National Data Privacy Day Marked by a New Patent That Eliminates Passwords and Protects Personal Data

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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Today on National Data Privacy Day, TextPower announces that the company has been granted an important patent for a “text messaging authentication system” that is the basis for the company’s TextKey™ platform. Websites using the TextKey™ platform will offer their users higher security, easier logins and less hassle and save themselves from the most common cause of customer support calls — lost login IDs and passwords. TextKey™ will significantly reduce enterprise or e-commerce website operating costs and inoculate them against the most common forms of hacking: social engineering, password theft, key loggers and phishing schemes.

Unlike commonly available authentication systems TextKey™ users send a simple text message (SMS) from their cell phone to authenticate their identity. Through this one simple text message, multiple factors are authenticated using the patented technology forming a highly secure barrier to hacking. The TextKey™ system also employs a secure connection, completely outside the browser environment, that eliminates man-in-the-middle attacks making it significantly more secure than any other SMS-based two factor authentication technologies. Without physical possession of the authorized cell phone and knowing the user’s personal PIN, identity thieves cannot login to an account using someone else’s credentials.

“What an appropriate day to receive a patent for our authentication technology and announce our one-step secure login product, SnapID™,” said Scott Goldman, CEO of TextPower. “SnapID™, a new product based on our patented TextKey™ platform, eliminates the need for both user IDs and passwords. No more remembering, typing, managing or resetting passwords. No more lists, sticky notes or password managers to handle the dozens of login credentials we all use everyday. To login, users ‘just text it’.”

SnapID™ doesn’t just solve the password problem — it eliminates it and will fundamentally change the way people login to websites, use ATMs, buy pay-per-view movies, checkout at cash registers and any other process that requires identification and authentication. Cell phones have already replaced address books, cameras, calculators, boarding passes, navigation systems, music players and even heart rate monitors. By using them to send a simple text message they can now replace userIDs, passwords, authentication tokens, USB keys and the ubiquitous — and reviled — login box on every website.

A SnapID™-enabled website will have a “Login with SnapID™” button along with the traditional username and password fields. Visitors who have registered for a free SnapID™ account will simply click that button; a one-time password then appears on their computer screen. The visitor sends a plain text message with the one-time password from their registered cell phone (which doesn’t need to be a smart phone) and they are then logged in securely. Logging in takes about as long as it takes to send a text message and is explained in this 2-minute video: https://vimeo.com/107771091

For more information on TextKey™, visit http://www.textkey.com. To register for SnapID™ and check out the demo, visit http://www.snapid.co or text “NoMorePasswords” to 81888.

Next-Generation Customer Experience Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Security Zero Trust Chief Customer Officer Chief Information Security Officer Chief Privacy Officer

Social Media Has Killed Consumer Trust

Partner, Sensei Marketing
Partner, Sensei Marketing

Sales & marketing veteran with almost 30 years’ experience and now 1800 digital projects to his credit for clients including Morgan Stanley, AOL, Hyatt Gaming Management, Snyder's of Hanover, Hitachi, the Home Depot, Kraft Foods, Drees Homes, American Idol, and hundreds more, including leading agencies around the North America.     ...

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“People trust people, not brand advertising.” For the last few years, marketing analysts and social media marketers have been sharing copious studies and statistics which reiterate that sentiment. They give credit to social media for this new reality and point to the “wisdom of crowds” effect, which references the observation that people tend to believe what the masses say and share on social media, despite personal experiences or empirical evidence to the contrary. If enough people hold this belief, it must be true.

We trust the wisdom of crowds, despite the fact that we neither know the people who rate restaurants on Yelp! nor have personal relationships with many of the social celebrities who boast insane numbers of followers. Similarly, we don’t personally know many of those in our social circles or the online communities we spend so much time in. Yet, we gladly stepped in line, we trusted.

However, with every passing day, it has become more evident that social media has killed consumer trust.

Pre-social media, we called this phenomenon Bandwagonsim. As defined in the Oxford Dictionary of Psychology, the bandwagon effect is a phenomenon whereby the rate of uptake of beliefs, ideas, fads and trends increases the more that they have already been adopted by others. In other words, the bandwagon effect is characterized by the probability of individual adoption increasing with respect to the proportion of people who have already done so. Social media  amplifies this effect by allowing more people to become content creators and by facilitating more connections to more people.

