Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Laef Olson, CIO of RightNow (Part 2)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini SM: What is the scope of your internal IT organization? What you mentioned just now is the IT infrastructure piece for delivering your cloud-based offering or product as a cloud vendor. What about the internal requirements of RightNow as a company?

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Laef Olson, CIO Of RightNow (Part 1)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini The Software as a Service (SaaS) delivery model of cloud computing has seen steady and overwhelming growth that has cut across industries, verticals, and big and small enterprises. Worldwide SaaS revenue in the enterprise application software market was pegged at $8.5 billion in 2010, up 14.1% from

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CRM And RNOW Hook Onto Social Networking

According to Gartner, worldwide CRM market revenue was up 12.5% to $9.15 billion in 2008, and Salesforce.com continues to rise rapidly with a 10.6% share. The company recently announced its social networking product Chatter, which was inspired by Facebook and Twitter. While Chatter has been developed in-house, rival SaaS customer relationship management (CRM) vendor RightNow is

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Rules for Bootstrappers (Part 5)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author With so much of the world becoming standardized and interchangeable, there is little to differentiate your business from a legion of other companies. Except, that is, the special effort of backup support you provide to all your customers.

Rules for Bootstrappers (Part 4)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author The bootstrapper will inevitably come up against a stream of seemingly insurmountable problems. This is when the Unconventional Mindset comes into play. Your motto on all these occasions must be, “There is always another way.” In the Herculean task you are undertaking—starting a business from scratch—conventional wisdom does not apply.

Rules for Bootstrappers (Part 3)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author This week’s post addresses marketing, an often misunderstood aspect of starting and running a business. Marketing is not a euphemism for sales. Marketing’s primary role is to engage in activities that make sales more efficient and shorten the sales cycle.

Rules for Bootstrappers (Part 2)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author People have different reactions to those who are careful with their money. As a bootstrapper you can expect a mixture of admiration, denigration, and even open contempt for those you encounter in business if you push, and push again, for price reductions, cost savings, and expense elimination.

Rules For Bootstrappers (Part 1)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author [SM: On the heels of my Weapon Of Mass Reconstruction column, I’d like to welcome Greg Gianforte, CEO of RightNow, whose interview you have read recently, to share his perspective on bootstrapping.]