PGreenblog

Its 2008. SAP FINALLY Gets It. They Really, Really Do.....

I'm more than pleasantly surprised. Much more actually. As you know from my past "tough love" posts on SAP and their often dusty messaging, while I liked the company, I thought that they just didn't get "it." The "it" being the contemporary customer's approach to the world and the social changes going on that were affecting business in a rather dramatic way. In fact, one year ago at this time, I'd have to have said (and did) that most of large software - actually all large high tech - companies - were ignoring the changes and still trying to please the enterprise customer in ways that no longer made sense nor has an iota of reasonable excuse for continuing. But, I'm sitting here at Sapphire 2008 heading into day 2 after a very productive day 1, and not only hearing messaging at this conference that I think is on the money, but getting the anecdotal evidence I need to make me believe that this is more than messaging - that SAP seems committed to transforming itself down to its core culture - and has been proceeding to do so. Two things before I outline some of what I'm seeing here:

1. For those of you who don't know it. SAPPHIRE is SAP's annual conference, which for the last 3 (I think) years has been a joint effort of SAP and ASUG, their user group umbrella organization. This is a MASSIVE conference - with over 15,000 attendees - apparently stuck down here in Orlando FL for a few more years (too bad on that one) at the Orlando Convention Center. Which can handle the traffic. I just don't love Orlando.
2. My approach to figuring this all out is straightforward, I listen to the stuff said on the stage, then I go and talk to people and, ahem, eavesdrop on the more casual conversations that go on and watch and listen for the smaller things that indicate cultural and intellectual transformation. So, for example, if someone says, as Henning Kagermann, the CEO of SAP, did, that SAP is committed to a culture of co-development and co-innovation, then I go out and find the signs that they are by seeing what they are actually doing and hearing how people are talking

OK. Enough of the preliminaries. Now on to the meat (though there is a vegetarian alternative phrase if requested). I sat in on the morning Executive Session for Business Influencers (I have this nice ego-boosting black tag on my badge that says I'm one. Thank god someone believes that. I'll save the badge for when I need to remember) and one brief observations. Analysts wear far too much wool. Its hot here but about 80% of the audience were wearing suits. Yuck. The message that was presented yesterday morning at the Exec. session was claro. SAP is successful, growing and SAP is changing and meeting the requirements of that change. On the successful side, SAP's global market share was 32.6% with organic growth up 0.9% over the last year and growth of market share through acquisition 3.3%. They had some significant revenue growth too with total revenue for example in EMEA at 1,306,000,000 euros which is 21% year over year growth in that sector. I didn't manage to get the totals, but so what? You get the idea which is the idea of this number. The themes that were presented for their "as is" (as opposed to forward thinking) state were that they could handle complex systems by innovating quickly; they were people centric with the ability to develop ad hoc processes (I presume they meant here processes that were appropriate to the audiences and not pre-cut); and (KEY THEME) collaborative networks were their love and their neo-raison d'etre - which meant having relationships that provided and were provided insight and connecting people to share info so that those insights could be realized (though, admittedly, I find this a little abstract as a message though a great idea). Hennings Kagermann also made the point in his opening segment that they were making SAP enterprise apps along the line of CRM-SRM-SCM-PLM-ERP-and what is still unknown to me EhP/EhP (??????) easy to "consume" and available for continuous innovation without upgrade. Again not explained much but borne out later in conversations I had about it - though I intend to find out more later today on this if possible. They are going to have an announcement today about a new product, but I don't know if I should say anything since the announcement is today, not yesterday. Its interesting to me though and not CRM but something that I think needs to be talked about when it is released. John Schwartz, CEO of Business Objects, talked about what they are doing in merging with SAP and painted a rather rosy picture. He said BO had 45,000 customers and 6500 employees - pretty massive and made it seem that the merger and unification of the cultures was going just great, thank you very much. I'll choose to remain a skeptic since nothing of that magnitude has ever gone that smoothly but its not an area I care that much about really so warts, glitches, wind and fire will not be the subject of this. There was only a brief discussion of cloud computing which I would suggest to SAP they pay more than brief attention to with the Google-IBM and Google-salesforce.com alliances that have been announced in the last two weeks or so. Hennings K. mentioned that SAP is agnostic when it comes to cloud computing because they realize that not everyone is going to want the same thing and so SAP needs to be above the clouds (that's mine, not his. I take full responsibility for the bad pun). So that's the "as is" state of the company's cortex - what about the "to be" and "going forward" states?

Follow the Yellow Brick Road

There were three things they mentioned, much to my delighted surprise as their path going forward. They were:

