Guy Kawasaki to Deliver Keynote Address

CUPERTINO, Calif. – SugarCRM, the world’s fastest-growing customer relationship management (CRM) company, today announced its 6th annual SugarCon event that will bring CRM thought leaders from around the world together under one roof. The 2012 keynote speaker will be Guy Kawasaki, co-founder of Alltop.com, founding partner at Garage Technology Ventures and columnist for the Open Forum of American Express. SugarCon, geared toward customers, partners and developers in the CRM space, will be held April 23-26, 2012 at The Palace Hotel in San Francisco, California.

The theme of the 2012 event is “Explore the Possibilities of CRM,” where speakers will present thought-provoking sessions that inspire the audience to dig deeper into the CRM discipline. In addition to Kawasaki, this year’s speaker lineup includes:

• Paul Greenberg, author of CRM at the Speed of Light and president of The 56 Group, LLC, an enterprise applications consulting services firm
• Esteban Kolsky, principal and founder of ThinkJar, an advisory and research think tank focused on customer strategies
• Dr. Natalie Petouhoff, social media executive education program director at UCLA, Anderson School of Business, and adjunct professor measurement of PR and marketing at Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, University of Southern California
• Larry Augustin, CEO of SugarCRM

A full agenda will be available prior to the event, and SugarCRM is currently calling attendees to recommend topics and speakers to ensure that the event delivers information that conference participants demand. The event will have seven breakout tracks that tackle beginner through advanced CRM topics – CRM 101, CRM and the Cloud, CRM and the Cutting Edge: Mobile, Social Business, Solving Business Problems with the Sugar Platform, Shortcuts Through the Sugar Exchange, and Sugar U. (Sugar University).

For more information on SugarCon 2012, please visit the event web site. To register for the event, visit the registration page, and to sponsor, see the sponsorship details. To learn more about SugarCRM, become a Facebook, fan, follow us on Twitter and subscribe to our YouTube channel and blog.

About SugarCRM

SugarCRM makes CRM simple. As the world’s fastest growing customer relationship management (CRM) company, SugarCRM applications have been downloaded more than ten million times and currently serve over 850,000 end users in 192 countries. Over 7,000 customers have chosen SugarCRM’s On-Site and Cloud Computing services over proprietary alternatives. SugarCRM has been recognized for its customer success and product innovation by CRM Magazine, InfoWorld, Customer Interaction Solutions and Intelligent Enterprise. For more information, call (408) 454-6900 or 1 87 SUGARCRM toll-free in the US, email contact@sugarcrm.com, or visit http://www.sugarcrm.com

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

WHEN: Feb 5-8, 2012

eXtremeCRM is ALL about building technical capacity so you can keep driving phenomenal CRM growth!

eXtremeCRM 2012 Berlin will deliver 300 – 400 level technical content in our Deploy and Extend tracks geared towards the technical people in your organization.  Here are just a few of the highlights!

We have a great line up of speakers from the Microsoft Dynamics CRM product team in Redmond!

Mike Ehrenberg, Microsoft Technical Fellow and Chief Architect for Microsoft Dynamics will deliver a technical vision keynote giving insights to the future of Microsoft technologies.

Craig Dewar, Director, Microsoft Dynamics CRM Product Management and Eric Boocock, Sr. Technical Product Manager will to go deep on the recent fall release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 (R7) and the future roadmap of Microsoft Dynamics CRM!

Murat Ozturan, Principal Program Manager Lead, will also be in Berlin to deliver technical sessions.

Marco Amoedo and Fadi El-Hennawy, both expert Technology Specialists from Microsoft EMEA will be presenting as well.

