SugarCRM Named Best Open Source Technology by CRM Magazine

SugarCRM Recognized for Providing a Sophisticated Alternative to Proprietary Software

SugarCRM, the world's leading provider of commercial open source customer relationship management (CRM) software, announced today that the company was named the winner of CRM magazine's 2008 Market Awards in the open source category. SugarCRM was also named a "leader" in the small business suite category. Heralded for its flexibility and multiple deployment options, these awards highlight the innovative features of SugarCRM's technology and its ability to service organizations of all sizes.

SugarCRM offers a robust, Web-based human interaction management platform, well suited for companies of all sizes in any industry. SugarCRM's suite consists of: Sugar Community Edition, Sugar Professional and Sugar Enterprise. Sugar Community Edition is available under the GPL v3 at SugarForge www.sugarforge.org, SugarCRM's community development Web site. Both Sugar Professional and Sugar Enterprise can be deployed on-site, or delivered over the Web via the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model. SugarCRM also allows businesses to design and build custom applications in support of business processes outside the realm of CRM, such as HR and PR functions.

"SugarCRM outpaced all other contenders in every criterion to win this award," said Joshua Weinberger, managing editor for CRM magazine. "The company's ongoing success was a major factor in our decision to introduce this category this year, and while others have followed in its footsteps, SugarCRM is likely to lead the way as open source CRM continues its explosive growth."

"Our goal at SugarCRM is to provide a higher quality alternative to the predatory lock-in of proprietary CRM vendors," said John Roberts, CEO of SugarCRM. "SugarCRM is proud to be named CRM magazine's open source leader and will continue to deliver customizable, scalable CRM solutions for organizations of all sizes."

The 2008 Market Awards are included in the September issue of CRM magazine and available at http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/crmmedia/crm0908/index.php#/0.

About SugarCRM

SugarCRM is the world's leading provider of commercial open source customer relationship management (CRM) software for companies of all sizes. SugarCRM easily adapts to any business environment by offering a more flexible, cost-effective alternative than proprietary applications. SugarCRM's open source architecture allows companies to more easily customize and integrate customer-facing business processes in order to build and maintain more profitable relationships. SugarCRM offers several deployment options, including on-demand, on-premise and appliance-based solutions to suit customers' security, integration and configuration needs.

For more information, call (408) 454-6900 or 1 877 SUGARCRM tollfree in the US, email contact@sugarcrm.com, or visit http://www.sugarcrm.com.

About CRM Magazine

CRM magazine is the publication of record covering the field of customer relationship management. It offers executives a unique blend of strategic business information, case studies, and in-depth analysis. It is written, edited, and produced by our award winning staff of journalists and designers. Our editorial and circulation strategy targets three main categories of readers: Executive management; sales, marketing, and customer service management; and, IT management -- all important at different stages of a CRM program's life cycle.


Source:- marketwatch.com/

Startup Hacks: 5 Tips for Offshore Outsourcing

Outsourcing product development offshore sounds like a good idea at the time. After all, you can augment your dev group quickly and on the cheap. But it only seems to work under certain conditions; mileage does vary depending on the company. Longer-term enterprise development projects tend to be better suited for outsourcing than shorter-term consumer Internet projects for example (I learned this the hard way). It has to do with development cycles, level of skill required for tasks, time to market, and the ability to iterate.

Arguably, you shouldn’t ever completely outsource your product development. Some things are just too strategic to lose control over. If you do decide to outsource some parts, here are some tips.

1. Hire one of them

Hire someone locally who was originally from the country you’re outsourcing to. Oftentimes different languages or dialects exist in other countries, so be sure your guy speaks the lingo. Also be tuned into other cultural nuances (for example, make sure there aren’t centuries-old bad blood between your guy and the people at the firm you use).

2. Nurture them

You’ll want to take the time and make the investment in having an occasional call or even a visit to the offshore location. Offering a face and voice from the top helps gain buy-in, support and motivation for the project. Obviously if you have to do too much of this, it’s not worth it.

