Security Heartache

Steve Wilson

Former Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Steve Wilson is former VP and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, leading the business theme Digital Safety and Privacy. His coverage includes digital identity, data protection, data privacy, cryptography, and trust. His advisory services to CIOs, CISOs, CPOs and IT architects include identity product strategy, security practice benchmarking, Privacy by Design (PbD), privacy engineering and Privacy [or Data Protection] Impact Assessments (PIA, DPIA). Coverage Areas: -  Identity management, frameworks & governance-  Digital identity technologies-  Privacy by Design -  Big Data; “Big Privacy”-  Identity & privacy innovation Previous experience: Wilson has worked in ICT innovation, research, development and analysis for over 25 years. With double…...

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For the second time in as many months, a grave bug has emerged in core Internet security software. In February it was the "Goto Fail" bug in the Apple operating system iOS that left web site security inoperable; now we have "Heartbleed", a flaw that leaves many secure web servers in fact open to attackers sniffing memory contents looking for passwords and keys.

Who should care?

There is no shortage of advice on what to do if you're a user. And it's clear how to remediate the Heartbleed bug if you're a web administrator. But what is the software fraternity going to do to reduce the incidence of these disastrous human errors? In my view, Goto Fail and Heartbleed are emblematic of chaotic software craftsmanship. It appears that goto statements are used with abandon throughout web software today, creating exactly the unmaintainable spaghetti code that the founders of Structured Programming warned us about in the 1970s. Testing is evidently lax; code inspection seems non-existent. The Heartbleed flaw is in a piece of widely used Open Source software, and was over-looked first by the programmer, and then by the designated inspector, and then it went unnoticed for two years in the wild.

What are the ramifications of Heartbleed?

"Heartbleed" is a flaw in an obscure low level feature of the "Transport Layer Security" (TLS) protocol. TLS has an optional feature dubbed "Heartbeat" which a computer connected in a secure session can use to periodically test if the other computer is still alive. Heartbeat involves sending a request message, and getting a response. The bug in Heartbeat means the responding computer can be tricked into sending back a dump of 64 kiloytes of memory, because there is a payload length variable that goes unchecked in the code (for the technically minded, this error is qualitatively similar to a buffer overload; see also the OpenSSL Project description of the bug). Being server memory used in security management, that random grab has a good chance of including sensitive TLS-related data like passwords, credit card numbers and even TLS session keys. The bug is confined to the OpenSSL security library, where it was introduced inadvertently as part of some TLS improvements in late 2011.

The flawed code is present in almost all Open Source web servers, or around 66% of all web servers worldwide. However not all servers on the Internet run SSL/TLS secure sessions. Security experts Netcraft run automatic surveys and have worked out that around 17% of all Internet sites would be affected by Heartbleed - or around half a million widely used addresses. These include many banks, financial services, government services, social media companies and employer extranets. An added complication is that the Heartbeat feature leaves no audit trail, and so a Heartbleed exploit leaves no trace.

If you visit an affected site and start a secure ("padlocked") session, then an attacker that knows about Heartbleed can grab random pieces of memory from your session. Researchers have demonstrated that session keys can be retrieved, although it is said to be difficult. Nevertheless, Heartbleed has been described by some of the most respected and prudent commentators as catastrophic. Bruce Schneier for one rates its seriousness as "11 out of 10". 

Should we panic?

No. The first rule in any emergency is "Don't Panic". But nevertheless, this is an emergency.

The risk of any individual having been harmed through Heartbleed is probably low, but the consequences are potentially grave (if for example your bank is affected). And soon enough, it will be simple and cheap to take action, so you will hear experts say 'it is prudent to assume you have been compromised'. That action is to change your passwords.

However, you need to wait rather than rush into premature action. Until the websites you use have been fixed, changing passwords now may leave you more vulnerable, because it's highly likely that criminals are trying to exploit Heartbleed while they can. It's best to avoid using any secure websites for the time being. We should redouble the usual Internet precautions: check your credit card and bank statements (but not online for the time being!). Stay extra alert to suspicious looking emails not just from strangers but from your friends and colleagues too, for their cloud mail accounts might have been hacked. And seek out the latest news from your e-commerce sites, banks, government and so on. The Australian banks for instance were relatively quick to act; by April 10 the five biggest institutions confirmed they were safe.

Lessons for the Software Craft

Heartbleed for me is the last straw. I call it pathetic that mission critical code can harbour flaws like this. So for a start, in the interests of clarity, I will no longer use the term "Software Engineering". I've written a lot about the practice and the nascent profession of programming but it seems we're just going backwards. I'm aware that calling programming a "craft" will annoy some people; honestly, I mean no offence to basket weavers.

