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Yahoo, Google Eye More Microsoft Turf
Internet giants Yahoo Inc. and Google Inc. are making new pushes into Microsoft Corp.'s turf, with Web-based offerings such as email and presentation applications that encroach on Microsoft's traditional business and product strongholds. Yahoo announced an agreement to pay $350 million in cash and stock to buy closely-held Zimbra Inc., a maker of software used for Web-based email by over 1,300 organizations such as universities, Internet service providers and small- and mid-sized businesses. Yahoo says that deal is aimed at increasing its bet on email -- an area where it already has 250 million Yahoo Mail users -- by extending into the university and business markets Zimbra addresses.

Google separately plans to release its Web-based presentation application, which will compete with Microsoft's PowerPoint software. The service, whose arrival Google had announced earlier this year, is part of its growing suite of Web-based productivity applications, which also includes email, calendar, word processing and spreadsheet applications. Like Yahoo, Google itself is aggressively going after the market for Web-based email and other applications with free and fee-based services to customers, including universities and small and midsize businesses.
Source: WSJ

LiveTime ITIL Service Management Suite Adds Web 2.0 Features
LiveTime Software, a provider of ITIL certified Service Management and Help Desk software, announced its LiveTime Service Manager v5 and LiveTime Help Desk v5. With over 100 new features including Ajax-based, Web 2.0 interactivity, LiveTime Software raises the standard for ITIL Service Management with improved performance, and the interactivity of a rich internet browser application (RIA) powered by J2EE and advanced Web Services. LiveTime Service Manager 5 continues to provide tight integration between ITIL certified Incident, Problem, Change, Configuration and Service Level Management processes, while leveraging web services to provide integration interfaces to external systems such as Authentication Servers and Asset Management systems.

Pharmaceutical Services Provider Selects eGain OnDemand
eGain Communications Corporation, a provider of customer service and contact center software for in-house or on-demand SaaS deployment, announced that one of the nation's largest prescription management and pharmaceutical services companies has chosen eGain OnDemand, the hosted version of eGain Service suite, to deliver proactive, cross-lifecycle customer service to millions of participants. The company will implement an eGain-powered multichannel customer interaction hub (CIH), starting with eGain Notify for outbound 1on1 notifications through secure email, SMS, and voice, followed by other eGain applications.

Autonomy etalk Offers Hosted Archiving For Contact Center Recordings
Autonomy Corporation, a provider of infrastructure software for the enterprise, announced that its contact center clients can now take advantage of an off-site hosted archiving solution for storing, managing, and retrieving their critical customer call recordings. This solution provides customers with a secure storage environment and direct access to their contact center audio files, enabling them to effectively meet regulatory compliance and eDiscovery requirements. The hosting center provides an unlimited amount of hosting space, supplying companies a scalable site to archive, search, and retrieve voice and screen recordings.

LANDesk Announces Release of Service Desk 7.2
LANDesk Software, an IT service management solutions provider, announced the release of LANDesk(R) Service Desk 7.2, which features a number of enhancements and performance improvements that deliver enterprise-level service desk capabilities. LANDesk Service Desk is available as a stand-alone service delivery solution, or combined with LANDesk(R) Management Suite and LANDesk(R) Security Suite. The new solution includes built-in processes for ITIL service desk, incident management, change management, problem management and service level management to enable users to efficiently direct the life cycle of the services delivered by IT.

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Study on Customer Loyalty Reveals Employees Are the Most Critical Customer Service Asset
Organizations that have excited and passionate people are more likely to create a service-focused culture that delivers great customer service. And having a customer-focused workforce means that organizations must treat their people well so they, in turn, will treat their customers well. Employees are in fact an organization’s most critical customer service asset -- one that requires focused development and nurturing. These “sound-simple-but-difficult-to do” revelations are among the findings from a recent customer loyalty and service improvement survey conducted by The Ken Blanchard Companies.

Most participating organizations agree that customer loyalty is a powerful driver of organizational success and one that ties directly to the bottom line. Statistics show that it can cost six to seven times more to gain a new customer than to retain an existing one. Expenses related to customer losses cause many companies to recognize the need to channel resources toward retention. In fact, survey data shows that 74% of respondents declared that their organizations were highly focused on customer service improvement. However, only 44% indicated that their organization had a formal process for achieving these desired service improvements.

While respondents cited that serving the customer is everyone’s responsibility, they agreed that leaders and customer-facing employees have the primary ownership for creating a positive customer experience. Yet only 48% responded that their customer-facing employees are truly empowered to take action to resolve a negative customer experience.

Respondents stated further that customer-facing employees and leaders should be the primary recipients of training. This is supported by Blanchard survey data in which respondents cited training as the number one strategy for improving service, followed closely by making an organizational commitment to create a service culture.

The findings from the customer loyalty survey support earlier Blanchard research which documented that there is a direct connection between leadership, employee passion, and customer devotion. That is, the way that leaders treat employees is the way that employees will treat the customer.

When organizations create an environment that allows employees to win and be passionate about what they do, employees in turn take care of the customers at a level that causes customers to return year after year. Strategies such as smart hiring, training, managing performance, and creating a recognition culture can help organizations’ develop their most critical customer service asset -- their people.

