We’ll be adding some additional functionality over the next few weeks, and kicking it off with a new ebook for you very soon. The content creation engine—that is, me—will be back to work presently.

Here’s hoping 2012 will be a happy, healthy, and prosperous year for us all. I look forward to experiencing it with you.

Thanks,

Marshall

Congratulations to all the contestants, but especially to the two winners: Get Satisfaction (Americas) and BPMonline (EMEA). If you tend to think of my blog as tl;dr (and you should tell me if that’s the case), here’s a link to the CRM Idol page, including the winning videos and the reviews each company earned. No muss, no fuss.

But the muss and fuss are warranted, and I’ll tell you why. If you’ve ever wondered why so much of the news in CRM is about the same handful of companies, it’s because they’re generally the established players with enough market presence and marketing acumen to get the word out. Smaller companies, especially startups, have a tough time getting the ear of influencers and reporters—no matter how good their product, there isn’t enough time to meet with them if somebody we’re familiar with has an announcement or event.

CRM Idol, launched and led by Paul Greenberg, is an attempt to fix that. Just as the (usually) talented singers on American Idol get a shot at the national exposure they’d normally never hope to receive, CRM Idol provides a spotlight for some great up-and-coming CRM providers whose messages would be drowned out by Oracle, Salesforce, or even comparatively modest companies like Zoho. The contestants get a chance at spreading their message the way the big kids do, and receive advice and mentoring along the way so that they have better odds of making it on their own.

It works both ways, too. Over here on the influencer side, it can be hard to spot a new trend or a potential superstar because of all the competing messages. The exposure the contestants got is just as important to us, because I can promise you I’d never have encountered half of these companies if it weren’t for the contest. My knowledge is enriched, and I can improve my practice.

Work has already begun on CRM Idol 2012, apparently because the main judges and coordinators aren’t interested in having regular sleep patterns. I was thrilled and honored to be part of the 2011 process, and I’m really looking forward to playing a role in the next one.

Vendor conferences usually are a good source for industry news, but this year’s RightNow Summit was host to a bombshell before it even started. Oracle announced its intent to acquire RightNow Technologies for $1.5 billion. The deal is far from final, and most of the RightNow employees were themselves still reacting to the news when guests were arriving. The press release is here; you can read news coverage here, and some sharp analysis here.

A lot has already been said on this topic, but I can’t let the opportunity pass me by–I’m at the conference, after all. The phrase on every observer’s lips is “culture clash,” and I must agree. But more than that, there’s a positioning clash as well. RightNow serves CRM from the contact center, putting it in an ideal position to help its users deliver solid customer experience. Oracle’s CRM products cover a wide range of possibilities, but (with some exceptions) its apps cater to the user before the customer. RightNow is a sensible investment for businesses all over the spectrum, from SMBs to massive enterprises; there are not many industry watchers who would recommend an Oracle deployment for anything smaller than a midsized enterprise that’s on a growth path. I’m not saying one is better; I’m saying they serve very different markets.

Oracle is a company that is very good at acquiring what it needs to build out its own solutions. I don’t doubt there’s a good reason for the acquisition, but I am not yet certain what it is. Clearly, Oracle wants the RightNow brand, not just the tech. I’ll be watching to see how this all plays out.

Whether the buyout goes through or not, RightNow is still moving forward. The Tuesday morning keynote, I’m told, will be a vision statement of how customer interaction will look 10 years from now. I’m not going to get any information about the Oracle deal, because any further statements by either company would be illegal, but I can tell the RightNow team is excited–guardedly optimistic, but excited. Greg Gianforte’s presentation will show why RightNow is a strong brand worth the trouble to acquire, and I think it can’t help but come out ahead.

I should point out first, however, that Oracle paid for my flight and hotel accommodations, and treated me to a couple of meals to boot. The Oracle analyst relations people are top notch, and the company is smart enough to allow them to do their job without undue interference.

1. Oracle Is Too Big. This should not surprise anybody. I don’t even think it’s necessarily a problem—economies of scale are important for industries valued in the billions of dollars and touching every facet of life in the developed world. It becomes a problem when you have a diverse array of products to display, but only one opportunity to do so.

OOW11 was two conferences, one for hardware and one for software. Unfortunately, the two conferences were co-located and ran consecutively, so all the hardware people got their content first, and then all the software people got theirs. This was especially evident at Larry Ellison’s two keynotes. The first, on Sunday evening, was a drool session for server wonks, with nary a bone thrown to the applications crowd. The result? A number of walkouts, and scads of Twitter heckling. The second, on Wednesday afternoon, introduced enterprise social networking tools and the Oracle Public Cloud—a big deal for apps people, useless for server people. More walkouts, and probably some heckling as well.

This approach isn’t likely to change, either. Throwing two events would be more expensive than throwing one big one, and Oracle’s new Engineered Systems initiative will bind hardware and software even tighter. Should it succeed, there will be even less reason to separate the shows.

2. Larry Ellison Doesn’t Get People. He’s an extremely sharp fellow, this Larry Ellison. He’s passionate about Oracle technology, and he’s an absolute shark for business. But he hasn’t figured out these flesh creatures around him. Sunday’s widely-ridiculed talk about nuts and bolts—Oracle Exadata, Exalogic, and new Exalytics servers, and the new SPARC SuperCluster general purpose megaserver—was passionate enough to hold my interest for a while, despite being irrelevant to my immediate needs. It made a strong business case for the devices, and was really a love letter to the technology. No doubt about it: Oracle has some very sexy tech, and it runs the world.

But the whole thing was numbers. “Ten times faster than X! One-fifth the power consumption of Y!” Complete failure to engage people, to tell a story that sold these behemoths on anything but raw capability. Attendees of OOW10 said it was like he picked up right where he left off the previous year, with as little regard for the audience as he exhibited then.

By comparison, the Wednesday keynote showed us a different Ellison. His presentation, likely due in part to the poor reception from Sunday and the gaffe of cancelling Marc Benioff’s scheduled Tuesday address, was lively, pojnted, and full of humor and fire. I don’t know Larry Ellison personally, but I’ve observed him over the years and seen him speak on several occasions. This was the first time I felt he was human, and I liked it. He rose to the occasion, introducing a family of Cloud apps whose relevance to individual users as well as the enterprises that employ them was clear.