The modern world is increasingly dependent on software, so it passes understanding we still tolerate such ad hoc development processes.

The programmer responsible for the Heartbleed bug has explained that he made a number of changes to the code and that he "missed validating a variable" (referring to the unchecked length of the Heartbeat payload). The designated reviewer of the OpenSSL changes also missed that the length was not validated. The software was released into the wild in March 2012. It went unnoticed (well, unreported) until a few weeks ago and was rectified in an OpenSSL release on April 7.

I'd like to avoid apportioning individual blame, so I am not interested in the names of the programmers and the reviewer. But we have to ask: when so many application security issues boil down to overflow problems, why is it not second nature to watch out for bugs like Heartbleed? How did experienced programmers make the error? Why was this flaw in the wild for two years before it was spotted? I thought one of the core precepts of Open Source Software was that having many eyes looking over the code means that errors will be picked up. But code inspection seems not to be widely practiced anymore. There's not much point having Open software if people aren't actually looking!

As an aside, criminal hackers know about overflow errors and might be more motivated to find them than innocent developers. I fear that the Heartbleed overflow bug could have been noticed very quickly by hackers who pore over new release looking for exactly this type of exploit. Or equally by the NSA which is reported to have known about it from the beginning.

Where does this leave systems integrators and enterprise developers? Have they become accustomed to taking Open Source Software modules and building them in, without a whole lot of regression testing? There's a lot to be said for Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) but no enterprise can take "free" too literally; the total cost of development has to include reasonable specification, verification and testing of the integrated whole.

As discussed in the wake of Goto Fail, we need to urgently and radically lift coding standards.

New C-Suite Infosec Chief Customer Officer Chief Information Officer

The CMO is Dead: CMOs Use Big Data To Become Chief Revenue And Innovation Officers

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Role: Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on the IOT of Customer Experience and how the cloud is driving more flexible, agile, and robust customer service and customer experiences. In-app or in device customer service is the future. Coverage Areas: Next Generation Customer, Digital Marketing Transformation Bio: As a Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, Inc, Petouhoff works with Fortune 100 and 500’s Senior Leadership teams to create strategic customer experience (marketing, sales and service) solutions which engage customers, build brands and grow businesses. Combining her experience as a former Forrester software analyst, PWC systems integrator and change management consultant, Petouhoff leads executive workshops to discuss to not only…...

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I know you’ve seen these types of dramatic headlines before: The CMO is dead. But in actuality, the roles in marketing, sales, and customer service that once governed how business “gets done” are shifting. This best practices report, Data-Driven Marketing Campaign Optimization is about how CMOs can use big data and analytics to transform marketing campaign decision-making and advance corporate innovation and revenue.

What’s driving this shift? A great deal of the shift in roles is being driven by technology that is now available. In attending many conferences over the years, especially in the last 2 years, the technology has changed very dramatically and delivers on many of the promises CRM (Marketing, Sales and Service) wanted to deliver on, but just honestly the technology wasn’t there yet via its fullest capabilities to do this.

Now that we have technology that can deliver more than ever before, we have to make sure that people know how to use it and use it well. Read the rest of this blog post to understand my point of view.

The Report: Data-Driven Marketing Campaign Optimization     The report is about how CMOs can use big data and analytics to transform marketing campaign decision-making and make better decisions about their businesses. It looks at how to ensure you’re using big data to optimize not just your marketing efforts, but your whole company. A few of the juicy tidbits from the report:

• Contains a 5 level evaluation marketers can use to determine how well they’re incorporating big data into their marketing efforts
• Reveals how CMOs can use big data to enhance marketing decision-making and advance corporate innovation and revenue (Level 5)
• Helps marketers contribute value to making the best possible customer experiences and drive higher customer lifetime values
• Ensures Marketers become an essential member of senior leadership team that is responsible for driving revenue and showing that’s so by using data-driven marketing
• Addresses the politics, the “not invented here” and the silly finger pointing (that should actually be a while collar crime) that often happens in companies…

CMO‘s Paradigm Shifting To Innovation and Revenue Officers     I know it’s often tough being a Marketer and not getting the credit due. You might find yourself suffering from what I call the Rodney Dangerfield Affect, meaning you don’t get enough respect in your organization. I get it. But let’s put that idea in the past. You can get credit; you just really need to know that there is a new way to do marketing and the tools and platforms are there to support you.

In the past CMOs were charged with top of the funnel activities, driving qualified leads to Sales. It was then Sales job to take the lead and close as many as they could. But just like we know the earth isn’t flat (old paradigm) revenue generation is now not just the mission of Sales (new paradigm). In fact, the CMO role is changing and changing fast. The reason? Because the technology today can show what the Marketer has contributed to the bottom-line. And that’s what you as a Marketer need to know and need to focus on— for your career and for your company.

