The 2009 CRM Service Awards: Table of Contents and Introduction

Service has never been more important than it is today.

Need irrefutable evidence of the recession? Just ask the vendors that provide the systems and software enabling companies to deal with their financially oppressed customers. The context surrounding this sixth annual edition of CRM magazine’s Service Awards is that the markets have wreaked havoc with everyone—vendors, users, and customers alike.

The ability to rise above these recent (and still ongoing) economic difficulties is reason enough to shower praise. But we’ve spotlighted not just the best and the brightest across eight categories of service and support offerings, but also the up-and-comers in the service field and a quartet of CRM users whose stellar results inspire us all.

Rising Stars:
We cast an approving eye on five companies -- some names that might be new to you, but at least one that will be all too familiar, in a different context.

• Get Satisfaction: Socializing Your Service
  Get Satisfaction enables customers to connect with companies—and receive “people-powered customer service” in return.
  
• Helpstream: Ministering to the Masses
  Helpstream brings the community into customer service.
• Parature: Gaming the System
  On-demand customer service provider Parature expands from interactive gaming to target firms of all sizes.
• Salesforce.com: Clouding Up the Scene
  CRM veteran Salesforce.com utterly revamps its service offering through acquisition and innovation.
• Sword Ciboodle: Crossing the Pond
  Sword Ciboodle—the former Graham Technology—plants a flag in North America
  

Service Elite:
These four implementations -- successfully undertaken by wildly different companies utilizing products from a variety of vendors -- represent the very best of this year's efforts.

• Retailer Bath & Body Works, for a knowledge management system developed with Astute Solutions;
• CBS Interactive, for its slam-dunk handling of the NCAA basketball tournament, among other events, with the help of RightNow Technologies;
• the Municipality of Coamo, Puerto Rico, for a Microsoft Dynamics CRM deployment with Rock Solid Technologies; and
• identity-theft watchdog LifeLock, for an initiative with on-demand contact center provider LiveOps.

Service Leaders:
Eight categories -- including a new one introduced this year -- with 31 winners, leaders, and ones to watch. Join us in honoring those that made the cut.

• Contact Center Infrastructure
  
• Interactive Voice Response
  
• Web Self-Service
  
• Web Interaction Management
  
• Workforce Optimization Suite
• Contact Center Search
  
• Enterprise Feedback Management
• Outsourcing

Every month, CRM magazine covers the customer relationship management industry and beyond. To subscribe, please visit http://www.destinationcrm.com/subscribe/.

For more of the April 2009 edition of CRM magazine, please click here.

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