We also have a superior group of technical experts from within the Microsoft Dynamics community, who will be speaking including Ramon Tebar Bueno (Barclays), Sebastian Waksmundzki (AlfaPeople), Giorgio Garcia-Agreda (Crionet) Matt Parks (Avanade), Shan McArthur (ADXStudio), Jakub (Kuba) Skalbania (Netwise Sp. z.o.o.) and Dino Esposito, well know author and .Net expert. And the list keeps growing…

There is a fully packed agenda that can benefit partners and customers alike – here are just a few of the highlights:

• Fall release (R7) plus a look ahead at R8 and beyond
• Azure & Microsoft Dynamics CRM Better Together
• Web Services & Code Generation Deep Dive
• Advanced SharePoint Integration
• Agile Project Management with SureStep
• Software Development Lifecycle with Microsoft Dynamics CRM
• Silverlight & Microsoft Dynamics CRM Development Tips & Tricks
• JavaScript Best Practices
• Outlook Client: Deployment, Performance & Security
• Patterns & Practices

There is not a better opportunity to go eXtreme in building your technical capacity! Don’t miss this once a year chance to build your skills.

For more information: http://extremecrm.com/eXtremeCRM2012BerlinH.aspx

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

WHERE: Miami Marriott Dadeland. Miami, Florida, USA

WHEN: Feb 22-23, 2012

For several years now, the Vendor Shootout™ for ERP has changed the way companies approach software selection by minimizing the overall time and effort involved in qualifying potential Enterprise Software vendors.  This unique event offers a one-of-a-kind opportunity for you and your team to see the best in Enterprise Software Solutions in the world all in one place, all at the same time! 

Moderated by Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC), the goal of the event is to simplify the Enterprise Software selection process, alleviating some of the painful inefficiencies by coordinating on-site software presentations and delivering them in one event. 

Geared toward ERP selection teams and decision makers for companies with a manufacturing, distribution &/or project-oriented requirements, the Vendor Shootout™ for ERP is ideal for businesses who are budgeting for or are currently evaluating ERP software.  Through scripted and unscripted product demonstrations from several vendors, companies can ultimately walk away with a short list of potential products.

What Should You Expect?

Attendees are given the opportunity to see a series of scripted, as well as unscripted product demonstrations from the presenting vendors.  Attendees  select the scripted product demonstrations they wish to attend, based on the products being presented that they are interested in learning more about.  Scripted demonstrations will cover product functionality, user interfaces, and overall usability. 

Scripted, software demonstrations by each vendor will allow an "apples to apples" comparison of each product.  Each vendor will follow the same script guidelines to present similar functionality covering the basic requirements of distribution, manufacturing, and project-oriented companies.  Vendors are under strict instructions to explicitly indicate any customizations, modifications, or 3rd party products used in order to complete the presentation.  The same presentations will be made during each of the scripted product demonstrations during the event so you can easily compare between packages and select your short list for further evaluation.

FOR MORE INFORMATION: http://www.erpshootout.com/erp_software_shootout.html

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

Heroku, a leading cloud platform as a service (PaaS) and a salesforce.com company, today announced it has been recognized with the 2012 InfoWorld Technology of the Year Award.

Selected by InfoWorld Test Center editors and reviewers, the annual awards identify the best and most innovative products on the IT landscape. Winners are drawn from all of the products tested during the past year, with the final selections made by InfoWorld’s Test Center staff. All products reviewed by the Test Center are eligible to win.

"From the smartphones in our pockets to the data centers and clouds that are delivering the applications that businesses depend on, the technology landscape is changing faster than ever. Drawn from the very best hardware, software, development tools, and cloud services we tested during 2011, our 2012 Technology of the Year Awards celebrate the products and services that are leading the way," said Doug Dineley, Executive Editor, Test Center

Heroku is the fastest growing, most widely used cloud application PaaS. Heroku enables developers to concentrate on building, deploying and scaling web applications without having to think about servers, system administration, or other common tasks. In May 2011, Heroku introduced the Polyglot Platform to PaaS and currently supports over six computing languages including Ruby, Node.js, Clojure, Scala, Java, and Python. Heroku’s innovative Add-on program gives application developers one-click access to top third-party cloud service vendors and popular developer platforms such as Facebook. In November, Heroku released Heroku Postgres, a standalone database as a service (DBaaS) that developers can use with any cloud PaaS. Heroku Postgres has been available to Heroku customers for several years and conducts over 400 million write-transactions daily, backed by Heroku’s Continuous Protection technology.