While there’s lots more to cover in the transition from the old paradigm of Marketing as “top of the funnel” people – to the Chief Information and Revenue Officers— if you are a Marketer who is interested in the “new world”, this report is a good first step in taking a look at not only where your organization is at with respect to how they view marketing, but also how you, as a Marketer are approaching Marketing. I’ve created a 5 level of Marketing Automation and Campaigns capability matrix (see the above figure). Often times you may not know what level your organization is at or what else you could be doing. This maturity level overview helps you to see where you are and also what other levels you can achieve.

How Can You Get Started?

• Begin to have a revenue mindset
• As you choose technology, ask yourself, can I show how I generate revenue with this technology?
• And if I have the right technology, how am I going to present that I am contributing to the bottom-line to the senior leadership team?

Change Means Politics Heat Up       As part of any change in an organization, you’ll want to be careful of organization change management issues that come up with change. The roles of Marketers and Sales are both need and provide great value. But if Marketers are becoming Chief Revenue and Innovation Officers because they have a lot of data and know how to use it to close sales, make sure to think through how that might affect other departments (Sales, IT, Customer Service…) And if / or when Marketing transforms into a “Revenue and Innovation Organization” what now is the role of Sales, IT and Customer Service?

Redefining Roles    In one particular company that I worked with on this this transformation, Marketing became responsible for the top and middle funnel revenue drivers. Sales then transitioned into executive account management and renewals: they were really the relationship builders and maintainers. And Customer Service delivered on the “promises” made by Marketing and Sales by integrally working together with Marketing and Sales. This meant that all three departments knew what their new roles were and the importance of customer lifetime value (CLTV). They knew that all three department’s goals were to collaborate to increase CLTV so that customers, whether it was a B2B or a B2C company, spent more time and money with the company over longer periods of time- hence increasing the customer life time value.

What business experts are really striving for with Big Data is to create blue ocean strategies where the competition is irrelevant; we learned that from the authors of the Book, Blue Ocean Strategies,  W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne. We also learned from W. Edwards Deming, that if we listen to our customers and our employees and take that data, we’d have better products, services and companies — which help to build companies that become their own marketplace or live in an uncontested market space. And that’s what can be done with all the data that we have today — if CMO’s know what to do with it.

Making Cross-Functional Collaboration The Most Rewarded Executive Activity    In this particular company, when cross-functional collaboration was a primary part of their culture, Marketing wasn’t spending millions of dollars to acquire customers only to have the other departments provide such poor relationship building and service that the customer’s defected. Instead they made sure that once the customer had bought and come on board, Customer Service delivered on promises by Sales and Marketing. (In your company, it might mean people in these departments have to talk to each other…) Now that’s an interesting concept!

This is just one company’s take on how they approached these issues. I’d love to hear what you think about the report. There’s much more I could / need to cover in this area. This report just a first look at the idea of CMOs transforming into Chief Intelligence and Revenue Officers.

@DrNatalie

 

Marketing Transformation Chief Marketing Officer

First Take - 3 Key Takeaways from Ultimate's UltiConnect Conference Day 1 Keynote

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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Here are my top 3 takeaways from today’s keynote:

• People First – Ultimate has been stressing their people first perspective on building software since a while, but it is now that this philosophy becomes real and tangible in software with its new recruiting functionality, designed for the main people population in recruiting, the candidate. It will be interesting to see Ultimate apply this philosophy to new functionality coming in 2014 and beyond. There is certainly a differentiating angle with the people first perspective – it will be interesting to see how Ultimate will make this approach even more tangible going forward. 

• Global – Globalization is one of the strongest forces enterprises are facing today and it is good to see Ultimate reacting to that. Support 30+ languages and localizations is a good start, opening an office in London also helps, but Ultimate will have to pick up speed in this area to remain a credible and viable vendor for more global needs and aspirations in its existing and prospective customers. 

• Roadmap – Ultimate shared its roadmap not only for the next 12 – but the next 24 months. And there are major HCM building blocks coming – at the end of that period Ultimate will be complete in terms of HCM automation (as we know it today). Kudos to Ultimate for sharing this, which requires significant fortitude and is seldom seen today for a 12+ month horizon – but sharing product plans is of immense value for customers and prospects to chart their course in their uptake and usage of HCM automation. 

