CRM News Feed

Before some recent changes, contact lens wearers who dialed 1-800 Contacts to fill prescriptions often reached call center agents overly focused on making a sale. But business intelligence data pointed to a more prudent strategy: Agents should aim to maximize customer satisfaction by helping with physician follow-ups and making other moves that would lead to long-term increases in sales. More than 150,000 customers hit 1-800 Contacts’ Web site or call centers each week.

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When Oracle bought Berkeley DB provider Sleepycat Software early this year, some feared the open source database maker’s product — and the entire open source database market — might be at risk. Now, however, Oracle is winning praise for a hands-off approach that has resulted in its first update to the database, Berkeley DB v4.5, made available this week. Oracle is touting improved performance, availability and ease-of-use for both commercial and open source software developers.

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Lyris Technologies said China-based Alibaba will use its e-mail marketing solution to handle messaging to both Chinese and international members who use the site to import and export goods. Alibaba, the largest e-commerce company operating in China today, will use ListManager to manage its communications with members who live in 200 countries and territories around the world, according to Lyris. The e-commerce site gets a half-million visitors per day, many of them global merchants looking to find trading partners inside China.

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Louis Burns, vice president and general manager of Intel’s digital health group, on Wednesday demonstrated a mobile point-of-care platform designed specifically to help the healthcare industry deliver better services at lower cost. Intel’s mobile clinical assistant platform — the outcome of hospital workflow studies, nurse and physician interviews, and ethnographic research — focuses on the needs of healthcare providers to enhance patient safety, reduce medication-dispensing errors and ease staff workloads.

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Delphi said it has struck deals with two of the world’s biggest providers of outsourcing services to shift its information-technology operations to them, a move that will shrink the company’s global roster of IT suppliers by 90 percent. The automobile parts company, which has spent the last year in Chapter 11 reorganization, said in papers filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan that it reached deals with Electronic Data Systems and Hewlett-Packard involving an “accelerated consolidation and outsourcing” of its IT functions.

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An easier way to get the latest news

Most stock investing Web sites and news sites offer RSS feeds that you can subscribe to in order to get the latest information. Many companies are beginning to offer RSS feeds to their stockholders as well. This can make your research easier, as instead of check several stock investing news Web sites you can have the latest headlines delivered to and organized on your desktop.

See Also

• Better Stock Investing Research
  Use RSS technology to stay on top of your stock investments

Smart marketers can make use of nearly anything

One smart marketing idea that will cost you practically nothing is to turn your invoices into marketing tools. This can be done by adding your slogan to the bottom, or by making sure that your company name, Web address and other information is included prominently on the invoice.

Sweetening the deal

But the invoice can also serve as a vehicle for other marketing tools. Include a coupon with the invoice, or a short message about a special promotion your company is having. You can also write a handwritten note, thanking the customer for being such a good customer, and offering a discount on the next order.

See Also

• Smart Marketing Ideas
  Becoming a smart marketer

Preconstruction real estate investment can be profitable

Preconstruction real estate investing consists of purchasing properties that are at an early stage of construction. Often, these investment properties are townhouses or condos. Because they are purchased at such an eary stage of construction, they are less expensive. And, even though you may have to take on the remainder of the construction costs, you can still make a tidy profit on the units when you sell them later.

Don’t forget once your e-commerce business Web site to let people know about it

When you get your e-commerce Web site put together, it is important that you let people know about it. Marketing your e-commerce business Web site is an important part of making sure that you get customers to buy your products and services. You can let people know about your Web site by putting your Web address on everything:

• Invoices
• Print and TV ads
• Business cards
• Letterhead
• Email signature
• Discussion board signature
• Novelty advertising items (pens, mugs, etc.)

See Also

• Better E-commerce Business
  Marketing your e-commerce Web site

As a rule, manufacturers have been blissfully unconcerned with some of the finer points of CRM functionality and process. This is not to say they are indifferent to their customers’ needs. Rather, the low adoption rates of CRM technology in this sector have been more reflective of manufacturers’ business operations, which traditionally have not required much input from customers beyond their initial specifications. Indeed, until recently, most manufacturing operations could not respond to last minute changes in customer demands or requirements.

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