• Co-innovation - That was specifically discussed with the recent RIM/SAP alliance to provide all of SAP's applications, starting with what might be a brilliant execution from what I saw of SAP CRM for the Blackberry. Driven by SVP of Mobility and Analytics Michael De La Cruz on the SAP side and a variety of folks on the RIM side including my good bud, Paul Briggs as the marketing guy for RIM in this effort, the application I saw was easily the most comprehensive and user friendly CRM application for the Blackberry bar none. I saw it in pre-production so I don't know how its going to play but even in that state it was fully integrated with the RIM alarm and calendar and contacts and accounts. In other words, the native Blackberry apps - which makes sense given that in the spirit of co-innovation, RIM actually developed the app for SAP - which is a marked departure, by the way, for BOTH companies in how they do things. That alone for those of us into the arcane machinations of company politics and culture - is important. But the idea of SAP doing it alone is seemingly not entirely a thing of the past but has become simply one of the approaches. While coopetition is not new, as old as 1990 or 1994 or something (a Novell guy wrote a book by that name), the idea of collaboration and co-development was never something that was culturally comfortable - apparently until now.
• Web 2.0 - what made this particularly interesting was not just the new use interface of SAP CRM 2007 which was I think the best looking interface and perhaps the most functionally useful and simple one I've ever seen in a large enterprise CRM application, but also the fact that SAP claimed that they were "living the Web 2.0" - which is the harbinger of their cultural change. Now, I treated that as a marketing claim until I had the ability to speak with some of the senior management at the conference (from CEO Hennings Kagermann - a really nice guy - to SVPS of varying title to VPs to some of the less senior) and I had the ability to listen in on some "ordinary" organic conversations - and I think they are being authentic. Or as we say on the street (yeah, Paulie, you're quite the street guy aren't you? Right.), they're real. Keep in mind, I'm a skeptic not by nature but by profession to some degree. But the level of interest and activity among a decidedly younger management and staff than I expected (given that I'd talked with several of them in the past) around Web 2.0 tools and the freedom to innovate which seems to have seized control over the last year or so or some more recent time period is amazing. They don't seem to always move as glacially as they did in the past though they still (as I can personally attest) have their icebergian moments. (yes, I made that word up. But you know what it means don't you?). They seem able to take an idea and incorporate it quickly into their thinking. For example, I had a meeting with one SVP who was pointing out to me (proving it, really) what they were going to do in future generations of their products around the social applications - which was on a more significant scale then I expected. I mentioned something that I thought they needed to consider, a lightbulb seemed to go off in his head and he then made serious note of it and I do think he'll follow up. None of that "traditional" SAP "we'll do it and you'll like it" approach that characterized the past. In multiple discussions with analysts from Gartner, Forrester, AMR and IDC, there was a universal agreement amongst them that there is something different about SAP as a company and all really like the new SAP CRM 2007 and the Blackberry implementation of SAP CRM out there besides. I'd like to think that while I certainly am naive enough to be made a fool of on occasion, these folks (about 6-8 of them) are far more seasoned and "foolproof" than me and they saw what I saw. SAP is living the Web 2.0 "philosophy" or whatever you call it and they are different than they were even a year ago. What's amazing is that I'm not sure what triggered it at all. But it's good.
• Analytics and Insight - Insight in particular was a word that was thrown out there a hundred times. Now, this is maybe the one glitch in the soft message. This is now a pillar of the trio of pillars because they acquired Business Objects and they have to do SOMETHING with it. Actually it seems to be a good acquisition but this is the one part that smacked a bit of self-aggrandizement. Its forgivable. Its their conference, for godssakes. What they emphasized here, though, was still a plus - the idea of providing real time analytics embedded across applications so that dynamic insights could be provided in real time.

  There is one piece of advice that I hope they take. I noticed that there was almost far too much consistency to the conversations about SAP product releases. So for example, in every discussion I heard or had, without exception, when it came to the discussion about the Blackberry CRM product, whether in a speech or on in a conversation, they all began the discussion with how people use the alarm on the Blackberry to wake up. EVERY-LAST-ONE-OF-THEM. Obviously everyone is well schooled in what the messages need to be around product, but it comes across as plastic which isn't good. A little messaging freedom might be nice.

  That's a niggling thing though by comparison to the sea change that SAP seems to have undergone. Look, maybe over the next several months, they'll break my heart and turn out to be what they used to but I don't think so. This one is here to stay.

  If I had to venture a guess as 2008 keeps moving inexorably to its end - I'd say that salesforce.com is going to be challenged by SAP and Oracle for CRM 2.0 leadership. Not expected at all, but welcomed. I'm not sure I'm right because my big caveat is that I haven't seen either Oracle or SAP new products in live customer environments over time and THAT is the final arbiter of success, culture change or not.

  As far as SAP goes, they've revitalized themselves and it seems unanimous among those I spoke with here - analysts, some customers, SAP staff members - that the change is deep and real.This is a far cry from what Microsoft did at Convergence at month ago to itself at this location and a far cry from what SAP did to itself a year ago in Orlando. But this time, SAP did good. Real good.

  Good for them.

A Few Items of Note Part Ten Million

Got an announcement, a request to everyone, a recommendation, and one thing I think is kinda cool.

The Announcement

I've been getting a fair amount of industry buzz for the Microsoft - salesforce.com configuration tool shoot out that I called for (and that Microsoft and salesforce.com) accepted. As a result, we've gathered up a great group of judges that I think can both be fair and know their stuff better and hold some sway all in all in the industry. You've probably heard of some and maybe not others, but the reality is that they all are knowledgeable, smart, and long standing experts in the industry. I tried to mix it up with technical folks and with business side folks so that all those who needed to be represented by judges were.

Without further ado, our judges:

• Denis Pombriant - for those of you who know him, you know him as the star analyst in the on demand world - not just CRM. He has a long and honored track record and is one of the most insightful and foresighted analysts in the business. Each year he issues his WizKids report (for 2008, go here) which gives exposure to up and coming companies in the world of on demand in particular though can extend beyond that certainly. He has his own blog and his own company, Beagle Research. YAY Denis.
• Brent Leary - if there is anyone who knows what small business needs when it comes to CRM, on demand technologies and Web 2.0 technologies, he is it. Brent is a popular radio/podcasting host, with his show, Technology for Business' Sake; a man who just simply "gets it" when it comes to how SMB and CRM work together. He and I are going to be partnered in the world class, super hot, awesomely spectacularly videocast,CRM Playaz by Summer 2008 which is easily going to be the best show on the Web for business - and where cool people want to hang out. That's because not only is Brent smart, he's cool.
• J. Bruce Daley - Having him on the team is just an outright honor. He is not only influential in the CRM and enterprise applications world, he is a serial entrepreneur and colorful quote in the major press when it comes to matters of software - and he is just a good man. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of Siebel Observer and now is the CEO of Test Common - a software testing company designed to hurry up the software development path. He knows from whence he speaks.
• Peter Churchill - Peter is the Director of CRM and Outreach Technology for the Center for American Progress - one of the smartest thinktanks in Washington D.C. - and one of the most influential. Peter is a CRM veteran, having been a CRM technical expert for the last at least 13 years. Because he brings, lets call it, a "wry sense of humor" to his work, he is a perfect person to judge this kind of contest because it needs an expert with some technical brilliance who can also laugh out loud. He is that man.
• Matt Witteman - Matt is the vice president of the CRM Practice at consulting firm, Customer Connect, based in Charlotte, NC. When I announced the shootout - before Microsoft and salesforce.com agreed - Matt stepped to the plate and said that his company, which is partnered with both companies was capable of doing the effort if that was the route I chose. While I chose the "get the parents to pony up" route, it occurred to me that what better judge than someone who knew both companies initimately. Matt, a clearly savvy guy, graciously agreed and that made me very happy.

