We Blog CRM

San Francisco, Calif.-based on-demand retention marketing firm Loyalty Lab, Inc. has released their line of “Loyalty Line Solutions.” And, as an attention grabber, press material gives guarantees for ROI outcomes for the most common problems faced by consumer brand marketers.

The five members of the Loyalty Line Solutions set are the following. The Cross-Sell Driver allows probing and education in a broad range of promotional activities, to find the specials that foster cross sell performance. Loyalty Line promises increases in purchases across categories by an estimated twenty percent. The loftily titled “Customer Evangelist” would “produce a real source of new customers by recognizing and rewarding both referrer and referee.” The promise here is an approximate doubling of customer acquisition through word of mouth. The Magic Moments program involves those “watershed events in a customer relationship.” The feature is designed to analyze key behavioral customer transition. Loyal Line says the program will reduce the number of inactive customers by at least ten percent. Second Sale consists of a customer management program focused on generating a repeat purchase. Promised is an estimated twenty percent increase in transaction frequency. Smart Email is a personalized email that focuses on engaging customers to interact at what Loyal Line PR claims can reach five times typical open rates. This is said to approximately double email open rates and increase conversion by thirty percent.

The full Loyalty Lab’s platform, spearheaded by its flagship customer relationship manager suite is also still available, essentially featuring these features and more. Loyalty Lab creators formulated their individual programs based on experience and study of dozens of loyalty and retention marketing programs. After a comprehensive study of users, the recently created solutions seek to clear up problems experienced by the overwhelming majority: insufficient repeat customers, retaining at-risk customers and such. “We’ve discovered that many marketers, regardless of their company’s core competencies, are trying to solve the same problems,” summarized Loyalty Lab CEO Mark H. Goldstein.

Loyalty Lab currently holds the leading spot in on-demand relationship and retention marketing solutions for consumer brands. Among their clients are 1-800-Flowers.com, Bally Total Fitness, Pfaltzgraff, and Smith & Hawken.

Seemingly making a high profile move daily, SAP AG representatives announced this week their company’s imminent acquisition of Cambridge, Mass.-based supplier relationship management software provider Frictionless Commerce.

The purchase will be an all-cash deal, though exact terms were not disclosed. Frictionless Commerce currently specialized in serving large- and mid-sized enterprises in markets such as banking, consumer products, discrete manufacturing, insurance, life sciences, professional services, telecommunications and utilities.

Through the addition of Frictionless Commerce, SAP clearly hopes to become to the SRM industry what it has been to the CRM industry: a business to watch for. No serious business acumen is required to see what Frictionless PR tells us, namely that the acquisition can only add value to SAP’s range of extant applications; SAP press material states that Frictionless product while become a “key component of the company’s strategy to offer the preferred global purchasing platform for organizations of all sizes and across all industries.”

With the acquisition, SAP promises to combine the web-based e-sourcing capabilities with which Frictionless made a name for itself together with SAP applications. Frictionless products already run on SAP NetWeaver solutions, making them fully compatible with SAP applications and minimizing the necessary product integration.

SAP AG product and technology group president / executive board member (and a man in industry news often lately) Shai Agassi proclaimed the deal “a quick win for our customers. We extend a warm welcome to Frictionless Commerce employees and partners.” Indeed, the former may have some considering to do for the time being. The acquisition will not be completed until July. Frictionless currently supports seventy employees in the Massachusetts office and a handful more in their London, England, outlet.

Though SAP has promised to continue operations in the offices, no word was given on exactly how many (or even if any) layoffs can be expected. SAP representatives said that additional details regarding personnel integration would be provided upon closing of the deal.

Bellevue, Wash.-based Avidian Technologies closed out the week by announcing enhancements to their flagship product Prophet 3.0. Billed in PR material as “the leading contact and sales management software in Outlook,” Prophet 3.0 will now carry more advanced user permissions. Avidian has also promises to provide support for Terminal Server in Prophet 3.0, its leading Outlook-based sales software.

Avidian Technologies CEO James Wong, using language appropriate to his company’s high-fallutin’ moniker, said that “This update to Prophet answers the call from our customers” in their request for greater simplicity and control. Press material promises that support for Terminal Server will allow users “seamless” access to data via a Terminal Server session, thereby increasing access and mobility. The upgrade will also reportedly reduce IT maintenance costs.