This second address wasn’t perfect. It was largely devoid of specifics and, coming on the last full day of the conference, left little opportunity to get more information, or even build up much buzz. Introducing the Oracle Social Network and Oracle Public Cloud earlier on would have given us industry analysts and reporters a chance to talk amongst ourselves, dig for details, and basically do Oracle’s PR work for it. Instead, we spent three days begging for scraps, and Oracle leaders like Anthony Lye and Steve Miranda were reduced to telling us “there’s an announcement coming on Wednesday, and we can’t talk about it.”

3. If You’re Going to Give Free Press to the Competition, Do It on Your Terms. If you heard a loud bang on Tuesday night, it was Oracle shooting itself in the foot. Marc Benioff, chairman of Salesforce.com, was scheduled to give an address at OOW11 on Wednesday, as he’d done for at least the previous two years. At the last moment, Oracle (Larry Ellison) cancelled the address—changed the time, actually, to Thursday 8 a.m., after many attendees would have already left. This, combined with Marc having a prior commitment in that time slot, effectively killed the session.

Perhaps inviting Benioff in the first place was a bad move. He’d been critical of Oracle’s strategy and products in years past, and there’s no reason to think this year would have been different. The social tech Oracle was introducing would put the two companies into more direct competition, so providing a podium could be a risk.

As bad as it might have been, blocking the address was a HORRIBLE move. Marc Benioff is a master of the public address. Every word out of his mouth sells Salesforce.com and the vision of Cloud computing. Ellison’s actions removed any constraint Benioff might have had to be a gracious guest; they cast Benioff in the role of injured party and Ellison in the role of jerk; and they cost him money by making him have to get a different venue at the last minute. In other words, shit just got real.

Marc was able to use his time to attack Oracle much more fully than he could as part of the Open World calendar, pitting Salesforce’s fully-formed and successful Cloud model against Oracle’s still-unannounced one. Larry’s rebuttal in his own Wednesday address was intriguing and pointed, but it didn’t have enough meat on its bones. For the first time in history, Oracle was fighting outside its weight class. It’s believed Larry set this debacle in motion on his own initiative, which means there’s nobody else to blame. Stupid move from a very smart man.

4. Follow Your Announcements With Facts. I am really looking forward to seeing OPC and OSN in action. Their introduction alone was worth my attendance, and 2012 is going to be all the more exciting for the social technology crowd because of it.

The old show biz mantra is to always leave the audience wanting more. OOW11 took it to an unreasonable extreme, but it left us wanting anything. I can tell you little more about Oracle’s social and Cloud initiatives than that they exist, and there are some early adopters. I can’t name the early adopters because of NDA. I can’t tell you what the apps do, because the demo was sparse and the people who could tell us more were gagged. I can’t even tell you when to expect to see them in the real world, because the company’s official line is that no release schedule has been set beyond “over the next several weeks.” This is not how a company generates buzz. It’s a great way to make us industry watchers very suspicious of what we’re being shown.

Time spent by top executives deflecting questions could have been spent arming us with the facts we need to get the message out, all by tweaking the announcement date a few days. Now we have to beg for follow-on briefings and demos when available, hoping that satisfying our curiosity will wash this bad taste from out mouths.

5. Please Invite Me Back Next Year. Oracle is an incredibly important company. Even when Open World is a misfire, it provides valuable information, access, and networking. My criticisms are honest, and I offer them in the hopes you’ll make OOW12 much better for us, and thus for yourselves. Prove me wrong about what I perceive as your mistakes. I look forward to it.

Rather than make you read the update on this page (because I hate cropping docs to work with my page formatting) I’ve provided a link here. I will tell you that, because of the response, the judging has been extended from two rounds to three. There are more prizes for the participants as well.

Track the #CRMIdol hashtag, stop by the contest site, and read the blogs of the competitors and judges to catch the latest news.

=====

Speaking of news, I haven’t given you much lately. Mostly, I’ve been focused on long-term stuff that didn’t fit well with regular updates, or on keeping my head down and hitting deadlines. I think I’m getting back to semi-regular posts now, because we’re now in Fall Conference Season. Except it’s not fall yet. Just go with me here.

Last week marked what I have come to consider the kickoff event for the autumnal phase of industry get-togethers: CRM Evolution. Three days of some of the top minds in the CRM business crammed into a hotel together, with no single vendor pushing the agenda. I happen to really like vendor conferences, but there should be more opportunities to meet on neutral ground like this.

Once again, CRM magazine (led by intrepid editor David Myron) put together a great lineup. This is where one goes to find out how the influencers are thinking, and set the tone of discussion for the next several months. Many connections were made and plans discussed. Things are looking up for me personally, and for the industry generally.

I hosted the Tuesday morning keynote panel, Innovations in Social Strategy. My panel was an absolute dream, consisting of Paul Greenberg, Ray Wang of Constellation, and Brian Solis of Altimeter. It went great, and I’m waiting for a link to the recording. I also got to join in on the closing session, a CRM Playaz segment where the guest was David Alston of Radian6 (now a Salesforce company). There were also no fewer than three video interviews of yours truly; as soon as I have links, so will you.

There was a lot of focus on SCRM, but it seemed that many people were shying away from the more traditional side. CRM is becoming a dirty word once more, and some vendors and thinkers are starting to shy away from it by applying alternate names and acronyms.  I’ve said it before, and it bears repeating: There is no SCRM without CRM. Connecting businesses and customers in dynamic ways for more natural conversations is huge—but the tools must be there for businesses to track those customers throughout the life of the relationship, respond to changes in the market, and retain consistent business practices. Businesses are in it to make money; customers are in it to get the best value—whether in terms of goods and services, or the quality of care and the feeling that they are more than just a wallet. Social CRM builds from traditional CRM, but doesn’t replace it. End of rant.

You should be able to find no shortage of coverage for CRM Evolution 2011—you can start by checking #crme11—but I’m linking you to Blake Landau’s wrap-up article because she’s smart, and also kinda cool. She also says nice things about me when I mention her, and that’s how this social thing is supposed to work, right?

Today marked the launch of tibbr 3.0, which Tibco is calling “the 21st century universal inbox for social computing in the enterprise.” Tibbr 3.0 will be generally available in August 2011; you can read the launch press release here, but I’m inclined to give my own thoughts about what’s on offer.

