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February 2010

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Verizon Wireless, Clickatell SMS, Comverse BSS, IPod Baseball, Sybase and PlayPhone, SAP White Paper

February 25, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is The Clash's London Calling, because every once in a while you need the music to kick you into gear:   3G network operator Verizon Wireless has been ranked highest in customer care among wireless phone service providers in J.D. Power and Associates' 2010 Wireless Customer Care Performance Study, Volume 1, released today.   Based on responses from more than 9,600 wireless subscribers who contacted their wireless service providers by phone, in stores or online last year and were surveyed by J. D. Power and Associates between July and December of 2009, Verizon Wireless "continued to perform as an industry leader with an overall satisfaction score of 753, 14 points above the overall industry average."   Verizon Wireless' score included former Alltel customers in retained markets. Steven R. Smith, President, South Central Region, Verizon Wireless called it "an honor to receive such recognition."   Verizon Wireless has recently introduced an after-call survey to provide "fast, direct feedback from more customers," company officials said, "to help the company further improve the customer experience."   The company also continues to roll out its design in new and existing company-owned and -operated Communications Stores, offering shoppers the chance to experience their wireless voice, data, music and video services.   They were also cited for allowing customers to manage their accounts online using My Verizon, the company's online account management and customer service tool giving 24/7 online access to all their billing, payment and account-related information and the ability to view and pay bills online, check account balances, change addresses, track airtime usage, analyze monthly spending trends or change account features. ... Clickatell, a vendor of messaging, is providing in-country SMS alert services to Satelite Microfinance Bank in collaboration with Neptune Software. This means Satelite's customers "now receive real-time, priority alert messaging via Clickatell's Secure Enterprise Mobile Messaging Gateway, notifying them when transactions are taking place on their credit and debit accounts," according to Clickatell officials.   "Microfinance has fast become an important part of financial services as institutions serve previously under or un-served," said Pieter de Villiers, Clickatell CEO.

IBM's SPSS, Convergys, Black Box and Cisco, eGain and Customer Service

February 24, 2010

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is Frank Sinatra's wonderful album Night And Day. As the AllMusic Guide's review says, "Records don't get any better than this:"   IBM has announced that Digital +, UPC Broadband and Tesco Mobile are improving their customers' experience by using IBM SPSS predictive analytics software to "gain deeper insights into subscriber behaviors and preferences."   This, so the theory goes, will be used to "improve customer retention, call center interactions and marketing campaigns." You know, reduce churn.   As mobile broadband expands in developed markets, devices like the smartphones and tablets are proliferating rapidly -- challenging the traditional Communication Service Provider's core business capabilities, IBM officials say, adding that in order to succeed, "CSPs need to respond to competitive pressures, reduce customer churn, optimize product portfolios and become more relevant and personalized."   IBM's business analytic products for CSPs use data to "predict business outcomes, spot trends as they emerge, improve customer service, drive customer value and reduce churn by building a better understanding of the customer," said Scott Stainken, general manager for IBM's telecommunication industry.   Big Blue officials point to Digital +, part of Sogecable in Spain, using IBM SPSS predictive analytics to optimize its call center by "predicting individual customer behaviors and directing call center agents to provide real-time recommendations while engaged with customers."   Digital + "improved its customer satisfaction with customized offers, reduced churn by 20 percent and increased cross-sell campaigns by 5 to 10 percent over outbound campaigns," said Omar Rois, customer analysis manager at Digital +. ... Convergys Corporation, a vendor of relationship management products, has announced that a U.S. wireless operator with millions of subscribers has signed a contract for Convergys Intelligent Credits Solution, part of Convergys' Intelligent Automation portfolio.   By using Intelligent Credits to improve the process of issuing customer credits, the client can save on cost while increasing the satisfaction of its most valued customers, Convergys officials say, adding that the software contract, valued at approximately $6.5 million, "includes a license for Convergys Dynamic Decisioning Solution as well as annual maintenance and implementation services."   The implementation will be completed in the second quarter of this year.   The trick for companies looking to reduce costs is to do it while not negatively impacting customer satisfaction. Sure you can cut costs if that's all you want to do, eliminate your call center and hire a few guys in India to get around to answering the e-mails sooner or later, but your customer satisfaction's going to drop just a tad.   With this in mind, some companies choose to provide credits to their good customers when warranted due to an interruption in service or other unforeseen circumstance. Unfortunately, they often lack the automated controls needed to actively manage these credits.   This is what happened to this particular wireless operator, with spending on customer credits exceeding the industry average as a result of inconsistent policy adherence.   Then after finding Convergys Intelligent Credits the company had the capability to centralize policy creation and management as well as automated, real-time, and proactive policy enforcement across all customer contact channels.   The product will enable real-time evaluation of customer requests for credits based upon the wireless operator's business policies and the customer's history with the provider, Convergys officials say: "It will immediately provide customer service and retail associates with the appropriate credit offer they should make to subscribers in real-time."   It's expected to save this operator as much as $100 million per year by eliminating erroneously issued credits and reducing call handle times.