3. Package the tasks

Be mindful not to overwhelm them with a complex project with multiple touch points and dependencies. Have a baked, signed off spec completed and committed to and assign straightforward pieces of it. When you assign something, ask for a time/cost estimate which you can measure back to later. Once the work has been verified and tested you’ll be able to establish a baseline level of quality and performance; from there you’ll be able to give them more rope.

4. Top grade

Offshore dev shops tend to assign you a mixed team of some good folks, some ok folks, and some green folks. These proportions are simply part of their business model. Just don’t let it get the best of your development cycle and product quality. Ask for resumes and interviews of the people they’re assigning to your team.

5. Communicate with one voic

Use the guy from #1 to funnel all communications between your team and theirs. Besides language and time zone issues, there are project management and accountability requirements. The more chiefs you have, the more fingers you have pointing. You can’t afford the he said/she said.

Source:- mashable.com/

NetSuite - A Leading Silicon Valley ERP, CRM and Ecommerce Software Company

A leading vendor of on-demand, integrated business management software suites for mid-market enterprises and divisions of large companies, today announced the details of its expansion in the Denver, Colorado metro area, including the opening of a new sales and services facility in the city of Centennial. The announcement came at a NetSuite-sponsored event held at the Denver Ritz Carlton and hosted by NetSuite CEO Zach Nelson for NetSuite customers, prospects, local government officials and members of the media.

"Our Denver presence is a strategic investment that we believe will accelerate our growth," said Zach Nelson, CEO of NetSuite. "The information technology sector is growing rapidly in the Greater Denver and Centennial areas, due in no small part to the region's highly qualified and educated work force. We hope to leverage this expertise and regional location to service our growing customer base in the central region with world-class sales and professional services teams."

NetSuite's new office is located at 8000 S. Chester Street, Suite 100, in Centennial, Colorado. The office will augment NetSuite's sales and consulting teams located at its headquarters in San Mateo, California. Marc Huffman, formerly General Manager of Canadian operations for NetSuite, has been appointed General Manager for NetSuite's Denver office and will oversee all Denver area operations. NetSuite expects to have over 65 employees in the Denver office by year end, with continued expansion through 2009.

"I am so pleased to have NetSuite, a leading Silicon Valley software company, join our strong and dynamic business community in Centennial like other top employers such as Ceridian, Pitney-Bowes and TEKsystems," said Centennial Mayor Randy Pye. "Centennial and the metro Denver area are known for their highly-qualified, educated work forces and are recognized centers for expertise and growth in the information technology sector. We expect that NetSuite will be extremely successful by taking advantage of our attractive business environment."

NetSuite has a growing list of customers in Colorado from a wide range of industries, including online retail, distribution, professional services and non-profits. At NetSuite's Denver launch event today, three Denver-area based companies described how they benefit from using NetSuite to run their businesses. These customers include:

-- Imagine! -- a non-profit business with approximately 650 employees serving and supporting individuals with developmental disabilities and their families throughout the greater Denver area. Imagine! uses NetSuite to manage its business -- from tracking and supporting the over 2,000 consumers of its services to coordinating the 250 providers that are part of its network to

giving families self-service capabilities for managing key insurance information and service authorizations.

-- RLE Technologies -- a manufacturer and distributor of monitoring systems for data centers has been in business for over 23 years in the Denver area. RLE Technologies uses NetSuite for tracking its work orders through the sales process with its ever growing network of distributors, to integration with its Materials Resource Planning system, to managing its billing and financials.

-- Accuvant -- offers Internet security products such as anti-virus and managed solutions to its customers, in addition to maintaining a healthy security services consulting business. Headquartered in Denver, Accuvant has over 150 employees in offices throughout the West and Central regions and uses NetSuite to manage sales, marketing and finance operations. Particularly, consulting personnel enter time and expenses that are billed to clients and the sales teams track orders for both product and services. Accuvant finds the ability to have visibility into its commissions as soon as an order is submitted particularly helpful.

Source:- foxbusiness.com/

Ecommerce solutions advice

Online retailers have been offered advice for ecommerce solutions in a new report.

The study by Retail Systems Research found that innovations in web design, like featuring comprehensive reviews and video, should be embraced.