Videoconferencing. One of the components is tibcast, a video conference app with desktop video and voice. You might think this is no big deal, since there are several companies who have conference modules, and at least one or two who only do video conferencing. the difference is that tibcast is built right into your desktop work environment, and is completely ad-hoc. Nothing needs to be set up or agreed upon in advance; you can decide to have a conference on the fly with anybody you can reach, and just start the thing up. Anybody on the team who wasn’t available has full access to the recorded meeting, as well as any files that were shared.

Related to this is Tibbr Voice. When you dial into 1-800-TIBBR, the system recognizes your phone number (and thus your permissions) and allows you to post voice memos directly to your wall, or somebody else’s.

Document Management. Ram Menon, Tibco’s EVP of marketing, has been mentioning lately that next year, businesses will generate an estimated 1,500 exabytes (1 EB = 1 billion GB) of files—some 33 trillion documents—in addition to all the other data they will produce. Each year, what Menon calls “Where’s the File Syndrome” grows worse, and is exacerbated by cases where static copies must be distributed.

Tibbr 3.0 integrates with any folder file system (the example given is Microsoft SharePoint), granting discovery and write-back capabilities while preserving all corporate permissions and security. You can’t accidentally share a forbidden document by dragging it to the wrong area of your desktop, but you can make it available to the right people as if they had their own copy while still preserving a single version of the truth.

Easing Social Sprawl. Anybody who deals with more than a few social networking tools knows what social sprawl is—our attentions are split between so many communities and different kinds of interaction that managing the feeds becomes its own full time job. Tibbr Communities provides a single work space for them all, with multiple walls and varying access rights—again, you can’t accidentally put sensitive data on the wrong wall. All the pieces of your social media pile are consolidated into one installation. Tibco is calling this an industry first.

Actionability in the Social Context. Seeing the activity of coworkers, partners, and customers, and being able to communicate about it quickly and easily, is a huge plus. But business operations need more than a news feed and some chat. Tibco draws on its SOA expertise to let users act on what they see in the feed without going to another applications. Tibbr 3.0 lets you do things like approve purchase orders, OK budget requests, or order more inventory without ever leaving your wall—the place where you found out about the needed actions.

Further drawing on SOA, Tibbr 3.0 introduces tibSmartwidgets (I don’t choose the names, I just report on ‘em), a way to embed tibbr 3.0 into any existing enterprise apps through context-sensitive widgets.

What it all means to me. From what I can see, tibbr 3.0 is bloody beautiful in concept and execution. I might never again work in a large corporation where all of these new and awesome technologies will be used, but I can imagine using something like tibbr if I did, and feeling like it was how things should always have been. Feeling faceless, powerless, out of the loop, disconnected—these are major concerns for modern workers, and the younger generations coming into the work force won’t stand for it.

A number of good point solutions and adaptations of consumer-level social technology already exist, and there is a growing movement to integrate them into a single social business environment. Tibco is doing a fantastic job of it with tibbr. This is full-bore SCRM here.

Tibco is a name well known to industry insiders, but it seems the company doesn’t get much attention beyond those circles. I think this is a mistake. Tibco is doing game-changing work, and I urge you to take a closer look. Even if you’re happy with what you’ve got, or are a competitor, make Tibco part of the conversation. A rising tide floats all boats.

THE GENESIS

Today, we announce an award that celebrates and recognizes leaders who have overcome the odds to successfully apply emerging and disruptive technologies for their organizations.

In Search of Protostars

Most award programs recognize the technology suppliers for their advancements in the market. Few, if any programs, have recognized individuals for their courage in battling the odds to effect change in their organization. The Constellation SuperNova Awards celebrate the explorers, the pioneers, and the unsung heroes who successfully put new technologies to work. More importantly, these leaders have created disruptions in their market.

“Applying technology innovation to effect business results requires exceptional organizational leadership and teamwork. It is not enough to simply implement the technology. To ensure success, these leaders had to build buy-in relationships across all levels of the organization – appealing to rational and emotional senses – as well as make tough calls in system delivery to make change easier”, noted Amy Wilson, Vice-President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research, Inc.

An all star cast of judges will identify applicants who embody the human spirit to innovate, overcome adversity, and successfully deliver market changing approaches. Applicants will be subjected to a vigorous set of criteria that reflect real-world and pragmatic experience. Semifinalists will be selected in five categories: social business, mobile enterprise, cloud computing, advanced analytics, and emerging technologies.

“Innovation is the life blood of businesses. We need to celebrate those pioneers who are able to see what the others don’t, who are willing to invest their time and energy while others don’t dare to, and whose passion inspires us all to look innovation in the eyes, embrace it and become innovators.” said Paul Papadimitriou, Vice-President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research, Inc.

THE DETAILS

Twitter: @SuperNovaAwards
Website: www.supernovaawards.com (Not Up Yet)

Time Lines
June 6, 2011 – First day of submissions
July 31, 2011 – Last day of submissions
August 15, 2011 – Protostars (semi-finalists) announced
November 4th, 2011 – SuperNovas (finalists) announced

All Star Judging Panel
Our judging panel comes from the best of the best. We’ve mixed an esteemed group of media professionals and industry experts with our analysts. Judges have agreed to volunteer their time in the evaluation of the submissions. The 2011 judging panel includes:

Social Business
Aaron Pearson (@apearson), Senior Vice-President – Weber Shandwick (PR Agency Lead)
Jeff Ashcroft (@jeffashcroft), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.
Barney Beal (@barneybeal), Managing Editor – Tech Target
Paul Greenberg (@pgreenbe), President – The 56 Group, LLC, Constellation Board of Advisors
Esteban Kolsky (@ekolsky), Founder – ThinkJar, Constellation Board of Advisors
Marshall Lager (@lager), Managing Principal – Third Idea Consulting, LLC
David Myron (@dmyron), Editor In Chief – CRM Magazine
Jon Swartz (@jswartz652), Technology Reporter – USA Today

Mobile Enterprise
Kewal Varia (@kewalv), Managing Director – Spark Communications (PR Agency Lead)
David Brousell (@drb1), Editor-in-Chief – Thomas Publishing/Managing Automation
Bob Egan (@bobegan), Chief Analyst – Sepharim Group
Maribel Lopez (@maribellopez), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.
Jason Maynard (@jasonamaynard), Managing Director – Wells Fargo Securities
Mike Simons (@ITjournalist), Editor In Chief – ComputerWorldUK
Thomas Wailgum (@twailgum), Co-Editorial Director – ASUG News

Advanced Analytics
Susan Thomas (@susantrainer), CEO – Trainer Communic@tions (PR Agency Lead)
Courtney Bjorlin (@cbjorlin), Co-Editorial Director – ASUG News
Bridgette Chambers (@bchambersASUG), CEO – America’s SAP User Group (ASUG), Constellation Board of Advisors
Douglas Henschen (@dhenschen), Editor at Large – Information Week
Dennis Howlett (@dahowlett), Blogger – ZD Net Irregular Enterprise, Constellation Board of Advisors
Chris Kanaracus (@ckanaracus), Technology Reporter – IDG News Service
Erin Kinikin – Board of Advisor – Constellation Research, Inc.
Amy Wilson (@awils) – Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.

