CRM - October 2008 - (Page 37)

Price ion t timiza the op es “mak nce in e differ her you whet money leave table.” on the ‘look like you’ and have results, those are the best buying criteria we know of.” At the moment, though, there may not be a lot of choice in any particular vertical. Vendors have so many prospects to choose from that there tends to be very little overlap in coverage. “We [all] serve different markets,” Hills says, referring to his firm’s peers in the optimization space. Fortunately, the CRM industry and the analysts who watch it are beginning to devote more resources to price optimization. The Gartner MarketScope referenced above estimates the total worldwide revenue of the market for B2B pricing software at $150 million as of 2007, and it’s growing at 30 percent per year. In fact, according to another report, Gartner considers price optimization and management the single most beneficial technology in the sales sector—the only one rated “transformational”—albeit one that won’t enter the mainstream for five to 10 years. Gartner’s research includes early ratings of some of the larger contenders in the pricing space. “Early” is the operative word, though; Gartner’s five-column rating chart, which ranges from Strong Negative to Strong Positive, has no vendors mentioned at either end. PROS, Vendavo, and Zilliant were the only vendors rated Positive (one step from the top); Oracle-Siebel, Servigistics, and Vistaar Technologies rated Promising (the middle column). Of course, no technology gets far without differentiating itself—even within the confines of CRM. “Price optimization is rightly part of CRM, but it’s very different from other CRM applications,” Hills says. “Turn it on and you start seeing results.” Aasen, one of Hills’ customers, is aware of the CRM connection as well.“CRM data is a valuable component—you can mine out value if you channel it into optimization,”Aasen says. “You can significantly enhance the optimization benefit with good customer data in a CRM.” Senior Editor Marshall Lager can be reached at mlager@destinationCRM.com. www.destinationCRM.com ©2008 Calabrio, Inc. All rights reserved. Just because you’ve got a fish and gold, doesn’t mean you have a goldfish. Just as patching contact center tools together doesn’t yield true contact center performance. Calabrio One™ is the only software suite that truly integrates a unified desktop with workforce optimization. It aligns people and processes, driving continuous improvements to meet your business objectives. Interested? Learn more at www.saynotoducttape.com. http://www.saynotoducttape.com http://www.saynotoducttape.com http://www.destinationCRM.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of CRM - October 2008

CRM - October 2008 Contents Front Office Feedback Reality�Check Customer Centricity The Tipping Point Sprinting Toward Disaster? SAP�Retains Market-Share Lead in�CRM A�Week of Strong Customer�Service CRM�on Twitter Build a Good Event and They Will Come Required Reading There's No Place Like Home The New Breed of CRM�Consultant The Price is Right...You Hope How Much Marketing is Too�Much? The�Sweet Smell of High-Quality�Service The Next Act! For An Acquisition Some Stories Never Get Old CRM�Eases the Pressure For WIKA�Instruments Secret of My Success Re:Tooling Scouting Report Pint of View

CRM - October 2008

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