"We feel honored to be included alongside past winners such as the iPad, Android, Visual Studio, and Eclipse; and this year’s winners, including Amazon Web Services, Node.js, Hadoop, and Heroku add-on provider Rhomobile," said  Adam Wiggins, CTO and co-founder of Heroku. "InfoWorld is a venerable publication in the technology world, and this is the first time they’ve given awards in the cloud space. We see this as another major point of validation for PaaS, and cloud technologies more generally. 2011 was the year that PaaS came into the greater collective consciousness of the technology industry. We can’t wait to see how things will unfold in 2012."

"Heroku is clearly leading at the moment" concludes InfoWorld Test Center Editor Andrew Glover in the announcement of the award for Heroku. In his November review of Heroku PaaS, Glover noted that "the wide variety of languages offered by Heroku reflects a growing trend toward developer polyglotism and speaks volumes to the growing community surrounding the platform." Glover also highlighted the value of Heroku’s Add-on program, noting the "extra features made available by Heroku and third-party vendors span the gamut of utilities…with more than 60 such add-ons, some of which are available at no additional cost, Heroku makes building integrated applications all the easier."

About InfoWorld

InfoWorld helps IT decision makers choose the right technology, within the context of a cohesive strategy for business impact at their organizations. InfoWorld identifies and promotes emerging technology segments that add unique value for the organizations that implement them, as well as the vendors that provide those solutions. Using an integrated communications approach including online, events, research, and a continued investment in the independent InfoWorld Test Center, InfoWorld analysts and editors provide hands-on analysis and evaluation, as well as expert commentary on issues surrounding emerging technologies and products. Visit InfoWorld at http://www.infoworld.com.

About International Data Group

International Data Group (IDG) is the world’s leading technology media, events, and research company. IDG’s online network includes more than 450 web sites spanning business technology, consumer technology, digital entertainment and video games worldwide. IDG also publishes more than 300 magazines and newspapers in 85 countries. IDG’s media brands include CIO, CSO, Computerworld, GamePro, InfoWorld, Macworld, Network World, and PC World. IDG’s lead-generation service, IDG Connect, matches technology companies with an audience of engaged, high-quality IT professionals, influencers, and decision makers. IDG is a leading producer of more than 750 technology-related events including Macworld Conference & Expo, LinuxWorld Conference & Expo, Entertainment for All Expo (E for All), DEMO, Storage Networking World, and IDC Directions. IDC, a subsidiary of IDG, is the premier global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events. More than 900 IDC analysts in more than 90 countries provide global, regional, and local expertise on technology and industry opportunities and trends.

Additional information about IDG, a privately held company, is available at http://www.idg.com.

About Heroku

San Francisco-based Heroku is the leading cloud application platform provider, offering a cloud PaaS service focused on ease of use, automation, and reliability. Heroku is a passionate and active supporter of modern computer languages and introduced the Polyglot Platform, currently supporting Ruby, Node.js, Scala, Clojure, Python, and Java technologies and cloud architectures. Hundreds of thousands of developers worldwide have deployed hundreds of thousands web applications to Heroku. Heroku was recently named #1 in Read Write Web’s List of Enterprise Cloud Apps and Services of 2011, following recognition by RWW as a ‘Best Products of 2009′ and ‘Best Platform of 2010. Heroku was named a Gartner ‘Cool Vendor in Application Platforms as a Service,’ recognized as an AlwaysOn Top 100 Private Companies, and selected by Dow Jones as a ‘Fast 50 Company.’ In 2011 San Francisco Business Times named Heroku #2 on its list of ‘Best Places to Work’ in the Bay Area. For more information, please visit http://heroku.com  and http://blog.heroku.com or follow Heroku on Twitter at http://twitter.com/heroku. Heroku is a wholly owned subsidiary of salesforce.com.