Cloud Computing
Colette Ballou (@coletteballou), President and CEO – Ballou PR (PR Agency Lead)
Naomi Bloom (@infullbloom), Managing Partner – Bloom & Wallace
Larry Dignan (@ldignan), Editor-in-Chief – ZDNet
Zoli Erdos (@zolierdos), Editor – CloudAve
Mary Jo Foley, Editor (@maryjofoley) – ZDNet All About Microsoft Blog and Contributor – Cloud Pro
Debra Lilley (@debralilley) – Board of Advisor – Constellation Research, Inc. & Chairperson – UK Oracle Users Group
Kash Rangan (@kashrangan), Managing Director – Merrill Lynch
Frank Scavo (@fscavo), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.
Krishnan Subramaninan (@krishnan), Industry Analyst and Researcher – KrishWorld & CloudAve
Alex Williams (@alexwilliams), Editor – SiliconAngle

Emerging Tech
Vanessa Camones (@vanessacamones), Principal and Founder – theMIX Agency (PR Agency Lead)
Adrian Bowles (@ajbowles), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.
John Furrier (@furrier), Editor and Founder – SiliconAngle
Annalie Killian (@maverickwoman), Catalyst for Magic – AMP , Executive Producer – Amplify Festival
Marshall Kirkpatrick (@marshallk), Co-Editor -ReadWriteWeb
Paul Papadimitriou (@papadimitriou), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.
Robert Scoble (@scoblelizer), Tech Evangelist – RackSpace
Alan Silberberg (@alanwsilberberg), Vice President – Constellation Research, Inc.

Awards Criteria
Judges will evaluate submissions in six key areas:

1. Building the business case for exec sponsorship - How did you overcome internal adversity for the project? What was used to build the case for buy – in among the executives? How did you fund the project?
2. Applying change management critical success factors - What communication channels did you face? How did the organization gain acceptance for new approaches? What worked? What didn’t work? What were your key lessons learned?
3. Deploying innovative uses of emerging and disruptive technology – How did you determine which technology was feasible? Why did you choose the vendor or approach you chose for this technology? How did IT and the business cooperate to apply new technologies?
4. Measuring the metrics that matter – What metrics drove the business case? Why were these metrics chosen to measure the impact of the technology? How did you measure success with those technologies?
5. Assessing the impact of innovation? What was the impact to stakeholders (internal and external)? What was the impact to the business? What was the impact on the competitive landscape?
6. Coolness factor for the story - How well was the story told? Is this story usable for a panel on best practices? Was this truly game changing or disruptive? Can others learn and apply the lessons told?

THE REWARDS

All semifinalists will be invited to Constellation’s Connected Enterprise 2011, an invitation only innovation event in Scottsdale, Arizona from November 4th to 6th, 2011. Described as TED meets Davos meets Innovation summit, the three-day executive retreat will include mind expanding keynotes from visionaries and futurists, interactive best practices panels, The Constellation SuperNova Awards event, a golf outing, and an experiential spousal/partner program.

“Connected Enterprise 2011 brings together our research, our clients, and a network of thought leaders into a networked physical and online community” noted Maribel Lopez, Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research, Inc..

A select group of semi-finalists will be chosen to present on one of five best practice panels at the event. The panelists will receive one innovation retreat invitation and one spousal/partner experiential invitation. All semifinalists will become honorary SuperNova community members of Constellation Research.

All finalists will win a one -year subscription to Constellation’s Research Library and complimentary tickets to the Connected Enterprise 2012 event, an estimated value of $120,000 per winner. Additional rewards will be announced as sponsors are added to the Constellation’s Connected Enterprise 2011 event. For sponsorship details contact: sales (at) ConstellationRG (dot) com.

APPLY NOW

Applications can be obtained by using the official submission form.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Questions?

Send your comments to the blog or reach Constellation via email: SuperNova (at) ConstellationRG (dot) com.

Disclosure

Although we work closely with many mega software vendors, we want you to trust us. For the full disclosure policy, see the full client list on the Constellation Research website.

Copyright © 2011 R Wang and Insider Associates, LLC All rights reserved.

Okay. We’re locked and loaded. Reference checks done. Programs being put into place. Website in progress. A new prize. Final contestant list in place with times and dates complete.

Here’s what’s happened since we last talked.

Prizes

We have new prizes.

First, Donal Daly CEO of The TAS Group, has generously provided his sales deal software, Dealmaker Sales Performance Automation, to a winner. Not one, but ten licenses for a full year with setup thrown in for free and no strings attached. This is a $12,000 value. Not too shabby.

Then, Brent Leary, one of the most influential folks in CRM and small business and a CRM Idol primary judge is offering for the Americas only

1. inclusion in his 2011 coming in September 2011 CRM-Ish List of companies to watch that can provide products/services to the small business community.
2. an invitation to be a featured participant (speaker and/or panelist) at the inaugural Social Business Atlanta conference in September 2011 (details coming soon)
3. a featured spot on SmallBizTrends.com One-on-One conversation series

And finally, for seven finalists, Brent Leary and I are offering an interview on CRM Playaz, our widely watched and of course wildly popular lets-just-say “funny” show. Though they may not consider that much of a prize since we get the chance to not just give them exposure, but mock them if we care to.  But the offer is there to all seven finalists.

More large prizes are in the works. We’ll be working on those until the date of the competition so stay tuned. Now that Scottie won American Idol, what else do you have to do with your time anyway? We’re way more interesting than “So You Think You Can Dance?”.

Website

We knocked it out of the park on this one. Soon, though I can’t give you an exact date, we’re going to be the proud recipients of a Drupal-enabled social site for CRM Idol which will allow you to do a lot including:1.