RedHorse Systems, Kayak for IPhone, Salesforce.com Foundation, CRM SpellCheck, Jaspersoft Open Source

February 24, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music, sorry if you're tired of hearing about it but we must be truthful, we can't say we're listening to Mozart when we're actually listening to Aimee Mann's Live At St. Ann's Warehouse, which is probably the album that's soundtracked more First Coffee work than any other:   Officials of RedHorse Systems, which sells business management products, say that "in response to customer requests," the company is releasing an updated version of its customer relationship management product, RedHorse CRM v2.5.   Company officials say they're "committed to producing a CRM product with the functionality that its customers need," so follow a policy of releasing updates on a quarterly basis. In January they released v2.4, containing a list of new functions, and began work on the next version scheduled for release next quarter.   Customers "identify much needed functionality that incorporates their custom use of the application into standard functions that RedHorse provides," company officials say, adding that "we felt that these requests would provide a whole new set of possibilities for customers furthering the extensibility of RedHorse."   As a result, "we decided to produce an interim release for our customers rather than waiting three months to release with the next version," says founder Connie Koch.   Koch says with this new release RedHorse users can now perform standard RedHorse functions like e-mail merging, e-mail rules and global updates using filters based on their own custom data in the system.   In related news, RedHorse has also released a new version of their link with Microsoft Outlook, RHOLink, which adds the capability to synchronize up to 19 phone numbers per contact between RedHorse and Outlook. Company officials bill this as a way to improve customers' ability to sync as many phone numbers as necessary to a handheld device or smart phone.   "We really are committed to providing a system that users want, rather than a system that we think they should have," says Koch, adding that the company is also "beginning background design work on our web based version and incorporation of Windows Workflow Foundation to provide automated processing of activities in the system." ... Travel search engine Kayak has released a new version of the Kayak for iPhone application integrating the site's baggage fees tool. "Coming only two months after the company launched a major upgrade to the application, the updated app also adds new flight, hotel, and car rental search capabilities," company officials say.   Saying mobile travel search is "a major focus of our product innovation," Kayak Chief Architect Bill O'Donnell said "people want to know how much different airlines charge for checking bags, so we're pleased to add this feature to our iPhone app."   New features include the aforementioned baggage fees tool, flight tracking, other flight search filters and a hotel search by name.

Fonolo's IPhone App, Quickoffice on IPhone, Green Hills Results, Consumer Tech Revenue Falls

February 17, 2010

The news as of the second cup of coffee today, and the music is Van Morrison's St. Dominic's Preview. We had an iTunes shuffle on, and as usually happens, within the first few songs there was one which led us to think okay, that's the album we want to hear:    Fonolo, which interestingly catchphrases itself as "the company that makes it easier and less frustrating to call large companies," has announced the availability of its free iPhone application.   What? Ah, here we go: "The frustration of having to 'press 1 for this, press 2 for that' to navigate through lengthy phone menus is universal. From quickly changing a flight time, to reaching an agent about your phone bill, Fonolo allows consumers to visually navigate a company's phone menu with a single tap of the iPhone, before making a call."   Wow. We need this app.     "Users have long been asking for a way to use Fonolo on-the-go," said Fonolo COO Jason Bigue.