"Ecommerce winners will be the ones to invent something new, not track what customers tell them they want," the report says.

As more and more shoppers are going online, retailers can not afford to be lazy.

"Today, retailers can no longer assume that their sites are able to easily handle increased holiday volume or that customers will stick around to wait for a web page to load," the report adds.

"Delivering quality web experiences while using advanced web technologies is now a competitive necessity."

The report clearly thinks that innovation - and proper testing of that innovation - is the way forward in ecommerce solutions.

But isn't it better to have a simple website that lets users easily interact with a company, or will such a site look amateurish and affect sales?

Business Feet deliver targeted results through internet marketing and SEO web design

Source:- businessfeet.com/

Easier Content Management Deployment With Pharos Mediator 4

The Pharos Mediator 4 platform now enables content management to be rolled-out in easy stages. A new range of Mediator 4 Task Packs cover specific roles in each area of operations from ingest to playout.

Operations covered include Library, Ingest, QC, Promotions, Compliance, Approvals, Playout and New Media (VOD, IPTV and Mobile). Each Task Pack presents a sequential set of tasks empowering operators to manage their workload as efficiently as possible. Every Task Pack is an enterprise license for a specific area of operations and can be used concurrently by any number of Mediator users.

"Content management systems need to work across the enterprise, unifying operations and making content searchable, accessible and usable by everyone," comments Russell Grute at Pharos. "Every user from the library to playout is affected during installation or migration. Rolling out a content management solution is often considered to be a big problem and all too often seen as an impractical project. Mediator 4 offers a step by step approach to rolling content management and workflow across the enterprise. With a powerful core architecture and Task Packs for each area of operations, our projects teams are deploying Mediator systems in weeks and not months"

Mediator 4's secure and efficient workflow aligns users, roles and tasks in all areas of operations. Every Mediator user has desktop Browse and Search Tools where required. Mediator 4 also provides an audit trail of actions and workflow states whilst managing all underlying file transfers and third-party infrastructure such as routing, storage and transcode sub-systems.

New Task Packs for IBC include New Media Workflow and Subtitling Workflow.
Mediator can manage content for VOD, Mobile and Internet based delivery can be managed side by side with linear distribution. This option deals with all the necessary file transfers and transcoding. It can generate and recover additional platform specific content such as stills for an EPG or metadata such as a VOD synopsis.

Mediator 4 directly integrates the management of subtitles and voice-overs for international distribution at the optimal stage in the workflow.


Source:- broadcastbuyer.tv/

BreakingPoint Publishes Deep Packet Inspection Testing Methodology

Videos and Documentation Detail Techniques for Testing Deep Packet Inspection Functionality Using Stateful Application and Malicious Traffic

BreakingPoint Systems, Inc., today released a detailed test methodology and video series that enables network engineers to test the deep packet inspection (DPI) features of content-aware network devices.

BreakingPoint's testing methodologies, videos and documentation can be found at www.breakingpointsystems.com/resources/testmethodologies.

DPI functionality allows network devices such as content-aware switches and routers, next generation firewalls, intrusion prevention systems (IPS), and application delivery controllers to inspect and take action based on the contents and context of packets as they travel across the network. DPI is heavily leveraged in helping to prevent buffer overflow attacks, denial of service (DoS) attacks and intrusions. Effective testing of DPI functionality requires an authentic blend of application traffic, combined with live security strikes, at speeds of 10 gigabits per second.

Dennis Cox, BreakingPoint CTO, commented:

"Deep packet inspection receives a lot of attention, primarily due to the controversy over privacy concerns and P2P bandwidth shaping. Often, these debates overshadow the important role of DPI in providing value for increased security, tiered services and data loss prevention. Testing DPI functionality is critical for network equipment manufacturers producing these devices and service providers offering these services. The BreakingPoint DPI Test Methodology and video guide was our chance to demonstrate the steps for testing DPI functionality."

