
Time to Drill Deeper
No, this is not an article about fracking, drilling for gas and oil in shale. This is about drilling down into big data. We’ve been using the term for a long time and it provides a useful metaphor for data analysis. But we’ve conditioned ourselves to think of drilling down only to a superficial degree […]

Customer Science
Part of my New Year routine has been ordering new business cards. In this electronic age they are the only things I actually print, and I’m a writer! Well, actually, in a few weeks I’ll publish a book, Solve for the Customer, in paperback, and the two are related. Printing cards requires a special diligence […]

New Year Thoughts
We are now through almost 15 years of the century and for all of that time I have been analyzing the CRM industry as it has evolved. This year, rather than simply reviewing some of the progress we made in the industry for the last 12 months, I think taking a broader view of the […]

Platform Native
The idea of an omnipotent software platform and the evolution of Customer Science go hand in hand. Customer Science is the upshot of my idea that we’re in the process of converting from random acts of CRM in the front office to a more structured, efficient, and predictable approach to conducting front office business. Platforms […]

Importance of the Journey Map
The journey map and the tools used to make one might be the sleeper part of CRM in the year or two in front of us. The reason is simple, journey maps enable you to figure out your processes and they are useful in much more than just marketing. Recently in this column I’ve discussed […]

More Front Office Science from Xactly
Xactly continues its pioneering ways by analyzing anonymous data collected by its customers in compensation management. If you aren’t familiar with the company or its groundbreaking market analysis, you might be in for a treat. Their appr oach is relatively simple but extremely powerful. With the permission of the data owners, Xactly strips out identifying […]

The State of Customer Science
Bluewolf, the consultancy that was founded to assist customers implementing and deploying Salesforce.com, has released its annual State of Salesforce report. The company started this practice a few years ago using MIT Sloan School of Management personnel to interview Salesforce customers and the methodology is tight. So what’s in the report? Just what you might […]

Platform Native
A number of Salesforce AppExchange partners including Apttus, Kenandy and ServiceMax formed an alliance called the Force United Consortium back in April but I hadn’t had the chance to talk to anyone about it. It’s a cool idea and a way to differentiate a partner that makes good use of the Salesforce1 Platform. I got […]

Dreamforce 2014: Announcements, Paradigm Shift, Crowds
Dreamforce has always been about many things happening at once — a three-ring circus in a good way. There are announcements about applications, platforms, philanthropy, entertainment and, importantly, parties. This year there was all of that and then some I was a guest with a ringside seat. Since most of the product announcements came out […]

Et Tu Symantec?
Just as we were trying to digest the HP announcement that it would cleave amoeba-like into two distinct entities, Symantec has announced the same intent. This also follows eBay’s announcement that it would spin off PayPal, so says the New York Times. And what do eBay and HP have in common? Meg Whitman. What’s going […]