It’s often said that “marketers ruin everything” and in this case, I tend to agree. I’m picking on marketers here but in reality, the blame could fall squarely on the lap of most businesses who sought to take advantage of social media. In their efforts to earn free media, brand awareness, “Likes,” mentions, and followers, business have attempted to create short cuts that generate faster results for less time and investment.

Social Media’s Dirty Little Secret: Cyber-Shilling

Cyber-shilling has become a lucrative business, offering those with cash the opportunity to receive thousands or tens of thousands of positive reviews, fans, followers, and 5-star ratings. Cyber-shilling continues to make news when businesses are sued for posting fake reviews and social networks are called out for not doing enough to prevent them. Forget social proof; social trust is what businesses should be focused on and that trust is eroding, fast.

Klout became popular for using gamification tactics to create and/or encourage social media “influencers.” In turn, the social scoring platform would sell access to these social celebrities in hopes that they would shill for corporate sponsors who shower them with product samples or free services. Klout is essentially a non-player in today’s social influence marketing game but newer players such as HelloSociety, Niche, and TapInfluence are stepping up. Instead of promoting influence scores, they connect businesses with content creators and help them develop and share the content that is more relevant to their audiences.  Are consumers fooled?

On a more personal scale, “like-for-like” schemes are constantly in play where enterprising individuals work together to bolster each other’s social profiles in order to appear more popular, relevant, and influential.

All this worked – for a while. Businesses earned a lot of free media and brand awareness;  individuals were elevated to social celebrity status. However, it didn’t take the general public long to figure out that cyber-shilling, gamified endorsements, and native advertising   were real, and in no time, the inherent trust we placed in our social communities was lost.

Millennials Trust Real People

The phrase “people trust people, not brand advertising” should be updated to state: “People trust real people and real friends,  not social media and/or brand advertising.” Nowhere is this more evident than among the Millennial generation, who for all their good intentions and social-do-goodness, are less trusting of what they read and see in social media.

An October 2014 Student Monitor survey queried college students about the the media through which they learn about products and services. The number one channel by which students preferred to receive product/service information was good old-fashioned word of mouth (48%). Interesting, “ads on the Internet” was second at 39%, well ahead of “information on the Internet” (21%) and “product reviews online” (18%).

In fact, when asked specifically about what most influences their back-to-school purchase decisions, the vast majority of Millennials reported that “friend’s recommendation/one-to-one” was “very influential” (58.3%). Compare that to “friends’ recommendations via social media” which was said to be very influential by only 34.1% of respondents or “Pinterest or other visual social sharing channels,” which was said to be very influential by only 18.9%.

Social Media Has Killed Consumer Trust

Clearly, the pendulum has swung back to traditional word of mouth and away from “the wisdom of crowds.”

In June of 2013, I wrote that social media has led business astray. For all its promised benefits including faster, more effective access to larger communities, it has forced many marketers down a path that leads to lower business revenue. I speculated that the bigger online communities and our social circles grew, the less influential those communities would be regarding purchase decisions.

There’s no denying that consumers are embracing social networking in greater and greater numbers.  And, you cannot deny that social media is a phenomenon that has fundamentally changed the way humans communicate, learn, and live. Yet businesses and marketers may have killed the promise of riches for businesses embracing advocacy or influencer marketing strategies by their very own actions.

Sensei Debates

Is there no trust left in online recommendations and ratings?

Has social media killed consumer trust?

Sam Fiorella
Feed Your Community, Not Your Ego

The post Social Media Has Killed Consumer Trust appeared first on Sensei Marketing.

Marketing Transformation Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Next-Generation Customer Experience Future of Work Innovation & Product-led Growth New C-Suite B2C CX Marketing B2B 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 Chief Customer Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief People Officer Chief Human Resources Officer

Suspension of Disbelief and digital safety

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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If the digital economy is really the economy, then it's time we moved beyond hoping that we can simply train users to be safe online. Is the real economy only for heros who can protect themselves in the jungle, writing their own code, as if they're carrying their own guns? Or do we as a community build structures and standards and insist on technologies that work for all?

For most people, the World Wide Web experience is still a lot like watching cartoons on TV. The human-machine interface is almost the same. The images and actions are just as synthetic; crucially, nothing in a web browser is real. Almost anything goes -- just as the Roadrunner defies gravity in besting Coyote, there are no laws of physics that temper the way one bit of multimedia leads to the next. Yes, there is a modicum of user feedback in the way we direct some of the action when browsing and e-shopping, but it's quite illusory; for the most part all we're really doing is flicking channels across a billion pages.