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

3M, ASG Software, CA Technologies, Capgemini, Cisco, Citrix, EMC, Gale Technologies, IBM, Jericho Systems, Morphlabs, Red Hat, SAP, Software AG, TELUS, and Others Collaborate on Standard for Deploying Interoperable Cloud Applications

The OASIS international consortium has launched a new open standards initiative to enhance the portability of cloud applications and services. The OASIS Topology and Orchestration Specification for Cloud Applications (TOSCA) Technical Committee will advance an interoperability standard that will make it easier to deploy cloud applications without vendor lock-in, while maintaining application requirements for security, governance, and compliance.

"IDC’s research shows cloud initiatives are top priorities for many enterprise IT teams," says Mary Johnston Turner, IDC Research Vice President, Enterprise Systems Management Software. "The goal of these cloud programs is to reduce costs and improve business agility by creating highly flexible IT environments that can quickly respond to changing business priorities. To date, however, most cloud implementations have been unable to easily migrate applications across heterogeneous public and private infrastructure resources. TOSCA’s aim is to enable broad cloud portability by providing an open standard to describe a complex application running on a complex environment. This is a critical missing link for customers that want to take full advantage of hybrid cloud architectures and the full range of available cloud services."

TOSCA will enable the interoperable description of application and infrastructure cloud services, the relationships between parts of the service, and the operational behavior of these services (e.g., deploy, patch, shutdown)–independent of the supplier creating the service, and any particular cloud provider or hosting technology. TOSCA will also make it possible for higher-level operational behavior to be associated with cloud infrastructure management.

"By improving service and application portability in a vendor-neutral ecosystem, TOSCA will streamline the migration of existing applications to the cloud as well as cloud-bursting," said Paul Lipton of CA Technologies, co-chair of the OASIS TOSCA Technical Committee. "It could also facilitate the evolution towards more dynamic, multi-cloud provider applications."

"TOSCA will be the first standard to describe IT services that go beyond infrastructure as a service. It will define service templates across *aaS layers, connecting them to the resource abstraction layer," added Simon Moser of IBM, who also co-chairs the TOSCA Committee.

An initial draft specification for TOSCA was jointly authored by Capgemini, CA Technologies, Cisco, Citrix, EMC, IBM, NetApp, PwC, Red Hat, SAP AG, Software AG, Virtunomic, and WSO2. This specification will be contributed to the OASIS TOSCA Technical Committee for further development and advancement within the open standards process.

"Similar to the advent of the World Wide Web, cloud computing is creating new possibilities and enabling more efficient, flexible, open and collaborative computing models," said Laurent Liscia, executive director, OASIS. "Having open standards around cloud will help achieve an IT environment with fewer boundaries, increase the speed of adoption and add a new level of flexibility. The beneficiaries of TOSCA will be consumers, developers and providers of cloud-based solutions."

Support for TOSCA

ASG
"Freedom of choice is part of ASG DNA. Being able to participate in the elaboration of the TOSCA standard is for us a fantastic opportunity to ensure our current and future customers take advantage of seamless interoperability of Cloud environments." –Pascal Vitoux, Senior VP, Development

CA Technologies
"With this effort, OASIS is breaking new ground with the first significant standard focused on the lifecycle of cloud applications and services across a wide range of infrastructure platforms. TOSCA shows great potential to facilitate higher levels of cloud application and service portability without vendor lock-in, which is what our customers need to achieve the full benefits of cloud computing." –Adam Famularo, General Manager, Enterprise and Cloud Solutions

