ISG Software Research Analyst Perspectives

Aspect Provides Customer Engagement Center in the Cloud

Posted by ISG Research on 25 September 2016

Aspect is a well-established global provider of contact center systems. Its portfolio of products includes applications for contact centers, self-service, workforce optimization and analytics. In May the company announced it has gained clearance for restructuring its debt, which means it is in a better financial position to invest in its products and global ecosystem of partners, to the benefit... Read More

Topics: Customer Experience, Customer & Contact Center, Call Center

ERP Can Help Transform Finance

Posted by ISG Research on 25 September 2016

Like many other industry observers I’ve heard overblown claims for information technology for decades. However, I’ve also observed that – eventually – reality catches up with vision. Finance and accounting departments are particularly resistant to change, yet because almost no corporations use adding machines or typewriters any more, it’s clear that transformative change can happen. Nonetheless,... Read More

Topics: Social Media, Supply Chain Performance, Human Capital, Mobile Technology, Office of Finance, Operational Performance, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance

Teradata Takes On Cloud and Developers with Big Data & Analytics

Posted by ISG Research on 22 September 2016

Teradata recently held its annual Partners conference, at which gather several thousand customers and partners from around the world. This was the first Partners event since Vic Lund was appointed president and CEO in May. Year on year, Teradata’s revenues are down about 5 percent, which likely prompted some changes at the company. Over the past few years Teradata made several technology... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Predictive Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Cloud Computing, Information Management

Value Index Analysis Finds Workforce Optimization Market Mature

Posted by ISG Research on 21 September 2016

Ventana Research has published its Workforce Optimization 2016 Value Index. The Value Index provides a comprehensive evaluation of contact center workforce optimization vendors based on responses to our RFP-like questionnaire, which was constructed using insights gained from our recent benchmark research into workforce optimization and our knowledge of the market. In our definition workforce... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Customer Experience, Mobile Technology, Customer Performance, Cloud Computing, Call Center

Get to Know Enterprise Spreadsheets to Improve Business Effectiveness

Posted by ISG Research on 21 September 2016

Ventana Research coined the term “enterprise spreadsheet” in 2004 to describe a variety of software applications that add a desktop spreadsheet’s user interface (usually that of Microsoft Excel) to components that address the issues that arise when desktop spreadsheets are used in repetitive, collaborative enterprise processes. Enterprise spreadsheets are designed to provide the best of both... Read More

Topics: Sales Performance, Supply Chain Performance, Office of Finance, Customer Performance, Operational Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, Information Management, Financial Performance Management (FPM)

Corporate Controllers: Always Be Closing!

Posted by ISG Research on 09 September 2016

It strikes me that the motto of successful salespeople – “ABC: Always Be Closing!” – could apply equally to corporate controllers, albeit in the accounting sense. For a while now I’ve been advocating continuous accounting, a holistic approach to managing the finance and accounting function that, in part, emphasizes using technology to distribute workloads more evenly over an accounting period –... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Business Performance, Financial Performance

Verint Adds Robotic Process Automation to Its Portfolio

Posted by ISG Research on 09 September 2016

Verint is an established vendor of workforce optimization products that was the top-ranked vendor in our 2015 Workforce optimization Value Index. However, like many other large vendors in this category, its product portfolio and capabilities extend beyond workforce optimization; indeed, from a glance at its home page it is not immediately obvious that workforce optimization is a main part of its... Read More

Topics: Customer Experience, Customer Performance, Operational Performance, Call Center

Research Finds Mobile Analytics and BI Reach Crossroads

Posted by ISG Research on 09 September 2016

Ventana Research has newly published its Mobile Analytics and Business Intelligence 2016 Value Index. The Value Index provides a comprehensive evaluation of vendors and their product offerings across seven categories. In performing that analysis, I realized that this software category is at a crossroads. Once an optional capability often reserved for executives, mobile analytics is becoming a... Read More

Topics: Mobile Technology, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Information Optimization, Mobile BI, Analytics, Business Intelligence

Xactly Inspires Sales Performance with Coaching and Insights

Posted by ISG Research on 02 September 2016

Imagine how the third Monday in next January looks to leaders in the sales department. That’s the first day of the annual sales kickoff and the excitement level won’t get any higher. New products and services are in the works, lucrative customer contracts are up for renewal, alliance partners are in the house, and qualified opportunities are already flowing through your pipeline. The executive... Read More

Topics: Sales, Sales Performance, Human Capital, Human Capital Management, Mobile Technology, CRO, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Operational Intelligence

Five9 Contact Center System Provides Omnichannel Customer Experiences

Posted by ISG Research on 01 September 2016

Five9 provides contact center in the cloud systems. Its Virtual Contact Center is essentially communication infrastructure software deployed through cloud computing. At the heart of its products is cloud-based telephony software that replaces on-premises ACD and PBX technology. The software connects to public telephone systems and helps users receive, make and manage telephone calls while... Read More