1. Learn something about all 60 companies participating in the contest.
2. Be able to rank and rate and comment on the videos and other uploaded content that might be provided by the participant companies
3. Get the latest updates.
4. Get all links you need for the participants, the vendors, the influencers, the media and even communicate with them – publicly
5. Communicate with the judges.
6. Plus lots of other stuff.

What makes this a home run is that the company doing this for us is Dri, a premier web design company who specializes in open source. The owner, Diogo Rebelo, is making sure that we get a Drupal social site, so that we can communicate with each other throughout the CRM Idol process. A first iteration focused around content management will be up in about 2 weeks. Watch for it at http://www.crmidol.com.

Mentor-60

One thing that we want to provide throughout the CRM Idol process is mentorship. For example, as simple as it might sound, it isn’t that easy to impress an influencer/analyst with your product or company, given that its likely the influencer/analyst has seen it all already – being asked to take demos between 10-50 times a week. So, in the spirit of preparation for the demos the 60 candidates are going to have to do for the primary judges, we are announcing the Mentor-60 program. This will consist of two pieces:

1. A 45 minute webinar by primary judge and top CRM analyst Esteban Kolsky on “How to Demo”. This will be given once at a time that will be convenient to both the Americas and EMEA and all 60 of the contestants will be invited to join. However its strictly optional when it comes to signing up and not signing up will have no impact on how the voting/judging on the 60 goes later on in August.

2. Many of the extended judges panels have volunteered their time to be mentors who during the month of July will make time available for communicating with the 60 participants to answer questions on how to handle the demos. This won’t include a full review of the demo but more in the “should we do something like this” or “does it make sense to include this” mode. What channels and dates and whether we are going to assign judges to specific companies or have them be generally available on a specific day remains to be determined. As of now, 32 of the judges have already volunteered and many others are in the process of responding.

Final Calendar

The reference checks are done. That was the final step in the process. We have only one change. We are adding Crowd Factory to the list of contestants. Congrats to them! (Whoo! Hoo!) They were able to be first in line for the waiting list. If others drop out for reasons that are driven by them, the next in line on the waiting list will be chosen. And so on and so forth. See the final (and this is the final final final) calendar below for the dates and times of your favorite CRM Idol participant.

The Americas Calendar – FINAL

The Americas (all times are Eastern Time)

EMEA – FINAL

EMEA (all times are GMT)

All the Rules, We are not Fools

We are now working on the finalizing the processes and rules for the actual judging of the competition. As you know there are five judges for the Americas and four for EMEA as of this update. (No changes are expected but one never knows). We recognize that all the judges might not be able to do all the demos due to client conflicts etc. and we are working from that premise to make sure that there is fair and adequate representation and a set of minimum standards. We are also working on defining the scoring system that works in this environment. Some of the criteria will be made public; the weight placed on the criteria will not be made public. We are discussing what to do with the results also.

Additionally, in an entirely optimistic vein, we are discussing how to handle the awards of the prizes. The winners won’t get all of the prizes, they will choose from a selection of prizes (the number is TBD). There will be prizes that all 7 finalists (the video makers) get because it won’t be an easy thing to get there. There are other models under discussion on the award. Watch here for the results soon.

In the next update we’ll (if the spirit moves us) reveal the judging criteria and the prize awards model. Stay tuned. The ride starts here. We’re ALL going to Vegas -except me. I don’t like Vegas. I’m going to Barcelona. Or New York. Anyone wanna come?

I tell ya, this stuff is easy when somebody else writes it.

That state of affairs is a thing of the past. Once again, Paul “CRM Godfather” Greenberg is shaking up the industry—he has masterminded CRM Idol 2011: The Open Season. As the name suggests, it’s something of a riff on American Idol, but with more talent and less drama. Entries are being accepted, starting today; more about that later.

A total of 60 companies (40 in North America, 20 in EMEA) will present their commercially-available CRM wares to a panel of judges composed of the greatest influencers, analysts, and journalists in the field (and also me). Finalists chosen from these vendors will create a 10-minute video presentation to fight it out for a choice of the top prizes.

The prizes, you ask? Several. Free consulting from members of the judging panel and other top minds in the field. Webinars conducted pro bono by the same. Subscriptions and/or beta access to leading CRM suites so partner applications and integrations can be developed. And the coveted free publicity, consisting of a joint product review produced and signed by the judging panel, released immediately through a huge list of media partners.

And since everybody’s a winner in a game like this, everybody gets the review. Like American Idol, though, there is a risk of the Simon Cowell experience—a weak product and a bad presentation will be reviewed appropriately.

But enough of my paraphrasing and editorializing—you want the meat of the subject. Here it is, straight from Paul:

The Idea

Most of what we’re trying to do was outlined in the pre-announcement announcement of CRM Idol last week. But it bears some repeating:

Small companies – at least in the CRM software related world – and that means social software world, in this case, too – abound. There are thousands of companies out there that are possibly innovative, possibly commercially viable in a big way, possibly the next big thing. But, as we said, there are thousands of them. And, no matter how great your product is, if no one knows about it, well, then, oops. Not a good thing.

These small companies are all making efforts to get into the ecosystem that could benefit them – one which includes investors, influencers, technology/strategic partners, media connections, etc. While getting support from this powerful ecosystem is by no means a guarantee of success, it can be enormously helpful in getting well down the road there. But, those small companies are often thwarted in that effort by either really bad PR people, or just the incredible amount of companies out there trying to reach into the ecosystem who are pummeling the small amount of influencers, etc. every week with requests to demo or talk.

Now, to be fair to the influencers, they are human beings with lives that aren’t built around supporting this one company that really thinks they are it. All they know is that each of them is getting between 20-50 requests a week to take a demo or conversation with someone who owns or represents a company they’ve never heard of and never talked to yet. In addition to those that they know. Often enough, they are pitched by a public relations person who is either inexperienced or not really good at their job who makes no effort to find anything out about the person that they are pitching to. So the influencer, journalist, venture capitalist gets a generic curve thrown at them that doesn’t even break over the plate – guaranteeing that the email is going to be discarded as a matter of course before the first paragraph is even read. Or it could be that on a particular day the influencer got 10 pitches and had a headache and didn’t want to see any of them.

As unfair as generic pitches and high volumes of noise are to the influencers in the highly desirable ecosystem we are chatting about here, it is a problem because what are probably a lot of good companies are never given a chance to move ahead because of the difficulties inherent in the process and the vagaries of bad luck on any given day.

Which is why CRM Idol 2011: The Open Season exists.