BreakingPoint Test Methodologies were developed by the team at BreakingPoint Labs based on their experience developing and testing a variety of high-performance content-aware network equipment. BreakingPoint's testing platform enables network equipment manufacturers (NEMs) to realize a 50% reduction in time-to-test and ultimately accelerate the development of next generation network devices.

About BreakingPoint

BreakingPoint is the only company exclusively focused on application, performance, and security testing for content-aware devices. By delivering the industry's most accurate, fast, responsive and easy-to-use testing solutions, BreakingPoint helps network equipment manufacturers, services providers, and other organizations accelerate the development of high performance content-aware networks and network devices. BreakingPoint was founded in 2005 by engineers with deep experience developing high speed networking devices at companies such as NetWorth, NetSpeed, Cisco, TippingPoint, and 3Com. The company is headquartered in Austin, Texas with offices and customers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, and China. For more information, visit www.breakingpointsystems.com.

Source:- marketwatch.com/

Top 10 Resources for Search Engine Optimizers

Having been in the search-marketing field for quite some time, I typically write about topics that assume readers are familiar with SEO (define). Lately, I've had requests for some information on SEO basics to get Web sites to rank better in search engine results. That got me thinking that in any field, there are always newbies looking for access to good information and resources.

If you're relatively new to SEO or just about to undertake SEO on your Web site for the first time, you're likely looking for some key resources. For the benefit of SEO newbies, here's a short list of some top online resources for SEO -- in no particular order.

* Google Webmaster Guidelines. Right from the horse's mouth, these are the guidelines Google suggests you follow to help your site rank in its listings.

* Yahoo Search Content Quality Guidelines. Same concept as with Google, but for Yahoo.

* MSN Guidelines for Successful Indexing. See above.

* Google Keyword Tool. This is the best and cheapest (free) tool around to help you identify potential keywords to optimize your site for. Supplement the information on volume with the advertiser competition estimates to get a sense for how much competition you might face for those terms in the organic listings. Although the competition estimates are for paid search advertisers, typically a term with a high amount of paid search competition will also have steep organic ranking competition.

* SEOmoz Tools. An ever-growing list of handy tools for search marketers, SEOmoz helps you to do just about anything when it comes to SEO, including measure the SEO strength of your site (Trifecta tool), find out how well your site is targeted to your keywords (Term Target tool), and evaluate the feasibility of achieving ranking those keywords (Keyword Difficulty tool), as well as check site inclusion, back links, PageRank, and much more with the SEO ToolBox. The only downer is that for access to the advanced features of the tools, you have to pay a subscription fee.

* SEO Book.com tools. Downloading these free tools to your computer can reduce the labor required to evaluate and track your SEO efforts. SEO for Firefox automatically displays the relevant SEO info for each site (e.g. PR, inbound links, etc.) alongside your search engine results, the Rank Checker automates the pesky tacking of positioning, and the Keyword Tool (while not the greatest) gives you a long list of links to keyword tools to get suggestions for your search term.

* Bruce Clay Search Engine Relationship Chart. Learn how the search engines are connected to each other. Knowing who the big engines are can help you focus your SEO efforts and avoid wasting time on improving your rankings in an engine that is really fed results from another.

* SEO Chat Forums. This is a key forum for exclusively SEO-related topics and discussions with information for rookies and veterans alike. SEO Chat also has an abundance of useful tools and articles. Newbies should check out a recent posting: An SEO's Experience: 21 Rules for Performing SEO.

* SEMPO Learning Center. The Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization is dedicated to providing education in the area of search marketing. Although it's supposed to be for pros, the information in its learning center is directed more at those starting out in the field. The SEMPO Institute offers online training in all aspects of search marketing, including both beginner and advanced courses in search engine optimizations.

* Intro to Search Engine Optimization. A great Search 101 primer on Search Engine Watch (ClickZ's sister site) by one of the most recognizable names in search, Danny Sullivan, formerly of SEW. Read this to get a good overall sense for what SEO is, how it works, what are the key factors used to rank sites, and more.


source:- clickz.com/

Digital Surgeons Now Providing Magento Commerce Development for Powerhouse Ecommerce Websites

Web development firm Digital Surgeons takes on the East Coast ecommerce industry with the announcement of their Magento Commerce development services. Already with a healthy menu of website design, programming, branding, and search engine marketing services at their finger tips, this dynamic group is now mastering the Ecommerce art form known as Magento.

