CRM from Microsoft and SHO Guide, Bluenog and Oracle, Talisma's Milestone, Ravielli to Infusionsoft, FreeCRM and TRUSTe

David Sims : First Coffee
David Sims
| CRM, ERP, Contact Center, Turkish Coffee and Astroichthiology:

CRM from Microsoft and SHO Guide, Bluenog and Oracle, Talisma's Milestone, Ravielli to Infusionsoft, FreeCRM and TRUSTe

By David Sims
David at firstcoffee d*t biz
 
The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is The David Holland Quartet's Conference Of The Birds:
 
Bluenog, an application infrastructure software company, has announced that it has become a Certified Advantage Partner in the Oracle Partner Network. Under the program, Bluenog will resell Oracle software, including Oracle Database and Oracle Fusion middleware, and will provide associated services and integrated products. 
 
Bluenog's areas of concentration include enterprise portal, enterprise content management, and business intelligence products. The company "blends open source and commercial technologies," the Bluenoggers say, and will "complement Oracle's plan to blend BEA with Oracle into enterprise middleware.
 
Oracle announced the acquisition of BEA on January 16, 2008. 
 
"Many of our customers are seeking to manage IT environments that combine BEA and Oracle software," said Sastry Taruvai, CIO, Bluenog, adding that becoming a member of the Oracle PartnerNetwork "builds on our J2EE expertise, adds to our BEA and Oracle technical certifications, and helps our customers manage their commercial and open source infrastructure."
 
"Bluenog has developed a products methodology called Project Blueprint," said Taruvai, explaining that it lets the company "lead a customer's entire project from architecture and design, all the way through development, to testing, staging and ongoing support. Or, we can complement a customer's existing project team at any stage of the development lifecycle."
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Talisma Corporation, an nGenera company and Customer Interaction Management vendor, says their Talisma Chat product has hit the 10 million chats per month milestone.
 
"Talisma Chat now powers four of the largest commercial chat implementations in the world," said Dan Vetras, President and CEO, Talisma Corporation.
 
He says one of their clients found that prior to their chat implementation, more than 75 percent of respondents listed the phone as their preferred contact method. After their chat interaction, more 70 percent listed chat as their preferred channel, while the phone fell to 20 percent.
 
According to Forrester's March 2008 report, The Design of Chat Interactions, by Adele Sage, customers appreciate the immediacy of chat interactions.  When North American consumers who have used online chat were asked what they liked about chat interactions, half said "I was able to speak to someone immediately; "The information I received from my rep was personalized to my situation" was the response of 32 percent; and 27 percent said, "I had a simple question that would have been a waste to call about over the phone."
 
By simply placing a "Chat Now" button on Web pages customers frequently visit, companies can provide immediate assistance before, during, and following the buying process, Talisma maintains, adding that "Talisma Chat can be deployed on premise or in a SaaS environment."
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Infusionsoft, a vendor of marketing automation software for small businesses, has announced that Jo Anne Ravielli joined Infusionsoft as vice president of customer service and support. 
 
Ravielli is expected to "develop service tools, metrics and programs to ensure customer loyalty and positive customer experience" for customers, Infusionsoft officials say.
 
Clate Mask, Infusionsoft CEO, said Ravielli's experience, management style, and enthusiasm "are going to make her a valuable member of our team."
 
Ravielli has a reputation for turning around underperforming organizations by revitalizing their customer focus and using CRM database products. Most recently with Ravielli CRM Consulting, she implemented CRM and call routing technology for ScriptLogic that "reduced resource load by 30 percent," Infusionsoft officials say.
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Count on the curse -- just this morning First Coffee told his wife "Isn't it great? No rain this Wimbledon." Turn on to see if Ancic can upset Federer and... rain delay.
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Transcensus's SHO Guide has been optimized for Microsoft Dynamics CRM online, according to Transcensus officials.
 
The product "delivers learning content at the moment of need inside Microsoft Dynamics Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Online software instead of in a separate browser, a simulation window, or some other external training interface," company officials say: "The user learns by performing real work inside the real software application."
 
Russ Gubler, CEO of Transcensus, said if users have difficulty entering information or getting data from the CRM software, "bad things happen. SHO Guide enables Dynamics CRM users to increase accuracy, reduce errors, and increase performance by capturing and sharing common user scenarios."
 
SHO Guide allows a subject matter expert to capture or record the procedures to complete a task which creates a SHO script. SHO Guide publishes the task, resulting in other employees being able to follow the step-by-step guidance directly in the CRM software.
 
For example, a Dynamics CRM user receives a call from a customer and needs to input action items into the CRM tool. Clicking on the published SHO script ensures the right steps are completed.
 
Dan Peay, Transcensus vice president of sales and marketing, said "I've experienced frustration with various CRM tools, knowing the data is in there, but unable to produce the report I need."
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FreeCRM.com, a vendor of on-demand CRM business software, has announced that it has been certified to display the TRUSTe Privacy Seal, which FreeCRM officials say "demonstrates its commitment to data privacy and trust online."
 
TRUSTe, a privacy certification and seal program, awards its privacy seal to companies that complete the TRUSTe certification process and agree to comply with ongoing oversight.
 
"We are pleased to join TRUSTe in promoting responsible privacy information practices online," said Eric Stone, CEO of CRM ASP, parent company to Free CRM. "We are committed to ensuring that critical business information is kept private and confidential in our environment and that our customers' data is never shared with third parties for any reason."
 
The TRUSTe Privacy Seal is given to indicate that a Web site has posted an approved privacy statement and that its information and data gathering practices follow guidelines for notice, choice, access, and security.
 
FreeCRM.com has invested in security and fraud prevention, company officials say, and "takes a comprehensive approach to data security and privacy."
 
Among the security assurance programs Free CRM uses are TRUSTe, VeriSign Extended Validation Security, and the Better Business Bureau Reliability Program.
 
With unlimited data storage and XML data integration, Microsoft Outlook integration, Palm Pilot, BlackBerry, and Pocket PC support, FreeCRM.com positions itself as an alternative to SalesForce.com and other CRM products, with Web-based products or on-premises licensing options.
 
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