The concept is simple, small companies out there. If you meet the submission criteria outlined below, you will be given the opportunity, first come first serve, to secure a time slot on a specific day that will put you in front of some of the most influential people in the CRM/SCRM world. They will spend an hour with you in a demo to hear about your technology product – software only – and they will write a jointly signed review of what they saw of you – that will be published in multiple venues as soon as its written. It can be a good review, a bad one, a mix or indifferent. There’s risk on your part to be taken here. But it is something that you need to be aware of. The reviews will go up as soon as the 5 judge sign off on the final content. They won’t be exhaustive reviews but they will be opinionated and fair.

Forty companies from the Americas and twenty companies from EMEA (that means ONLY Europe, the Middle East and Africa) will get a shot at this – again first come first serve (more later on what that means). Of the 40 in the Americas, 4 finalists will be chosen. (NOTE: There will be an APAC edition hopefully late in the year or if not, early 2012, depending on the success of these two events. Sorry, Asia, Australia, New Zealand, et.al. Logistics made it impossible at this juncture.) Out of the 20 in EMEA, 3 finalists will be chosen. Each of the finalists will be REQUIRED to do a ten minute video about their company and the product. Not a repeat of the demo but a video. Note I used the word REQUIRED here. Let me put it this way. If you make the finals and don’t do the video, we will publicly skewer your company. Know why? Because our judges are giving up what little free time they actually have in a summer to do this and it will take us 4 hours a day for 3 business weeks to do it. So if you can’t or won’t put in the effort to do the video, don’t bother to apply. Seriously. We’re trying to help out here and we want you guys all to succeed but it’s a two way street.

Okay, that rant out of the way. Once the finalists are chosen and the videos done, they will be posted online in multiple media outlets. They will be voted on in two ways:

1. 1. Popular vote – see, crowdsourcing is important. All the votes for the one winner from the Americas and the one winner from EMEA will be tallied from the public sites – in aggregate. That’s 50% of the vote.
   2. Extended Judges Panels – as you can see below, we may have assembled the greatest panels of judges – both leading vendors and influencers ever assembled in the history of CRM – not to be hyperbolic or anything. Each judge will select a specific winner in each of the Americas and EMEA from the 7 finalists. That’s the other 50% of the vote. The original judges will be voting as panel members.

The winners in each will get a major array of prizes, some of which are below, and be declared “CRM Idol 2011 Winner.”

Not too shabby is it? Vast amounts of media attention even if you don’t make the finals. If you make the finals at all, some prizes to you. The winners get everything that the ecosystem can offer but guaranteed success. But they do get all the accoutrements they need to support their increased likelihood of it.

That way, you small companies out there who have been victimized by bad approaches or just circumstance have the opportunity to bypass all of that and make something happen. It’s up to you to take the reins in hand but once you do, you have at least a serious chance at making yourself successful.

The Criteria

This competition is for small companies in the CRMish/SocialCRMish world. – see the categories below for some guidelines though please feel free to make the case if you don’t see yourself in the guidelines.

1. 1. You have to have software that is commercially available by the time of the demo – that would be in August – again see below. No betas, alphas, release candidates allowed. If we find that you’re not commercially available, and you have a time slot, you’re out and someone else will fill the slot. So please be sure that you can verify the claim if you want to participate.
   2. You have to have 3 referenceable customers that, if we care to, we can contact and ask about you.
   3. You have to have revenue under $12 million U.S. your last fiscal year. As far as disclosure goes, you have the choice of making the claim that you do – though that will have to be stated in your submission and we’ll trust you or you can disclose your revenue in the submission with the knowledge that only the permanent judges will know what it is. If you make the claim, please be prepared to back it up if we ask. Your call on how.
   4. You have to be willing to make a ten minute video if you get to the finals. More on that later.
   5. You have to fit a category – though there is some leeway there.

The Categories

The categories that we’ve identified to start are:

1. 1. Traditional CRM Suites
   2. Social CRM
   3. Sales – Sales Force Automation, Sales Optimization, Sales Effectiveness
   4. Marketing – Marketing Automation, Revenue Performance Management, Social Marketing, Email Marketing, Enterprise Marketing Management, Database Marketing
   5. Customer Service – all permutations
   6. Mobile CRM
   7. Customer Experience Management
   8. Social Media Monitoring – requires the possibility of integrating with a CRM technology
   9. Customer Analytics – including text/sentiment analytics; voice based analytics; social media analytics, influencer scoring, etc.
   10. Enterprise Feedback Management
   11. Innovation Management
   12. Community Platforms
   13. Enterprise 2.0 – collaboration, activity streams etc.
   14. Social Business
   15. Knowledge Management – this one requires the possibility of integrating with CRM systems
   16. Vendor Relationship Management
   17. Partner Relationship Management

Once again, if you don’t see yourself in this list, don’t worry. Just make the case as to why you have some customer-facing possibilities and the likelihood is that we’ll be cool with it. We’re trying to make this easier for you, not hard.

The Rules

They are numbered to be entirely clear.

Submissions

1. 1. There will be 40 slots made available in the Americas and 20 in EMEA.
   2. The submission will be by email ONLY to: nextbigthing@crmidol.com. (See below to see this again and what to do if there are problems). Any other attempt at submission will be rejected out of hand with the problem exception mentioned below.
   3. The submissions will occur starting today – Monday, April 25 and will continue until Friday May 13 or until all slots are filled, whichever is first (watch #crmidol on twitter for updates on that as it occurs). On May 13, should any slots be left, the remaining specific dates and times will be made publicly available and another final round of submissions for those remaining slots will occur from May 13 through May 20. After that the submissions will be closed.
   4. Each submission will include the following:
      • Your company contact and named person contact information Two date and time specific slot requests. ONLY two. If your slots are not available, you’re out of luck until May 14 – and then you can resubmit to any time slots that are publicly announced as still available. Though there is no guarantee that there will be any available slots at that time. (see below for examples of how to submit the dates/times)
      • The category you feel you fit into – or if you don’t but think that you qualify – why.
      • A description of what the product is/the company is. Be persuasive here that you meet the criteria, not that you have a great product. This is merely a qualifying discussion. URLs cannot be used as substitutes for this description. The submission needs to be all inclusive. However, they can be used as supporting documentation.
      • The names of the three (3) referenceable customers – the company, the contact and the way to communicate with them – minimum of email and phone, please.
      • A statement that says that you meet the revenue requirement along the lines of “our company states truthfully that our revenues in our last fiscal year 2010 were under $12 million U.S”. OR you can state the actual number with the knowledge that the primary judges in each of the Americas and EMEA will treat it as under non-disclosure. But please be aware those designated primary judges below will see the actual figures if you choose to reveal them.
      • A statement that says, “if (you) make the finals, you are committed to making a 10 minute video for submission and public viewing as part of the conditions for entry.” Word it anyway you prefer but make the commitment clear.
   5. If you are accepted, you’ll be notified privately but it will be posted that you’ve been accepted on the Twitter #crmidol stream. The time will only be sent to you privately. Just your acceptance will be posted. Please allow some time between your submission and the posting of it to the hashtag and your private notification, since we all still have to work for a living.
   6. If you don’t include everything specified in the rules for submission, it means automatic disqualification and you cannot resubmit.

