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Globalization, adoption of more open, capitalist economies in developing countries, and technological advances have made building a small or medium-sized business (SMB) as tough as it's ever been. The potential rewards are substantial, however. Thanks to developments in the IT and telecommunications industries, SMBs -- like their larger counterp...

Globalization, adoption of more open, capitalist economies in developing countries, and technological advances have made building a small or medium-sized business (SMB) as tough as it's ever been. The potential rewards are substantial, however. Thanks to developments in the IT and telecommunications industries, SMBs -- like their larger counterp...

Globalization, adoption of more open, capitalist economies in developing countries, and technological advances have made building a small or medium-sized business (SMB) as tough as it's ever been. The potential rewards are substantial, however. Thanks to developments in the IT and telecommunications industries, SMBs -- like their larger counterp...

RightNow is adding chat to its expanding Feedback feature set. The new functionality is part of the application's May '08 update to its flagship CRM product "By adding feedback into RightNow chat, we have filled out our multichannel story," Andrew Hull, director of product marketing for RightNow, told CRM Buyer. RightNow has rolled out feedback for...

Botnet operators intent on duping Internet users out of their savings have proved adept at social engineering, taking advantage of breaking news events and direct marketing -- as well as audio and video files and PDF attachments -- to lure people into downloading a variety of malware and visiting spoofed Web sites aimed at capturing personally identifiable information. The government's economic stimulus tax rebate program is giving them another excellent opportunity...

Part 1 of this series explores the technologies behind analyzing customer behaviors. Part 2 looks into the tools of business intelligence and Web analytics Business "intuition," popular in the days of pen, ink and paper, was the first "BI" -- keen and quick insight rooted in trading experience and utilizing heightened observation with direct percep...

For years, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) has granted patents covering e-commerce business methods, and companies have exploited such patents to gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. In one famous example, Amazon.com sued Barnes & Noble just before the 1999 holiday season, alleging infringement of Amazon's "1-click" shoppin...

OK, this may seem like a huge stretch because I doubt there are any tech companies more different than EMC and Apple. However, I just spent several days at EMC World and I actually found one similarity: Both companies are focused like lasers on customer loyalty This goes beyond customer satisfaction and speaks to a process that ties their respectiv...

Responding to heightened concerns about the privacy of individuals' medical and healthcare information, the federal government in 1996 introduced HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. It empowered the Department of Health and Human Services to develop and manage the methods governing the collection and sharing of personal health information and the mechanisms with which all U.S. healthcare organizations covered under the Act must comply...

Yahoo has postponed its annual shareholders' meeting, which had been originally scheduled to take place on July 3. Now, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), that meeting will take place at the end of July in order to give regulators time to review paperwork related to the proxy challenge one of its shareholders has launched.

Hop-On, a small cell phone company based in Irvine, Calif., has released what it says is the antithesis of Apple's iPhone -- the HOP1800, a US$10 bare-bones GSM (global system for mobile communications) cell that doesn't take pictures, doesn't play music, movies or podcasts, doesn't surf the Web, and doesn't even do text messaging. In fact, it doesn't even have a screen of any kind.

Broadcast, cablecast, simulcast, webcast, podcast, vodcast, mobilecast -- the melding of the realms of "lean back" (TV) and "lean in" (Web) technology can mean coming attractions for business-to-business (B2B) marketing communications and video news generation -- if done straight-up, i.e., correctly and transparently. Part 1 of this three-part ser...

As the 2008 elections approach, political mudslinging on the campaign trail has become an all-too-familiar sight. No less muddy, however -- and no less central to the democratic process -- is the battle that's currently being waged over the ballot box How Americans cast their votes has become a subject of hot debate ever since the Florida debacle i...

You might call Randal Vaughn the Botnet Slayer. After all, he spends much of his time researching the intricacies of cybercrime carried out through malware marauders perpetrating their evil deeds with robotized computers around the globe When Vaughn is not peering through sinuous Internet traffic reports looking for botnet trails, he is lecturing t...

Michael Hollick isn't really a Balkan criminal -- he just plays one in a video game that happens to be one of the fastest-selling ever, generating at least US$600 million in sales over the last three weeks Yet while Rockstar Games' "Grand Theft Auto IV" has enjoyed its wild success, Hollick -- an actor who plays Niko Bellic in the game -- hasn't be...

Seeking to capitalize on the rapidly growing interest in sustainability and green business practices, IBM has launched a software tool that will help companies analyze the impact of their supply chains on the environment IBM's Carbon Tradeoff Modeler will enable companies to manage their carbon footprint by giving them insight into how different de...

Salesforce.com was created during cloudy economic times, and its business model -- per-user, per-seat pricing when the market offered nothing but million-dollar enterprise-based pricing -- took off, precisely for that reason Now the company, which has since remade itself into an enterprise class vendor that is still available at moderate enough pri...

Facebook is introducing a tabbed interface as part of its ongoing effort to keep its profile page fresh-looking and streamlined, in contrast with many other social networking sites This latest change, which is currently in beta, will introduce separate tabs for a personal news feed, photos, applications and information. The company designed these s...

It didn't take long for the European Union (EU) to react to Microsoft's Wednesday announcement that it would provide support for additional document formats in its market-dominating Microsoft Office productivity suite. Shortly after Microsoft announced that it would support the Open Document Format (ODF) v1.1 with the future release of Microsoft Office 2007 Service Pack 2 (SP2), the EU released a short statement noting that its European Commission is aware of Microsoft's promise.

In its most aggressive and creative effort yet to challenge Google in search and search advertising, Microsoft has unveiled a plan to give cash rebates to consumers who use its Live Search and end up making online purchases Live Search cashback essentially shares advertising revenue with end users, providing a direct incentive to use Microsoft's se...