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November 2006

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CRM for Small Business, Citizen "Service" In the Middle East

November 30, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is the North Mississippi All-Stars' Electric Blue Watermelon. Think the Allman Brothers with Peter Wolf on vocals playing a raucous college English Lit Department bachelor party:

Okay, it's not exactly breaking news, but there are 25.8 million small businesses in America, paying more than 40 percent of the total U.S. private payroll, and the majority are not using CRM.

Avaya, Holy Cow, CRM, Biz IT Pro, Yeon, Open Solutions, ISL, Hofmann, Integras, Empirix

November 29, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Steve Earle's 1990 album The Hard Way album. Visiting my folks in Richmond over Thanksgiving we went to the Ft. Lee thrift store where I found the CD for sale, and snapped it up for a buck or so. It's an album you rarely see in stores, it's the only album of his you can't find on iTunes, which puzzles me because I always found it his most interesting album. Yeah the first side of Copperhead Road is his best stretch -- by far -- but the second side's really, really weak.

Xactly's On-Demand SCM, Eng to eFunds, ATG and Woolworths, TeleTech, Christmas Call Center Stress

November 28, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and we're back in action, jet-lagged as all get out from Richmond-Washington, Washington-Atlanta, Atlanta-Milan, Milan-Istanbul this weekend. So any mistakes are to be blamed on any one of the seven cups of coffee so far.

First Coffee did manage to pay a visit to TMC headquarters while back in America for Thanksgiving, and let me say in this e-mail world it's great to sit down over coffee and get to talk with the people you work with and for. 

Entellium, Mortgage CRM, TechTarget, Brainshark, Smart CRM Results, 4 Real, Clickpoint

November 15, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Return To Forever's Romantic Warrior:

This will be my last First Coffee column until the 27th as we'll be in Richmond for Thanksgiving. My sister's family from Vermont's coming down, The Whole Fam Damily™ will be together for the first time in a hair past a coon's age, all 23 of us. Other than family my priorities are much time at Barnes & Noble and dinner at the Smoky Pig in Ashland, as good books, beer and barbecue are hard to find here in Istanbul.

Entellium, a vendor of on-demand Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software, has announced the commercial availability of the Usability Release 2006, a series of upgrades and enhancements to its on-demand CRM product suite.

SoundBite and Mindshare, SugarCRM, Microsoft, SPSS, Destination Elevators?

November 14, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is jazz bassist Jaco Pastorius's debut album, cleverly titled Jaco Pastorius. Guess whose picture is on the cover:

Folks, First Coffee's as much in love with technology and its advance as the next guy, but there are some technological innovations we don't need. "Destination elevators" are such an example.

Guest-Tek in Warsaw, CDC in China, VendorGuru's CRM and VoIP, FAMLS, Learn.com

November 13, 2006

By David Sims

[email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is one of the more underrated singer-songwriters from the 1960s, Donovan, remembered today chiefly for a couple "Colours," "Catch The Wind" and for being the unfortunate foil for Bob Dylan's tour of England in 1966. But people like Nick Drake, for example, owe a large musical debt to Donovan:

China.com, an Internet services provider in China and a Hong Kong listed subsidiary of CDC Corporation and parent corporation for CRM vendor Pivotal, has announced its Web 2.0 Developer Program, which includes $20 million allocated for investment in selected web development partners.

Intelliworks, Total IT Care's Hosted Microsoft CRM, Syclo, Salesforce.com Results

November 11, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is just about the best music for doing this kind of work, those great albums from Frank Sinatra's Capitol years, currently A Swingin' Affair:

Got an interesting e-mail the other day from a gentleman named Siddhart Swaroop, correcting my Indian nomenclature in an article I wrote recently:

How are you doing?

In the Tectura missive, New Delhi is called "Noida." Two different cities, though bordering each other.

No puns intended,
Sid

Many thanks, Sid, appreciate the e-mail. …

Boy, go from not ever having heard of a particular company to seeing their name pop up all over the place, today we hear that ClickSoftware Technologies Ltd. and Syclo, a developer of mobile software products and a company unknown to First Coffee three days ago, have announced the deployment of their joint workforce management at a "major water district in the United States."

It's coyly unnamed, but what might qualify as a "major water district…" New Orleans? Lake Michigan? 


Syclo's CRM Add-On, Tribridge, Autobytel, Autobase, Kintera CRM

November 10, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is arranging iTunes alphabetically, starting at the beginning and seeing how far we get… first two songs were "'Round Midnight" by John Coltrane and Miles Davis -- note the apostrophe before the capital "R" -- and "(Used To Be A) Cha-Cha" by Jaco Pastorius, currently we have "100 Years Ago" by the Rolling Stones, next one appears to be "25 Minutes To Go" by Johnny Cash:

I'll go back and check, but I believe at the beginning of the college football season First Coffee predicted that Rutgers would be undefeated and in the national title chase by this point.

Kintera Inc., a vendor of software as a service (SaaS) to the nonprofit and government sectors, has announced yet more red ink-stained financial results, this time for the third quarter ended September 30, 2006.

Total net revenue for the third quarter 2006 was $11.7 million, compared to $12.1 million in the third quarter 2005. Net revenue for the third quarter 2006 was within the guidance range provided by Kintera management.

CRM Deals From Kintera and Talisma, Tectura, EIS, Microsoft's CRM As Seen By Gianforte

November 9, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Charlie Parker: The Gold Collection:

Kintera Inc., a CRM vendor specializing in selling products to nonprofit organizations, has announced that La Leche League International has selected Kintera's social constituent relationship management (yet another variation on the CRM theme) system for its core member and donor management needs.

La Leche League International is a multinational organization that helps mothers worldwide breastfeed through mother-to-mother support, encouragement, information and education.