Van Natta Steps Down, Globoforce's Recognition, Flight To Crisis, Union Bank and SAS

February 17, 2010

The news as of the first coffee today, and the music is Jorma Kaukonen's Quah, the Jefferson Airplane guitarist's best side project:   News Corporation has announced that Owen Van Natta has stepped down from his position as MySpace CEO, effective immediately.   Van Natta is replaced by newly-elevated co-Presidents Mike Jones and Jason Hirschhorn, who will each report to Jon Miller, Chairman and CEO of Digital Media for News Corporation. All three executives joined MySpace in April 2009, according to News Corp officials, with Jones and Hirschhorn previously serving as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Product Officer, respectively.   "MySpace is an incredibly unique place and we've made real gains in terms of product focus and user experience. I'm proud of the work we've all accomplished together and look forward to watching its continued growth," Van Natta said in a statement.   "Owen took on an incredible challenge in working to refocus and revitalize MySpace, and the business has shown very positive signs recently as a result of his dedicated work," said Jon Miller, News Corporation's Chairman and CEO of Digital Media. "However, in talking to Owen about his priorities both personally and professionally going forward, we both agreed that it was best for him to step down at this time.

ICheer App, T-Systems and SAP, Tellabs Mobile Provider Survey, Google's FTTH

February 15, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Miles Davis's In A Silent Way. We wanted mellow here, we certainly got it, might have to switch over to his A Tribute to Jack Johnson if we find the pace of work getting a bit lethargic.   There's a Olympic and World Cup focused iPhone App called "'iCheer - Country," which hit the #3 spot of the top paid Apps in the Sports category on iTunes.   The purpose of the App is to allow fans to cheer for their country "whether they are at an Olympic event, a World Cup event like the FIFA World Cup, or just at a local pub cheering for their country." At home you're evidently on your own.   "Have you ever been to a game and forgot your jersey, or heaven forbid your face paint?" the vendor's site asks, hopefully rhetorically. "Not to worry, you always have your phone" Nobody'd ever forget that! "Use 'iCheer!' to cheer on your countries athletes or team!" Okay. Sounds good.

Aurix Survey, Sabio and DAS, Smaato's SDK, Axcess Ontario and Google, Healthcare Needs Social Media

February 15, 2010

The news as of the third cup of coffee this morning, we're well and truly wired by now, and the music is Neil Young's Live Rust, probably the best live album released by a major artist:   A recent survey from speech search specialist Aurix found that 70 per cent of complaints made to call centers are "not being heard."    And that's serious: Over 96 per cent of respondents said they would consider switching to a competitor as a result.   Surveying over 100 consumers, the Aurix survey asked respondents whether they had ever made a complaint to a call center, and if so, whether that complaint was taken seriously by the agent.   Peter Rogers, CEO at Aurix, found that their snap shot survey "reinforces the message that customers are significantly more likely to churn to a competitor" based on a poor experience.   "In my opinion, it is these interactions which should be viewed as an opportunity to gain feedback and intelligence, as well as to deal with the customer's query -- take the chance to reinforce positive messages about your brand, not cause it any further damage."   It's well-known that how a company handles a negative customer experience is a great time to bond a customer's loyalty. We have companies we patronize over the competition because of how they treated us when we had a problem.   Look, folks, everybody knows you'll screw up once in a while. Your customers know that. They're not expecting perfection, they're expecting you to rectify the situation when it happens.

Consona ERP, Bahama Power Phones, HP and LTE, You Grow CRM Worldwide

February 15, 2010

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is a general Creedence Clearwater Revival iTunes mix:   CRM and ERP vendor Consona Corporation has announced that its Intuitive ERP solution has achieved what company officials call "exceptional customer satisfaction levels for educational resources and support services."   The company's Intuitive ERP software is designed specifically for the business needs of mid-market manufacturers, Consona officials add.   Based on customer survey results cited by company officials, 89 percent of Intuitive ERP users were satisfied with their support experience in 2009: "Remarkably, compared to the same time period the previous year, case volume decreased 24 percent and the case backlog plummeted 26 percent, marking a significant increase in case resolution."   The company says they favor proactive support through educational resources as a tool for customers to learn directly from Intuitive support staff and instructors, "as well as from peers who share tips and experiences, through Consona's database of online educational courses and Knowledgebase articles in the searchable Expert network that is accessible at any time."   At present, Consona offers more than 50 classes on the Intuitive ERP product, which has seen "over 8,000 customer downloads." Consona Education now offers personalized training online, which allows customers to schedule classes to meet their schedules on a one-on-one basis.   ...   The Grand Bahama Power Company has announced that they are finalizing the launch of their phone system "expected to improve the customer service experience."   According to GBPC officials, a team comprised of members of the GBPC management, engineers and line staff have been working on the implementation. They noted that the new Integrated Voice Response System is equipped with "several features that will allow customers to access their account information via their phone."   According to Katherine Demeritte, GBPC Director of Customer Service, the phone company is "excited about this new feature to our Customer Service Department. The best feature is that our customers will be able to access their personal account information from home. They will be able to obtain their account information, have billing queries addressed by an interactive automated system and receive real time information in the event of an outage in their area."   Company officials say they'll also be delivering disconnection messages, which they assured the public they would implement in 2010.