That, folks is our judges panel for the shootout. Stay tuned for the next details. More coming.

The Recommendation

You know, I've been a reader of all the CRM sites that have been out there ranging from the venerable (Customerthink) to the upstart (InsideCRM - who I'll be writing a monthly column for starting in May). There are a good nearly dozen of them and I'll be straight. They all have value, they all have some good (and some bad) stuff on the sites but the reality is that the best of them is the most underserved and one of the least known in the U.S. That would be MyCustomer.com. MyCustomer.com has some of the best writing, the deepest content, the most engaging thinking that I've read. Its UK based and has a significant readership (I think that I've seen 80,000 as a number somewhere though I'm not sure of that). Its organized well, the content is forward thinking and cutting edge and still manages to be fair to the traditional forms that we deal with. They don't spare vendors their wrath - but only if they deserve some upside the head clubbing. They have strong opinions and state them. I mean, holy crap, they are just friggin' excellent!

I'm going to do an assessment of the CRM sites and their strengths and weaknesses (someone is welcome to do mine if they want.) in the near future - maybe even with a grade attached. I'll do it here and I'll do it as a list on my podcast, Experience on the Edge sometime in the coming weeks. But until then, make MyCustomer.com a daily stop on your reading route. They are the best out there - bar none.

The Request

Could you all put a link to this blog somewhere in your blogrolls please? I'm asking because I want to expand my reach and also I'm testing something. I would appreciate it a great deal. Really.

The Cool Thing

For those of you who don't know, the Kindle Reader is Amazon's e-reader that can wirelessly get books and subscriptions anytime and anywhere because its tied into Sprints EV-DO 3G network. It has been wildly popular - something akin to a small Wii-sellout - and is backordered for about 100 years or so - even though its really ugly. That said, there are 80,000 books that have been chosen out of Amazon's millions to be Kindle-ready e-books and I found out, by sheer accident, that CRM at the Speed of Light, 3rd Edition is one of them. Isn't that way cool (it is to me at least)? That's certainly a reason for you to go out, spend $399.00 plus shipping, wait about 5 years to get the backordered device and then order my book over the air for an additional $17.81 plus shipping, isn't it? Well, isn't it? Why aren't you saying anything........?

Bye.

Technorati : CRM at the Speed of Light, Center for American Progress, Microsoft, salesforce.com

The Weather Outside's Delightful: My Predictions Last Year Were Frightful

Okay, time for some truly sincere self-flagellation. I'm willing to impale myself on a stake by reviewing how utterly poorly I did on my forecast of a year ago - so here it is. I'm actually cutting and pasting it in without looking at it first so whatever I said and whatever I write about it isn't pre-scripted - so consider this I(trickling) stream of consciousness (barely) as I do it: (My new comments will be in red, though the green ratings are from last year and are my level of confidence which might be a new number this year: (Shattered)

Note that you'll see a number in color after the bullet and prior to the text. That's what I think my odds of being right are. (10) means I have total confidence that I'm going to be vindicated when this long trial is...I mean I'm going to be spot on when the year is done. (5) means, I'm right...no, I'm wrong...no, I'm right...no, I'm wrong...I'm.... (1) means I'm taking a really stupid shot here but ain't I brilliant if I turn out to be right? I'm the next Amazing Randy.

• (8) CRM 2.0 will become more than a buzzword in 2007 and the inexorable march toward the death of "traditional" a.k.a. "classic" - Coke, okay, CRM in 2008 will continue. This will be done through partnerships and alliances rather than home grown "pure" CRM products. However, there will be a marriage of the "social web" products and services with the CRM technology vendors partnering with the blog producers, wiki whackers and especially social networking softwares/services (or acquiring them) to provide a more useful collaborative experience for customers and partners/suppliers/vendors. The framework for CRM will finally change to the point that the old META definition of operational, collaborative, analytic will be put to rest once and for all. Watch for a new feature-function-business rules-technological architecture CRM 2.0 framework by 4th quarter of 2007. (OK. I was partially right about this. The social web products and services are now part of the CRM landscape but they were homegrown, not too much in the way of partners at all -as we saw with the Oracle OpenWorld and SAP announcements in December. Also, I would say that the framework, while dramatically advanced by the salesforce, Oracle, SAP, etc. platform push in 2007, is not done yet but technologically on its way. So, my head and heart were in the right place, but my feet and hands seemed to be where my hands and feet should have been. I'd call myself CLOSE ENOUGH)
  
• (5) The customer experience will be the defining characteristic of 2007 corporate strategy and the old CRM formulation of People-Process-Technology will be replaced by a focus around mapping customer interactions and providing the tools to enhance the customer's experience with the company. This is already a work in progress with companies like Disney Destinations changing their approach through changing their acronym from CRM - customer relationship management to CMR - customer managed relationships. However, this doesn't mean that PPT will be entirely replaced. It does mean it will be subsumed to new strategic formulations built around the customer experience and experience mapping and design will be a major component of contemporary corporate activity. That is presuming both the CRM world and the experience design worlds which currently co-exist, can get over their arrogant attitudes to each other. With CRM trying to stuff the experience design/mapping into a convenient CRM pothole and the experience design guys trying to poo-poo CRM entirely. Why don't both of you big babies get over it and just work together (C'mon people now, smile on your brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now...) (My waffling was entirely justified by this because while more and more companies recognized the value of the customer experience in shaping their business success as 95% of the respondents did in a CScape 2007 survey, only 38% of them were even mapping out the customer touchpoints AND traditional CRM software continued to sell at a record pace ($7.4 billion or thereabouts in 2007 according to Gartner), AND there was no discernible change in the relationship between the traditional CRM advocates and the CEM advocates, proving once again, humans can be stubborn a-holes when they want to be, despite the glories of the species. I'd call myself EH, SORTA RIGHT, SORTA WRONG on this one)
  