Through the User Permissions program, companies are promised to gain the ability to create hierarchies in order to properly divide customer information and thus simply options for each individual user. Global views become just as easily doable as detailed looks.

Avidian touts Prophet as unique in the CRM and sales management software spheres, as the program is built on the .NET platform and into Outlook and so eliminates multiple contact databases and multiple switches between applications. Two editions of Prophet are currently available: the Professional Server Edition and Enterprise Server Edition are available for companies of five or more users. Prices start at just under three hundred dollars per user.

CRM suite solutions provider Entellium announced at the end of last week that the firm’s product will serve as the “backbone” for the web-based accounting and business solutions provider Weboffice franchise network. Weboffice will be using Entellium CRM tools in the areas of customer support and sales. Oddly included in press material was the inclusion of Entellium’s rate for the agreement: sixty dollars per user.

Specializing in small- and mid-sized businesses, Weboffice services assist in customer tracking, email campaigns, marketing and telephony. As of late, Weboffice has even growth to warrant a firmer base of online operations. “There is a ton of information to be managed,” Weboffice sales and marketing vice president Taylor Mayo said in the announcement to the press. Mayo cited personal satisfaction as part of the reason for the deal, stating that Entellium’s free live chat support, which has proven to be excellent in servicing Weboffice troubles, was what put Entellium over the top. Indeed, Entellium guarantees “24/7/365” online service. “We couldn’t be happier,” gushed Mayo.

The announcement came just two days after Entellium officially inked another deal, this one with online infrastructure firm PortoLynx.com. PortoLynx.com specializes in coordinating centralized ordering processes for e-commerce networking. The company’s first network was GiftPorto.com, which handles the hand delivering of custom gift baskets from Global 2000 companies to up to “hundreds” of recipients. Like Weboffice, PortoLynx.com has seen a decent amount of success recently; also similar is the company’s suddenly urgent need to upgrade in networking system. “The first requirement,” explained PortoLynx marketing vice president Bobbi Leach, “was a hosted CRM model that could support a global infrastructure.”

Similar, too, to the Weboffice deal was the citing of Entellium online customer support; Leach called it “amazing.” With such service, Entellium hopes to earn a reputation as the single best customer supporter in the business. Entellium chief marketing officer Natalee Roan expresses the carpe diem approach thusly: “A global infrastructure … requires around-the-clock system availability and support.”

Roan promises “99.7 percent uptime” for their systems, including “the most aggressive, customer-centric written service level agreement for every single customer.” Entellium can now number PortoLynx and Weboffice to a burgeoning list of clientele which currently includes the Virtual Finance Organization, ScreenPlay, MobileLime, Milestone Group, Junxion, gDiapers, DSL Computer, AWSM Technology and Allied Home Mortgage.

NetSuite, Inc., all over the CRM news lately, provided a reason for more headlines today. Reportedly the leader in on-demand business software suites, NetSuite representatives today announced further expansion within the Japanese market. Partnerships were sealed with outsource services provider Transcosmos and IT venture capital firm / consultancy Inspire Corporation.

Including distribution, engineering and equity factors, these commitments of Transcosmos and Inspire add up to an investment of over $18 million. The agreements were undertaken in order for NetSuite to reach further into the Japanese small- and mid-sized business market; the company hopes to leverage “the expertise in marketing, outsourcing and IT provided by Transcosmos and Inspire.” This represents both a bold and cunning play by NetSuite as, despite popular perception, over ninety percent of the Japanese economy is taken up with smaller enterprises.

Transcosmos provides NetSuite with the resources of Japan’s single largest outsourced call center company. Additionally, Transcosmos is an industry leader in website building and online advertisement reselling in Japan. The firm hopes to realize its “Marketing Chain Management” plan with the addition of NetSuite product, promising to live up to the mission statement of creating a model that helps companies optimize their marketing content and efficiently perform marketing tasks, acquire new customers, expand sales, and enhance customer satisfaction by bringing into sync real-time marketing and the contact and call centers that enable companies and consumers to communicate directly with one another.

