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This story was originally published on June 3, 2010, and is brought to you today as part of our Best of ECT News series. ...

About the easiest way for companies to dip their toes into the social media waters is the blog. There are few technical burdens to setting them up, the time needed to create posts can flex with the workloads of the assigned writers, and they can become a conduit for customer conversations through the comments section ...

Social CRM has earned widespread appreciation as a real business tool. It's no longer an idea or a theory or a hunch. However, it's still a new idea, and many are approaching it with trepidation because its impact on the bottom line is not yet well understood. There are two reasons for that, and they're interconnected. ...

This story was originally published on May 19, 2010, and is brought to you today as part of our Best of ECT News series. ...

A funny thing happened to open source CRM over the last few years: It stopped being all about open source and started being about delivering CRM -- at least, for some vendors. ...

Customer service is being touted as a lot of things these days -- "the new marketing," "the new CRM," even "the new sales." That's all well and good, but many customers just wish customer service could be "the new, actually functional customer service." ...

This year, the CRM Evolution event was true to its name. The organization of the show reflected the way thinking about CRM has changed over the years, with a breakdown into three tracks: CRM, Social CRM and Deployment Strategies. ...

CRM is a complex thing. It involves understanding your customers and your own business -- two difficult things to fully grasp under any circumstances -- and then using technology to convert that understanding into a positive impact on your business. ...

It's well established that social CRM and the use of social media for sales and marketing purposes can be a difficult concept to fully grasp and integrate into business operations. That's because every business needs to understand its audience in order to put together a social strategy that makes sense for its unique circumstances. A one-size-fits-all template fits no one in the social era...

If you've ever implemented a CRM application or trained to use one, you've undoubtedly noticed that there are an awful lot of features that you never touch. Some just aren't useful for your circumstances or for your particular vertical industry segment; some are overkill; some are just attempts by your vendor to anticipate a need that never materializes...

The facts about today's customers are well established: They know more about your business than ever before, they're talking to their peers and to the wider public about you, they want to be communicated with through the channels of their choosing, and they desire to have a more partner-like relationship with your company ...

CRM and marketing systems are all geared toward getting people to buy. After all, the whole point of investing in these tools is to increase top-line revenue. At least, that's the argument we make to our bosses when we seek to implement them ...

The last two years have been rough for many sales and marketing departments: Head counts have been cut, goals have increased, and the emergence of technology has boosted expectations. ...

Building better relationships with customers is an ideal that's not limited to any one market, community, industry or even country. The basics are the same, for the most part; they involves collecting data and applying it where appropriate to drive sales and customer loyalty ...

Business software has long been described as "front office" and "back office," which essentially mirrors the arrangement of real-world processes within most businesses. That arrangement made sense in the past -- what went on within the business was usually shielded from the customer. ...

Adoption is truly the CRM killer. If your employees won't use your CRM system, your investment is an utter waste ...

By this point, most businesses understand that they exist in a new reality -- the reality that allows customers to communicate with them and with each other in new, faster and in a more pervasive way. Some businesses are actually doing something about it, too -- hence, the emergence of social CRM, social marketing, social service and a whole host of other social takes on key business functions...

CRM is not a technology; it's a discipline that encompasses people, processes and technology. How many times have you heard that truism? How many times have you heard it from a CRM vendor? ...

One of the great things about CRM is that it allows you to discover who your best customers are -- and not just who the best ones are on a regular basis, but who are best over time. Knowing this allows you to focus your sales and marketing efforts more precisely and ensure the loyalty of these customers over the long haul ...

When CRM first came into being -- before it was even an acronym -- it was intended as a way to streamline and organize some very basic and essential processes and data. Those underlying features are still there today, and we take them for granted ...