• (4) The 6Cs of the new customer will become the new business model that drives the era from 2007 beyond (if it were 2008, I'd make that a (7))
• 1. Collaborative - communities
  2. Contextual - Context driven advertising
  3. Content-driven - user generated content
  4. Connected - mobile & social networking
  5. Conversational - death of the 4Ps in marketing
  6. Creative - Co-creation of value
• What this means is that user generated content, experiential marketing, experiences as commodities and business as an aggregator of experiences that include products and services - among other things - will be more than just experimental but will break into the mainstream of both mindshare and market share. The Proctor & Gambles on the big boy enterprise side and the Threadlesses on the little guy disruptive side will become much more common than they have been. Because the customer is looking for it and wants it that way. AND it makes good business sense. (I think about 2/3 right on this. It certainly has broken into the mainstream of mindshare but I think that most companies are still wrestling with how to actually do something with what they know they should be doing. The impact of social media has been profound and the subject almost beaten to death in the business publications, the political world, and on that old school network TV news. But most companies still haven't figured it out - though about half of them have begun to do blogging according to most studies. A step in the direction. I'd say for me, PRETTY DAMNED CLOSE works)
• (7) As I mentioned earlier, I don't think that open source CRM will be a disruptive element in any way or set any bars. However, I think there will be some impact on the enterprise from the free CRM programs that are entirely web-based. Companies like Zoho who put on social networking tools like ZohoWiki and CRM tools that are functionally pretty decent like ZohoCRM, or Zimbra who have a collaboration suite that can be utilized online or through the salesforce.com AppExchange, will start to make some headway into the small business market since their price is nearly free or free. The reason for their increased access will be the vacating of the SMB market that I think we'll see in 2007 by salesforce.com, NetSuite and several other CRM vendors as they move upmarket and start scaling up to the enterprise level deployments that will put them in league with SAP, Oracle and even Microsoft. I don't think this will be much more than a trickle in the coming year because they don't have the buzz yet nor do they have the functional chops that the companies vacating the space have, but they do have enough value to grab a foothold in the SMB space. (I was right in that this year was a trickle. Zoho is going to make its bones in 2008 with the release of its business edition, I suspect, but actually there are a number of on demand and even on premise CRM applications and services that are moving in the SMB space like InfusionSoft and EBSuite who provide solid CRM functionality for small businesses that began to have an impact in 2007. The one thing I didn't see coming was that SugarCRM as an open source platform got interesting with the release of their 5.0 version and promises to be more interesting when they incorporate the social media tools - a different subject, still not disruptive, but a new value for open source CRM. I'd say NEARLY PERFECTO on this one)
• (7) Companies like Rearden Commerce will begin to show up on the horizon as service oriented architectures begin to blossom more fully and become the foundation of the bulk of the enterprise IT architectures over the next three or four years. 2007 is the year that the companies that provide business/prosumer services attached to their offerings will begin to become a niche unto themselves. Rearden will continue to own the space - especially in light of their deal with American Express. Rearden Commerce itself will have a breakout year as its deal with American Express begins to generate both market share and buzz like crazy. Also, it doesn't hurt that Rearden has the first fully realized SOA on the IT side of the house. First to market is HUGE for Rearden and 2007 is their year. (Right about SOA becoming the ubiquitous technological architecture - devoutly to be desired and actively pursued as the IT department architecture of choice. But not as right about Rearden Commerce. Did fine, wasn't so huge. I'd say PRETTY STRATEGICALLY COOL; BUT TACTICALLY DORKY for me on this one)

• (9) Social networking and other forms of 2.0 driven applications and services will be integrated with CRM and enterprise applications. But not as I originally thought - through building or acquiring the companies that make the assets. Instead we'll see partnerships and OEM relationships etc. between the social networking companies and particularly, the on demand vendors to integrate the functionality of social networking and user collaboration, especially with CRM vendors. The on demand vendors like salesforce.com & NetSuite in particular are best positioned to do this but I also see SAP being savvy enough to do this kind of collaboration, though if any one company would build their own, it would be SAP. This may portend something of a revival for Lotus Notes as a collaboration platform and toolset. Though maybe not. That's going to be up to IBM - who have good people at the Lotus helm, but have been terrible about their marketing and positioning of Notes. We all might be surprised - and not unhappily. (I must have done this on about an hour of sleep since this is awfully close to being the same entry as the first one. The only difference is that I said SAP might build their own and Lotus might surprise. Right, and not right, not wrong with that. What makes this entry all the more remarkable is that I gave the top entry an 8 and this one a 9! Wow. That shows you the value of forecasting. See CLOSE ENOUGH GIVEN THAT I WAS ASLEEP with the added two adjectival comments on SAP and Lotus as my result here)

• (2) Web 2.0 will finally get another name though 2.0 will remain the buzzword/cliche that drives us all to distraction when it comes to naming new technologies, applications, platform and ANYTHING that smacks of peer to peer. How about "the Social Web?" This works, n'est ce pas? After all, they have a name for Web 3.0 already - The Semantic Web - so why not 2.0? Come ON, papi. (Sadly, this one fully justified my 2 (dot oh). I was TOTALLY WRONG as Web 2.0 the Term 2.0 Continues 2.0 to Drive 2.0 Us 2.0 to Distraction 2.0)

• (7) I said this up top, so look to there for some of the rationale, but mobile CRM will become something to be reckoned with in 2007 with the Blackberry platform leading the way - especially as RIM continues to roll out successful Pearl-looking super-stylish phones that have their already heavy-duty and secure push functionality. Already significant numbers of vendors are developing mobile CRM applications/services and almost all are doing it for at least the Blackberry and then the Treo. (Pretty much CORRECTIMUNDO on this one with the caveat that I didn't see that the coming iPhone would be looked at as a business phone. To wit, SAP produces CRM for the Blackberry and the iPhone)

