Applications

CRM Topic Center

Analysis, opinions, best practices, news and more about CRM

Salesforce.com shakes up Standard support plan features

Salesforce.com has made a series of changes to its support services that include the removal of certain features from the Standard tier, but which the company says overall will provide a better experience for customers.
Read more...

Upcoming Microsoft CRM clients may mean more productivity

The productivity of salespeople could jump with the upcoming release of native Microsoft Dynamics CRM applications for specific mobile platforms and put the software vendor ahead of some of its competitors, an expert says.

Microsoft to roll out wave of native mobile apps for its CRM software

Microsoft is gearing up to release a phalanx of native mobile applications for its CRM software, with clients aimed at BlackBerry, Windows Phone 7, iOS, and Android 2.2 and higher devices, the company announced Monday.

Salesforce.com yields to pressure over analytics pricing

Salesforce.com will include some new analytics capabilities at no additional cost with the Enterprise and Unlimited editions of its CRM (customer relationship management) software, following complaints from customers who argued that the features should have been used to fill long-standing gaps in the products' core functionality, not sold separately.

Oracle outlines plans for RightNow integration

Oracle executives gave a more detailed picture of their plans to integrate technologies gained through October's $1.5 billion acquisition of RightNow, maker of cloud-based software for customer service through the Web, social networks and contact centers.

Salesforce.com launches Desk.com help-desk service

Salesforce.com on Tuesday unveiled a new SaaS (software as a service) help-desk application called Desk.com that can reach end users through social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

Salesforce.com customers say new analytics should be included in core fees

Salesforce.com customers are sounding off about the fact that an upcoming Analytics Edition of the CRM (customer relationship management) software will have an additional price tag, saying that the functionality it includes should be part of their base subscriptions.

RightNow shareholders approve $1.5B sale to Oracle

Oracle's $1.5 billion purchase of cloud software vendor RightNow Technologies took another step forward as a vast majority of RightNow shareholders approved the deal.

Oracle Q2 net income jumps 17 percent, but hardware sales slump

Oracle's net income for the second quarter ended Nov. 30 rose 17 percent to US$2.2 billion, with software sales rising but hardware-related revenue falling, the company reported Tuesday. Revenue for the quarter rose 2 percent to $8.8 billion.

Salesforce.com acquires Rypple for push into cloud HR software

Salesforce.com announced Thursday it will acquire cloud-based performance management vendor Rypple in a bid to enter the human resources software market.

8 CRM Trends You Need to Watch

Customer relationship management vendors and industry analysts discuss which CRM trends will continue to gain strength and what new trends IT professionals need to watch.

Why enterprise software will never be the same

It's a stretch to call 2011 a truly transformative year for enterprise software, given all the old warts that remain, from large-scale IT project failures to creaky legacy systems that will take years and great expense to replace with the latest-and-greatest.

CRM and Sales: If it's Broke, Fix it.

Fixing your CRM system and the sales and marketing organization will take some real time, and should be done in stages. Further, in both CRM and sales there's a serious talent shortage. Sure, there are people on the street -- but just try to find a truly great salesperson or SFDC wizard in New York or San Francisco. So you should grab the employees and consultants whenever you can find them, and expect to fix the software and organizational issues in parallel.

10 essential MySQL tools for admins

The MySQL community is a hotbed of free, open source tools to enhance the performance and health of your MySQL systems

NoSQL standouts: New databases for new applications

Cassandra, CouchDB, MongoDB, Redis, Riak, Neo4J, and FlockDB reinvent the data store

After OpenOffice and Hudson, will Oracle stick with open source?

NetBeans, MySQL, and GlassFish are all likely to remain in Oracle's software portfolio as they have profit potential

Implementing Territories in CRM Systems

Defining and managing sales territories is one of the key responsibilities of sales management. But territories in CRM systems can be one of the hardest parts of the implementation.

Don't Gamble Your Company's Reputation on Data Governance

Today's growing challenge: Data. There is suddenly too much of it, and while firms rush to mine it, they do so without adequate regard for the risks in keeping and using it.

How to Get Smarter About CRM Security

If Value Engineering is the identification of different implementation strategies to achieve the business goal, the ultimate in value engineering is to identify requirements that don't need to be done in the first place. Although security and access control would seem to be a poor candidate for this kind of requirements elimination, in many situations the technical solutions are so clumsy and expensive that there's almost no ROI.

What the Cloud Really Costs: Do You Know?

14 ways CIOs under estimate the costs of cloud computing