Capgemini
"As one of the market leaders in SaaS and cloud computing, Capgemini is well versed in the chal-lenges of cloud computing. We are delighted to see the industry coming together to help drive standardisation and interoperability in the provisioning and management of next generation envi-ronments."–Steve Jones, Global Head of Master Data Management

Gale Technologies
"Gale Technologies applauds the creation of the TOSCA Technical Committee and looks forward to working with fellow committee members to advance the open standards that will facilitate out-of-the-box interoperability between cloud technologies. We fully expect that TOSCA will enable complex automation and orchestration between cloud applications, services, and infrastructure, and will ultimately accelerate the adoption of cloud technologies, which has been hampered thus far by the lack of open standards for interoperability." –James Thomason, CTO

IBM
"This effort is about helping organizations to extend their business leveraging model-driven Cloud Service Management – using open standards – to get the greatest benefits from cloud. TOSCA ena-bles standardized development, deployment and management of Cloud Services across develop-ment-, test-, acceptance- and production environments hosted on a single Cloud or multiple Clouds." –Gerd Breiter, IBM Distinguished Engineer

Morphlabs
"Cloud users today are making large investments migrating their businesses to the cloud, and, given our history and commitment to removing barriers to efficient computing, it’s exciting for Morphlabs to contribute expertise to the development of standards that will help extend our customer’s investment into the future." –Lee Thompson, CTO

Red Hat
"Red Hat’s ongoing work in the cloud is focused around providing powerful open cloud technolo-gies and enabling an ecosystem of developers, tools, scripts and applications that can interoperate across public and private clouds. TOSCA’s efforts to contribute to an open approach for cloud environments align well with our cloud goals, and we feel this organization will provide benefits for many enterprises looking to deploy open clouds today." –Scott Crenshaw, VP, Cloud Business Unit

SAP AG
"As one of the initial co-authors of the TOSCA input specification, SAP is pleased to see it advance towards industry standardization. SAP is committed to helping its customers run enterprise software on cloud infrastructures, and the TOSCA specification will enable customers to enjoy more cloud choices through easier portability between clouds." –Claus von Riegen, Program Director, Industry Standards and Open Source

Software AG
"Software AG has been closely involved at the forefront of leading industry standards, recognizing the need for interoperable and portable solutions for our customers. A standard and interoperable way to describe cloud applications, portable across disparate cloud providers, is essential for the success of cloud applications of the next generation and for smoother migration of existing applications to the cloud. As a co-author and co-submitter of the TOSCA specification to OASIS, we are happy to see the TC work launched successfully." –Hans-Christoph Rohland, Senior VP, R&D

TELUS
"With the ongoing propagation of ‘Cloud Computing’ and expected ubiquity of this paradigm, a standard mechanism for customers to avoid vendor lock-in and to be enabled to churn is in their best interest. A day may come when governments mandate ‘Cloud Portability’ in a similar fashion as telephone number portability of decades past. TELUS intends to take a proactive stance in pre-paring for the projected future mode of operations in this area." –Shane Logan, Director, Services Enablement

About OASIS:

OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) is a not-for-profit, international consortium that drives the development, convergence and adoption of open standards for the global information society. OASIS promotes industry consensus and produces worldwide standards for cloud computing, business transactions, security, privacy, SOA, the Smart Grid, content technologies, emergency management, and other applications. OASIS open standards offer the potential to lower cost, stimulate innovation, grow global markets, and protect the right of free choice of technology. OASIS members broadly represent the marketplace of public and private sector technology leaders, users, and influencers. The consortium has more than 5,000 participants representing over 600 organizations and individual members in 100 countries.
http://www.oasis-open.org

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

When: March 14-16

Where: Gaylord Palms, Orlando, Florida

Members of the media can register for the event by contacting Christy Pettey at christy.pettey@gartner.com.

For complete event details, please visit the Gartner Customer 360 Summit Web site at www.gartner.com/us/crm .

Details: Gartner Customer 360 Summit delivers complete coverage of the new strategies and technologies that are enabling organizations to better understand and engage their customers, build loyalty and grow the business.

