May 2007

Magazine Features

No More Dying by Inches

To help reverse the effects of its information malnutrition, a sales team must let its marketing department know what customer data is of value and what is not.

Too Much Pork for Just One Fork

Shiny, clean data and solid lead qualification will help satisfy all by closing the nutritional sales-and-marketing info loop.

Yackety Clack

Text chat is no longer exclusively for the tech-adept, buddy-list teen set--it's picking up steam as an enterprise touch point to facilitate multichannel strategies for service and sales efforts.

The Big Picture

How to connect the dots to reveal a complete image of new corporate performance management software solutions.

Front Office

Farewell Blues

Even if a salesperson is successful selling to these blues, consider what the company sacrifices.

Reality Check

A CRM Initiative's Bermuda Triangle

Two best practice suggestions for preventing--permanently--user-adoption disappearance.

Customer Centricity

Hybrid Hopes

If call centers want to circumvent most speech recognition problems, the time has come for hybrid architectures.

The Tipping Point

Analytics Is the Answer

What do contact center managers need to generate revenue? New tools and technologies.

Pint of View

Do You Believe the Hype?

Well, stop!

Insight

Microsoft: Partnering Up or Partnering Down?

For partners it is a question of how far Microsoft will go with the verticals initiative.

JetBlue's Service Flies South

Accepting responsibility is a key component of staying aloft during a PR nightmare.

Is Salesforce.com Changing Direction?

The vendor is implementing vertical solutions after long shyness, but how far should they go and who is creating them? Plus, two questions for the CEO.

Market Focus: Government: Citizen Satisfaction

The public sector thinks differently about the C in CRM, as more vendors cater to this vertical's specific needs.

destinationCRM Dashboard

Required Reading: Analytics: A Winning New Way

Thomas Davenport and Jeanne Harris argue that companies need analytics to make better decisions and extract maximum value from their business processes.

REAL ROI

Playground Gets Maximized

Ease of use allows sales teams to focus on customers and build relationships.

IT Meets CRM for ROI

A network administration toolmaker turns to Soffront to tame some of its own wild technical difficulties.

Chatting Up Customers Down Under

A telecommunications company combines speech with CTI and increases customer satisfaction, agent efficiency, and self-service adoption as a result.

Gaining Altitude

JetBlue implements a Web self-service solution to power customers to field their own questions and let agents focus on the human touch.

Secret of My Success

Philadelphia Housing Authority's New Lease on CRM

The PHA turns to Oracle PeopleSoft for an enterprisewide implementation to integrate CRM with finance and HR.

Re:Tooling

Tech Solution: E-Catalog Software

Business Problem: A company must design and manage a visually appealing interactive storefront for its Web site.