What SMEs cannot do without..........

As per the Latest SME Buzz in Economic Times, Top 10 disciplines that SMEs cannot do without include-
1. Customer Relationship Management
Tools that companies use to interact with customers which includes Marketing, Employee training and special purpose CRM software.
2. Knowledge Management Tools
Tools for managing knowledge in organisations for supporting , creation, capture, storage and dissemination of information to enable employees to have ready access to organisation's documented base of facts, sources of information and solutions.
3. Enterprise Resource Planning
Systems which are intended to manage all the information and functions of a business or company from shared data stores.
4. Online Collaboration Tools
5. Information Security
6. Social Networking
7. Payroll management tools
8. Search Engine optimisation
and many more........

IIM-A incubator iAccelerator accepting applications for 2010 edition

I post an excerpt of the mail sent to me by the program manager of iaccelerator 2010 from IIM-AMD requesting me to host this information on my blog.

"iAccelerator is an incubator of internet & mobile startups in India.
We’re looking for brilliant individuals and teams who want to make a
dent in the universe and do so profitably. Our incubation programme
runs from June 1st to August 1st this year. The deadline
for our 2010 edition is April 10th.

Karam Lakshman
Program Manager, iAccelerator
karaml@iimahd.ernet.in
iaccelerator.org"

The Gartner Hype Cycle for emerging technologies, 2009

As per the Gartner Hype Cycle for Emerging technologies, 2009, corporate blogging is inching up towards mainstream adoption.This is an improvement as against the Gartner Hype Cycle...2008.This has been an improvement from the Gartner report, 2008, as Corporate Blogging moves up from the Trough of disillusionment to the slope of enlightenment. Cloud computing and E-book Readers top this year's Peak of Inflated Expectations.

237 individuals come together for a noble cause

Early this year, 237 bloggers from the marketing, research and associated streams, from 15 countries across the world decided to partcipate in a collaborative venture called the 'Age of Conversation 2' to raise money for Variety, the children's charity. All proceeds from sales of the book, available in hardcover and softcover editions, as well as a downloadable e-book, will be donated to Variety, the international children’s charity.

My chapter in AOC 2 on "Interactivity in the digital age" talks about improving the interactivity of an online marketing communication tool for better brand communication. The thoughts included in the chapter are based on my research paper: "Improving Corporate Blog Interactivity for increased brand communication" which can be downloaded from the research library at Customerthink-the global thought leader in customer-centric business strategy.

The primary thought behind the book-

The marketing industry is abuzz about how citizen marketers are changing the landscape, and these books capture that new phenomenon from a uniquely global vantage point.

The Age of Conversation 2 is available as a downloadable e-book, at a cost of $12 and a limited number of printed books in hardcover for $29.95, and softcover for$19.95.

Purchases can be made online at lulu.com. More information can be seen online at the Age of Conversation.

Keywords and content attractiveness

Having the right keywords for your blog-

Keywords are words you need to have on your blog that search engines look for as they crawl through your site, helping them categorize your blog’s content. They obviously are also the words people type into a search engine and need to be on a blog to help it appear in the search results.

That's the premise of internet marketing.......

As I sprinkled the right keywords, through a set of posts on my blog to aid categorisation, a post on the 4 C's of marketing, placed over 15 months back, surprisingly has garnered the highest volume of hits. The ability of the most basic concept of Marketing to generate that volume of interest on the internet as a medium, is interesting to note.

Food for thought:The correlation between keywords and ability to generate content attractiveness in a corporate blog would be interesting to look at.

Corporate Blogging Series VIII-Driving Consumer Engagement through a corporate blog

General Motors has been using it's Corporate Blog as a marketing tool to change brand perceptions and build consumer engagement.It would be interesting to know how the kind of content posted by an organization drives consumer engagement.

My article on Customerthink
A Troubled General Motors blogs to connect with it's customers
which has been featured under the category CRM, has been created out of findings of research being pursued on a set of corporate blogs to look at content categorization and how content attractiveness can build consumer engagement, which is an integral component of the CRM endeavours of any organization.

Social CRM-Finally......

Finally!!!

Recognition for Web 2.0 as a tool for CRM!!!

Courtesy: Oracle

An Oracle Appcast with Oracle V.P, CRM Solutions

While summarising the state of CRM industry, Anthony Lye, Vice Prseident, CRM Solutions-Oracle talks about changes in the CRM Technology in the last 3 years, where he highlights the emergence of Web 2.0 as a tool for CRM.

Relevant points-

1.Emergence of web 2.0 and its ability to extract innovation by enabling people to participate, socialise and collaborate has generated huge opportunities.

2.Web 2.0, by ushering in an era of collaboration and social partiicpation, has, for the first time in the history of computing, brought about the fact that technology on the internet leads technology on the intranet.

Key points relevant to Corporate Blogging here-

A Corporate Blog-a Web 2.0 outcome, is an excellent tool in an integrated organisational context, for the dimensions of-
a)Interactive Marketing
as an instrument in the value chain, specifically in terms of communication of value to the customer.
b)Branding
as in ability to create a brand image by influencing consumer perceptions and hence diverting greater traffic to websites.
c)The Customer Relationship
as in a vital tool for consumer engagement.

As per my suppositions in this field an year back,
i)Customer Acquisition and Customer Retention were the twin CRM objectives for any organisation(Shainesh)
ii)Customer Acquisition was a result of collective organisational efforts directed towards marketing and branding.
iii)Retention was a result of the organisational ability to drive brand loyalty through directing efforts towards customer engagement and satisfaction.

Just when the entire contribution of Web 2.0 to the entire fabric of marketing, branding and customer relationship was on the verge of going down in history under the segment of 'Interactive Marketing' alone, merely for want of acceptance from a reputed name in the field of CRM, the announcement by Oracle has been timely!!!

With Gartner recognising Corporate Blogging and Oracle pitching in for Web 2.0, the evolution process of Social CRM, over the next couple of years, will be interesting to watch.