Amex Call Center, IPhone Vancouver Guide, Sea Colony Tennis and NFL

February 15, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a rare treat: After years of trying, we finally found, via a Facebook friend, one of our favorite albums which has been out of print for years: The Screaming Blue Messiahs' Bikini Red, a glorious punky freeway crash of The Beach Boys, Velvet Underground and The Clash. Thank you, Facebook:   Call center employees at American Express Travel Related Services, a subsidiary of American Express, have filed a class action lawsuit alleging that "the company required them to work off the clock and through their lunch breaks without compensation."   The suit, filed recently in Arizona, alleges that American Express is in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act and Employee Retirement Income Security Act: "Call center employees working as customer service representatives were required to work overtime as well as work during unpaid lunch breaks without being compensated for those hours," according to Anne Regan of Zimmerman Reed, the law firm hired to represent the employees.   According to the suit, Zimmerman Reed officials say, "American Express knowingly violated the FLSA when it intentionally failed to include time worked at the beginning and end of shifts as well as during unpaid breaks," in the employees' wages.   "Travel Related Services' pay policies don't allow call center employees to count as time worked things most workers would get paid to do...like talking to American Express' clients," says Zimmerman Reed's Regan. "They are clearly owed these unpaid wages."   American Express Travel is a wholly owned subsidiary of American Express, which is headquartered in New York City.   ...   In case you've emerged from a coma over the past week, the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics are being held in Vancouver. And Lonely Planet - you've heard of Lonely Planet, surely you weren't out for that long? - is offering a free iPhone city guide application to the city. "Vancouver Travel Guide: The Sights" offers all the sights and wonders of cosmopolitan Vancouver.

Satuit Earnings, Pearson and iPad, IdentityTruth's 8 Warnings, Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition (Really)

February 15, 2010

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is AC/DC's Back In Black. Ever have one of those days where you couldn't decide between Back In Black or Miles Davis' Kind of Blue for the music, either would have been fine? It's that kind of day here:   Norwell, Massachusetts-based CRM vendor Satuit Technologies, which focuses on the market for investment professionals, has announced that the company's earnings for 2009 grew by 80 percent year over year. The company credits "strong client retention and the growth of its sales force" for the strong results.     "2009 was a building year for us," said Karen Maguire, CEO of Satuit, adding that "we took advantage our surplus cash and of the market conditions to add staff, in sales, programming and client support."

  We must say "surplus cash" sounds nice about now. Our hat's off to you.

  "There was a lot of strong talent out there and we were in a position to make some bold moves," Maguire said.