MyPOV

 

Future of Work Matrix Commerce Innovation & Product-led Growth New C-Suite Data to Decisions Tech Optimization Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity User Conference workday SAP Oracle AI Analytics Automation CX EX Employee Experience HCM Machine Learning ML SaaS PaaS Cloud Digital Transformation Enterprise Software Enterprise IT Leadership HR Chief People Officer Chief Customer Officer Chief Human Resources Officer Chief Information Officer Chief Technology Officer Chief Information Security Officer Chief Data Officer

Effective Engagement Strategies Segment Audiences by Digital Proficiency not Age

Research uncovers catering to five generations of digital workers yields higher levels of engagement

Toronto, Ontario – April 9, 2014 Constellation Research, announced today the publication of “Segmenting Audiences By Digital Proficiency” by Constellation Vice President and Principal Analyst, Alan Lepofsky. This Big Ideas report reveals that segmenting audiences by digital proficiency yields more effective engagement strategies than segmenting by age. The report establishes five levels of digital proficiency, and provides a digital proficiency-centered framework for readers to utilize in the creation of their own engagement strategy. A free snapshot of the report is available for download.

Report highlights:

• The way people interact with technology can be broken down into three primary components: content, people and actions
• Five Digital Proficiency categories: Digital Holdouts, Digital Disengaged, Digital Voyeurs, Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives
• Example scenarios of how Digital Proficiency can be used as a framework to plan improvements in employee collaboration and customer support.

Commentary: Alan Lepofsky, report author

“The proliferation of digital technology is causing businesses to go through one of the largest shifts since the Industrial Revolution. This digital transformation forces organizations to rethink everything about the way they do business - from the way they manufacture products to their sales and marketing strategies, even the way they communicate with employees and customers. Unfortunately, many companies start planning their digital transformation by discussing the needs of the various generations of people that will be affected by this change. While people of different generations may indeed have different wants and needs, age alone should not be the determining factor used in planning these transformation projects. Instead, Constellation recommends using a combination of a person’s knowledge and comfort level with technology, a characteristic referred to as Digital Proficiency. This report looks at five types of digital proficiency and helps guide organizations on how to tailor their digital transformation to each category.

It’s time to put the “Millennials are different” conversation to bed. When companies make broad assumptions about people based solely on age they are not painting accurate pictures of their employees or customers. Instead, Digital proficiency uses a combination of skill level and comfort with technology to segement audiences into five categories."

This report fits into Constellation’s business-focused research themes: The Future of Work, Next Generation Customer Experience, and Digital Marketing Transformation

 

ABOUT Alan Lepofksy

Alan Lepofsky is Vice President and Principal Analyst covering collaboration platforms and practices, project management and analytics. Alan’s current research focuses on the evolution of tools and processes that help people get their jobs done.

 

COORDINATES

Profile: http://www.constellationr.com/users/alanlepo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/alanlepo
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alanlepo
Geo: Toronto, Ontario

THE REPORT

Segmenting Audiences by Digital Proficiency

 

ABOUT CONSTELLATION RESEARCH

Constellation Research is a research and advisory firm that helps organizations navigate the challenges of digital disruption through business models transformation and the judicious application of disruptive technologies. This renowned group of experienced analysts, led by R "Ray" Wang, focuses on business-themed research including Digital Marketing Transformation; Future of Work; Next Generation Customer Experience; Data to Decisions; Matrix Commerce; Technology Optimization and Innovation; and Consumerization of IT and the New C-Suite.

Constellation's collection of prestigious analysts and Orbits members bring real world experience, independence, and objectivity to client solutions that span cross-role, cross-functional, and cross-industry points of view. Clients join Constellation Research for a fresh and business focused perspective.

Unlike the legacy analyst firms, Constellation Research is disrupting how research is accessed, what topics are covered, and how clients can partner with a research firm to achieve success. Over 225 clients have joined from an ecosystem of buyers, partners, solution providers, c-suite, board of directors and vendor clients.

***

Constellation Research, Constellation SuperNova Awards, Constellation Orbits, Connected Enterprise, Constellation Cosmos, and the Constellation Research logo are trademarks of Constellation Research, Org. All other products and services listed herein are trademarks of their respective companies.

 

Press Contacts:
Contact the Media and Influencers relations team at [email protected] for interviews with analysts.

Sales Contacts:
Contact our sales team at [email protected].

 

 

Marketing Transformation Future of Work Next-Generation Customer Experience Innovation & Product-led Growth Tech Optimization Chief Customer Officer Chief Executive Officer Chief People Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief Digital Officer

How to Get the CFO's Buy-In For Social, Custexp Investments

Zachary Jeans

Principal Strategist and Founder
Genius Cloud Solutions

Zachary Jeans is Principal Strategist and Founder of Genius Cloud Solutions. He enjoys discovering new market strategies and digital disruption. Zachary has been the number one Salesforce influencer on Twitter according to research done by Run Consultants in 2014 & 2015. He has also earned the distinction of being in the Top 50 retweeted people in the world by CIOs. He is a Constellation Research Orbits member, a select group focused on digital disruption in technology, business models, and society. Beyond the focus of technology, Zachary was co-leader of LeadWithGiants for 5 years, an organization dedicated to raising up 10,000 uplifting leaders across eduction, business, tech, and government. He then founded ImpactMatters Chat, a leadership-oriented community…...

