Customers

FrontRange Solutions is expected to introduce GoldMine IP Voice in the United States within the next few weeks. The application, which combines contact management and VoIP telephony in one package, is integrated in the GoldMine Corporate Edition CRM suite. Linking the telephony layer to the CRM appl...

Retailers are finding that a blog that is supportive can translate into measurable new sales, but they are exercising caution, despite the word-of-mouth advantages blogging can bring. Blogging is a dual-edged sword: A well-trafficked blog that is critical can deliver a blow. Eva Yusa is not crazy a...

Managed care is facing a fundamental shift in the way it handles member relations. Historically, payors invested little in developing solid relationships with individuals. This was a logical arrangement as employers selected and paid plans, so sales, service and marketing resources were dedicated ...

Dell has indicated it will continue to expand its ties in the Indian outsourcing market, building on the contact center and R&D operations it already has established. Its most recent initiative? Plans to establish a customer contact facility in Gurgaon to complement its existing operations in Ba...

Sparking the interest of retailers around the globe, UK supermarket chain Tesco announced it will be selling Internet-based phone service and handsets on a pay-as-you-go basis. Tesco's move is more than a product announcement; by private labeling a VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, service, Tes...

Microsoft has introduced an upgraded version of a product it quietly rolled out last year. Called Customer Care Framework 2005, it is a desktop application for contact-center operators that provides customer-care information via e-mail, instant messaging, interactive voice response and the partner-d...

New research indicates that many brand-name computer companies perform poorly when it comes to online customer service. The study by the Ipswich, Mass.-based Customer Respect Group, an international consulting company, demonstrates that only six companies included in the report received an "excellen...

Asia Pacific is still the dominant locale for contact-center outsourcing, new figures from Frost & Sullivan confirm. The number of contact centers in the region totaled more than 21,360 in 2004 and is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of 9.1 percent to reach 39,247 by the end of 2011, a...

The home-based customer care market -- a small but quickly growing niche of the contact center industry -- could triple by 2010 to 300,000, according to a new report by IDC. "Current estimates put the number of home-based agents at 112,000, so that is a strong growth rate," Stephen Loynd, senior ana...

The holidays are over, but retailers are still waiting for the holiday shopping season to end. Increasingly, consumers are opting to give gift cards instead of actually buying an article of clothing or an electronic gadget. This is good news for retailers hoping to drive up modest margins. When rede...

It seems so many companies are finding it easier than ever to automate, speed up, and turbocharge their way into mediocre performance with customers all because they don't stop to re-define the essence of their strategies for attracting, selling to, and serving customers in the first place. What's n...

The coming year is going to see the fruition of several dominant trends that have been percolating just under the surface of CRM specifically and enterprise software markets generally. It's going to be an invigorating and challenging year because many software companies will need to re-invent thems...

There's a dividing line emerging in marketing today, and it doesn't have anything to do with the size of a marketing budget, the amount of CRM or channel management software installed, the size of the company or its long-standing reputation. In fact all these things don't matter nearly as much as a...

Ask any salesperson what they never have enough of, and leads will always be at the top of the list. The traditional forms of creating leads including advertising, direct mail, webinars, events and tradeshows, and even cold calling aren't delivering enough leads to create consistently strong pipeli...

American retailers are turning to radio frequency identification technology -- RFID tags -- to ensure that in-demand items are in stock this holiday season, hoping to bolster end-of-year revenues, experts say. Holiday revenue can account for 25 to 40 percent of a company's annual revenue, and retail...