Respond CenterPoint 3.66, Vtiger's CRM 5.0, Pitney Bowes CDQ, Princeton Softech's Optim

November 8, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Billie Holiday's Lady In Autumn: The Best Of The Verve Years:

Scanning the election results from yesterday, First Coffee sees that MSM-backed Nancy Pelosi and Hugo Chavez-backed Daniel Ortega both won. I can hear the champagne glasses clinking from San Francisco to Caracas.

Respond, a UK vendor of complaints and feedback software (some things are better automated, listening to ratchet-jaw complaints has to be one of them), has announced the latest version of its complaints and feedback management application, Respond CenterPoint 3.66.

Respond CenterPoint is a software system that has been "incrementally improved" to allow dedicated complaint and feedback handlers "within a customer service or feedback management department to automate the entire process from capture through resolution to reporting," according to Respond officials.

CRM Upgrade From Microsoft, Creative Manager CRM, Satuit CRM Sale

November 7, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music, since we seem to be on a Stones kick here, is Sticky Fingers, which some consider their best. First Coffee's willing to grant it could be as high as their second best, but no higher:

Today in Munich, at Convergence 2006 EMEA, Microsoft announced it will release a new version of Microsoft Dynamics CRM for the 2007 Microsoft Office system and Windows Vista.

FTS, Business Control Layer, Recommind, Recreation Day, Princeton Softech, Optim

November 6, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is the south end of First Coffee's collection. Only the truly finicky among us have an absolute order system for arranging CDs on the shelf -- alphabetically by artist, then chronologically within artist, and yes we do look up release dates we don't know -- so starting from the other end, we've selected Warren Zevon's Excitable Boy, Neil Young's Live Rust and Dwight Yoakam's Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc. for our listening pleasure:

Princeton Softech, a vendor of enterprise data management, has announced that Thiess, an Australian engineering and construction companies, has selected Princeton Softech Optim JD Edwards EnterpriseOne to improve the management of enterprise application data.

Zeus, Netic, Technalign, Christian OEM, Marketing Solutions, Nexus CRM, Council Contact Center

November 5, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the lazy afternoon coffee here, and the music is lazy afternoon music, the Stones' "Waiting On A Friend." Love that Sonny Rollins sax, really makes the track:

Zeus Technology, a vendor of application traffic management software, has announced its partnership with Danish network, security and consultancy services company Netic A/S.

The partnership will enable Netic to deliver Zeus Extensible Traffic Manager to its customer base, establishing availability of the advanced Application Delivery Controller in Denmark. A leading Danish mobile network operator has already selected ZXTM to power its billing, CRM and self-service platforms.

CRM Add-On From Cobblesoft, Visitar, Starbucks Data, SAS, Miniskirts in South Korea

November 4, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys' From One Good American To Another album. Kinky for Texas governor; look what that job's a stepping stone to:

Let's see what the top news today is, and you know, First Coffee isn't one of these depressing, "if it bleeds it leads" MSM journalists, intent on reporting only the bad news, here at First Coffee we believe there's a lot of positive news out there, starting with the fact that the Democratic Party seems to have finally realized what most of America had known for years, that John Kerry, known to Republicans as "the gift that keeps on giving," is somebody you don't want on your side in anything, be it fighting in Vietnam or running a campaign:

To kick off, Reuters is reporting that "Hot pants and miniskirts will soon be legal in South Korea:"

CRM Vendor Cognizant's Results, Autodesk, AdventNet, Amcat

November 3, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a 1970s Rolling Stones mix. It's sturdy if not great music, but I appreciate it: After their 1968-1972 skein of the best four-album run in rock history there was going to be some letdown, but even through all the marking-time records they’ve made in the past 34 years, there hasn't been any outright rubbish. Bob Dylan's thrown some absolute garbage out there, The Kinks, The Beach Boys, Eric Clapton, Steve Miller, Tom Waits, Paul McCartney, The Who, John Mellencamp, Lou Reed, R.E.M., David Bowie, U2, Joni Mitchell, anybody who's been around twenty years or more has at least one avert-your-eyes bad album, Neil Young's got a whole shelf of crap, but almost uniquely not the Stones, they've always adhered to a high standard of professionalism in what they do that's frankly admirable. It’s not all timeless music, there's forgettable product like Emotional Rescue and Undercover, but none of their records sound like they just didn't care about the quality, it all sounds like they were at least taking their job seriously and there's something to be said for that, other bands could do with a work ethic and taking pride in a job well done like that:

Crediting demand for the company's CRM and ERP products, among others, IT vendor Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation has announced its financial results for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2006.

In the third quarter 2006 quarterly revenue increased to $377.5 million, up 60 percent from the year-ago quarter.

ShoreGroup, Cisco CRM Connector, FileVision, Sand

November 2, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning and the music is Bob Dylan's Modern Times:

CRM vendor Sand, an international provider of intelligent enterprise information management products, has announced that a large Asian telecommunications provider has purchased Sand/DNA for SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence as a nearline product to manage what Sand officials call "the rapidly growing volumes of data in its SAP Business Information Warehouse environment."

The Sand/DNA product, officially certified by SAP as an integrated ABAP add-on with SAP NetWeaver BI, was specifically developed to address the increasingly complex data management issues faced by companies running large-scale SAP NetWeaver BI implementations.

CRM Integration Issues, Recommind, Satuit, IBM, Hanaro

November 1, 2006

By David Sims [email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is The Rolling Stones' Some Girls:

Satuit Technologies, Inc. has announced that Harris Investment Management, Inc. has selected Satuit as its customer relationship management (CRM) provider of choice.

HIM needed a CRM product that could scale as its business grows while providing "more efficiency, better management and stronger analytics from the marketing, sales and client service processes," according to HIM officials. 

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