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1

So your CFO doesn’t want your company to participate on the world’s global communication platforms, otherwise known as, ‘Social’?

Welcome to the 21st century. According to@IBMBigData, poor #custex resulted in an estimated $83 billion in lost annual revenue in United States alone. Everyone is selling their initiatives with better data and they are doing it across all digital properties, including the social platforms. A large business taking a defensive posture towards social media might have been thought of as conservative and wise in the late 2000?s, but more and more it is being interpreted as arrogant and eroding relevance. Your company, once like a gated community, has the opportunity to open up, like a shopping mall on a Saturday afternoon. With social platforms your company has the chance to meet your potential partners, and existing clients in a day-to-day conversation.

Doubting digital #CustEx spending in social channels today, is like doubting the telephone’s value at the dawn of the 20th century. The first metric I share with anyone about #social #custex, is: You exist now. If you don’t have a presence digitally, your existence is degrading day-by-day as generation C?—?‘The Connected Generation’?—?matures into adulthood. If you are trying to sell your CFO on the ROI of social, I have a few suggestions:

• Calculating the minimal ROI of Digital is a simple equation: Take your known site conversion rate and multiply it by the increase in traffic directly from social platform properties.
• Deliver some leads, some happy customer stories, and show them some money!
• Show the CFO meaningful engagement with targeted people, which translates to warm phone calls and the eventual ringing of the register.

Companies must change or end up like Blockbuster. The power to convince your CFO is in illustrating a story backed by financial data. It is the business intelligence they need to see the value of and, embrace #CustEx innovation.

Today’s customers are stakeholders, there are many implications on the future of the enterprise, and now they have a voice through social platforms. Roadmaps can’t be like the Magic 8 Ball, where customers ask their sales rep a question, then shake them for an answer. Customers deserve, and expect, the TRUTH on product releases. Vendors can’t sell multi-year $1M+ deals on “Maybe we’ll get around to your product improvement requests” anymore. In the social era, the customer is as educated on your product features as your sales reps, and there is simply too much visibility into other products to claim your competition can’t become a solution for them. As well, vendors can no longer hide behind a sales process that is more complex than the IRS tax code. In the social era, customers have as much visibility as the vendor does to the public; therefore, enterprises must think like their customers and respond appropriately with speed and agility. Vendors can decrease churn by meeting real customer needs that surface in social platform discussions; ultimately, those met needs turn into positive customer stories, instead of cancerous complaints. And that is a result anyone in C-Suite can get behind.

 

Future of Work New C-Suite Next-Generation Customer Experience Tech Optimization Marketing Transformation Revenue & Growth Effectiveness Innovation & Product-led Growth Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Data to Decisions Chief Customer Officer Chief Executive Officer Chief Financial Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief People Officer Chief Revenue Officer Chief Human Resources Officer

Event Report - ADP’s Meeting of the Minds

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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We had the opportunity to attend ADP’s yearly user conference for their large enterprise customers, the Meeting of the Minds (#ADPMOTM) as ADP calls the event. With well over a thousand attendees this was the largest MOTM ever and both vendor and customers were energized about the new ADP, which is more informal, approachable, and funny and especially cares about all aspects of HCM automation now (see my takeaways from Day 1 here), way beyond the traditional payroll and compliance aspects.

 

2012, 2013 & 2014 (C) Holger Mueller - All Rights Reserved

 

Next-Generation Customer Experience Revenue & Growth Effectiveness Data to Decisions Future of Work Innovation & Product-led Growth New C-Suite Marketing Transformation Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Tech Optimization Hadoop ADP SuccessFactors workday SAP Oracle AI Analytics Automation CX EX Employee Experience HCM Machine Learning ML SaaS PaaS Cloud Digital Transformation Enterprise Software Enterprise IT Leadership HR LLMs Agentic AI Generative AI business Marketing IaaS Disruptive Technology Enterprise Acceleration Next Gen Apps IoT Blockchain CRM ERP finance Healthcare Customer Service Content Management Collaboration Chief Customer Officer Chief People Officer Chief Human Resources Officer Chief Technology Officer Chief Information Officer Chief Information Security Officer Chief Data Officer

Big Data Marketing Report Published by Constellation Research

Report reveals how CMOs can use big data to enhance marketing decision-making and advance corporate innovation

Los Angeles – April 8, 2014 Constellation Research, Inc. the research and advisory firm focused on how disruptive technologies transform business models announced today the publication of "Data-Driven, Marketing Campaign Optimization" by Constellation Vice President and Principal Analyst, Dr. Natalie Petouhoff. This Best Practices research report teaches marketing professionals how to apply a data-focused ROI optimization method to elevate the efficacy of Marketing Campaign Automation.

