
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 […]

Workday Rising: Speak softly and carry big, happy customers
Howard Street in San Francisco on Tuesday morning looked different. The tarmac was visible and cars were actually using it. Outside Moscone Center, a local folk rock band, Blind Willies was playing. Excellent, but nowhere near the brand recognition of say, Aerosmtih or Will.i.am. Inside Moscone, the rooms had plenty of empty seats. Welcome to […]

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 […]

Dreaming of the next generation of clouds
Dreamforce this week had an even more festive feel than ever. Pennant fever gripped the town as the Giants played October ball. The Beach Boys sounded as youthful as ever during Benioff’s keynote. The many school kids invited in the keynote audience and Hillary Clinton’s talk of babies provided an even more youthful and optimistic […]

Technology for Good – episode thirty four with Salesforce’s John Tascheck
Welcome to episode thirty four of the Technology for Good hangout. In this week’s episode our guest was SalesForce SVP of Strategy, John Taschek. John and I are both longtime members of the Enterprise Irregulars, but this was the first time John and I had had a conversation outside of email! Some of the more […]

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 […]
Dreamforce 2014: Converging on cloud, apps, mobile, analytics, and community
The vision Salesforce has for market-facing engagement is the right one: Tear down data, app, and user experience silos between marketing, sales, operations, and support. But does their cloud measure up to this vision yet?

Salesforce and the New Bucket of Bits. Phoenix, Ashes.
When Salesforce.com and Oracle announced a renewal of their vows last year I was kind of surprised. Why would Salesforce deepen its reliance on the Oracle database at a time when others across the industry were lessening their reliance on that venerable and not inexpensive platform. To be fair Oracle database has excellent high availability […]

Dreamforce 14: Live Blogging the Benioff Keynote #df14
The enormous crowd here is streaming into the main keynote with Marc Benioff here at Moscone Center on Tuesday. it’s nearly 1pm PT and the main hall is filing up quickly. I’ll live blog the event here as much as possible given that the Ethernet for industry analysts isn’t working, but the private Wifi is, […]