Expert Advice

As online shopping becomes a larger and larger part of global consumers' spending habits, they are demanding the highest levels of availability, performance and security. Your application cannot be unavailable, slow or vulnerable. Period. The single most important factor in keeping an application ...

Gulf Cooperation Council banks have begun to feel the heat of competitive pressure from foreign banks that are trying to exploit the potential investment prospects in this market by riding on their vast experience and proven consumer-friendly services. In such a scenario, the banks have nothing to ...

Over the past few years, we have seen a seismic shift in the relationship between sellers and consumers, with the power shifting to the consumer. Customers have always wanted exactly what they want, when they want it, at a great price. With today's technology, however, they have near total control...

Businesses are constantly searching for ways to reduce costs and improve revenues. Mobile technologies can provide incredible value because they offer immediate business interactions from almost anywhere. Mobile payments can expand your sales channels by helping you meet customers where they are. Pr...

Those of us who have been around the IT block a few times have witnessed remarkable changes in hardware and software capabilities. The big ones are fairly obvious in hindsight: from mainframes to minicomputers in the 1960s; from minis to PCs in the 1980s; and from dumb terminals to client-server te...

With the continued emergence of new technology and channels including social media, mobile, avatars and more, the relationship between brands and their customers and prospects has been changed forever. It's interesting to consider the role of technology in these increasingly dynamic relationships.

As hard as it may be for CRM veterans to accept, there are still a great many businesses out there who don't have an application to track the customer and to feed data to sales, marketing and service. These businesses -- mostly small -- are not in the position to afford an employee designated as the...

2010 was the year of social media: Mark Zuckerberg was named Time's Person of the Year, "The Social Network" seemed poised for Oscar glory, and Facebook exceeded Google's daily traffic. Certainly there were hiccups along the way -- privacy settings, ease-of-use and the Google Buzz debacle -- but no...

Consumers face a staggering number of online choices. This reality comes as a burden to e-commerce companies that watch more than 95 percent of visitors leave before making a purchase, despite all the money spent on SEO, search and other customer acquisition tactics. While once a niche tactic, reta...

The proliferation of social media and the real-time Web has created a significant change in the role of today's marketer. The shift from a traditional marketing mix to a predominantly online marketing focus has placed new expectations on marketers to understand website traffic, generate leads online...