• (9) CRM and social customer related blogs, podcasts, and vlogs will continue to proliferate in 2007 in all kinds of interesting and unique ways that we have yet to "aha" about. This, despite Gartner's prediction that the blogosphere will level at 100,000,000. That's kind of a funny one actually. Because, what does it really matter whether it levels at 100,000,000 or 150,000,000 or 200,000,000? You or anyone you know gonna read most of them? Its a helluva lot of blogs no matter how you cut it and it also indicates the level of influence by sheer weight (not necessarily quality or originality) that the blogs carry. Speaking of which, there is a guy named Jesus Hoyos who runs a blog called "CRM En LatinoAmerica" that has a great listing of current CRM related blogs. Check it out here. This is the best compilation of CRM related blogs I've seen. The site is in Spanish and English but this is a universal set of links. (This one was easy. I was TOTALLY RIGHT. Interestingly, since last year, I've met Jesus Hoyos and he is amazing AND through BPT Partners, we are partnered with his organization Customers Forever - a Latin American consortium of CRM related companies, institutions and individuals)

• (25) I'm not going to predict "consolidation in the industry" since that's a cliche and consolidation in all industries is going to always go on. To predict "continued consolidation" is to predict "the sun will come up - tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar, that tomorrow, there'll be sun..." So screw it. I rank THAT one 25 on a scale of 10. (What can I say? Oracle alone makes this right every year. This year look at Cognos and Business Objects. Oh, that's right, you can't. They're IBM and SAP now, I forgot. This one is ALWAYS TOTALLY RIGHT)

So, all in all, not too shabby I don't think. I did better than I thought when I began cutting and pasting. So ruminate, comment, do your thing on this. Disagree and pound me into dust. Agree and make me feel like buttered cinnamon raisin toast or....something.

Next up: Number 3 of 4: The Analysts Forecast and I Either Agree or Mock Mercilessly.

Technorati : CRM, Forecast 2008, Web 2.0, customer relationship management, social media

Note that you'll see a number in color after the bullet and prior to the text. That's what I think my odds of being right are. (10) means I have total confidence that I'm going to be vindicated when this long trial is...I mean I'm going to be spot on when the year is done. (5) means, I'm right...no, I'm wrong...no, I'm right...no, I'm wrong...I'm.... (1) means I'm taking a really stupid shot here but ain't I brilliant if I turn out to be right? I'm the next Amazing Randy.

• (8) CRM 2.0 will become more than a buzzword in 2007 and the inexorable march toward the death of "traditional" a.k.a. "classic" - Coke, okay, CRM in 2008 will continue. This will be done through partnerships and alliances rather than home grown "pure" CRM products. However, there will be a marriage of the "social web" products and services with the CRM technology vendors partnering with the blog producers, wiki whackers and especially social networking softwares/services (or acquiring them) to provide a more useful collaborative experience for customers and partners/suppliers/vendors. The framework for CRM will finally change to the point that the old META definition of operational, collaborative, analytic will be put to rest once and for all. Watch for a new feature-function-business rules-technological architecture CRM 2.0 framework by 4th quarter of 2007. (OK. I was partially right about this. The social web products and services are now part of the CRM landscape but they were homegrown, not too much in the way of partners at all -as we saw with the Oracle OpenWorld and SAP announcements in December. Also, I would say that the framework, while dramatically advanced by the salesforce, Oracle, SAP, etc. platform push in 2007, is not done yet but technologically on its way. So, my head and heart were in the right place, but my feet and hands seemed to be where my hands and feet should have been. I'd call myself CLOSE ENOUGH)
  
• (5) The customer experience will be the defining characteristic of 2007 corporate strategy and the old CRM formulation of People-Process-Technology will be replaced by a focus around mapping customer interactions and providing the tools to enhance the customer's experience with the company. This is already a work in progress with companies like Disney Destinations changing their approach through changing their acronym from CRM - customer relationship management to CMR - customer managed relationships. However, this doesn't mean that PPT will be entirely replaced. It does mean it will be subsumed to new strategic formulations built around the customer experience and experience mapping and design will be a major component of contemporary corporate activity. That is presuming both the CRM world and the experience design worlds which currently co-exist, can get over their arrogant attitudes to each other. With CRM trying to stuff the experience design/mapping into a convenient CRM pothole and the experience design guys trying to poo-poo CRM entirely. Why don't both of you big babies get over it and just work together (C'mon people now, smile on your brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now...) (My waffling was entirely justified by this because while more and more companies recognized the value of the customer experience in shaping their business success as 95% of the respondents did in a CScape 2007 survey, only 38% of them were even mapping out the customer touchpoints AND traditional CRM software continued to sell at a record pace ($7.4 billion or thereabouts in 2007 according to Gartner), AND there was no discernible change in the relationship between the traditional CRM advocates and the CEM advocates, proving once again, humans can be stubborn a-holes when they want to be, despite the glories of the species. I'd call myself EH, SORTA RIGHT, SORTA WRONG on this one)
  
