June 19, 2011 by Harish Kotadia, Ph.D. One year ago (June 15th, 2010 to be precise), I wrote a post titled Social Media: The New Front End of CRM System in which I highlighted that in spite of undergoing a fascinating technological transformation over the last decade, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems essentially record transactional information using pre-determined fields on the screen (front-end) and store that...

I am constantly asked by telecom professionals “John, the telecom landscape is really changing but, where is it headed”? So, I thought I would share of few of my view points here: While not a new concept but one that is finally ready for primetime… As Apple demonstrated with their FaceTime app on the IOS 4 with AT&T, they slipped a communication app that uses the data network right under AT&T’s nose so to...

Did you know that a large percentage of the millions of products that are sold on the Internet everyday are sold through affiliate networks? That’s right. You know that banner ad you clicked on for more information? That was likely an affiliate partner that pays to have that ad there and “gets paid” on a performance basis (a commission if you buy or take whatever action the merchant was looking for). I can create a...

1. Social media is an important SEO tool. Links from social media are playing an increasingly important role in your site’s search position. Since 80% of consumer purchases start with search, this reason alone is a good argument for embracing social media. 2. Your customers expect you to be social. 60% of Americans spend time on a social network at least once a week. YouTube reaches 36% of all business decision makers, more than...

Facebook has 610,736,920 MEMBER PROFILES. That’s one for every ELEVEN people on the planet. Facebook has 610,736,920 MEMBER PROFILES. That’s one for every ELEVEN people on the planet. Based on page views and users, Facebook is the NO. 2 site in the U.S., behind Google and ahead of YouTube and Yahoo. EVERY 60 SECONDS ON FACEBOOK, USERS send 230,000 messages, update95,000 statuses, write 80,000 wall...