Roxxxy the Sexbot, Free Flowers or TV, NBC's Mobile Olympics, Glowpoint

February 8, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Coleman Hawkins, an underrated saxophonist. He wasn't flashy but he sure was good:   True Companion's Roxxxy the Sexbot - we just read off the cue cards here, folks -- is a 120-pound, 5-foot, 7-inch mechanical with an anatomically-accurate mechanical skeleton hidden underneath real-feeling "flesh," according to its maker.   "No matter how real she may feel, I can't shake the thought that she's a cross between Joan Jett and Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, with a dash of Chrissy Hynde of the Pretenders thrown in for good measure," says industry observer Brennon Slattery. Obviously she's got your basic Rock Slut appeal.   Roxxxy debuted at the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas, yet another event we were not invited to, and at the show, Slattery says, "had a laptop plugged into her back." No, sorry, we don't have any pictures. We've seen the pictures, and trust us, actually seeing the robot makes it all just that much more pathetic.   But you'll be glad to know she's also Wi-Fi capable, and "her little quirks, like the way she holds your hand, can be shared with other sexbot owners through the True Companion Web site."   Roxxxy has attitude, Slattery reports, "with several personality types you can elicit at the touch of a button: "Frigid Farrah is reserved and a bit chilly; Wild Wendy lives up to her name; S&M Susan, well, you know; and Mature Martha has that experienced thing goin' on."    Owners can also change Roxxxy's hair color, cup size, race, and other characteristics until they get that perfect creature, Slattery reports, adding in the key observation: "However, you cannot take away the cold, dead stare."   Her creators claim the sex aspect is mere marketing, that Roxxxy is "all about companionship," probably in much the same way Las Vegas claims it's all about family entertainment, not gambling, and guys say they read Playboy for the articles.   Slattery says Roxxxy's built with technology that allows her to carry out simple conversations, and we can believe she would certainly be a more sprightly conversationalist than the majority of live women the sort of men who would fancy Roxxxy are used to.   Douglas Hines, the robot's inventor, insists that "She's a companion.

Frost & Sullivan Webcast, LCEC and ENERGYprism, IDC for HPC in Europe, Video Chat Going Worldwide

February 8, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is To The Bone, and wonderfully idiosyncratic collection of The Kinks doing a lot of acoustic material, a la Unplugged: Industry analyst Olga Yashkova will be the featured speaker for a Frost & Sullivan Webcast titled "Customer Experience Management and Service Assurance: A Happy Marriage?" It will be held Tuesday, February 9 at 11:00 a.m. East Coast time.   "The service assurance market offers tremendous opportunities for vendors," Frost & Sullivan officals say, emphasizing that it is "an extremely competitive market with high barriers to entry."
  This is so partly because service assurance is a broad concept in a fragmented market: "There are over 50 participants in this market. In addition to being fragmented, different types of vendors cover various aspects of service assurance."   Recently, the analyst firm has found, "there has been a shift toward all-IP networks, delivering VoIP, IP video, data, and wireless applications, that have demonstrated better performance and throughput than legacy networks. From a service assurance vendor perspective, the emergence of these highly technically complex technologies creates a multitude of opportunities in such a difficult financial period."   Converged networks are known for their complexity, and because of the increasing number of IP-based applications on them and the augmented emphasis on quality of end-user experience, the need for effective service assurance solutions is expected to increase.   This briefing is pitched to "Service Assurance Vendors, Test Equipment Vendors, Component Manufacturers, Network Equipment Manufacturers, Original Equipment Manufacturers, Wireless and Wireline Service Providers," officials of the analyst firm say.
  "The level of QoE ultimately determines whether customers will keep the service or leave for another operator...

Webtrends and Spirit Airlines, Level 3 at the Super Bowl, TrustedOnes, HealthAssist for iPhone

February 3, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is our very own "Rockin' Country" playlist, featuring Hayes Carll, Jack Ingram, Steve Earle, Robert Earl Keen, Reckless Kelly, Charlie Robison, Chris Wall, Slobberbone, just all kinds of great stuff:   Webtrends, an enterprise customer intelligence company, has announced that Spirit Airlines, an Ultra Low Cost Carrier in the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean, will use Webtrends Analytics, Visitor Data Mart, and Optimize offerings to help improve the company's online customer service.   Spirit Airlines will also integrate Webtrends Analytics with Yesmail's Enterprise e-mail marketing platform. "Together," Webtrends officials say, "these products and partners will enable Spirit Airlines to execute marketing campaigns, and analyze data."   Spirit Airlines was in need of "a truly open customer intelligence platform," airline officials say, one that integrates with other marketing partners. The Webtrends Open Exchange allows this, resulting in an open framework of tools "working together and sharing information."   Spirit Airlines' Senior Director of Consumer Marketing Bobby Schroeter noted, correctly, that "The competition within the airline industry is incredibly fierce, and it is critical for us to go beyond that of which our customers demand," adding that with Webtrends' flexible architecture "we are able to integrate Web analytics in our daily processes and fully expect this to help drive our marketing."   Through their implementation, Spirit Airlines will use Webtrends Optimize to execute multivariate testing, segmentation and customer targeting to "maximize revenue and streamline the purchase processes in regard to online and offline marketing activities," airline officials say. Spirit Airlines will also integrate Webtrends Analytics 9 with Yesmail for closed loop re-marketing: Webtrends officials say they're targeting low-use segments specifically, "and will also integrate the products with their custom voucher and coupon marketing system."   Yesmail offers e-mail marketing products, data management, media, social marketing and award-winning services for businesses of all sizes. Founded in 1997, the company's a subsidiary of Infogroup, and a part of the new Infogroup Interactive division. ... Level 3 Communications officials say the company will provide live compressed and uncompressed high-definition television broadcast video services to CBS for Super Bowl XLIV. For the first time ever, instead of sending the feed to a production truck for compression and delivery to the broadcast studio, an uncompressed 1.5 Gigabit per second feed will be sent from Miami to CBS studio headquarters in New York via Level 3's fiber-optic network.   In total, Level 3 officials say, "over 2,800 hours of video content will be acquired, encoded and transported across the Level 3 Vyvx services platform for overall Super Bowl coverage."   Bob Mincieli, director of Broadcast Operations at CBS, said "This year, we worked with Level 3 to test uncompressed HD feeds in the delivery of various NFL games and have been impressed with the results."   The NFL has used Level 3 Vyvx broadcast services for 21 consecutive years.