• (4) The 6Cs of the new customer will become the new business model that drives the era from 2007 beyond (if it were 2008, I'd make that a (7))
• 1. Collaborative - communities
  2. Contextual - Context driven advertising
  3. Content-driven - user generated content
  4. Connected - mobile & social networking
  5. Conversational - death of the 4Ps in marketing
  6. Creative - Co-creation of value
• What this means is that user generated content, experiential marketing, experiences as commodities and business as an aggregator of experiences that include products and services - among other things - will be more than just experimental but will break into the mainstream of both mindshare and market share. The Proctor & Gambles on the big boy enterprise side and the Threadlesses on the little guy disruptive side will become much more common than they have been. Because the customer is looking for it and wants it that way. AND it makes good business sense. (I think about 2/3 right on this. It certainly has broken into the mainstream of mindshare but I think that most companies are still wrestling with how to actually do something with what they know they should be doing. The impact of social media has been profound and the subject almost beaten to death in the business publications, the political world, and on that old school network TV news. But most companies still haven't figured it out - though about half of them have begun to do blogging according to most studies. A step in the direction. I'd say for me, PRETTY DAMNED CLOSE works)
• (7) As I mentioned earlier, I don't think that open source CRM will be a disruptive element in any way or set any bars. However, I think there will be some impact on the enterprise from the free CRM programs that are entirely web-based. Companies like Zoho who put on social networking tools like ZohoWiki and CRM tools that are functionally pretty decent like ZohoCRM, or Zimbra who have a collaboration suite that can be utilized online or through the salesforce.com AppExchange, will start to make some headway into the small business market since their price is nearly free or free. The reason for their increased access will be the vacating of the SMB market that I think we'll see in 2007 by salesforce.com, NetSuite and several other CRM vendors as they move upmarket and start scaling up to the enterprise level deployments that will put them in league with SAP, Oracle and even Microsoft. I don't think this will be much more than a trickle in the coming year because they don't have the buzz yet nor do they have the functional chops that the companies vacating the space have, but they do have enough value to grab a foothold in the SMB space. (I was right in that this year was a trickle. Zoho is going to make its bones in 2008 with the release of its business edition, I suspect, but actually there are a number of on demand and even on premise CRM applications and services that are moving in the SMB space like InfusionSoft and EBSuite who provide solid CRM functionality for small businesses that began to have an impact in 2007. The one thing I didn't see coming was that SugarCRM as an open source platform got interesting with the release of their 5.0 version and promises to be more interesting when they incorporate the social media tools - a different subject, still not disruptive, but a new value for open source CRM. I'd say NEARLY PERFECTO on this one)
• (7) Companies like Rearden Commerce will begin to show up on the horizon as service oriented architectures begin to blossom more fully and become the foundation of the bulk of the enterprise IT architectures over the next three or four years. 2007 is the year that the companies that provide business/prosumer services attached to their offerings will begin to become a niche unto themselves. Rearden will continue to own the space - especially in light of their deal with American Express. Rearden Commerce itself will have a breakout year as its deal with American Express begins to generate both market share and buzz like crazy. Also, it doesn't hurt that Rearden has the first fully realized SOA on the IT side of the house. First to market is HUGE for Rearden and 2007 is their year. (Right about SOA becoming the ubiquitous technological architecture - devoutly to be desired and actively pursued as the IT department architecture of choice. But not as right about Rearden Commerce. Did fine, wasn't so huge. I'd say PRETTY STRATEGICALLY COOL; BUT TACTICALLY DORKY for me on this one)

• (9) Social networking and other forms of 2.0 driven applications and services will be integrated with CRM and enterprise applications. But not as I originally thought - through building or acquiring the companies that make the assets. Instead we'll see partnerships and OEM relationships etc. between the social networking companies and particularly, the on demand vendors to integrate the functionality of social networking and user collaboration, especially with CRM vendors. The on demand vendors like salesforce.com & NetSuite in particular are best positioned to do this but I also see SAP being savvy enough to do this kind of collaboration, though if any one company would build their own, it would be SAP. This may portend something of a revival for Lotus Notes as a collaboration platform and toolset. Though maybe not. That's going to be up to IBM - who have good people at the Lotus helm, but have been terrible about their marketing and positioning of Notes. We all might be surprised - and not unhappily. (I must have done this on about an hour of sleep since this is awfully close to being the same entry as the first one. The only difference is that I said SAP might build their own and Lotus might surprise. Right, and not right, not wrong with that. What makes this entry all the more remarkable is that I gave the top entry an 8 and this one a 9! Wow. That shows you the value of forecasting. See CLOSE ENOUGH GIVEN THAT I WAS ASLEEP with the added two adjectival comments on SAP and Lotus as my result here)

• (2) Web 2.0 will finally get another name though 2.0 will remain the buzzword/cliche that drives us all to distraction when it comes to naming new technologies, applications, platform and ANYTHING that smacks of peer to peer. How about "the Social Web?" This works, n'est ce pas? After all, they have a name for Web 3.0 already - The Semantic Web - so why not 2.0? Come ON, papi. (Sadly, this one fully justified my 2 (dot oh). I was TOTALLY WRONG as Web 2.0 the Term 2.0 Continues 2.0 to Drive 2.0 Us 2.0 to Distraction 2.0)

• (7) I said this up top, so look to there for some of the rationale, but mobile CRM will become something to be reckoned with in 2007 with the Blackberry platform leading the way - especially as RIM continues to roll out successful Pearl-looking super-stylish phones that have their already heavy-duty and secure push functionality. Already significant numbers of vendors are developing mobile CRM applications/services and almost all are doing it for at least the Blackberry and then the Treo. (Pretty much CORRECTIMUNDO on this one with the caveat that I didn't see that the coming iPhone would be looked at as a business phone. To wit, SAP produces CRM for the Blackberry and the iPhone)

• (9) CRM and social customer related blogs, podcasts, and vlogs will continue to proliferate in 2007 in all kinds of interesting and unique ways that we have yet to "aha" about. This, despite Gartner's prediction that the blogosphere will level at 100,000,000. That's kind of a funny one actually. Because, what does it really matter whether it levels at 100,000,000 or 150,000,000 or 200,000,000? You or anyone you know gonna read most of them? Its a helluva lot of blogs no matter how you cut it and it also indicates the level of influence by sheer weight (not necessarily quality or originality) that the blogs carry. Speaking of which, there is a guy named Jesus Hoyos who runs a blog called "CRM En LatinoAmerica" that has a great listing of current CRM related blogs. Check it out here. This is the best compilation of CRM related blogs I've seen. The site is in Spanish and English but this is a universal set of links. (This one was easy. I was TOTALLY RIGHT. Interestingly, since last year, I've met Jesus Hoyos and he is amazing AND through BPT Partners, we are partnered with his organization Customers Forever - a Latin American consortium of CRM related companies, institutions and individuals)

• (25) I'm not going to predict "consolidation in the industry" since that's a cliche and consolidation in all industries is going to always go on. To predict "continued consolidation" is to predict "the sun will come up - tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar, that tomorrow, there'll be sun..." So screw it. I rank THAT one 25 on a scale of 10. (What can I say? Oracle alone makes this right every year. This year look at Cognos and Business Objects. Oh, that's right, you can't. They're IBM and SAP now, I forgot. This one is ALWAYS TOTALLY RIGHT)

So, all in all, not too shabby I don't think. I did better than I thought when I began cutting and pasting. So ruminate, comment, do your thing on this. Disagree and pound me into dust. Agree and make me feel like buttered cinnamon raisin toast or....something.

