CRM Cloud Computing Provider to Offer Online Banking

FinancialForce.com, a major player in online cloud accounting solutions built natively on the Force.com platform from CRM cloud computing provider Salesforce.com, has extended its functionality by adding electronic processing of bank payments to its online accounting offering.

Officials with FinancialForce.com said that the customers will benefit from a fully automated, on-demand end-to-end payment system.

Company officials said that through integrations, initially with SunGard in the US, which supports check processing and banking system integration, and Albany Software in the United Kingdom, a company developing electronic payment software for Bacs payments, FinancialForce Accounting users will have one integrated system for managing customer accounts and making and receiving payments.

Upcomings: CRM & Call Center Complimentary Webcasts

1. The ABCs of Marketing Analytics

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 — 11:00 am PT / 2:00 pm ET

REGISTER NOW for this complimentary webcast

Join Sam Boonin, Vice President of Marketing at GoodData who will share best practices for building great marketing dashboards, and review how GoodData uses marketing analytics to 'walk the talk' of running a metrics-driven business. Our featured presenter, Suresh Vittal, Vice President and Principal Analytst at Forrester Research, will discuss the ABCs of Marketing Analytics.

2. Avatars Drastically Reduce Call Center Costs

Wednesday, May 19, 2010 11:00am PT / 2:00pm ET

REGISTER NOW for this complimentary webcast

Watch Forrester, Comcast and InteliWISE answering key questions: How can these virtual experts immediately answer customer requests on the web, being a first - line of defense for Customer Service.

Source: destinationCRM

Telco to help rural majority access banking services

Dtac's Pakistani partner lays blueprint for developing countries

Telenor Pakistan, the country's number two mobile operator, has recently purchased a bank and is now using its banking license through its network of franchisees and top-up agents to offer banking services to Pakistan's largely unbanked population, with savings, insurance and international remittance soon to follow.

Remote Telenor Franchise in the misty hills of Dungagali, Pakistan. Telenor has 150,000 franchisees. Some 20-30,000 of these will be upgraded and trainedto offer EasyPaisa microfinance to the unbanked majority in Pakistan.

Known as EasyPaisa, the idea by Telenor and the State Bank of Pakistan is to find a sustainable, profitable new banking model to help the billions in developing countries break out of the cycle of poverty by providing them with low-cost, convenient financial services.

In an exclusive interview, Roar Bjaerum, Telenor Pakistan Vice-President for Financial Services, and Arif
Abdul Qayyam, Telenor Pakistan Director for Financial Services, explained the history of this innovative project.

CRM Software - How Do You Measure Return on Investment (ROI)?

The cost of ownership and return on investment of your CRM software depends on your requirements initially and over time. As your business changes, so do your CRM requirements. A well planned CRM software strategy can save you time and money now, yet allow you to scale your solution as your organisation grows.

For many companies, a cost of ownership model over a 3-5 year period will give a better return on investment with an in-house system. To justify this however, you need to think out your strategy carefully. One of the key decision points is whether you will need to integrate CRM software into your accounting system or a specialised customer service or ERP system. In this case, although the initial cost of ownership can be quite substantial your return will justify such an upfront investment. The initial costs for example will involve license fees, consulting fees and deployment costs.

Oracle Siebel CRM demo for iPad

Oracle announced support for the iPad by combining their Siebel driven REST API with the Apple iPad OS SDK. Siebel is turning out to be a surprisingly versatile development tool for contemporary social capabilities. They are never ceasing to surprise at this point.Here’s a look at a Oracle/Siebel iPad app as demonstrated:



Other than Siebel, Sugar CRM have also launched its application for Apple iPad

Brett King: Who gets it right with Internet Banking opportunities?

by: Brett King.Author, Bank 2.0,
      banking4tomorrow.com

Take a look at your retail or consumer banking website or homepage. I can 100% guarantee that regardless of who you are, and in what market you are in that I know exactly which part of the site is clicked on most. Contact us? Nope. Press Releases - definitely not. The biggest Ad banner on the homepage? Nope...

Figured it out. Well the headline gives it away. It is the login button. In developed economies click-thru rate from the bank homepage can be as high as 97% of traffic that visits the homepage, and in developing markets it still hovers around 70-75% generally.

The thing is that in most cases banks spend a considerable amount of money each year trying to entice new customers to apply online or to send in their details so someone in the mortgages team, call centre, preferred banking or private banking team can reach out to them. Acquisition must be a key metric of any direct channel team today. However, in most cases the visitors to your homepage are existing customers. Thus, 70-95% of daily traffic is being channelled immediately from the homepage to the secure internet banking website behind the login.

So let's get this straight. Your bank marketing team has just spent US$1m upgrading your site and putting offers all over 3rd party properties to direct traffic to your website and trigger acquisitions, but still 95% of visitors are clicking through to Internet Banking. How much product are you selling behind the login? Well, if you are most banks - virtually zero. Why? Because most managers see Internet Banking as a transaction platform designed to lower the cost of operations by transferring low-margin or costly transactions to a direct channel with a lower cost than a branch or call centre.

Dynamics CRM Online to expand into 32 more markets

Microsoft plans to expand Dynamics CRM Online, its competitor to the successful Salesforce.com cloud service, into 32 more markets later this year, the company said Sunday.

The expansion will happen in near conjunction with the next version of Microsoft's customer relationship management service, known internally as Dynamics CRM "5." There are 1.1 million paid users of the CRM line, said Marie Huwe, general manager for Microsoft Dynamics marketing.

"This is a really big thing for our business. We're making a big bet on CRM Online," she said. "I'm sure you've heard Steve Ballmer say, 'We're all in.'"

Indeed, the Microsoft CEO in March told an audience of University of Washington computer engineering students that the software superpower is playing its hand for cloud computing. CRM Online is just one of Microsoft's many cloud services. And like many of the others, CRM Online has a formidable online foe – in this case, market-leading Salesforce.com.