“Data Driven marketing Campaign Optimization” contains an evaluation marketers can utilize to test how well they incorporate data analytics into their marketing efforts. The results of this assessment enable marketers to select the right staff, process, and technologies to enforce their strategy, reduce internal politics and generate the best ROI for the company.
“The value of combining marketing campaign automation with analytics and Big Data means Marketers can continuously compare and contrast campaign scenarios before sending them out, increasing the relevance to the customer, optimize the business results and create an uncontested marketplace, thereby making the competition irrelevant”, commented report author, Petouhoff.

This report fits into Constellation’s business-focused research theme, Digital Marketing Transformation, NextGen Customer Experience and Data to Decisions.

ABOUT Dr. Natalie Petouhoff
Dr. Natalie Petouhoff is Vice President and Principal Analyst covering Marketing, Customer Service and the Gap Between Marketing and Customer Service Dr. Natalie Petouhoff current research focuses on maturity capabilities of companies and how well they implement software to get the best possible return on investment. Previously a Forrester Analyst, Petouhoff wrote the world's first social media ROI model.

COORDINATES
Twitter: www.Twitter.com/drnatalie
Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/drnataliepetouhoff/
Analyst Profile: http://www.constellationr.com/users/nataliepetouhoff
Geo: Los Angeles, CA

THE REPORT
Data-Driven Marketing Campaign Optimization
A free report snapshot is available for download: 

ABOUT CONSTELLATION RESEARCH
Constellation Research is a research and advisory firm that helps organizations navigate the challenges of digital disruption through business models transformation and the judicious application of disruptive technologies. This renowned group of experienced analysts, led by R "Ray" Wang, focuses on business-themed research including Digital Marketing Transformation; Future of Work; Next Generation Customer Experience; Data to Decisions; Matrix Commerce; Technology Optimization and Innovation; and Consumerization of IT and the New C-Suite.
Constellation's collection of prestigious analysts and Orbits members bring real world experience, independence, and objectivity to client solutions that span cross-role, cross-functional, and cross-industry points of view. Clients join Constellation Research for a fresh and business focused perspective.
Unlike the legacy analyst firms, Constellation Research is disrupting how research is accessed, what topics are covered, and how clients can partner with a research firm to achieve success. Over 225 clients have joined from an ecosystem of buyers, partners, solution providers, c-suite, board of directors and vendor clients.
For more information about Constellation Research, visit ConstellationR.com
***
Constellation Research, Constellation SuperNova Awards, Constellation Orbits, Connected Enterprise, Constellation Cosmos, and the Constellation Research logo are trademarks of Constellation Research, Org. All other products and services listed herein are trademarks of their respective companies.

 

Press Contacts:
Contact the Media and Influencers relations team at [email protected] for interviews with analysts.

Sales Contacts:
Contact our sales team at [email protected].

 

Data to Decisions Marketing Transformation Next-Generation Customer Experience Future of Work Innovation & Product-led Growth New C-Suite Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Marketing B2B B2C CX Customer Experience EX Employee Experience AI ML Generative AI Analytics Automation Cloud Digital Transformation Disruptive Technology Growth eCommerce Enterprise Software Next Gen Apps Social Customer Service Content Management Collaboration Machine Learning LLMs Agentic AI Robotics SaaS PaaS IaaS Quantum Computing Enterprise IT Enterprise Acceleration IoT Blockchain CRM ERP CCaaS UCaaS Enterprise Service developer Metaverse VR Healthcare Supply Chain Leadership business finance Chief Customer Officer Chief Information Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief Technology Officer Chief Information Security Officer Chief Data Officer

Future of Work – Is voice part of it?

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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Today’s’ debut of Cortana at the Microsoft’s Build conference in San Francisco made me think once again how we work with our devices. Obviously devices are a key component of the ‘Future of Work’ research area that we have at Constellation Research.

 

Screenshot from Wikipedia

There is no question we live in the information age and devices are the key tools used by the worker of the information age. A life without them is hardly imaginable at this point – both at work and off work. Kids ask their parents how people met before they had mobile phones. Or what is a fax. I recently found out about that generation gap when our 8 year old daughter asked me if a rotary phone is really a phone and if it was how to use it.

The irony that till today almost all input into our devices happens through keyboards. We need keyboards so the devices understand us. Even if you think back to early computing – the punch card was the medium of choice to store information and program – and load them to devices.