In 2.5 days experience 50+ sessions focused on helping you deliver a world-class customer experience, integrate sales and marketing (new!) and use analytics to deepen relationships and drive growth. The event is designed to help CMOs,senior sales and marketing leaders and customer experience and services professionals, better leverage the latest technology developments to deliver more effective marketing and integration within the business units to deliver business value and greater ROMI.

Keynotes:

*Seth Godin, Best-Selling Author and Entrepreneur: Mr. Godin will focus on the realities of our post-industrial world and how ideas that spread win, that stories rule, not facts, and that remarkable products and services are the most profitable and most likely to succeed.

*Gartner Keynote: Top Trends for 2020: This session looks at the top trends that will impact sales, marketing, customer service, customer management and CRM professionals over the next eight years.

*Gartner Keynote: The New Role of CRM in the Age of the Empowered Customer: This panel of C-level executives, presented by the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council and Gartner, will discuss where and how innovation is being driven through better marketing and technology integration.

*Gartner Keynote: What to Do Monday: When attendees return from the Gartner Customer 360 Summit, they will have key project and priority decisions to make based on the information at this event. How should they consider and prioritize what to do next? This interactive keynote will help prepare the "to do list" for that first Monday back at the office.

Leading providers of customer relationship management (CRM) solutions will be exhibiting at the conference. A listing of current exhibitors is available in the Exhibitor Directory at http://www.gartner.com/technology/summits/na/customer-360/exhibitor-directory.jsp

Join the discussion on Twitter using #GartnerCRM.

About Gartner

Gartner, Inc.is the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company. Gartner delivers the technology-related insight necessary for its clients to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders in corporations and government agencies, to business leaders in high-tech and telecom enterprises and professional services firms, to technology investors, Gartner is a valuable partner to 60,000 clients in 11,500 distinct organizations. Through the resources of Gartner Research, Gartner Executive Programs, Gartner Consulting and Gartner Events, Gartner works with every client to research, analyze and interpret the business of IT within the context of their individual role. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, USA, and has 4,500 associates, including 1,250 research analysts and consultants, and clients in 85 countries. For more information, visit www.gartner.com

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

Pre-built Integration using Concur Connect Platform Delivers Single Entry, Compliant Expense Reporting

PLEASANTON, Calif.  — Veeva Systems introduces a new integration between Concur’s expense reporting system and Veeva CRM. Now, pharmaceutical sales representatives can simplify and streamline expense reporting using Veeva CRM as the single point of entry for call related expenses — a significant advantage considering the fact that most reps spend more than 70% of their time traveling for meetings with doctors across ever-growing territories. With such extensive travel and entertainment in a highly regulated industry, managing expenses and allocating each expense line item accurately is not only a huge administrative burden, but also a regulatory risk.

Concur’s cloud-based travel and expense management solution — used extensively within the pharmaceutical industry — enables reps to create, review and approve expense reports, as well as book and change travel itineraries. However, up until now, users had to do "double entry" — once in their CRM system and then again in their expense reporting system. With the new integration between Veeva CRM and Concur, users instead simply complete their call activity in Veeva CRM, and transactions flow seamlessly into Concur. Veeva’s latest product release also accurately aligns incurred expenses with the appropriate customer, simplifying compliance with Sunshine Act requirements.

"With the Concur Connect Platform, it’s quick and easy for application providers like Veeva to integrate their systems directly into Concur, yielding advantages for both the customer and the individual user," added Barry Padgett, EVP, Concur Connect Platform services at Concur. "Reps love the fact that they no longer have to do double entry and managers appreciate the efficiency. It’s a perfect example of the power of cloud computing and a smart marriage of two well-developed applications."

Brian Longo, senior director, Product Management, concluded "we are always looking for innovative ways to simplify our end user’s experience and reduce administrative tasks. The integration of Concur’s popular expense reporting application is a great way to leverage the strengths of both systems to enhance sales force effectiveness and operational efficiency."