The Demo

The demo has few rules. Just be prepared to a. explain your company; b. show your product – live please c. answer questions from the influencers/experts. Not much more than that. I’m sure many of you are experienced at this already so wed don’t have to tell you this, but just in case… A site for the demos with login etc. will be announced to the timeslot owners in early August.

The Video

The standards for the video will be mentioned to the finalists once they are named. To rest any unease, you won’t be required to spend lots of money to get it done. How much you spend and on what will be up to you as will the content and how you present it. We’ll issue guidelines when the time gets near, including how the video is going to be distributed for posting and voting.

The Judges

Here are the lists of all the judges. As you can see, we have what is likely to be the heaviest hitting list in the history of anything done in CRM when it comes to awards or competitions. Click on their names to get to their LinkedIn bios. They are in alphabetical order.

Primary Judges

The Americas

These five judges will handle the 40 entries for the Americas which consists of the United States, Canada, South and Central America. They will all be involved in the one hour reviews each of the days over the two weeks and will jointly sign off on each review which will be posted to multiple media sites. They will also solely choose the four finalists for the Americas.

1. 1. Paul Greenberg – Managing Principal, The 56 Group, LLC
   2. Jesus Hoyos – Managing Partner, JesusHoyos.com, LLC
   3. Esteban Kolsky – Principal and Founder, Thinkjar LLC
   4. Brent Leary – Managing Partner, CRM Essentials
   5. Denis Pombriant – CEO, Beagle Research Group

EMEA

These four judges will handle the 20 entries from Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia etc. They will all be involved in the each of the 1 hour demos/discussions from Sept 5 through 9 and will write and jointly sign off on each review which will be posted to multiple media sites. They will also solely choose the three finalists for EMEA.

1. 1. Laurence Buchanan – Vice President, CRM & Social CRM, EMEA, Capgemini
   2. Silvana Buljan – Founder & Managing Director, Buljan & Partners
   3. Paul Greenberg – see above
   4. Mark Tamis – Social Business Strategist, NET-7

Mentors

This is an exciting part of CRM Idol 2011. Each of these fine human beings has volunteered a day of their time – two during the finals and one with the winners – to provide the benefit of their experience to the contestants. What they will do is noted by their name. This is an awesome idea that Anthony Lye actually cooked up. Each of these mentors has decades of experience in the software and venture capital world and is considered a leader in the CRM space. So if you make it to the finals, you have the benefit of their knowledge and their valuable time. Amazing.

1. 1. Anthony Lye – Anthony will provide one day for the Americas finalists and one day for the EMEA finalists for consultation on how to best do the content for the contending videos and whatever other pertinent advice the finalists need. Anthony has had years of experience as a senior management person for enterprise CRM and a thought leader.
   2. Joe Hughes – Joe will provide one day for the Americas finalists and one day for the EMEA finalists for consultation on how to best do the content for the contending videos and whatever other pertinent advice the finalists need. Joe has been a leader in the CRM space for as long as we can remember and one of the more foresighted when it comes to the value of Social CRM
   3. Larry Augustin – This is a prize for the winner of EMEA and the winner of the Americas. Larry who has years of experience as an executive in the software space and has been a successful venture capitalist will work with the winner to prepare them for dealing with possible investors including doing a VC matching with the winners.

There will most likely be other mentors announced as the competition gets closer to the demo dates. We might try to make some mentors available to prepare you if you need them for the one hour demos but that’s still up in the air. We’ll keep you posted.

Extended Judges Panels

The Influencer Panel

1. 1. William Band – Vice President & Principal Analyst, CRM, Forrester Research
   2. Jim Berkowitz – CEO, CRM Mastery
   3. Bruce Culbert – Chief Service Officer, The Pedowitz Group
   4. Zoli Erdos – Publisher/Editor, CloudAve and Enterprise Irregulars
   5. Mike Fauscette – Group Vice President, Software Business Solutions, IDC
   6. Josh Greenbaum – Principal, Enterprise Applications Consulting
   7. Dr. Graham Hill – Partner, Optima Partners
   8. Dennis Howlett – Buyer Advocate
   9. Ian Jacobs – Senior Analyst, Customer Interaction, Ovum/Datamonitor
   10. Michael Krigsman – CEO, Asuret
   11. Marshall Lager – Managing Principal, Third Idea Consulting
   12. Kate Leggett – Senior Analyst, CRM, Forrester Research
   13. Maribel Lopez – Principal Analyst and VP, Constellation Research Founder Lopez Research LLC
   14. Jeremiah Owyang -Managing Partner, Altimeter Group
   15. Sameer Patel – Managing Partner, Sovos Group
   16. Scott Rogers – Customer Evangelist
   17. Robert Scoble – Managing Director, Rackspace Hosting
   18. Brian Solis – Principal, Altimeter Group
   19. Dilip Soman – Professor of Marketing, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
   20. Ray Wang – CEO, Constellation Research
   21. Mary Wardley – Vice President, CRM Applications, IDC

The Vendor Panel

1. 1. Larry Augustin – CEO, SugarCRM
   2. Anthony Lye – Senior Vice President & GM, CRM, Oracle
   3. Phil Fernandez – CEO, Marketo
   4. John Hernandez – General Manager, Customer Care Business, Cisco
   5. Jonathan Hornby – Director, Worldwide Marketing, SAS
   6. Joseph Hughes – Senior Executive, CRM Service, Support and Social System Integration Lead, Accenture
   7. Charlie Isaacs, VP, eServices and Social Media Strategy Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise
   8. Vinay Iyer – Vice President, Marketing CRM, SAP
   9. Katy Keim – CMO, Lithium
   10. Marcel Lebrun,- CEO, Radian6
   11. Mitch Lieberman, Vice President, Marketing, Sword-Ciboodle
   12. Chris Morace- Senior Vice President, Business Development, Jive
   13. Zach Nelson – CEO, NetSuite
   14. Bill Patterson- Director, CRM Product Management, Microsoft
   15. Dileep Srinivasan – AVP – CRM & Social CRM, Digital Marketing & MDM, Cognizant
   16. John Taschek –Vice President, Market Strategy, Salesforce

