At a private event in San Francisco this afternoon, Marc Benioff and Sheryl Sandberg (who runs Google's AdWords business) formally announced a global strategic alliance between Salesforce and Google. The alliance encompasses five critical areas of partnership and shared values:

1. Technology. A new product was announced today: Salesforce Group Edition featuring Google AdWords replaces our best-selling Team Edition product and offers seamless integration with Google AdWords. Not only can you create and manage AdWords campaigns from within Salesforce, but you now get free AdWords just for signing up for the Salesforce product, as well as instant access to lead management, dashboards, and links to related Google apps. The two companies have worked closely together to create a breakthrough new product that makes it easier than ever before for small businesses to take advantage of the Internet to scale quickly and efficiently. And there is tremendous opportunity here - Sheryl cited the statistic that even in the US, over 50% of small businesses do not have a website and are not taking advantage of the tremendous efficiencies possible with the Internet. The number presumably is much higher elsewhere.
2. Distribution. Salesforce is now an official reseller of the Google AdWords platform. We believe it's an ideal fit for existing customers, and a compelling differentiator for prospects.
3. Business Model. Salesforce and Google pioneered the B2B Internet selling model. Instead of requiring customers to pay upfront for software licenses or ads before they demonstrate value, the "pay as you go" model both companies have always embraced aligns our customers very fundamentally with customers' best interest, since we are continually working to win repeat business.
4. Community. Both companies have become successful over the years thanks to the passion and engagement of their user and developer communities. On the developer front, both companies plan to further build out their APIs to enable even more creativity and mash-up innovation on the AppExchange, eg Appirio's Google Gadgets for Salesforce.
5. Philanthropy. Just before their IPO in 2004, Google adopted the "1-1-1" model of philanthropy introduced by Marc in his first book, Compassionate Capitalism, in which 1% of equity, 1% of product (donations to nonprofit organizations), and 1% of employees' time are set aside for charity. Marc and Sheryl also made history today in announcing that this joint product will be given away for free to registered 501(c)(3) nonprofits!

Now, any business can establish an online presence, market to larger audiences, and measure ROI with just a few clicks and a few hundred dollars. We are all very excited about these developments and welcome your ideas on future potential integration areas!