This is a follow up to last year’s shenanigans.

Guerrilla Marketing at Dreamforce appears to be the norm.  If you DON’T do it, then you aren’t a major player in the industry.  What it really boils down to is competitors to Salesforce giving them a taste of their own medicine from their own tactics just a few short years ago.

But like a SuperBowl commercial, every year you have to out-do yourself and your competition with witty and catchy tactics.  The more viral, the better.

That being said, instead of just SugarCRM this year, we have Oracle and Microsoft joining in on the shenanigans.

Salesforce bought out all the billboards in the downtown area, everything from newspaper kiosks to skyscraper ads, but they left one corner untouched, and that is at the coveted Moscone center, ironically site of Dreamforce! Nothing fancy, just their standard Oracle #1 CRM red, black and white banner on the corner of the building.

Microsoft had people on Segways to spread the Microsoft Dynamics and their $200 per user incentives to switch from Salesforce.com (or Oracle, for that matter). The slogan on the Segways had “I didn’t get Forced”.   Microsoft also ran a full page ad in The Wall Street Journal.  The timing is impeccable.

SugarCRM handing out mock Christmas carol book and had a group of carolers singing carols with lines like “On the first day of Dreamforce, Marc Benioff gave to me: An overpriced subscription fee.”   Their URL for this stunt was redirected to NightBeforeDreamforce.com

They even had the classic red Salvation Army sign with the words “Salvation from Salesforce”.  SugarCRM is offering free migration to anyone switching to from Salesforce.com to SugarCRM, plus guaranteeing 50% in savings.

Here is the video on YouTube.