It's the suspension of disbelief when browsing that lies at the heart of many of the safety problems we're now seeing. Inevitably we lose our bearings in the totally synthetic World Wide Web. We don't even realise it, we're taken in by a virtual reality, and we become captive to social engineering.

But I don't think it's possible to tackle online safety by merely countering users' credulity. Education is not the silver bullet, because the Internet is really so technologically complex and abstract that it lies beyond the comprehension of most lay people.

Using the Internet 'safely' today requires deep technical skills, comparable to the level of expertise needed to operate an automobile circa 1900. Back then you needed to be able to do all your own mechanics [roughly akin to the mysteries of maintaining anti-virus software], look after the engine [i.e. configure the operating system and firewall], navigate the chaotic emerging road network [there's yet no trusted directory for the Internet, nor any road rules], and even figure out how to fuel the contraption [consumer IT supply chains is about as primitive as the gasoline industry was 100 years ago]. The analogy with the early car industry becomes especially sharp for me when I hear utopian open source proponents argue that writing ones own software is the best way to be safe online. Who changes their own oil anymore?  Would most people even know what "change the oil" means? Can you imagine if the warranty on your car required that you change the oil, in the way that Internet banking Ts&Cs require you to keep your computer patched? I wonder what will happen if the time comes that a bank refuses to cover a customer's online fraud losses because their A/V was out of date ... 

The Internet is so critical -- and I'd have thought this was needless to say -- that we need ways of working online that don't require us to all be DIY experts.

I wrote a first draft of this blog six years ago, and at that time I called for patience in building digital literacy and sophistication. "It took decades for safe car and road technologies to evolve, and the Internet is still really in its infancy" I said in 2009. But I'm less relaxed about his now, on the brink of the Internet of Things. It's great that the policy makers like the US FTC are calling on connected device makers to build in security and privacy, but I suspect the Internet of Things will require the same degree of activist oversight and regulation as does the auto industry, for the sake of public order and the economy.

Do we as a community have the appetite to temper breakneck "innovation" with proper safety rules?

Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Security Zero Trust Chief Information Officer Chief Information Security Officer Chief Privacy Officer

IOT: From the Intranet of Things to the Internet of Everything – Introducing the required solution architecture

Andy Mulholland

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Andy Mulholland is Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on cloud business models. Formerly the Global Chief Technology Officer for the Capgemini Group from 2001 to 2011, Mulholland successfully led the organization through a period of mass disruption. Mulholland brings this experience to Constellation’s clients seeking to understand how Digital Business models will be built and deployed in conjunction with existing IT systems. Coverage Areas Consumerization of IT & The New C-Suite: BYOD, Internet of Things, IoT, technology and business use Previous experience: Mulholland co authored four major books that chronicled the change and its impact on Enterprises starting in 2006 with the well-recognised book ‘Mashup Corporations’ with Chris Thomas of Intel. This was followed in…...

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Remember when everything was Intranet focused? It seemed right at that time when all enterprise activity was internal, behind the Firewall, but in reality it was an early development stage in moving to external Internet based activities cumulating in Digital Business. Right now IOT looks to be at the same stage in many enterprises, so it’s the right time to start to understand the bigger picture as well, otherwise todays’ relatively small deployments could be tomorrow’s problem.

Research report now available: The Foundational Elements for the Internet of Things (IoT)

Designing IOT solutions has to, by its very nature, involve networks, but the challenge is that IOT devices are ‘small’ and ‘distributed’, in comparison to conventional networked items such as PCs, Servers, or even Mobility devices. The design of an IoT solution network needs to be approached differently.

The ‘Internet of Everything’ is a Cisco term used to deliberately identify that with the lowering of processor prices, and the rise in ‘consumer’ style devices of all sorts. As demonstrated at Consumer Electronic Show this year, and other trade shows, a huge range of devices are expecting to connect and interact through the Network. The future, which is arriving now, requires not just massively expanded networking capabilities, but a wholly different architecture to cope. An Enterprise might start with an internal deployment of IoT connected to its internal network, as an ‘Intranet of Things’ solution, it will soon as with all Internet based services rapidly expand to embrace external and ‘everything’.

Digital Business means that all Enterprises initial ‘controlled’ Digital Business external activities focusing on sales and purchasing will, as the overall market inevitably changes, will expand.  An Enterprise will have to ‘participate’ in the massively connected ‘Internet of Everything’ environment of the Digital Society to gain information, spot opportunities and organize responses.