About Concur

Concur is a leading provider of integrated travel and expense management solutions. Concur’s easy-to-use Web-based and mobile solutions help companies and their employees control costs and save time. Concur’s systems adapt to individual employee preferences and scale to meet the needs of companies from small to large.

About Veeva Systems

Veeva Systems is the leader in cloud-based business solutions for the global life sciences industry. Committed to innovation, product excellence and customer success, Veeva has over 100 customers, ranging from the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies to emerging biotechs. Founded in 2007, Veeva is a privately held company headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, with offices in Philadelphia, Barcelona, Paris, Beijing, Shanghai and Tokyo. For more information, visit www.veevasystems.com .

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

New patent from NewVoiceMedia will enable customer information to be gathered from the Internet in real-time

The call centre experience is set to become radically different as agents will soon be able to make use of real-time social media information as customer calls come in, following NewVoiceMedia’s recent award of a new UK patent. The patent, invented by NewVoiceMedia’s founder Richard Pickering, brings a regularly discussed concept to reality and discloses a technique in which caller data is used to execute a search query using internal data repositories and external resources such as Google or Microsoft Bing.  The subsequent results are then used to deliver targeted information to the receiving agent.

The recently granted Patent covers the integration of automated CLI information and IVR information to extract more personalised data about the caller.  The technology enables a search of internal data sources, partner sources, public services (Experian, Royal Mail) or the Web. Information is then prioritised and presented to the agent to support the call and allow a more meaningful and valuable interaction to take place.

Richard Pickering, founder of NewVoiceMedia, said: “This new patent award will soon enable us to integrate real-time search as part and parcel of our true cloud contact centre product, ContactWorld. This integration of search engine capabilities with existing contact centre technologies such as IVR and CRM databases will enable our customers’ agents to quickly access huge amounts of callers’ data from internal databases and the Internet.

“Since many major social networks are now accessible to search engines such as Google and Bing, recent social media comments from or about the calling customer could be used to identify potential issues and opportunities enabling agents to be one step ahead of the game and offer a truly unique customer experience.”

As NewVoiceMedia offers a true cloud experience to its customers, its product is multi-tenant meaning that any customer using ContactWorld will benefit from the added internet enabled search capability the moment it is made live. To make use of the technology, agents will just need a phone line and internet connection as no software needs to be downloaded and there’s no need for lengthy integration.

Jonathan Gale, CEO of NewVoiceMedia, added: “With social media on the rise, more consumers are taking a multichannel approach to communicating with businesses and with each other. Right now, this real-time information is blocked from the view of the contact centre agent, who is on the frontline of a consumer’s experience with a business. By making that information available and accessible to the agent, we are not only enabling them to become more effective but are also giving their customers an experience that they will not forget.”

Gale continues, “We want to enable our customers to deliver the very best customer experience simply and efficiently. Our true cloud approach to contact centres means we are able to develop and roll out innovative technology, such as this patent allows, to every single customer using our product. Being in the cloud gives us the scope to create and develop applications and functionality that our on-premise competitors are simply not able to do.”

About NewVoiceMedia

ContactWorld from NewVoiceMedia is an enterprise-class contact centre, delivered via true multi-tenant cloud architecture. Our customers benefit from fast, flexible and cost effective access to contact centre capabilities that would normally be very complicated, expensive and slow to acquire, integrate and use.

ContactWorld offers customers an incredibly rich suite of integrated call centre technologies. We leverage the cloud to provide complex data driven routing of calls so they are delivered to the correct agents. We provide them the technology and information to resolve more enquiries first time, resulting in a more rewarding interaction between agents and customers.