For more information, download “The Key to Customer Loyalty” and “The Leadership-Profit Chain”.

The Future of Global Contact Centers
The growing contact center market continues to proffer new revenue potential for vendors in emerging and established markets. However, as developed markets begin to mature, effectively enhancing the strategic identification and exploitation of opportunities will become a requisite core competency for successful growth sustainability, according to new research from Business Insight.

Some key findings from this report:

• Over 800,000 hosted AP's will exist globally by 2010.
• Contact center outsourcing deployments in mature vertical markets will rise from 0.87 to 1.25 million APs during the period 2006-12, although annual growth will fall by 8% in the same interval.
• Remote (virtual) workers represent a significant expansion in contact center functionality, despite only constituting a small percentage of APs, encompassing 354,000 workers in 2007.
• The Indian contact center market is suffering a decline in annual growth, falling by 30% between 2005 and 2009, due to the maturing market and increased competition from offshore locations.
• The public sector is the fastest growing global vertical market;
• APs in Central and Eastern Europe are set to grow by 71% to 308,800 between 2004 and 2009 with this growth driven by offshoring and outsourcing.

More...

Survey: A third of IT projects exceed budget
A third of IT projects carried out in the private sector runs between 10 and 20 percent over the original budget, according to a survey. And one in four projects costs 50 percent more than it was expected to, according to the survey of 100 chief information officers, which also found that the typical large company is running 29 projects at any one time.

According to the research, sponsored by software management company CA, the main reasons for overspending include poor forecasting, increases in project scope, and issues of interdependencies and conflicts between multiple projects.

It said this isn't helped by the lack of visibility and control chief information officers have over their project portfolios -- 39 percent of IT directors do not have clear visibility of projects and so do not know when they are close to running over budget.

CA said the survey shows that chief information officers are still principally being judged on whether they deliver within budget rather than whether they deliver strategic value to the business.

Staffing is also an issue, with highly skilled workers being assigned tasks off-the-cuff rather than being strategically placed where they would be most effective, according to the survey.

More...

If your company has ever considered offering SLAs but has been concerned with the potential downside of increased customer expectations, consider the impact of not managing these expectations. When left to their own devices customers will set their own expectations for a reasonable level of service. Failure to meet these expectations is the leading cause of customer dissatisfaction. When you do not take a proactive role in setting expectations you are at the mercy of customer expectations for which you have had no role in influencing. SLAs are not only beneficial for managing customer expectations, they are also an important vehicle for communicating the value of service.
Full Article...

Ongoing Training Makes the Difference
If your telephone agents are the glue that drives performance in the call center, how did they become that way? Sure, natural talent is always a factor, as is terrific candidate recruiting and excellent hiring. But, more than likely, the performance of your call center agents hinges on the training department—from new hire training when agents first learn about your products and services to ongoing training where skills are refined and accentuated. It’s your training department and your systems that will keep your telephone performance thirty or forty percent above minimum goals.
Full Article...

How to Measure Real Outsourcing Success
"There's a lot of pain around outsourcing deals," admits Dr. Paul Roehrig, a senior analyst with Forrester. The situation in the $120 billion-a-year IT services market isn't quite as dire as some would have you believe, says Roehrig. About 57 percent of IT buyers are somewhat satisfied with their primary outsourcer and 22 percent are very satisfied, according to Forrester's research. But that leaves more than 20 percent indicating it could be better. That's why Roehrig advocates regular checkups on outsourcing deal health. And that doesn't just mean looking at performance against service-level agreements (SLAs) or price benchmarking.
Full Article...

10 Green Technologies That Could Change Your Life
Talk to regular folks about energy prices or climate change and you'll hear it: an unshakable conviction that technology will solve all our problems. Scientists and venture capitalists are chasing these dreams, too, since enormous riches will flow to the company that invents a revolutionary new battery or ultra-efficient solar panel. Yet for every mention of some far-off miraculous solution, there are scores of emerging green technologies that work today and are already lowering energy consumption, reducing materials use, and cutting costs for businesses and consumers alike. Here are 10 technologies, business processes, and financial innovations that are ready (or nearly ready) and will have an impact.
Full Article...

Good Service Means I'll Be Back
WIt's common sense, but now a survey quantifies it: A bad experience with a salesclerk is the biggest reason a shopper stops shopping at a store. According to the study, being unable to find a store clerk causes retailers to lose about 6% of their business. Being ignored by salesclerks drives away 3% of shoppers. The bottom line is that shopping isn't so much about buying a shirt or washing machine or a can of paint, it's about the experience.
Full Article...

Award-Winning Customer Service: 101 Ways to Guarantee Great Performance
by Renee Evenson

Delivering top-of-the-line customer service is Job #1 for most companies, an important factor in keeping profits high and customers coming back. Customer service problems can damage not just a company’s reputation but its bottom line, so for busy managers -- and business owners with little time to search for solutions -- some fast help is needed.

Containing 101 effective tips in all, unique "When this happens, try this" sections, and encouraging quotes, this is an essential reference for anyone who needs guidance or just a refresher on making customers feel truly valued.

More Info...

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