Magento Commerce is a PHP ecommerce platform with all the versatility of open source code, as well as unprecedented control over online store features and functions. Magento popularity is growing at a rapid rate for reasons that make a great deal of sense. The store keeper gets all kinds of say about how the store looks and functions. The administrative section is logical, clear, and very easy to use. The store layout is built to be all about the customer in every detail.

This ecommerce platform delivers much more than your average shopping cart software. Magento includes a content management system for building new website content pages and managing newsletters; a micro-site builder for high focus marketing of multiple locations and store divisions; an impressive array of marketing tools and options; and a scaleable php site structure that is more than ready for company growth.

The professional service and support that goes with Magento is a very welcome benefit, one previously unheard of with other open source ecommerce platforms. Help with all kinds of questions, integration, start up, and custom website development is available from a lively forum community of users; the Magento development team; and from quality Magento Partners that have learned the software inside out.

Digital Surgeons is a full service Connecticut marketing agency with deep experience in the world of ecommerce websites, search engine marketing, and conversion enhancement. Magento Commerce fits perfectly with the firm’s talents, with a suitcase full of the best search engine optimization tools available and an SEO friendly structure that is highly uncommon with most ‘out of the box’ shopping carts. This platform is built from the ground up with Conversion to Sale as the main focus. Proven marketing elements, based on exhaustive research, are woven into the Magento storefront, incorporating everything that makes a consumer friendly experience.

The php ecommerce team at Digital Surgeons crafts custom ecommerce websites for their clients geared toward each unique consumer audience and industry. Magento Commerce is seamlessly woven into this website tapestry for a powerful online store that sells, and sells well.

Custom development to integrate with other essential software systems, or to further expand on Magento’s capabilities, is a Digital Surgeons specialty. The company also arranges professional ecommerce hosting services and provides in-depth training on the administration of the website for their clients.


source:- webwire.com/

Report: Beware of 'chaos' SharePoint Can Create

A report from Forrester is warning customers to consider carefully how they plan to use Microsoft's Office SharePoint Server product, which they say can wreak havoc in an IT organization when used as a custom application development platform.

The recently published report, "Now Is The Time To Determine SharePoint's Place In Your Application Development Strategy," outlines how, while SharePoint can be extremely useful for creating company intranets, companies should be careful when using it to create custom applications because the product lacks features -- such as in application lifecycle management (ALM) and enterprise application integration (EAI) -- that other, more proven development platforms have.

Also, SharePoint is misunderstood in general, and while it allows users to create their own applications and customize SharePoint intranet sites quite easily, this can turn into a quagmire of complexity for the organization when it comes to managing and supporting those applications, the report said.

This complexity causes IT teams to become busy trying to "fill the product's gaps in application life-cycle management and enterprise integration as they create policies to prevent a new chaos of user-generated applications," according to the report, written by Forrester analysts John Rymer and Rob Koplowitz.

The problem becomes further complicated by the lack of people who have advanced development skills for SharePoint, they said.

In the report they outline several customer scenarios in which custom development on SharePoint got out of hand and became more than a company's IT staff could handle.

In one, a so-called SharePoint "power user" inspired "a reshuffling of IT," analysts wrote. The user built several popular custom applications using SharePoint, assuming that the development and operational organizations could support them. However, they couldn't because it required "specialized skills that neither organization possessed," according to the report.

The firm had to hire a new IT specialist to fill in the gap and expand SharePoint's role in the company's application-development strategy, according to a report.

Microsoft originally conceived SharePoint as a portal product on which companies could build Web sites. But with its release as part of the 2007 Office System, Microsoft has expanded the product to become a hub for collaboration, document-management and business intelligence, not to mention a development platform for building custom intranet sites and other applications.

SharePoint adoption has grown faster than even Microsoft could anticipate, which could have something to do with the lack of people with the skillset to deal with the product. The quick uptake also could have pushed SharePoint into uses that Microsoft hadn't yet prepared the product to deal with.