The ContactWorld platform provides a market leading 99.999% service availability SLA, and processes hundreds of millions of calls, for thousands of agents working across the globe. We have customers in 14 countries on 5 continents, including Berry Bros & Rudd, Long Tall Sally, QlikTech, Royal Mail, SHL Group and Parcelforce. For further information, please visit www.newvoicemedia.com

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

Analytics Add Power to Leading SaaS-Based Help Desk & Customer Support App

Dallas –TeamSupport.com (http://www.TeamSupport.com) – the popular provider of web-based customer support and help desk software solutions – today announced the addition of analytics powered by Zoho Reports. Using the collaborative tools, TeamSupport clients can easily filter, sort, view and analyze their business data. An intuitive drag-and-drop interface makes easy work of creating dashboards, graphs and reports to share with all, or selected team members.

Once the integration is set up, TeamSupport automatically updates Zoho Reports with Ticket data, Portal Logins, Chat Requests and Knowledge Base Traffic – all in near realtime. As a TeamSupport add-on, licenses—based on database size—are available directly through Zoho; a free version may be sufficient for the smaller TeamSupport account. Please visit TeamSupport.com for further information.

"Linking Zoho Reports to TeamSupport was an easy choice for us, as it complements our existing integration with their popular CRM software," said company CEO Robert C. Johnson. "Among our top goals at TeamSupport is providing our users with the best tools available to help make well informed business decisions; Zoho Reports definitely fits in that category."

Used by customer support and corporate help desks worldwide, TeamSupport is easily configured and customized; the application is offered in several reasonably priced, upgradeable versions. TeamSupport is scalable from a simple help-desk application to a 100+ seat enterprise-wide customer support and product defect tracking system.

About TeamSupport

TeamSupport.com is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dallas, TX-based Muroc Systems, Inc. (http://www.MurocSystems.com), a holding company focused on developing productivity enhancing software products delivered via the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model.

Copyright ® 2011 by CRM HELP DESK Software .com. All Rights Reserved.

More than 10,000 Companies Can Now Monitor and Respond to Facebook Wall Posts From Within Their Customer Support System

SAN FRANCISCO  — Zendesk, the proven cloud-based help desk software provider, today announced Zendesk for Facebook, enabling customer service teams to engage with their Facebook users from within Zendesk. This helps to ensure satisfaction even when customers choose to communicate with a company through social media.

"Communicating with customers via social media has created a fundamental shift in customer service," said Mikkel Svane, Zendesk’s CEO. "Studies have shown that even the biggest companies have an ad hoc approach to social media, resulting in unhappy customers. By having Facebook posts flow right into a company’s help desk software, support teams can engage immediately, helping to ensure greater customer satisfaction."

Social media has given the customer a very powerful voice. A public outcry through social channels over a company’s misstep can be devastating to a business due to the viral nature of these media. Companies need to keep a close eye on what customers are talking about so they can react swiftly before a situation that could have been easily fixed becomes a public relations disaster.

Now support teams can quickly respond to Facebook wall posts without ever having to leave the Zendesk interface where they spend their working hours. Zendesk for Facebook delivers a quick, easy way to boost support teams’ productivity, enable collaboration and improve responsiveness.

"A large group of our special needs community lives on Facebook, and we can now provide much more comprehensive support by monitoring and responding to their posts on our wall," said Sami Rahman, Co-Founder of SNAppsforKids. "Zendesk for Facebook has allowed us to serve more users more effectively than we ever could before. And best of all, we can focus on helping our members without needing to be too technical – we love it!"

Zendesk for Facebook is available now. Learn more at zendesk.com/facebook

About Zendesk

Zendesk is the leading provider of proven, cloud-based help desk software. For growing organizations, Zendesk is the fastest way to enable great customer service. More than 10,000 Zendesk customers, including Adobe, MSNBC, Sony, OpenTable and Groupon, trust Zendesk with their most valuable assets: their customers, partners, and employees. Founded in 2007, Zendesk is funded by Charles River Ventures, Benchmark Capital and Matrix Partners. Learn more at www.zendesk.com.