The Journalist Panel

1. 1. Elsa Basile – Director, Callcenternews (Argentina)
   2. Barney Beal – Managing Editor, SearchCRM,
   3. Anita Campbell – Publisher, SmallBizTrends.com
   4. Robin Carey – CEO, Social Media Today
   5. Neil Davey – Group Editor, Sift Media
   6. David Myron – Editorial Director, CRM Magazine, Speech Technology Magazine
   7. Valdir Ugalde – Board, Member, mundocontact (Mexico)
   8. Ann Van Den Berg – Senior Editor, CustomerTalk (Netherlands)

Media Partners

You’ll note that we have 8 journalists on a panel of judges. Well, each of them represents a media partner that will be broadcasting the competition and posting the videos for voting in the finals for the popular vote. They are an awesome array of the most influential media sites in social media, CRM, and small business as well as local influencers in CRM in Latin America and Europe. They will be significant in the lives of the contestants, the finalists, and the winners giving each what may be an unprecedented breadth and depth of coverage. Their coverage will be supplemented by posts to the blogs and other sites that are owned by many of the judges so there will be significant reach for all 60 of the initial contenders. Each of these partners will be getting exclusives from the judges and hopefully some of the companies too so that we can add a quality of coverage that would enhance the value to the SMBs participating. in all areas – CRM, social and small business directly.

We expect to add more media partners as we continue on throughout the competition.

The current partners and links to their sites (in alphabetical order, like every list here):

1. 1. Call Center News (Argentina)
   2. CRM Magazine/DestinationCRM
   3. CustomerTalk (Netherlands)
   4. Mundocontact (Mexico)
   5. MyCustomer.com/Sift Media
   6. SearchCRM
   7. Social Media Today
   8. SmallBizTrends.com

The Prizes…So Far

These are the prizes as of launch today. There are several others in the works that will be announced as the contest rolls out.

All Finalists

All 7 finalists will get to choose one day of consulting from the list of Influencer consultants below. The order of choice will be based on the popular vote on the video which will be kept confidential but used for the choosing. There will be more consultants added to the list as contest moves forward.

The Americas and EMEA Winners

Each winner will get to choose four prizes from the list. Note – in the case where multiple prizes are being offered by a single vendor – the vendor counts as a single prize with all the items as part of that.

1. 1. Accenture
      1. A full day workshop with CRM leaders in Accenture for possible partnership and/or possible investment.
   2. Capgemini (for EMEA winners only)
      1. A half day workshop with Patrick James, Global VP CRM and Laurence Buchanan to explore joint go to market opportunities and help you refine and test your value proposition.
   3. Social Media Today
      1. A blog post featuring the winner of the contest to run on both The Customer Collective and Social Media Today
      2. A single blast to the Social Media Today opt-in list (approximately 50,000 names) which will conform to their minimum standards (valued at $10,500)
   4. Microsoft
      1. 12 mos. of CRM Online Free for developing extensions to CRM
      2. 12 mos. of Windows Azure Free for developing web-based portals and BI solutions
      3. Access to the Office 365 Beta for building collaborative applications and services
      4. Access to the BizSpark One program -a program designed to connect emerging businesses and their investors with a Microsoft advisor to help them identify unique opportunities and expand its business presence
   5. SugarCRM
      1. Free 10 user subscription to SugarCRM Professional or Enterprise
      2. Membership in the Sugar Exchange and free consulting on product integration with SugarCRM
      3. CEO Larry Augustin, a successful venture capitalist in his own right, does a mentoring & VC matchmaking session with the winners
   6. Brian Solis
      1. One hour internal webinar on how to use SCRM and social media to your advantage
   7. Paul Greenberg
      1. One hour pro bono external webinar on a subject TBD for lead gen, mindshare, etc.
   8. Ray Wang
      1. One hour pro bono external webinar on a subject TBD for lead gen, mindshare, etc.
   9. Sameer Patel
      1. One hour pro bono external webinar on a subject TBD for lead gen, mindshare, etc.
   10. Influencer Consulting– free strategic consulting for 1 day or 8 hours from a variety of judges (in person travel expenses to be covered by winners)
   11. Esteban Kolsky (in person only)
   12. Paul Greenberg (on phone or in person)
   13. Denis Pombriant (on phone or in person)
   14. Mark Tamis (on phone or in person)
   15. Jesus Hoyos (on phone or in person)
   16. Brent Leary (on phone or in person)

The Times, Dates, Hashtag and Email

Okay here’s the hardcore stuff:

1. 1. The hashtag is #crmidol
   2. The email for submission is nextbigthing@crmidol.com
   3. If you have a problem submitting to that email send your submission and a report of the specific problem to pgreenbe@gmail.com

Dates and Times Table for the Americas and EMEA

We’ve put together an easy little table with all the relevant dates and times that you’ll need as you progress through the competition.

A Note or Two

A little bit of unfinished stuff that will sort itself out as time goes forward.

• • There will likely be a CRM Idol site (Joomla based) coming in the next month or so that will be an aggregate site for all the media outlets and streams. However, this remains a work in progress that’s still under discussion.
  • There will be more mentors and prizes added and possibly a judge or two.
  • For now ongoing news will be found at the twitter hashtag #crimidol.

In Closing

That’s about it. Now its time to bring it. First come, first serve. See you, maybe as the 1st ever CRM Idol, in Vegas, Hollywood. London or on the Social Web. Somewhere anyway.

CRM IDOL 2011 IS NOW OFFICIALLY UNDERWAY

My chapter deals, surprisingly enough, with social CRM and how business can use it to form close bonds with the digital customer, as well as how businesses are built upon social principles. There’s a load of good stuff from other contributors as well, so expect to learn from pages I’m not even responsible for. ^_^

Yes, I did just use a Japanese-style emoticon on my professional blog. I like them, and the regular ones screw up my formatting.