Steve Jobs is on the case

March 31, 2008

The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs has caught on to the Benioff succeeding Ellison rumor. Check it out for some just in time for April fool’s day funniness.

Thanks to Todd for pointing this one out!

Written by Adam Killam · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

Ideas + Coffee = Mmm..mmm..good

March 31, 2008

Anshu Sharma wrote a nice piece on the latest corporate rollout of Salesforce.com’s Ideas platform by Starbucks.

Complete with witty metaphors relating to clouds and coffee Anshu gives us 3 solid take aways from the Starbucks rollout.

Focus on Innovation, not Infrastructure
Simple is Beautiful
Business Value

To see the explanation for each point above..visit Anshu’s blog here.

Written by Adam Killam · Filed Under SFBlogged

Hey buddy, psst, need a Call-Center? Step into my alley…

March 28, 2008

By Michael Cawston-Stewart

A few weeks ago I highlighted the new Salesforce integrated VOIP softphone from Broadsoft, and it seems this LiveOps offering is a match made in heaven.

Some of the features offered like click and drag call management and instant caller info would be of great benefit to call-center employees at the very least. How do I know this? Deep down my resume in the shadowy places I don’t like to talk about there’s a year of giving out trips to Vegas if you attend a meeting about timeshares.

Ouch, I think I just felt my credibility shrivel up and fall off.

Here’s the press release at the liveops site, everyone seems to just be quoting huge blocks of it anyway.

Written by admin · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

The dog digs Salesforce friends and family

March 28, 2008

By Michael Cawston-Stewart.

Beagle Research’s annual Wizkids Web 2.0 success-story awards have just been passed out for companies forging ahead in the fields of both excellence and doing what they do. I’m may be fairly cynical when it comes to industry based awards that only people within the industry would ever understand, you know, it’s like cutting out your own gold stars to give to yourself to tell yourself how great you are.

However, these seven companies listed in their annual .pdf are real achievers, and they haven’t been given this recognition without warrant. Icing on the cake? Six of the seven award-winning companies are Salesforce.com partners or made their start in the AppExchange network.

The post at CrmBuyer is here, Beagle Research is here and .pdf is here. (It’s a good read)

Written by admin · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

Benioff to make special announcements

March 26, 2008

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff has apparently scheduled an internal meeting with staff to make some important announcements next month on April the 14th.

I can’t wait to see the variety of stories that get cooked up over this one…

Written by admin · Filed Under Breaking News

Collective Media releases Salesforce.com integrated ad platform

March 25, 2008

Being a publisher of sorts I found this tidbit interesting: Collective Media has just released an ad platform that integrates with Salesforce.com. Apparently the platform “is tightly integrated with salesforce.com’s Salesforce application for sales pipeline data.”

From the official release:

“By making AMP available to publishers, we are really bucking the trend of technology companies turning into ad networks. We’re an ad network releasing a technology platform that gives publishers everything they need to create and manage their own network,” said Joe Apprendi, CEO of Collective Media.

See the official release here.

Personally, I’d like to learn more about the Salesforce integration as the release only touches on it. I will do some digging and let you know what I come up with. In the mean time, please toss and email my way if you know anyone at Collective who can give me a bit more detail.

Written by Adam Killam · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

Another Foremski rumor surfaces…

March 25, 2008

Tom Foremski is at it again, attempting to stoke the coals of the rumor he started a while back about Salesforce.com being sold to Oracle. In his latest post on Zdnet, Foremski discusses why he thinks Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff will eventually succeed Larry Ellison, Oracle’s CEO.

From Tom’s post:

“The more I look at it the more I’m convinced that Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com, will replace Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle when he retires.Of course, that would mean Oracle acquiring Salesforce, but Apple got back Steve Jobs when it acquired his Next corp. And I have heard from a very good source that earlier this year Salesforce had approached Oracle about a possible buyout at $75 per share, which would be a 50 per cent premium at the time, a reasonable premium.”

While I’m not a fan of tossing out rumors to generate hype, to Foremski’s credit the article is a good read and points out some interesting tidbits about Benioff’s relationship with Oracle and Ellison. Nothing we haven’t heard before of course but I also recommend a quick look see just so that when the time comes that something does happen (aka a buyout) down the road, you can look back at all the conjecture and have a laugh…

Continue reading over at Zdnet.

Written by Adam Killam · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

Business Analytics Deployment Strategy Research

March 24, 2008

Aberdeen Group is working on a study that focuses on the deployment of business intelligence tools and analytic applications. According to the survey introduction, “BI initiatives involve any undertaking that is targeted at improving a company’s awareness of the drivers affecting the business, and the desire to improve decisions and actions based on new understanding gained from exposure to previously unavailable business data.”

I think it would be interesting to get the input of salesforce.com customers and partners. If you’re considering deploying business analytics more broadly in your organization, take 10 minutes to fill out the survey and you’ll be sent the results when the research is published in May. Note that the survey wraps up this week.

Written by dcunningham · Filed Under Features

Salesforce: Protecting you from the next Andromeda Strain?

March 20, 2008

By Michael Cawston-Stewart.

BigMachines Inc. a provider of configuration and proposal software, has announced the completion of a project it was on with the eLogic Group to install the Configure, Price, Propose (CPP) solution for Particle Measuring Systems. The CPP implementation, led by eLogic Group has streamlined the front-end selling process and is fully integrated with Salesforce.com.

Particle Measuring Systems provides ultra-fine measuring tools and application solutions for semi-conductor, pharmaceutical, and microcontamination monitoring.

So when you’re thinking of throwing together the cleanroom for your underground lair, remember, Particle Measuring Systems has a salesforce-ready tool to help you decide exactly which airborne molecular contamination monitoring devices you really need, or whether an accuracy of 0.05 µm is really enough for your liquid particle counter accuracy needs.

Have a look at the press release here or Particle Measuring System’s selection of sci-fi geek friendly industrial-grade toys here.

Written by admin · Filed Under Salesforce.com News

Salesforce VOIP? C/o Broadsoft

March 20, 2008

By Michael Cawston-Stewart.

Sometimes this stuff is kind of like thick Amazonian jungle, I sit down to try and write a news piece and my English-savvy mind is overwhelmed and pummeled by swarms of buzzwords and have to machete my way though invent-a-words created by some marketing “guru” somewhere being paid more than he’s worth! Hot tip: Fire him, get a Salesforcie on your side.

Anyway the gist of this story is that this company Broadsoft (http://www.broadsoft.com/) which is actually a deceptively large company who happily sells it’s services to be private-labelled elsewhere in the world is offering a VOIP softphone hook-in called BroadForce Xtended (which sounds like a marital aid to me) for Salesforce. What does this mean for you and me? Well, your client lists? Direct-dial straight from it, add your notes on the fly, record the length of the call, probably a plethora of other features, I mean the whole shebang. Just one more thing automated to make that client management that much easier.

To read more, have a look here or here.

Written by admin · Filed Under Salesforce.com News