At the Network level this is part of the fundamental shift already underway. A shift from resource centric (Cloud) based data centers supporting interconnected centralized internal IT networks towards de-centralized networks of small-distributed devices. This introduces a shift in data traffic patterns, as much of the new IOT traffic will remain ‘local’ and with no obvious pattern. This change is fundamental enough to require the network technology architecture to have to change and to need a whole new lexicon of terms.

The diagram below illustrates on the left the usual visualization of a legacy IT network, frequently referred to as ‘tree and branch’ architecture, with the main data flows running to a centralized Data center, or master server. Interconnection with other external Internet resources are, ideally, from the IT security point of view made through well-managed gateways at the Data Centre. The term ‘north-south’ is used to describe the data flows in Tree and Branch architecture which are usually predictable, and manageable.

Its difficult diagrammatically to illustrate in such a neat manner the mass connected environment that IoT and Internet of Everything will introduce. The right hand illustration is a simplistic representation mainly to introduce where the various terminologies apply. Here the term North-South continues to describe conventional data flows to and from a centralized set of resources, but introduces the term East-West to describes data flows between the huge number of distributed devices that are networked.

In time East-West (or around the edge) data flows are expected to become dominant as cheap processor power and the sheer number of Devices expected to participate in ‘Smart Sessions’ will out number the more restricted functionality of conventional IT style PCs working in Client-Server Enterprise Applications inside an Enterprise.

The sharp eyed will also have spotted the addition of the term ‘Fog Computing’ to describe the new architecture in which all these IoT, and IoE, smart devices operate creating the East-West data flows. Cloud Computing by contrast supports the architecture that provides large conventional large Data Center resources in the North-South IT architecture.

The term, ‘Fog’, is used by Meteorologists to describe a low level, close to ground, wide spread effect produced by the same conditions that produce Clouds high in the sky. Clouds are generally though of as being more distinctly separate entities whereas Fog swirls round and covers large areas at ground level. As such Fog makes sense as a term to be used for de centralized thin spread computing in contrast to Cloud for the defined centralized computing model. Cisco first introduced the term, but its use has spread, and become increasingly defined as a key part of the architecture required. As an example in the diagram below;

Source; http://thoughtsoncloud.com/2014/08/fog-computing/

IoT is all about Data of course, so how the data environment is made to function is clearly the next question. Cisco also use the term ‘taking the query to the data’ when talking about Fog Computing. This causes more than a little confusion, especially when considering the excellent capabilities of Salesforce and SAP IoT solutions. (Indeed it’s the question of what and how to use the data that defines the differences in the SAP and Salesforce approaches to IoT).

The data from ten IoT devices is easy to handle and use, the data from one hundred devices less so, and the data from a thousand small IoT devices is a flood of small data packets that are extremely difficult to handle. Fog Computing architecture sees local consolidation and processing as one of its main duties.

However, there are three main data flows will usually result in a ‘forward’ of the locally processed data across the network as consolidated data for enterprise processing; 1) a trigger alert condition occurs in the local group; 2) at set times, or intervals, updates are forwarded; or 3) a query is received requesting certain data at that moment.

In IoT solutions, even at the smaller Intranet scale and, without moving to the scaled up adoption of Fog Computing architecture, the whole topic of ‘networking’ data flows is an important consideration. With time, as with the adoption of Client-Server architecture and IP based networking in the past, it will become recognized as a critical success factor in IOT/IoE solutions. Some experienced IoT solution architects even think the Network will function as the new Middleware.

The next post in this series will examine the role of the Network as an Orchestrator of data flows within Virtual networks created by a Query or Event.

Resources

The Foundational Elements for the Internet of Things (IoT)

The Elements of Business Architecture for Digital Transformation  

  Boards Prepare Executives for Digital Business and Digital Leadership  

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Tech Optimization Chief Information Officer

Time for Parents to Step Up as Digital Role Models

Gavin Heaton

Founder
Disruptors Co

Gavin is the Founder of Disruptors Co, one of Australia’s leading independent strategy and innovation companies. Gavin advises firms on strategy, marketing, product development and innovation. He is also a member of the Orbits program, the influencer network of award winning analyst and advisory firm, Constellation Research. Gavin advises boards and leadership on innovation strategy, marketing, data-driven product development and corporate venturing. Gavin is on the board of Vibewire, a youth-led social enterprise based in Sydney, Australia and on the Technology Advisory Group for Good2Give – the workplace giving platform. ...