Next up: Number 3 of 4: The Analysts Forecast and I Either Agree or Mock Mercilessly.

The iPhone CRM Bakeoff: The Cookies are Good, But They Take a Long Time To Bake

I've got some preliminaries on the CRM iPhone bakeoff. For those of you with ADD or who really haven't paid that much attention for many a good reason I can even think of, a few weeks ago, I announced a "bakeoff" for iPhone CRM apps which for some reason proliferated quickly. At the time, I said I would review NetSuite, saleforce.com, Etelos, HEAP, and EBSuite. I decided in the course of it to not review salesforce.com because, to be fair, while they told me (and I believe them), that salesforce works on the iPhone, they, unlike the other four, didn't have version they specifically developed for the iPhone, so to review it in this bakeoff wouldn't be fair to the other entries. So I didn't.

That said, I will take a look at it but not in the context of the bakeoff.

Okay, here's the preliminary findings which I presume are no particular surprise. I've looked at NetSuite and Etelos so far so I'm going to give you the findings for them. Keep in mind, I'm not commenting on their general functionality here. I'm commenting on how well their iPhone specific versions worked - with the iPhone.

I have first tell you, both of them, and I suspect this will carry over with HEAP and EBSuite, are BEARS when EDGE is in play. Ain't their fault, its Apples and AT&T for hooking up with EDGE compatibility. It is PAINFULLY slow to use, even with the small amount of disturbingly limited functionality that Etelos has. With Wi-Fi working, though, its another ballgame. I wouldn't say its lightning fast but it works effectively and, most important, you aren't grinding your teeth or brushing them thoroughly while waiting for a screen to either refresh or come up. So, with the assumption that these things just ain't worth the agony with EDGE, but Wi-Fi advils away the pain, the bakeoff goes on.

I guess not surprisingly (though why I expected something different, I don't know) the functionality in both NetSuite and Etelos carries into their iPhone versions. Etelos functionality is as bad with the iPhone as it is with their CRM for Google app, and makes some strange choices for a CRM application (for Google - or anyone for that matter) like setting up roles for project manager and developer for a CRM (not a PLM) application. On the other hand, NetSuite is an end to end enterprise application that can compete with the on-premise giants for the completeness of its functionality for CRM and ERP and order management and....you get the picture.

So I was pleasantly surprised in the not-particularly-planned head to head that NetSuite was far less buggy than Etelos. Etelos crashed on me several times - just threw me out of Safari and I had to reload. NetSuite somehow got around this was was stable

For example, with Etelos, I got a message four separate times that I had too many screens open when I had one open beyond the one I was trying to open. This seemed somewhat random because I didn't get it other times in the exact same circumstance.

Never had that problem with NetSuite.

Aside from the EDGE problem which made NetSuite unusable with the iPhone, NetSuite's only problem is that its screens are so functionally rich that limiting the view to a 3.5" screen creates some navigation issues that are uncomfortable, if not insoluble. I used the iPhone "pinch" to expand screens far more frequently than I would have liked.

Both apps of course suffered from that other iPhone limitation, lack of security. Not much you can do when you can't guarantee the security of the data you are staring at when the phone itself is the limitation.

Frankly, using the iPhone for CRM on EDGE is probably not worth it unless the circumstances are dire - or soemthing akin to disastrous. Much as I love my iPhone and think its the coolest gadget I've ever owned and can actually use it for my mini-me business empire, you're far better off using the Blackberry CRM applications that are coded for the Blackberry itself. They are fast even on EDGE and even do the same things that - meaning that they are supposed to.

If you have LOTS of WiFi access, then NetSuite on the iPhone is clearly the way to go because its...well...NetSuite and its one of the best on demand applications on the market. Etelos just sucks whether its web-based or iPhone based. The child doesn't get too far from the mother here. They have a long way to go to prove that they should even be calling what they provide CRM - though, of course, they can if they want. But its up to you, whether you believe them or not.

Next up: EBSuite and HEAP for the iPhone. Will they transcend EDGE or fall off it?

Technorati : CRM, EBSuite, Etelos, HEAP, NetSuite, iPhone

It works

I'm writing this on my iphone using typepads new iphone mobile app. Its at i.typepad.com.

Singapore - See You There

Just a couple of things....

I'm heading off to Singapore today by way of Tokyo and will be there sometime tomorrow - actually closer to the day after. I'm speaking at an SAP "Sapphire-like" conference in Singapore twice - once to the CxOs at a luncheon - and then to the general body - on the new media stuff and will then be doing a similar presentation at the Prime Minister's Office the next day. Then back here.

When I get back, the CRM iPhone bakeoff will begin. Everyone seems to be onboard and assigning me accounts to get going. I'll keep you posted both from Singapore and when I get back.

Wish me luck.

    Technorati : Singapore, iPhone

The Big iPhone CRM Bakeoff

Got an announcement to make.

Since I love my iPhone (I DO. I really DO) and of course make my living and career choices related to CRM, I've decided to combine the two and do a complete CRM for the iPhone bakeoff. A competition and rating of EVERY CRM application that works on the iPhone and a somewhat detailed review of each of them and why they are good, bad, or need improvement.

Why do that? I'd love to say something about the new paradigm for mobile CRM and that would be right - though to be truly the case, Apple will have to increase the security and administrative controls for enterprise purposes - but it is a lot better a business device than their detractors say. The Kingstone Yankee and the NY Yankee Paul are in the same corner on its potential as a business device.