"I don't think that even Microsoft could predict the adoption rates that SharePoint is seeing," said Andrew Brust, chief, new technology of IT consulting firm twentysix New York.

Indeed, in their report, Rymer and Koplowitz note that Forrester's clients said SharePoint's growth "has caught many application development managers by surprise." They compare the headaches SharePoint sites create for IT managers to how Lotus Notes databases were in the 1990s. Both products allow for the explosion of custom sites and applications that IT departments can have a hard time managing.

In Microsoft's defense, Brust said the company recognizes that SharePoint has some technology gaps and is working hard to fill them, noting that solving the problem of SharePoint's limited ALM capability in particular is the sort of thing "Microsoft lives for."

He also noted that other Microsoft products -- such as BizTalk for EAI and Visual Studio Team System for ALM -- can help IT departments work with SharePoint in the meantime.

In their report, Rymer and Koplowitz noted that while Microsoft is working to fill the gaps in the product, organizations should carefully consider before deployment how they will use SharePoint, if at all, in their organizations.

They suggested companies choose one of three scenarios for SharePoint to make the product work as effectively as possible.

One is to use the product as merely an application for collaboration and sharing information and not as a development platform at all, they said. The second scenario is as both an application and an intranet platform for which the company fills in product gaps -- which in addition to ALM and EAI include issues surrounding the reliability, availability and scalability of the product.

The third and most complicated scenario for an organization would be to use SharePoint as both an application and an enterprise portal at the core of a company's application-development strategy, analysts said. However, organizations must choose this option knowing it will require heavy lifting on the part of the IT team, and also eventually require a transition away from other portal or intranet software that may currently exist in the organization, according to the report.

source:- pcworld.com/

ROI Tools and Methodology Help Siemens Demonstrate Benefits of Unified Communications Solutions

After engaging with Glomark-Governan in 2001 to implement the practice of presenting IT Value to its prospective customers, Siemens Communications, Inc. has chosen to renew its contract with Glomark-Governan to leverage its solution to help demonstrate the value of Siemens’ unified communications products and services to customers.

“Siemens’ desire to re-license Genius® software demonstrates their continued confidence in our products and EVC™ Methodology,” said Todd Whittier, U.S. Regional Director of Glomark-Governan. “Their commitment to the collaborative development of a Business Case with their clients has been leveraged as a competitive differentiator. They rise above the typical “just another vendor” role, and are viewed as true business partners by their clients,” said Whittier.

Siemens has adopted the practice of Glomark-Governan’s EVC Methodology and the usage of the Glomark-Governan Genius tools to highlight the tangible and intangible benefits and value of unified communications to prospective and current customers. With these tools, Siemens’ sales force can build a business case for customers, which quantifies the total cost of ownership and the return on investment of Siemens’ unified communications solutions.

“Using the Business Case Builder (BCB), which is how we have branded the Glomark-Governan ROI tool, has given our sales force a distinct methodology and a unique customer deliverable to help articulate the value of Siemens’ unified communications solutions,” said Alina Urdaneta, Vice President of Marketing, North America, for Siemens Communications, Inc. “This has helped us show customers that Siemens can deliver significant efficiencies and cost savings through the deployment of software-based VoIP, for example. With the BCB, Siemens’ sellers can quantify improved productivity realized through solutions like presence and collaboration applications, high definition video, one-number service and mobility tools. More importantly, the BCB is a vehicle for Siemens’ sellers to better understand their customers’ business objectives, and build intimacy and loyalty among their customer base.”

About Glomark-Governan
Glomark-Governan helps enterprises around the world by providing them with the methodology, training, consulting, benchmarking research, and software tools necessary to assess, communicate and measure the economic value of investments in technology and services initiatives. Glomark-Governan has enhanced and refined its Economic Value Creation (EVC™) Methodology for more than a decade, bringing to market a proven, complete solution that allows companies to justify their solutions’ value, define operational and performance metrics, assess economic risk, and quickly create project-specific business cases.


source:- pr-canada.net/