Corporate executives know that if they don’t transform their companies into digital enterprises they are going to be at a significant competitive disadvantage going forward.

Yet, many corporate leaders have been unable to make significant progress transforming their organizations. These executives have found that changing their corporate cultures is a lot harder than adopting the new generation of cloud-based applications and services that make the digital enterprise possible.

No company has done more to advocate for this digital transformation process — so it can sell more of the cloud solutions to power new age businesses — than Salesforce.com. And no company is more at risk if a growing number of organizations fail to pursue their own digital transformation initiatives.

Now Salesforce is shifting its attention dramatically — away from solely selling CXOs on the virtues of leading the digitization process, and toward … Read More »

For the past decade, many IT departments have been on the defensive trying to keep pace with escalating end-user demands and competitive pressures. The emergence of ‘shadow IT’ as a major force within many enterprises raised questions about the role of IT in a cloud-first world.

Now, enlightened CIOs are exploring ways to employ artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to actively engage their IT teams as key players in the rapidly evolving digital transformation efforts within their organizations.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest commentary in Datamation regarding how these trends are impacting the marketplace.

It can be a full-time job trying to keep up with Salesforce’s latest cloud offerings and messaging. However, it is always worth the effort, because the company’s pronouncements are often early bellwethers of the future direction of the software industry.

This has become particularly true with respect to the company’s evolving efforts to penetrate and gain a prominent position in the artificial intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT) markets. Salesforce’s most recent moves, in anticipation of its annual Dreamforce conference, also could be a key indicator of the rapidly changing competitive landscape.

Salesforce has been in the vanguard of promoting Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and, more broadly, the value of the cloud. As it has gained success with its widening array of SaaS/cloud offerings, it also has borrowed a strategy from the traditional software industry playbook: adding a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) development layer … Read More »

After a decade of debate regarding the viability of cloud services as a strategic alternative to traditional, on-premise legacy systems and software, the war of words is over. Now nearly every SMB and enterprise is looking at how to incorporate cloud alternatives into their business operations.

However, in many cases these organizations are also discovering that today’s cloud services are adding a new layer of complexity to their existing IT environment rather than simplifying their situations.

Click here to read our latest commentary in Datamation about the escalating challenges associated with migrating corporate workloads to today’s widening array of cloud service alternatives and moving to a multi-cloud sourcing model.

The rise of Microsoft Azure as a major competitor to Amazon Web Services (AWS) has become a mixed blessing for IT managers.

While many were pleased to see Microsoft finally become a cloud-first company and build Azure into a viable alternative to AWS, they now are faced with a new set of challenges in trying to make the most of multiple cloud providers.

The expanding array of cloud alternatives not only has created a bit of a buyer’s market, but also has made it more difficult to manage the increasingly complicated assortment of cloud services.

Click here to read THINKstrategies perspective in E-Commerce Times about the IT and business impact of the rapidly evolving multicloud procurement trend.

There is no longer any doubt that Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions have become the preferred method for organizations of all sizes to acquire business applications to satisfy their escalating customer and end-user demands while keeping pace with intensifying competitive pressures.

In fact, many organizations are expanding their SaaS subscriptions to support additional workers, and adopting additional SaaS solutions to redesign more of their business processes.

However, these organizations are often finding that their SaaS implementations are getting a lot more complicated as the SaaS industry and its growing legion of enterprise customers are falling into the same software development and implementation traps that derailed the previous generation of on-premise, perpetual license ISVs who the leading SaaS vendors successfully disrupted over the past decade.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest commentary in Datamation about why we believe the SaaS industry could face a significant speed-bump in the future if … Read More »

Everywhere you look, organizations are shifting their software acquisition preferences and policies away from traditional, on-premises legacy applications to a new generation of on-demand, Software as a Service, or SaaS, solutions.

Although I was an early advocate of SaaS for the unprecedented, business advantages it offers, I’m becoming concerned that many leading SaaS vendors and their enterprise customers are taking actions that significantly compromise the fundamental value of SaaS.

As the old adage goes, “the more things change, the more they remain the same.”

In the case of SaaS, a growing number of vendors and customers are demonstrating that they can’t get away from their old software habits and biases.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest perspectives in E-Commerce Times about how the SaaS industry could face a serious backlash if it lets this trend continue.

You can also click here to read our views … Read More »

There’s been a lot written recently about how artificial intelligence, machine learning and automation are going to displace millions of workers. However, these powerful new technologies already have spawned a surge in demand for a new wave of highly skilled consultants to help organizations capitalize on the added business opportunities resulting from the latest innovations.

Although the potential business benefits that can be derived from AI, ML and automation are obvious, attaining these benefits requires highly specialized skills that most organizations currently lack. Salesforce sees the demand for this unique set of consulting skills rising and has launched a new US$50 million SI (system integrator) Trailblazer Fund and SI Trailblazer Alliance Initiative to fill the void.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest perspectives in E-Commerce Times on the industry implications of the new Salesforce campaign and how it could spawn a … Read More »

One of the cornerstones of a successful software business has been to build as big a partner ecosystem as possible. In the world of the cloud, showcasing the partner ecosystem in an online marketplace also has become an imperative.

Salesforce.com has been in the vanguard of this trend. Since its inception in 2005, the AppExchange has grown to include more than 3,000 partner solutions that augment Salesforce’s growing portfolio of cloud services. AppExchange has strengthened significantly Salesforce’s position in the marketplace by cataloging the company’s rapidly expanding ecosystem of independent software vendor and consulting partners.

However, the tremendous success of the AppExchange has made it a bit overwhelming for customers to find and easily implement the right third-party solutions to best meet their needs.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest commentary in E-Commerce Times about how Salesforce’s new AppExchange Partner Program is seeking … Read More »

Organizations of all sizes – but especially large scale enterprises – are facing unprecedented business challenges that require a better end-to-end revenue management approach and platform. I’d like to identify some of the specific ways enterprises can employ revenue management to augment their customer relationship management (CRM) capabilities and maximize their revenue opportunities and performance.

Many enterprises are putting aside their legacy applications in favor of a new generation of Cloud-based applications, also known as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). A large number of these migrations center around Salesforce.com’s Sales, Marketing and Service Cloud offerings. While these solutions provide a slew of powerful features to help businesses connect with their customers, in many cases they don’t go far enough to meet the specific needs of many enterprises to help them drive revenue growth.

Click here to read my latest commentary for Model N regarding how … Read More »