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Sales 2.0 is a big deal both because it is causing us all to take a new look at selling -- along with all of the social networking ideas and technology that is changing our work habits -- as well as for what it says about marketing. To be frank, Sales 2.0 is actually more about marketing than sellin...

A U.S. Senate subcommittee on Tuesday hauled credit card companies onto the mat for their practice of using credit scores to increase the interest rates cardholders must pay. "Credit card companies go too far when they hike the interest rates of consumers who are faithfully paying their credit card ...

SAP rolled out a new version of its SAP CRM application -- its first major release in a year. Significant changes to the platform include a new user interface that allows business managers to make changes that previously would have required more extensive customization and new functionality in a num...

Trust remains a critical component of today's online economy. By its very nature, the Web 2.0 phenomenon factors into consumer or enterprise trust, as it can cloud judgments over what is and what's not trustworthy online. Web 2.0 applications are typically lightweight and nimble, with slick user int...

VeriFone, a provider of secure electronic payment systems and consulting, lost almost 50 percent of its market value after the company said Monday it will need to restate its financials for several reporting periods -- going back to January. The restatements, resulting from an internal review, will ...

Amdocs has rolled out Smart Agent Desktop, a new product that gives contact center agents visibility into back-end applications and provides guidance on decision making processes related to calls. It is the combination of both factors in one product that makes this rollout unique in the industry, Ho...

Trust plays an important role in interpersonal relationships. The same can be said of business relationships. In both cases, trust means a willingness on the part of each partner to assume a certain amount of risk. In an interpersonal relationship, the risk may be that a partner will act unfaithful ...

Oncontact Software released version 6.1 of its CRM application, which caters to the growing demand among users for software delivered through the Internet. For the first time, with this release the vendor is providing users with Web extensibility along with its traditional client server access. What...

It happens all the time: Customers with complaints pick up the phone to call centers about a service problem. However, what if the service provider can pinpoint network problems before they occur? That way, customer service reps can resolve issues before disgruntled callers reach for the phone. That...

Maybe GRC is the new ROI, maybe not, but you can't deny that ROI is getting old. ROI is simply a metric that measures the excess profit -- or return -- made by implementing a solution, minus the cost of the solution, when compared to not having implemented the same solution. GRC is governance, ris...

All company executives believe that having loyal customers is a key to business success. However, what are executives really doing about it? Most will point to their customer care training or CRM system and say, "That's how we take care of loyalty here." Some will also point to their monthly newslet...

The trend toward environmentally friendly, or green, business practices is permeating just about every industry and, at a more granular level, specific operations within particular segments -- from high-tech server options to green building. The supply chain is no exception, according to a new surv...

It's about that time of year when we see all the predictions and forecasts of how much online sales will increase, by product, for this holiday season. From cautiously to wildly optimistic, these forecasts are things that e-commerce managers' dreams are made of. There's something missing in this yea...

In an effort to gain a competitive edge in the market, companies are implementing customer self-service solutions to address two distinctly separate business challenges -- improving the customer experience and cost reduction. While the cost-related benefits of self-service are widely understood, and...

They pulled out all the stops at Oracle Open World last week to unveil a whole lot of advanced and interesting business technology. It was the 30th anniversary show, but the emphasis was clearly about the future -- not the past. There was lots that was not CRM related -- though from my provincial pe...