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Results 221-240 of 273 for Christopher J. Bucholtz.
OPINION

Doing CRM Right Means Staying in Discovery Mode

This week, I interviewed a small business owner who told me a very interesting story. He'd done some planning before implementing his CRM solution, and his new technology took rapid care of the problems he anticipated. After that, however, he started finding new problems -- which he then found solut...

OPINION

What Holds Back CRM Success: Executive Fear

The past year seemed like one of marking time in CRM. The trends are all well spelled out: Social CRM will become a critical tool, service has grown in importance as customer acquisition has become more difficult, and the value of mobile CRM is becoming painfully apparent. So why aren't we acting on...

OPINION

A CRM Lesson From Sesame Street

This Christmas, I was sitting around with the in-laws after the presents were opened, when my father-in-law asked me a question that has probably been nagging him for a long time. "What is it that you do?" he said. Well, I'm a writer, first off, but what is it that I write about? CRM. Explaining wha...

OPINION

5 Great Gifts Your CRM Users Will Love

'Tis the Season. And it's better to give than to receive. And you'd better watch out. Besides being Christmas gibberish, those statements apply neatly to CRM. It's always the season to think about improving how your employees use CRM. It's better to give them tools that reward them for using them ...

INSIGHTS

The Lessons Antique Computers Can Teach About CRM

A few weeks ago, Computer History Museum's upcoming exhibit "Revolution: the First 2000 years of Computing." I was there to see a model of the SAGE computing facility, but I also reveled in seeing pieces of ENIAC, JOHNNIAC and a host of other early computers. As I toured the still-under-construction...

OPINION

Breaking the Tech Terminology Barrier

Salesforce.com's Dreamforce event is now 10 years old, and it's reached the stage where it draws a true sample of the Salesforce ecosystem. Of course, there are plenty of Salesforce personnel and vendors whose products work with Salesforce, but there is an increasing number of real customers. For me...

OPINION

4 CRM Questions to Ask Yourself During the Holidays

It's always fun to see the flood of articles this time of year about the holidays. "Is Your CRM Ready for Christmas?" the headlines knowingly ask. "Are You Facing a Christmas E-Commerce Customer Experience Crisis?" "The Holidays: Will You Survive? Will Your Family Survive?" OK, I stole that last one...

OPINION

The Social CRM Fallacy That Could Kill Your Business

For all the talk of social CRM, there's not so much talk of social CRM successes. Oh, sure -- there are scattered success stories, but there's not a wave of SCRM home runs being hit out there. As a result, there's been talk of SCRM having "jumped the shark" or "outlived its hype." In talking to user...

OPINION

When Disaster Strikes, Customer Relationships Can Be Critical

Developing good relationships with your customers pays off when all is going well -- but it can also pay big dividends when things go very wrong. In fact, as a recent case illustrates, those relationships nurtured through CRM can set the tone for your corrections and preserve your business. The busi...

OPINION

A Winning Sales Pitch for CRM Adoption

When it comes to the broad topic of "CRM failure," you often hear the same tales: a too-complicated integration, an incompetent integrator or inflexible technology. The reality is that technology is usually not the problem, nor is it integration or integrators. If you push, you'll find that the most...

OPINION

3 Industries Geared for Social CRM Success

Social CRM is quickly transforming from a concept to a reality. However, because of the diverse nature of customers and the broad range of options they have among social media channels, the best practices for capitalizing on Social CRM vary from segment to segment. That means some industries may hav...

OPINION

5 Worst Reasons for Pouring Resources Into CRM

CRM had a reputation as an often-unsuccessful technology, but it's not the technology that causes failure -- in most cases, failure is the result errors in expectations and execution on the part of users and implementers. Those errors often appear very early. There are many great reasons for impleme...

OPINION

Little Things Put the ‘Relationship’ in CRM

I was eating dinner at my favorite Japanese restaurant last night, and I was nearing the end of my meal when the waitress came to the table and presented two beautiful pieces of maguro, or tuna sashimi. When I said I hadn't ordered it, the sushi chef leaned over the counter. "No -- you did not order...

OPINION

Welcome to the CRM-isphere

We all like to say our businesses are "customer-centric." It's the de rigueur thing to say these days, and it's the only smart way to describe yourself to your customer audience. But how many companies really revolve around the customer? Not many, and for realistic reasons. For instance, your busine...

OPINION

Don’t Let Definition Debates Cloud Your CRM Vision

The term "cloud computing" has inspired a lot of thought, energy, ideas and enthusiasm. It's also sparked a lot of head-scratching, brow-furrowing and definition-debating. You might think that after several years of the concept being in the forefront of thought around business computing, this might ...

OPINION

The Rise of Social Service

Social media's explosion over the last few years has had some obvious implications for CRM. At first, as in every new thing in CRM, the implications for sales were appreciated first, although they have yet to be fully realized. However, this time around, there are other forces at work -- namely, eco...

OPINION

Is It CRM Time Yet?

If you're in the CRM industry, you may have a slightly skewed view of the world when it comes to CRM penetration. Many of my peers, when they hear about a company that still uses a home-brew system to manage sales, marketing and service, are aghast. With hundreds of applications out there and thousa...

BEST OF ECT NEWS

In Social CRM, Honesty Is the Best Policy

Business software has long been described as "front office" and "back office," which essentially mirrors the arrangement of real-world processes within most businesses. That arrangement made sense in the past -- what went on within the business was usually shielded from the customer. That dichotomy ...

OPINION

How to Build a Better Business Blog

About the easiest way for companies to dip their toes into the social media waters is the blog. There are few technical burdens to setting them up, the time needed to create posts can flex with the workloads of the assigned writers, and they can become a conduit for customer conversations through th...

OPINION

Analytics and Social CRM: Parallel Evolution?

Social CRM has earned widespread appreciation as a real business tool. It's no longer an idea or a theory or a hunch. However, it's still a new idea, and many are approaching it with trepidation because its impact on the bottom line is not yet well understood. I don't believe there's a single set of...

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