So the keyboard came along as well and as one of the earliest testaments for the importance of backward compatibility, loaned its design from the mechanical typewriters. Not sure who made the decision but the came along with a short term pro and a mega long term con. The short term pro was – it was easy for people to use the keyboard layout – as they were used to it from the mechanical typewriter. The mega long term con (that we suffer from till today) was, that the key layout of the typewriter was ultimately designed in a way to not be able to type too fast. Correct – not type too fast. A lot of research of early typewriter keyboard layouts went into creating a layout that would avoid the back then ‘blue screen of death’ – the mechanical jam of the typewriter’s hammers. One can imagine the productivity impact of such a crash was significant – unclog the hammers, clean fingers and get back to typing – a little slower this time. Still a faster recovery than the one from the PC blue screen of death. But even in the earliest computer times, there was no need to throttle the human typing speed.

And humans are extraordinary at adapting and learning. Ever seen an adept teenager tying on a T9 keyboard – beating many people typing on a regular keyboard day in and day out from an accuracy and speed perspective. Or the most recent trend to solve the input problem – the swipe across the keyboard. Saves the time to lift fingers – and let’s software help the understanding on what was supposed to be type. How fast that can be can be seen in the recent Guinness world record that Microsoft established for Windows Phone 8.1

And now we are seeing the rise of voice. First popular in the late 90ies – but it never took over the PC. And even with voice recognition now being part of Windows 8 – with no additional charge – voice never took over on a PC. The reason might be the multi-tasking nature of the PC – voice recognition only gets really good when knowing the context of the voice being heard – and PCs are used for multiple things at the same time. Smartphones though are usually only being used in one context (even though they can multitask) – and that makes voice recognition much easier to master. And of course the form factor, the disappearance of the physical keyboard all played hand in hand for the rise of voice.

As mentioned – Siri made the start – but interesting enough you see very few iPhone users using voice as their dominant input method. It is largely used as a search entry replacement – often in a social setting. Coupled with the prestige and coolness factor of Siri – the search results are often entertaining. Then came Google with Now – and that moved the yardstick quite a bit. In my unscientific and not representative samples I see Android users talking more to their phones for text input than iPhone users. .I even know a (in fairness dictation trained lawyer) that handles almost all smartphone input activity via voice.

And now it’s Microsoft with Cortana. As almost a tradition, Microsoft is not early in the game – but a later follower – with that it has the chance to get things right and differentiated from existing products. Being able to interact with Cortana also via keyboard – not just voice – is definitively an improvement that takes into account that people expect answers not only on a spoken context – but also in settings when you cannot speak (e.g. when in a meeting). From the developer angle, opening up Cortana APIs for specific jargon, words and context is also a differentiating move. Moreover Cortana can take notes and make turn them into reminders. Through pure coincidence I had lunch with the PM team of Cortana at the build conference – and it was interesting to see and learn how well planned the differentiating features were put in place. Having Cortana pro-actively tell you e.g. the latest weather forecast because she noticed you always ask this around 7 AM… is just another example.

At the end of the day voice tools like Apple’s Siri, Google Now and Microsoft Cortana need to get voice recognition, context and then intent right.

• Getting the voice side right is pretty much a table stake.
   
• A great search engine helps to get the context right – as Google has shown. And here Microsoft may have an advantage over Apple, but unlikely in comparison to Google. But having the largest email and calendaring platform with Office is a huge bonus on the other side.
   
• Getting the intent is largely depending on the context – and there smartphones capturing information on location, movement, applications are a very important help.

How Microsoft manages to create additional value and differentiation for Cortana beyond that– we will have to see.

At the end of the day voice recognition is all about getting the prediction of intent right. When it hits the sweet spot it is unbelievably cool. When it misses by a little, the results are – silly. And in order to increase prediction quality, voice recognition providers need to encroach into areas that are usually tucked under the cloth of privacy. Getting the mix right and not becoming creepy is the art to get right.

When will we know voice recognition has arrived? Well when we see no more QWERTY keyboards being sold. No keyboard accessory business. Cortana will be certainly a system that will fight the keyboards. Will we see the keyboards come back with a faster to type design – we will see. For now we certainly can say that we will use our voice chords more often than our fingertips.


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P.S. Siri and Cortana are female, Google Now the voice is determined by user setup. Cortana was loaned from the Halo game – so she has a physical appearance. How Microsoft got that by concerns on stereotypes and gender thinking is something I am still pondering on.

