The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a weird album from 1968, The Zombies' "Odessey and Oracle."
You've heard the one hit from the album, "Time of the Season," the rest of it sounds like a decent pop band trying to cross Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper, as so many albums of that moment did. Listening to Odessey and Oracle, especially solid tracks like "A Rose For Emily" and "Hung Up On A Dream," one thinks "Man, these guys were good, why were they messing around with this overproduction, dubbing in flutes and harpsichords, and not just doing what they did best -- straight-ahead smart pop?"
Veon has announced the launch of a Territory Management product on the SugarCRM platform.
Officials of the Hyderabad-based firm say they believe Sales Force Automation products are "the need of the hour for organizations with distributed marketing geographies." Using the tool, they say, regional sales teams can "keep lock-step with one another when collaborating."
The idea behind Territory Management, Veon officials explain, is so managers can gain "an up-to-the minute view of their individual territory pipeline from the highest level to the most granular." Territory management "develops and implements a strategy for directing selling activities toward customers in a sales territory aimed at maintaining the lines of communications, improving sales coverage, and minimizing wasted time." Functionality for the product, therefore, includes the allocation of sales calls to customers and the planning, routing, scheduling of the calls and similar options.
The TM product, using the SugarCRM platform, is easy set up and assign territories, Veon officials say, adding that it's designed to simplify territory realignments after sales reorganizations, eliminate lag time in lead assignment and "plan effectively for avoiding losing sales to better organized competitors."
It also claims capability for "minimizing distractions and procrastination," which for First Coffee alone would be worth the price of admission. And of course it includes the more prosaic functions, such as maintaining contact with key prospects and accounts and helping find ways to improve users' return on investment (ROI) and reduce turn-around time.
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Here at First Coffee we write a lot about how to improve your customer service, it's nice to recognize companies who are, in fact, doing it well. So a tip of the coffee pot to insurance provider
RIAS, which sells to the over-50 demographic, for being named a finalist in customer service categories in two industry awards -- the UK Broker Awards and the CCF European Call Center Awards.
This is the third time in two months RIAS has been recognized for its customer service, company officials say, explaining that these latest two accolades come "hot on the heels of RIAS being announced as a finalist in the 'Customer Care Award' category at the 2009 British Insurance Awards" in June.
As a finalist in the 'Customer Service Provider' category for the 2009 UK Broker Awards, RIAS was noted for its "customer-centric culture and service innovation," including the launch of Voice of the Customer, an online system allowing all colleagues to feed customer comments directly into the system.
The 2009 CCF European Call Center Awards put RIAS in the "Best Centre for Customer Service" category against teams from all over Europe.