Topics: Customer Experience, Customer Performance, Call Center

Vendavo Builds Price and Revenue Optimization into Business Processes

Posted by ISG Research on 01 September 2016

Vendavo is a vendor of business-to-business (B2B) price and revenue optimization software, which I have written about. A major focus of the conference sessions this year at the company’s annual user group meeting was on practical approaches to successful price optimization initiatives. While this category of software has been achieving increasing acceptance, penetration is still limited in the... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Sales Performance, Customer Performance, Operational Performance, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Vendavo, price, pricing, optimization, revenue, cu

Unit4 Adds Financial Performance Management with Prevero Acquisition

Posted by ISG Research on 23 August 2016

Unit4, a Netherlands-based vendor of financial management software focused mainly on midsize companies, recently acquired prevero, a German vendor of performance management and business intelligence software. The acquisition reflects a convergence of transactional and analytic business applications, which I have written about. ERP and financial management software vendors increasingly are adding... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Financial Performance

Upstream Works Delivers Omnichannel Experience for Customers

Posted by ISG Research on 23 August 2016

Since I last wrote about Upstream Works it has expanded its focus on contact center agent efficiency and effectiveness to include omnichannel customer experience. Each of its core products has undergone a number of developments. Its main product now is Upstream Works for Finesse, which it classifies as a smart agent desktop. This is a desktop application that enables users of contact center... Read More

Topics: Customer Experience, Customer Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Call Center

A Recipe for Cooking with the Hadoop Ecosystem

Posted by ISG Research on 23 August 2016

It’s part of my job to cover the ecosystem of Hadoop, the open source big data technology, but sometimes it makes my head spin. If this is not your primary job, how can you possibly keep up? I hope that a discussion of what I’ve found to be most important will help those who don’t have the time and energy to devote to this wide-ranging topic. I was a little late to the party. I first wrote about... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Information Management, Operational Intelligence

Hive9 Helps Tame the Chaos of B2B Marketing

Posted by ISG Research on 18 August 2016

It often seems to business-to-business (B2B) marketers as if the only people who understand them are other B2B marketers. They feel that salespeople don’t get what they do day-to-day, that friends and family don’t understand what they do for a living, and most of all that the executives to whom they report have no interest in what they do – that is, until the last day of the quarter. Then they... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Sales Performance, Operational Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Operational Intelligence, Hive9 Marketing Performance Management

Denodo Makes Data Virtualization Relevant to Big Data and Analytics

Posted by ISG Research on 18 August 2016

Data virtualization is not new, but it has changed over the years. The term describes a process of combining data on the fly from multiple sources rather than copying that data into a common repository such as a data warehouse or a data lake, which I have written about. There are many reasons for an organization concerned with managing its data to consider data virtualization, most stemming from... Read More

Topics: Big Data, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Information Management, Information Optimization, Data virtualization, data integration, data lake,

Recurring Revenue Billing: Where Back Office Meets Front Office

Posted by ISG Research on 18 August 2016

Invoicing and billing are mundane business activities that hardly anyone outside of the accounting department cares about, but they are where the back office meets the front office. How well a company handles the process of getting paid by its customers can have an impact on its relationships with them. Like most of the details of business process execution, the impact of substandard invoicing... Read More

Topics: Sales Performance, Office of Finance, Customer Performance, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance

Salesforce Assimilates Demandware, But Will it Help Them?

Posted by ISG Research on 09 August 2016

In July Salesforce officially closed on its purchase of digital commerce platform provider Demandware for US$2.8 billion. Salesforce’s executives were interested in acquiring a digital commerce platform, and they claim that Demandware was routinely mentioned in their due diligence of the market. So out came Marc Benioff’s and Salesforce checkbook, and they paid. Handsomely. For that sizeable... Read More

Topics: Social Media, Mobile Technology, Office of Finance, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance, Operational Intelligence, Uncategorized, Omnichannel, Commerce, Digital kDigital

IBM Watson and Cognitive Computing to Streamline Compliance

Posted by ISG Research on 05 August 2016

Today’s proponents of artificial intelligence (AI) tend to focus on its spectacular uses such as self-driving cars and uplifting ones such as medical treatment. AI also has the potential to aid humanity in more modest ways such as eliminating the need for individuals to do tedious repetitive work in white-collar areas. Along these lines, at its recent Vision users conference, IBM displayed an... Read More

Topics: Governance, Office of Finance, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance, Uncategorized, Risk & Compliance (GRC), GRC, governance, risk, compliance, risk management

Cloud-Based Contact Center Systems Embrace Analytics and Communications

Posted by ISG Research on 04 August 2016

I recently wrote that companies are struggling to provide omnichannel customer experiences and digital customer service is now seen as a business differentiator. To address these issues, organizations need to change how they use people and processes, and deploy innovative technologies that can support new initiatives. To provide an enterprise-wide solution, contact center systems fall into four... Read More

Topics: Social Media, Mobile Technology, Customer Performance, Cloud Computing, Uncategorized, Call Center