business applications in the cloud. This platform powers the Salesforce CRM applications. Applications built on the Force.com platform can be easily distributed to the entire cloud computing community via salesforce.com's AppExchange at http://www.salesforce.com/appexchange/.

The AppExchange is an on-demand marketplace for enterprise cloud computing applications. It provides access to thousands of applications and services that extends the use of Salesforce CRM and the Force.com platform. 

Apart from these platforms, Salesforce.com also offers the Sales Cloud for sales force automation and contact management; the Service Cloud for customer service and support solutions; and Chatter for social collaboration.

As of January 2010, salesforce.com has managed customer information for approximately 72,500 customers including Allianz Commercial, Dell (News - Alert), Japan Post, Kaiser Permanente, KONE, and SunTrust Banks, said officials with the company.

In the week of June 1, 2010, the enterprise cloud computing company is conducting investor events. Graham Smith, chief financial officer at salesforce.com, will be presenting at two upcoming investor events at Bank of America Merrill Lynch U.S. Technology Conference in New York City, NY on June 2 and at Cowen Technology Media & Telecom Conference in New York City, NY on June 3.

An audio webcast of presentations by Smith will be available on salesforce.com's website at www.salesforce.com/investor.

In the recent news, TMCnet reported that the New York Daily News has deployed Five9 on-demand call center software that integrates Salesforce CRM with the Five9 software to increase advertising renewal rates. Five9 is a call center on demand and hosted contact center software provider.