 

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It's Time To Put The Millennial Argument To Bed

Alan Lepofsky

Vice President & Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Alan Lepofsky - VP and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research. With almost two decades of experience in the collaboration software industry, Lepofsky helps organizations improve the way their employees work together to get their jobs done. Lepofsky’s primary research area The Future of Work, focuses on: integrating collaboration and business processes (Purposeful Collaboration), structuring work via Social Task Management, leveraging analytics and digital assistants to work more productively, the strategic impact of mobile computing on business transformation, and measuring workforce culture based on Digital Proficiency instead of age. Twitter: @alanlepoLinkedIn: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/alanlepo     , Title: Big IdeasIntelligent Collaboration: The Intersection of…...

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Last year my colleague Ray Wang introduced The Five Generations of Digital Workers.  Expanding upon this excellent work, I've just published a new report:

Segmenting Audiences By Digital Proficiency: Using Knowledge and Comfort with Technology as a Framework for Digital Transformation

The proliferation of digital technology is causing businesses to go through one of the largest shifts since the Industrial Revolution. This digital transformation forces organizations to rethink everything about the way they do business - from the way they manufacture products to their sales and marketing strategies, even the way they communicate with employees and customers. Unfortunately, many companies start planning their digital transformation by discussing the needs of the various generations of people that will be affected by this change. While people of different generations may indeed have different wants and needs, age alone should not be the determining factor used in planning these transformation projects. Instead, Constellation recommends using a combination of a person’s knowledge and comfort level with technology, a characteristic referred to as Digital Proficiency. This report looks at five types of digital proficiency and helps guide organizations on how to tailor their digital transformation to each category.

The following chart shows the various categories of relationships of how comfort level and knowledge can be combined with respect to a person's technological savvy.

 

Using this framework, Constellation outlines five levels of digital proficiency and discusses the various characteristics of each category.

 

 

Table of Contents

• Purpose and Intent
• Executive Summary
• Challenging the Myth that Age Affects Technological Savvy
• “Content” Contains the Information We Create, Consume and Share
• “People” Represent the Audiences We Interact with
• “Actions” Are the Tasks that Enable Us to Get Things Done
• Define Digital Proficiency by Knowledge and Comfort
• Knowledge Comes from a Combination of Education, Experience and Accessibility
• Comfort Stems from Beliefs, Desires and Trust
• The Five Types of Digital Workers Reflects the Future of Digital Segmentation
• Start By Determining Digital Proficiency
• Recommendations: Tailor and Customize Experiences Accordingly
• Scenario 1: Internal Collaboration
• Scenario 2: Customer Support and Marketing
• Parallax Points of View

Click here to access the full report. 

Marketing Transformation Future of Work Next-Generation Customer Experience

3 Key Takeaways from ADP’s Meeting of the Minds Conference Day 1 Keynote

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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We have the opportunity to attend ADP’s annual user conference for large enterprise customers – happening in Orlando right now. The conference is well attended with over a 1000 attendees.

 

Here are my top 3 takeaways from today’s keynote:
 

• It’s a new ADP – Gone are the days of ADP being the grey and boring back office payroll specialist. The executive team cracked more jokes than to be able to account for here – and most of them making fun of themselves. I wasn’t there – but that did not happen 5-6 Meetings of the Minds (MOTM) ago as attendees are telling me. The new ADP is social and lets their employees wear jeans and … bring their dogs to work (!). Quite a cultural change for a large enterprise but it’s good to see it lived and energizing employees and with that customers and partners.

 

 

• A complete vision – ADP CEO Rodriguez walked the audience through the company’s vision - using a hire to retire perspective coupled with the ADP strengths on service and compliance. It was a good setup for the rest of the keynote – though it could have been connected more with the following parts of the keynote. For instance the insight component came too short in my view. But what hasn’t happened can still be and the conference just started.

 

 

• Compelling product demo – Later in the keynote Mark Benjamin and Mike Capone engaged in a very good (and entertaining) presentation of the upcoming employee self-service user interface. Not only did the new user experience look well and easy to use – but it also showed the ADP higher ground around payroll and compliance. Seeing take home pay when electing benefits, showing overtime correctly calculated in a paycheck and swapping shifts were impressive highlights of the demo. Customers will see the new user interface first late summer / early fall.

 

 

MyPOV

An encouraging start of the MOTM conference. It’s good to see ADP not blindly imitating other leading HCM vendors but looking for a differentiating position, leveraging its strengths and bringing in a different perspective to the HCM automation game. Now it's key to see that ADP delivers innovation across a complex product portfolio and learn from customers what they see and how they feel on the progress. More to come in the next two days.

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You can find a Storify collection of Keynote tweets here.

More on ADP

 

• ADP innovates with with verve and good timing – read here

 

 

And  more on the importance of the paycheck:

 

• Could the paycheck re-invent HCM – yes it can – read here.

• And suddenly, payroll matters again! Read here.

 

2012, 2013 & 2014 (C) Holger Mueller - All Rights Reserved

 

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