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Working in digital and social media means you are often drawn into quite personal conversations with people. And by “conversations” I don’t just mean “discussions” or “chats” – but one way broadcasts where your only interaction may be to virtually “nod” (via a “Like”), acknowledge or amplify a situation (via sharing or a retweet). For while social media allows us to “engage” or interact with others, the vast majority don’t. Most of us are “lurkers”.

Lurkers are the 90% of people who use social media to observe. Watch. Listen in. It’s only 1% who create this content. We call this the 90-9-1 rule – or the “1 percenters”.

You may only be “Friends on Facebook”, but this can expose you to a vast insight into a person’s life. For example, lurking you will learn about:

• Private details – birthdays, relationships status, holidays, workplace, friends and networks
• Lifestyle – favourite restaurants, foods, cafes, sports, hobbies, games
• Travel – holiday destinations, desires, interests.

Social media reveals the pattern of your life

Now it all sounds innocuous enough, but think about all these pieces of information put together. What does it reveal? It reveals the pattern of your life. Every item that you post, share, click, promote and comment on can be found in your own feed. Perusing a Facebook profile page essentially provides a glimpse into your private world. For while you may feel that you are just sharing an inspirational quote with your loved ones, it generally means that you are sharing that quote with the friends of your friends. And in isolation you can easily ask – does this tell the “story of me” – and do I feel comfortable with strangers thinking that?

In fact, researcher Sam Gosling and author of Snoop – what your stuff says about you, uses his psychological framework, observation and analysis to explain how our small objects and personal spaces reveal a great deal about ourselves. While his research methodology centres on the analysis of personal bathrooms – his OCEAN framework has also been deployed as a Facebook technology to generate insights from Facebook profiles.

So when you see that 50 people have Liked one of your posts, the 1 Percenters rule suggests that more than 10x that number have “seen” it. And while this doesn’t mean that your update or profile has gone “viral”, it is far from private.

Think of the children

As an adult, this is not that frightening, right? But think of the role modelling that is taking place here. Especially for those who are parents – or who have high levels of interaction with children.

Telstra’s Cyber Safety – Balancing Screen Time Survey asked 1348 Australian parents of children aged 3-17 about their own use of devices. They also surveyed these parents on their children’s use of technology. The research revealed:

• 65% of parents don’t think they’re good role models when it comes to device usage
• 77% of parents considered putting controls on the device but 33% didn’t know what is available or HOW to implement it

It is that second bullet point that concerns me the most. Telstra provides Cyber Safety information available via their website, including links to:

• eSmart – a cyber safety behaviour-change initiative of the Alannah and Madeline Foundation, aimed at schools and libraries
• Smart Controls for customer mobile accounts that can create restrictions on devices
• Online Security – tools for broadband customers designed to keep your family safe

In the survey, when children were asked about perceptions of their parents’ device usage, 12 per cent said the amount of time their parent spends on their device impacts how well they look after their family, and a further nine per cent say the amount of time their parents spend on their device takes away from their family time.

Telstra’s Cyber Safety Manager, Shelly Gorr, said:

The results are a reminder to parents that they’re a key influencer on their children’s online behaviour.

Moving beyond screen time

There are plenty of additional insights coming from the survey – especially around the often vexed subject of screen time. How much is too much? How do you manage it? Why should you? Most of this is subjective – and dependent upon your own style of parenting. And while there is a real risk related to screen time – there is also much hype, conflicted and skewed research supporting both more and less screen time for kids. But surely this is not  a question of technology – but a question of “what kind of family” and “what kind of adults” are you preparing for the world.

If it is time for parents to step up as digital role models, there’s also a need for support for those parents. We are currently putting together a simple online course for parents interested in protecting their family online – and managing the effects of screen time. If you are interested in this, sign up below and we’ll let you know when it is available.

 

Marketing Transformation 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 Chief Marketing Officer

81% of all Marketers Say They Need to Overhaul Their Marketing Organizations

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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Marketo commissioned the Economist Intelligence Unit to do a survey where they asked nearly 500 CMOs and marketing leaders from around the world on where they think marketing stands today and where marketing’s headed in 2020. It’s the first of of an annual survey. Here’s some of the insights they found:

 

Marketing Transformation Chief Marketing Officer

The State of Retail in 2015 – trends and technologies affecting retail

pending

Guy Courtin was formerly Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research covering Matrix Commerce and how the Internet of Things drives the evolution of commerce.  Guy has over 15 years experience in the technology space and specifically in the supply chain space. Most recently he was the Vice President of Research at SCM World. Where he focused on the service providers that empowered supply chains. Prior to SCM World, Guy held numerous senior positions. He was responsible for product marketing at RSi, a retail supply chain solution provider. There managed RSi’s go to market strategy around their leading cloud based supply chain solutions. He also spear headed Progress Software’s supply chain group. Where he was responsible for driving revenue and market share as well…...