Tokyo-based Transcosmos Inc. (also known as Shibuya-ku) has been a player in Japan’s outsourced information services market for an incredible forty years. since 1966. Today, Transcosmos boasts over 7,600 employees and reported annual sales of 106.5 billion Yen for fiscal year 2005. Hoping to cut itself a big slice of the broadband pie, 2002 saw the restructuring of Transcosmos into “The Marketing Chain Management Company,” a firm with heavy emphasis in VoIP and broadband internet services.

Inspire Corporation is perhaps most familiarly known as the firm headed up by Makoto Naruke, a visionary type who joined Microsoft back in 1986 and rose to become head of Microsoft Japan in 1991. After leaving the big company’s Japanese version in 2000, Makoto founded the investment firm Minato-ku (the Japanese name of Inspire) on the foundation of what has been called “the first Japanese Strategic IT fund.” The fund was designed to foster management innovation via strategic investment in IT systems through investment and fund offerings to middle class public companies.

Today, Inspire administrates several funds, including the Inspire Advanced Technology Fund, and has expanded into the fields of marketing and intellectual property rights. “NetSuite is the first and only on-demand software company to create such a strong group of distribution and investment partnerships in Japan,” said NetSuite, Inc. CEO Zach Nelson in the company’s announcement. “Moreover, their investment commitment reflects their confidence in NetSuite’s leadership position in on-demand business software suites throughout the world.”

Naruke (definitely a “when he speaks, people listen” voice) added that “Being in IT for many years, I have recognized that NetSuite is undoubtedly the greatest product I have seen in the last decade, and we are passionate about making this product the number one on-demand ERP, CRM and e-commerce solution in the Japanese market.” The only question remaining for NetSuite at this point is just how far their stock can rise in Japan, but their prospects have got to be, well, sunny.

Belfast, Ireland-based Lagan is moving into Toronto before the end of the year in order to pick up more of Canada’s 311 business. In Canada, 311 phone numbers are reserved for municipal services inquiries in a system that has been established in Windsor and Laval. Britt Oldenburg has been named director of business for Lagan’s Canadian interests, bringing to the position her experience with the setting up of Motorola Canada’s own 311 business there in 2002.

Oldenburg states that approximately thirty-five large Canadian municipalities are prime for 311 service and that Lagan’s CRM solution is potentially well-adaptable to the Canada market. She claims that the Lagan U.K. municipal model can serve as basis for Canada’s business- and citizen-based services. “I think our timing is good here,” said Oldenburg. “Most of the major municipalities are studying 311 in some shape or form. [Almost] all of them have some project underway.

Hopefully by now we’re at a point in the sales cycle where they’re actually looking at CRM solutions.” Earlier this month, Lagan announced their move into providing CRM solutions for Hartford, Conn. The company currently lists over eighty municipalities as clients, including Minneapolis, Minn. and Yonkers, N.Y. in the United States, and Birmingham, Blackpool and Newcastle in the United Kingdom.

In an effort to keep its high consistent growth rate at its present levels, on-demand customer support software provider Parature has announced a special offer: The company is offering current Talisma customers free data migration and professional services set-up should they switch to the Parature customer support solution.

The reporting included in Parature’s customer service software promises to reach across the entire solution platform, enabling support personnel to quickly create custom reports analyzing any information in the system using drag-and-drop technology to choose parameters. In tandem, Parature is also offering a second promotion, a free thirty-day trial of the Parature on-demand support solution.

Promising the opportunity to set up support desk management and communication tools in minutes, the trial offer allows essentially unlimited test driving for one to four users. The preview also includes open access to online training and customer support, and full customization options. Press material pushing hard to sway Talisma customers promise benefits from “Parature’s highly customizable and easy-to-use customer service software that enables companies to configure the solution to their specific business processes and workflows.”

PR also claims that no technical skills (and therefore no IT departments or professional services) are required for customization. Parature currently counts ATI Technologies Inc., Florida State University and Office Depot among their clientele base and boasts a consistent growth rate of over 100% for three years running.

In quite a coup, Software as a Service solutions provider Kintera Inc. representatives announced earlier this week that the company had signed an agreement with America’s largest university system, California State University, to employ the Kintera comprehensive solution suite. The suite includes Kintera Advocacy, Kintera Constituent Relationship Management, and Kintera P!N Electronic Screening, a trio of programs founded on the web-based Kintera Sphere platform. The system will be deployed at CSU’s twenty-three campuses. The CSU system is currently using Kintera Grasstops technology in developing its advocacy program.

