CRM Consulting Firm vs. CRM Resellers: Choosing the Right Partner

Enterprise CRM projects carry high stakes. Industry analysts warn that a large share of CRM initiatives fail or under-deliver. HBR cites failure rates between 18% and 69%, with many experts noting that up to 90% of implementations don’t drive expected business growth hbr.org. The stakes are high: a bad CRM roll-out means wasted budget, frustrated users, and lost customers.

One reason is who you hire.

A CRM vendor’s reseller (also called a VAR or OEM partner) has very different incentives and expertise than an independent CRM consulting firm. Understanding these differences is critical for businesses aiming for ROI and user adoption. Key differences include:

• Focus & Incentives: Resellers earn commissions on software sales, so they tend to emphasize product features, demos, and licensing deals. By contrast, independent consultants are paid to solve problems – they’re vendor agnostic and focus on business value over sales.

• Replace vs. Optimize: Resellers often push replacing an old CRM (more product to sell) and will highlight any flaws or integration gaps in the legacy system. Consultants typically start by auditing and improving your current system (user feedback, process tweaks) and only recommend a replacement if absolutely necessary

• Breadth of Expertise: A reseller usually specializes in one CRM platform. A consulting firm brings broad multi-vendor experience across industries so they can match the best solution to your use case, budget, and industry.

• Objective Evaluation: Resellers may highlight the strengths of their favoured product. Consultants drive a fair evaluation process, putting every vendor through the same scrutiny. This ensures you compare systems on your real requirements, not on sales pitches.

• Long-Term Adoption & ROI: Consultants measure success in user adoption and ROI. They stay involved after go-live – providing extra training, tracking usage, and even helping recruit an in-house CRM manager. Whereas resellers often step back after initial implementation.

High-performing consultants explicitly build adoption into the plan. This matters: studies show that poor user adoption is a leading cause of CRM failure – fewer than 40% of projects ever achieve 90%+ user adoption nomalys.com – so focusing on user adoption can dramatically improve your CRM’s ROI.

CRM Resellers: Sales-Driven and Product-Focused

CRM resellers (VARs or OEM partners) are essentially part of a vendor’s channel. They are usually certified to sell and implement one specific CRM product, and their business model is tied to software sales. SalesProcess360 notes that many CRM channel partners are “closely affiliated with a major CRM company” and are given an installed base of clients to service salesprocess360.com. In practice, this means their advice tends to revolve around that product’s feature set and upgrade path. They will compare pricing tiers and pitch new modules or add-ons that earn them commissions, even when a small configuration change could fix the issue. In other words, the reseller’s goal is selling software.

Resellers often highlight every shortcoming of a legacy system (“It’s old, it doesn’t integrate easily, it’s missing this modern feature!”) because a full replacement means a new sale (and more commission). They are experts on that vendor’s CRM, but they may not thoroughly explore whether a cheaper fix — say, training users on an underutilised module or installing a minor add-on — could solve the problem.

By contrast, a CRM consulting services firm won’t earn commission on a new sale, so their conversation starts differently. They ask, “What problems are you trying to solve?” and “What’s not working for your users?” only then do they demonstrate solutions. Their pitch is about business outcomes, not product features.

CRM Consultants: Strategic, Vendor-Neutral Advisors

CRM Consultants begin with a thorough discovery and feasibility process. They conduct a business-case analysis to see if and how CRM should be used. This often involves documenting pain points, re-engineering processes, and defining clear success metrics. In short, they justify why a CRM should be implemented (or not), then tailor which features are truly required. You won’t hear them selling 100 features just because the software offers them.

Because they work across many clients and products, CRM consultants bring a broad perspective. A boutique reseller might only know Salesforce or Dynamics in depth, but a consulting firm is connected to a network of implementation partners across products.  

Refine or Replace? The Consultant’s Approach

One of the starkest contrasts is in attitude toward existing systems. Resellers often offer “replace”. Since they earn on new licenses. Consultants tend to ask first, “Can we make this work better”.

In practice, a consultant will audit your current system before recommending a new one. Armanino recommends exactly this: don’t rush to upgrade, but first evaluate the existing CRM thoroughly to understand what’s wrong and how to fix it armanino.com. If your CRM still meets most needs, the consultant might streamline workflows, improve data hygiene, or add targeted modules – often at far lower cost than a whole new system. Only if the audit shows fundamental limitations (for example, inability to re-configure or exorbitant customization costs) will they suggest a fresh implementation.

Broad Scope and Digital Transformation

Beyond CRM specifics, consulting firms often lead broader digital-transformation initiatives. They see CRM as one piece of the tech puzzle.

For instance, at ThinkCap Advisors, we advise, conducting a fit-gap assessment across ERP, CRM, Payroll and other systems to ensure all parts of the business are aligned. A consulting firm can coordinate such cross-functional integration because it understands the inter-dependencies: how customer data should flow from billing to support, or how sales forecasts tie to product installation.

A CRM-only reseller typically lacks that ecosystem view. They focus on their product’s roadmap, not on how it plugs into your finance or marketing systems. If you need your CRM to talk to your ERP or marketing stack, a CRM consultant will architect that solution. They might draw on ERP consultants or data teams to craft an end-to-end plan, whereas a single-product partner usually stops at the CRM borders. The result: consultants can drive a true transformation of customer-facing and back-office processes, not just a CRM project in isolation.

Objective Vendor Evaluation

CRM platforms are complex and ever-evolving, therefore, choosing the right one is non-trivial. Business leaders can easily be swayed by big brand names or flashy demos. A CRM consultant’s advantage is that, they lead a rigorous & unbiased selection process. Without this external critique, a company risk’s picking a popular CRM and later discovering it to be expensive, or difficult to adopt.

Adoption, Training, and Ongoing ROI

Perhaps the single biggest advantage of hiring a CRM consultant is focus on users, not just technology. Resellers typically wrap up their job after install and basic training. Consultants stay on to drive real usage and measure success. They know that even a great system fails if people don’t use it. Research confirms this: only about 22% of CRM project problems were technical – the rest were human or process issues (poor training, change resistance, etc.) nomalys.com.

Consultants tackle that head-on. They build comprehensive training, coaching and change-management into the plan. Many even help clients hire or designate an in-house CRM champion to keep momentum. Consultants also track usage metrics (dashboards, KPIs) and periodically refine the system so it continues delivering value.

Goals: Selling a Product vs. Solving a Problem

At the end of the day, a CRM reseller’s goal is to sell software. Their success is measured by new users and add-on sales. Their default recommendation will often be to buy more — more licenses, more modules, more integrations with the same vendor.

A CRM consultant’s goal is to solve your business problem. Their success is measured by outcomes: higher sales from better pipeline visibility, improved customer service through integrated data, or any other goal you set.

In practice, this means a consultant will say things like, “Based on our analysis, you only need 10 licenses” or “Let’s focus on automating your quotes process because that adds $X in value,” rather than, “Let’s upsell you to the Enterprise package.

Conclusion

Ultimately, choosing a vendor partner vs. a consultant boils down to purpose. If your priority is getting the cheapest license deal or setting up a new (basic) CRM right now, a reseller can often check that box. But if your priority is long-term value, adoption and ROI, a CRM consulting firm – with no product to pitch – is usually the safer bet.

Disclaimer: All references in this article have been sourced from publicly available information, with links provided to the original websites. All links were active and accessible at the time of publication. We acknowledge and credit all publishers and sources cited in this post.