NICE Systems and Cincinnati Bell, Marketo Noted, Fringe Facts Online, Domino's Pizza Listens

February 2, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Beethoven's Sixth Symphony. Seemed appropriate for a rainy, pastoral type of day:   NICE Systems, which sells products that lets enterprises and security organizations "extract insight from interactions," according to company officials, and AnswerOn, which sells customer retention, acquisition and loyalty products to telecommunications service providers, have announced that Cincinnati Bell has selected the joint NICE-AnswerOn Customer Churn Reduction product.   It integrates NICE Interaction Analytics and transactional data analytics from AnswerOn. The end-to-end product helps Cincinnati Bell create more accurate churn prediction models by integrating multidimensional analysis results into their churn reduction models: "It cross-references customer interaction and transactional data, and alerts customer retention personnel in near real-time," company officials say.   It helps Cincinnati Bell build offers for at-risk customers, deliver the offers and basically measure, monitor and fine-tune the effectiveness of churn models and retention offerings. It's deployed in a hosted model via a managed service.   Jeff Baker, Director of Planning and Support at Cincinnati Bell, says to provide service to our customers and ensure customer satisfaction, "we need to be able to use insights from both customer interactions and from transactional data."    For instance, he explained, "if we see highly emotional calls, combined with a drop in phone usage, this requires our immediate attention or a change in the service package." Indeed. More red flags in one place would qualify as a Communist march.   "Retaining subscribers is vital, where a mere two percent monthly churn rate can result in many millions of dollars lost on a monthly basis, even for mid-sized service providers," said Barak Eilam, president of Interactions Business Applications at NICE. ... Marketo, a marketing automation company, was honored with "Best Mass E-mail" product as part of Salesforce.com's AppExchange Best of '09 Awards.

Soffront and Edgewood, BeRelevant's Social CRM, Sage and Castle CRM, Intelestream and Visao

February 1, 2010

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Al Stewart's Year Of The Cat. Yes it was more than an extended single, there was a whole album, and it's pretty good - listening to "Flying Sorcery" now:   Soffront Software, a vendor of mid-market CRM software, has announced that Edgewood Partners Insurance Center is using Soffront CRM to "improve customer support, sales opportunities, and marketing activities."   EPIC is a Californian insurance brokerage, risk management, and employee benefits consulting firm. The firm's officials say they chose Soffront CRM over others because it fulfilled all of their needs within their budget: "We are impressed with the software's ease of use and ease of customization," says Brian Talebzadeh, EPIC's Information Technology Managing Partner.   The IT department at EPIC is using Soffront's Help desk module to "more efficiently manage customer information" as well as to "enhance communication with clients," company officials say. "With Soffront all customer information is easily available and organized," Talebzadeh says, adding that the software "allows us to automatically track customer issues, quickly assign ownership, and escalate issues."   The Web-based, self-help and knowledge management functions of the software provide knowledge base capabilities to EPIC's customers, partners and employees, company officials say.
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