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A couple of weeks ago, which corresponds with my absence from this space last week, I was on vacation trying hard to not think about work or CRM, but something hit me while watching a ballgame. I don't have a lot of current statistical data to back me up, so this might even be right ...

I have enjoyed reading Clayton Christensen's books on disruptive innovation and observing how many of the concepts articulated in his books have played out in the CRM market and beyond. With the theory in mind, it has been fascinating to watch as smart people have behaved in ways that are either predictably on target or way off the mark. One of the more interesting chess matches to watch over several years has been the growing importance of hosting in the CRM market...

I was on vacation when the news came out and for the life of me, I could not understand why Microsoft decided to announce version 3.0 of its CRM product a few days before July 4th -- the biggest public holiday of the year -- when practically no one was looking. They weren't alone. Siebel also made an announcement designed to garner minimal exposure...

One of the best parts of being an analyst or a journalist is that you get pretty easy entry to some of the most interesting companies in your space. I feel particularly fortunate to be able to call up a company to ask for a briefing. Most of the time they say yes and I get to spend an hour or so on the phone or in person talking to smart people about cutting edge ideas in business and technology. This ringside seat gives me access to understanding about where the market is moving as well as insight into the how and why...

When I was in high school, the summer reading list included titles like Great Expectations that were sure to induce a coma-like state if I tried to read them while hanging out at the pool or beach. As adults we look for mindless potboiler paperbacks to stuff in the beach bag and maybe we feel a bit guilty for it. But if you are looking for guilt-free reading that might even help your professional life when you get back to the desk in September, I can recommend several titles that will keep your attention when the sun gets high and motivation is low...

The big CRM news last week was Siebel's announcement initiating a dividend for its investors. In an open letter to shareholders, CEO George Shaheen announced the 2.5 cent dividend in typical Wall Street-ese, promising that future payments would be based on a decision of the board and, obviously, on how the company is fairing, etc., etc ...

Whenever I think about the direction of the CRM market and of technology and business in general, my mind keeps coming back to some data I saw in The Economist magazine in April. Frequent readers might recall this graphic from an article in the April 23 edition of The Economist titled "Looking for Trouble."Figure 1: Capital investment decline ...

When Marc Benioff asked me in New York what I thought of last week's Salesforce.com briefing and demonstration of CustomForce, I had to tell him the truth. I was impressed but not surprised -- after all, I have been writing about this approach to new application development and integration for over a year and the demo confirmed my predictions. But I was not and am still not trying to brag about it. Truth be told, I thought it would take years to get to this point -- it happened a lot faster than I had expected...

There has been so much to write about lately that I might have to break my own rule and file two pieces this week. I write this and other columns for fun, not profit, and I need to discipline myself to both tend to the for-profit knitting, and keep from overexposing myself. If I wanted to publish more frequently, I'd look into political punditry, and then where would the country be?...

The seasons of CRM are hard to describe but nevertheless interesting; they follow no conventional calendar and things tend to bunch up in a short time window in the spring and fall, preceded and followed by long periods of relative equilibrium. Last year I wrote about what I called the silly season, a time in the late spring and early summer when the major analyst firms reveal their CRM market share numbers for the previous calendar year...

Several macro trends are working their way through the CRM industry right now and having a direct impact on how CRM is sold. These trends include application hosting, tailoring horizontal CRM applications to fit the specific needs of vertical markets, and increasing reliance by software vendors on reseller channels to better meet the demands of specialized markets...

We've now completed our study of the call center. We did it because we wanted to learn about the trend that has executives looking to generate revenue from this part of the business that has traditionally been focused on servicing customers. I believe several long-term trends are currently at work in call centers and they are adding up to significant shifts in what this part of the business does and how it is viewed by others in the enterprise...

I really wanted to write about something other than Siebel this week. No such luck. There's so much news swirling around the CRM leader that you can do pretty well as a columnist just analyzing the analysis that has come forward so far ...

Last week Siebel Systems kicked off its annual EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) user group meeting in Barcelona with the introduction of George Shaheen, the company's new CEO. After a tumultuous prior week in which the abrupt change of leadership was announced, the company and its customers got back to business as it rolled out a typical --for Siebel -- cornucopia of new and improved technology offerings and gave some important hints about the future...

It seems like all the interesting news breaks when I am out of the country. I was in Paris, attending a venture capital conference for emerging IT companies, when I got the news that Siebel Systems had missed its revised revenue forecast and sacked its CEO. The trip had been planned around my attendance at Siebel's User Week conference to be held in Barcelona beginning today (April 18). Talk about timing!...

Ken Olson, founder of Digital Equipment Corporation, once said that the technology life-cycle goes through three phases -- do it, do it right, and do it fast. Maybe that was true of mini-computers, but today I would amend it to something like, do it, lower the cost, and make it small. If you look at the software market that's certainly where a lot of vendors and solutions are going. Take CRM, for example...

When is a sales representative not a sales representative? ...

Last week a small piece of our world changed. Did you catch it? It happened Thursday, when NetSuite, with its NetFlex announcement, became the second company to offer development and customization capabilities ...

Sales systems are a regular feature of the CRM suite, and if you didn't know better you might think that garden-variety sales force automation (SFA) is about the only thing you need. That might have been true a few years ago, but we're seeing that changes in markets and economies can have a great effect on what we sell and how we sell it. Consequently, the software we use to sell must evolve as well...

The indirect sales channel has emerged as a sales environment distinctly different from conventional business-to-business or business-to-consumer selling. This shifting focus is long overdue, especially in industries such as technology, where a high percentage of products are sold through distributor and reseller networks that require different approaches to selling and management...