But the other reason. The iPhone is incredibly cool and once you use it, you will never want to go back to any other device - unless AT&T drives you off the wall which is VERY possible. That coolness for whatever reason, had CRM vendors jumping on the business bandwagon far more quickly than any other business "category," which makes my life VERY interesting, and if you're reading this blog, your life too.

So far, as much as I can tell, here's the ones I know exist and/or claim to. There will be no "for the iPhone" version thingee attached to the same, since I think you're all smart enough to assume that an iPhone CRM bakeoff is going to use the iPhone version.

1. NetSuite - I've asked Zach Nelson, the NetSuite CEO in the business for a demo account to test and he said that it would be done.
2. EBSuite (see my next blog entry) - they have an iPhone app and gave me a login but I'm having a little technical difficulty which won't count against them because I think its me
3. Etelos - This is the company that proclaimed CRM for Google. I have access through iphoneapps.com
4. HEAP CRM - same access as Etelos
5. Salesforce.com - Tien Tzuo, CSO of salesforce.com, says he's gotten salesforce.com to work on the iPhone so I'm going to set it up to see how well. I'll contact him today for the details on how to do that.

So far, I think that's it.

CRM vendors, if I'm leaving you out I apologize but it will be up to you to tell me of your CRM for the iPhone application/service and get it to me. I wish I could test ZohoCRM because Zoho has done such a GREAT job with iZoho, their personal productivity Office buster suite on the iPhone. It looks good and works good, but is not ZohoCRM so I can't count it here.

Let the games begin on that awesome interface.

Technorati : CRM, EBSuite, Etelos, HEAP, NetSuite, Salesforce.com, iPhone

NetSuite Stylin' - iPhone

Now that NetSuite has announced its IPO, and is heading into its "I have to keep my mouth shut right now" period, you would expect that the rest of their corporate senses would also be affected and not much original or new would be coming out of NetSuite during this necessary, but often boring to the industry and customers time frame.

But that just is NOT the case here. Instead, NetSuite just did something that adds an interesting wrinkle to the SaaS, enterprise applications, mobile and CRM markets.

That would be SuitePhone, the first truly substantial business application that will work on the iPhone. Sure we saw the announcements from Etelos, Heap, and Zoho. But Etelos is still feature poverty stricken, Heap is a minor player and Zoho focused on the personal productivity side (though what they have is pretty damned cool).

This is different. This one begins to put both the iPhone into the business realm, despite its oft-discussed lack of security and several business-unfriendly features (my least favorite - no way to delete emails more than one at a time). This also puts NetSuite in the position of:

1. Trumping salesforce.com who have mentioned they were preparing an iPhone version (I'll bet Marc B. has one by now.)
2. Being a very cool company making a smart move with a VERY hot product after an IPO announcement - can't beat that one.

Its not particularly surprising that the first instance of a substantial and important business application on the iPhone would come from NetSuite. When I spoke at their partner conference last October (right around the release of the formerly uber-cool Blackberry Pearl), I found out, much to my astonishment, that NetSuite and Apple have had a strategic partnership from the moment that NetSuite came into this world. I blabbed for quite awhile with the Apple dude there (Direct of Technical Operations I think) and found that NetSuite was Mac-compatible from the first release onward. So going to the iPhone first is not surprising, but a natural progression and kudos to Zach Nelson's and whoever else was involved at NetSuite in doing this one.

That said, I haven't tried it out yet but have spoken to NetSuite and they are setting up an NetSuite for the iPhone account for me to test it live.

What does it do you might ask, besides being an unutterably cool idea?

One of my favorite analysts, Sheryl Kingstone of the Yankee Group, pretty much feels the way that I do about the iPhone and NetSuite:

"The iPhone is one of the most gorgeous form factors to hit the market in a while and manipulation through an application is much easier using touch. What's nice about NetSuite here is that it's all one application; you don't have to worry about integrating separate parts. Also, it's SaaS so you don't have to worry about VPN access."

I suppose I didn't think about the VPN access actually, but I did think that NetSuite is providing its ERP, CRM and Ecommerce capabilities 100% native to the iPhone through Safari - and they are first and the "proof of concept" that a major application/service can be adopted to the iPhone and that the iPhone is a potentially capable business device.

Here's a couple of screenshots worth looking at.

Let Business 3.0 begin.

This one makes it into the 4th edition.

Technorati : NetSuite, iPhone, mobile, multitouch display

CRM Calling....

This is a quick one. Seems that there are some vendors already using the iPhone interface for CRM so I figured I show you some of the cool functionality out there.

Remember a few months ago, I trashed Etelos' CRM for Google because it was so functionally bad? Well, I can't fault them for their sense of either style or knowledge of what's hot. They released a version of their Google CRM for the iPhone. Here's a bit of a picture of what it looks like courtesy of their (Eric Berto's) blog.

I noticed after trolling their site for a bit, they've made some improvements to their SFA functionality since last March. Though I'm still reserving my judgement. Nonetheless, they are doing something very, very cool here and a bit tricky since providing business capabilities to a consumer phone isn't always hte easiest thing to do. I give them some kudos for the chops and getting out there with the iPhone not much after day one.

But, interestingly enough, they aren't the only ones who made it out.

HeapCRM did too. I don't claim to know much about HeapCRM. Like nothing. (My bad, given what I do). Seems to be mobile from the get go. If you look at the tabs across the top of the iPhone picture, their functionality seems reasonable - but that's on the surface so this is by no means an endorsement or even a nice thing. But they have a soon to be released iPhone interface too. Here's a picture of a bit of contact management. The only thing spectacular here is that its so nicely suited to the iPhone.

ZohoCRM isn't up there with the iPhone yet, but because they were one of my Steppin' Out finalists, I thought I'd show you what they have done with their "Office-like" applications and the iPhone. Some screenshots. CRM is just a matter of time for these guys. They are just so damned smart.

Finally, when it comes to other CRM related iPhone news, it's been reported that salesforce.com works on the iPhone in its native state. And we know that Marc Benioff is going to get one for himself. So, no "iPhoneforce" yet.

Yet.

Technorati : CRM, iPhone