With Kintera P!N Electronic Screening, CSU hopes to identify individuals with the capacity to advocate on the university system’s behalf at federal levels. Using the Kintera Sphere platform, the CSU system is promised to centralize constituent data. Additionally, CSU hopes to expand its constituent base and engage financial supporters via internet technology. The advocacy software will be used to educate supporters on university issues related. The nonprofit-organization specialist firm Kintera now adds California State University to a client catalogue which currently includes Northern Arizona University, Tufts University, the University of Virginia, and Washington State University. The company now boasts over 15,000 Software as a Service accounts in the nonprofit, government and corporate sectors.

International outsourcing and insourcing advisory firm EquaTerra today released the results of its new study, “Outsourcing Management and Governance: Building a Foundation for Outsourcing Success.” Over 250 North American ITO and BPO decision makers participated in the study, with three-quarters representing organizations valued at over $1 billion in annual revenue. The key conclusion from the study is the discovered direct correlation between the investment made in outsourcing management and governance (OM/G) and outsourcing engagement satisfaction. EquaTerra usually advises clients to seek an optimum investment level of between four to seven percent of the total annual contract value on OM/G for greatest satisfaction from outsourcing deals; the study supported this suggestion.

The announcement provided further revelations, including: outsourcing satisfaction improves over time, with CRM and IT executives reporting the highest levels; nearly half of all respondents were found to spend four percent or less on OM/G; and greater satisfaction was found among executives outsourcing for process improvement versus cost savings. The report also listed the three industries with above-average levels of outsourcing satisfaction: high-tech products and service providers; pharmaceuticals; and automotive / manufacturing. CRM executives were mentioned alongside those of IT as those likely to be most satisfied with outsourcing agreements.

Study authors chalked this up to their status as the most mature outsourced processes; EquaTerra writers opined that many HR outsourcing organizations are relatively new to large-scale outsourcing and typically under-invest in OM/G. Industries which have outsourced for a longer period of time, claims the study, cited higher levels of satisfaction. Assessing the components of OM/G tool capabilities that respondents viewed as most crucial to the success of their outsourcing engagements, the study found service quality to be the most important functionality in OM/G tools; communication capabilities ranked least important.

In contrast, IT executives called communication management of chief importance in OM/G tools. In summary, EquaTerra research managing director Stan Lepeak said that “While EquaTerra has long cited the value OM/G contributes to the success of outsourcing initiatives, this study confirms the clear connection between OM/G and outsourcing satisfaction.” Analysis of the results will be conducted in a webcast entitled “Outsourcing Management and Governance: Building a Foundation for Outsourcing Success” on Thursday, June 1 at 11am EST.

San Francisco-based Salesforce.com has announced the release of its new AppExchange OEM Edition. Billed as “the industry’s first on-demand OEM offering,” AppExchange OEM Edition is an on-demand platform designed to be appropriate for start-up companies and established ISVs alike to develop new on-demand applications that “reach well beyond CRM.” Salesforce.com chairman / CEO Marc Benioff stated that the advantage of the new product lay in the fact that “applications built on the AppExchange platform can exist completely separate from CRM and can be distributed directly by salesforce.com partners.”

AppExchange OEM Edition includes the complete AppExchange on-demand platform, including the common user interface; a single security and data sharing model; AppExchange API; the AppExchange Database; AppExchange Builder for customization and integration; custom tabs and objects; and the Salesforce.com service delivery platform. The OEM Edition does not include Salesforce.com CRM applications, however.

The program is available for $25 per user per month. Salesforce.com PR also related the news that four partners have taken on the AppExchange OEM Edition: real-estate industry solutions provider Remend, Inc.; Agile software life cycle management support solutions provider Rally Software Development; loan officer web platform provider MyLoanBiz; and on-demand software systems customization and integration technology provider Dreamfactory. MyLoanBiz is a brand new firm whose foundation was announced at the same Appforce conference in which the OEM Edition was launched, and is built entirely on the AppExchange OEM Edition.

A few statistics were divulged as well. Calling the product an “overwhelming success,” Salesforce.com representatives stated that withn its first 120 days, AppExchange had over 8,600 customer installations of some 250-plus applications. AppExchange has delivered 122,000 “test drives” since last year’s beta-test release date of September 12.