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In the CRM arena, there are several myths surrounding best practices, and these myths get more pronounced the closer systems are to channels and customers. The situation gets worse as the pressure is increased to produce results from people you have no direct control over. Despite all the hype, best practices are far from being CRM's Viagra ...

The most dangerous aspect of commoditization is the illusion many companies and industries have that it could never happen to them. Somehow, companies reason, they will be protected; their differentiation is solid and sustainable. ...

Having become the centerpiece of thousands of companies' marketing efforts, CeBIT, which was held this year in Hannover, Germany from March 10-16, serves as a great industry barometer. With so many announcements made across the entire IT industry, I focused only on the business process halls, where software companies exhibited ...

Home-grown ERP systems are the Oscar Madisons of the IT world. Grizzled by years of service yet reluctant to change, these massive home-grown systems resist the efforts of CIOs to transform them. More often than not, the home-grown ERP system ends up changing the CIO. The complexity and lack of clarity makes some CIOs yearn for hosted applications to increase responsiveness...

Blogging is quickly becoming part of the online lexicon of marketing, sales and support organizations as companies look for better ways to connect with customers ...

There's a dangerous undercurrent tugging at even the best manufacturer and distribution channel relationships: the inability to set and manage expectations based on supply chain visibility ...

The allure of automating the most common tasks involving channel partners, manufacturers and distributors is so sexy that this corner of the CRM market erupted with growth during the dot-com bubble. Today it's collapsing faster than a souffle pulled from the oven too fast ...

Many manufacturers rely on special pricing requests, or exceptions to standard pricing, for a large part of their indirect channel revenue. Even for direct accounts, many manufacturers have given their sales managers and regional directors control over price limits to increase responsiveness. But these strategies don't pay off for either manufacturers or software vendors. That's because the systems that support special pricing are broken...

In discussing weight or golf scores it's easier to exaggerate the positive than to tell the truth. The same holds true when it comes to SAP ERP integrations. Integrating to any ERP system is hard work, but SAP integration around meaningful business processes can be much more challenging than integrating to even a back-office production scheduling system...

What makes channel, sales and service partnerships messy? Contracts, lots of them, for office leases, for equipment, even to prove the partnerships' existence to local, state and national governments ...

Too many companies seem to believe that the right technology is the key to e-commerce success ...

Too often channel strategies ranging from the most tactical and short-term to the most strategic and multiyear fail. Success or failure of a channel management strategy has nothing to do with the time horizon and everything to do with perspective, timing and getting away from a "one-and-done" mentality ...

While all eyes were focused on Oracle closing the PeopleSoft deal this week, a series of announcements from SAP and Microsoft may prove to be even more significant to the IT industry overall and to CRM specifically in the long term ...

While January 1 is a great mile-marker in any business timeline, the urgency for change needs to be dictated by honest assessments rather than by the flip of calendar pages. We all have enough to do already, and no one wants another action item list. That's why resolutions can turn out to be counterproductive ...

When it comes to pricing, simpler is better. Vendors who are reading the market right are moving more and more to per-CPU pricing, and, in short, trying to minimize the burden of accounting on their OEMs and their customers. The more simplistic a vendors' pricing approach, the greater the competitive advantage. The bottom line is that all the pain of value-based pricing is no longer necessary, there are plenty of good alternatives with other applications that have comparable or better usability, performance and features. Louis Columbus, a CRM Buyer columnist, is a former senior analyst with AMR Research. He currently works in the software industry and recently published the e-book Best Practices in Industry Analyst Relations, which is available on Amazon.com. This story was originally published on August 20, 2004, and is brought to you today as part of our Best of ECT News series. ...

Many companies question if the dollars spent with research and advisory firms are delivering unbiased, accurate guidance. This is particularly true in the CRM industry, where analysts influence short lists, sales cycles, and media coverage extensively. Analysts, in short, can make or break a start-up company relatively quickly ...

It's time for a reality check: When it comes to managing e-commerce strategies in your company, how do results line up with expectations? ...

The CRM systems of many companies fail because they don't properly manage the expectations of prospects and customers. What's been missing is the ability to capture the moment of truth with every prospect or customer and then bring these insights into a broader mosaic of what the many segments of a customer base like, don't like and expect from you...

In the last U.S. presidential election the candidates clashed on the issue of privatizing the Social Security system ...

It's that time again; the earnings calls for CRM, ERP, hardware and services vendors are being scheduled, rehearsed and delivered to shareholders, industry and financial analysts. What's common across the more than two dozen calls I've listened to that span CRM, ERP and SCM software, hardware and services companies is that every CEO is offering up a spin on how global outsourcing is making their business even more cost-competitive, responsive to global markets and stronger for the strategic long run...