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Constellation recently published our “State of Enterprise Technology” series of research reports. These reports assess the state of enterprise technologies Constellation identified as essential to digital transformation. These reports also describe the future usage and evolution of these technologies. Constellation will continue to publish reports in our State of Enterprise Technology series throughout Q1.

My contributions to “State of Enterprise Technology” series focus on Matrix Commerce (retail and commerce technologies). In my report, The State of Retail in 2015 and Beyond  I identified seven trends impacting retail. This report is designed to help you set benchmarks and prepare for your retail future.

Here’s an excerpt from the report:

The Customer–Retailer Relationship Becomes More Cooperative

From conversations with clients, prospective buyers, systems integrators, partners, and vendors, Constellation sees a number of retail themes. These trends all revolve around the continuing amplification of the consumer voice in the retail supply chain. As consumers gain more influence within the retail supply chain, retailers will continue to focus on areas that allow for greater cooperation among all entities. Savvy retailers realize they can no longer expect to dominate the relationship but instead should allow for an atmosphere of cooperation.

About Matrix Commerce

Matrix Commerce Addresses the Buyer in Digital Transformation

The theme of Matrix CommerceTM analyzes the disruptive pressures influencing the commerce paradigm. Commerce faces rapidly changing business models and new payment options that are often misunderstood and poorly integrated.

Matrix Commerce means the fusing of demand signals and supply chains in an increasingly complex world of buyers seeking frictionless buying experiences. Friction in this new world originates from new regulatory requirements such as sustainability, taxation, and privacy.

As the world revolves around the buyer, channels, demand signals, supply chains, payment options, enablers, and Big Data will converge to create what Constellation coined in 2011 as Matrix Commerce. Matrix Commerce spans across disciplines as people, process, and technologies continue to transform today’s commerce models.

Download the report snapshot and table of contents of The State of Retail in 2015 and Beyond. 

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Matrix Commerce Next-Generation Customer Experience Marketing Transformation Revenue & Growth Effectiveness Innovation & Product-led Growth Tech Optimization Data to Decisions Future of Work New C-Suite B2B B2C CX Customer Experience EX Employee Experience business Marketing eCommerce Supply Chain Growth Cloud Digital Transformation Disruptive Technology Enterprise IT Enterprise Acceleration Enterprise Software Next Gen Apps IoT Blockchain CRM ERP Leadership finance Social Customer Service Content Management Collaboration M&A Enterprise Service AI Analytics Automation Machine Learning Generative AI Chief Information Officer Chief Procurement Officer Chief Supply Chain Officer Chief Customer Officer Chief Data Officer Chief Digital Officer Chief Executive Officer Chief Financial Officer Chief Growth Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief Product Officer Chief Revenue Officer Chief Technology Officer

Last Chance to Watch Connected Enterprise Recordings

Just a warning... this is your last chance to watch Constellation's Connected Enterprise session recordings! On February 2, the majority of the recordings will be restricted to Research Unlimited and Constellation Executive Network members.

Don't miss out on these informative sessions with industry leaders. 

Here are a few of my favorites: 

• How Sports has Changed with Digital - Paul Greenberg, The 56 Group Panelists: Bryan Srabian, San Francisco Giants; Jerry Drobny, San Francisco Giants; Ashwin Puri, University of California Office of the President; Kenny Lauer, Golden State Warriors; Russell Scibetti, KORE Software 
• How Digital Changed Commerce Forever - Panelist: Alexander B. Karasik, Manager, Onboard Retail, Delta
• Beyond Journey Maps, Delivering Mass Personalization at Scale -  Panelists: Andrea Chin, Citibank Mobile & Tablet PMO and Robin Jenkins, RMH Franchise Corporation.
• How Does the Public Sector Benefit from Digital Government? - Panelists: David Chou, University of Mississippi Medical Center; David Bray, University of Oxford & FCC; Scott Barnwell, City of Asheville (NC).
• The Chief Digital Officer: The Future of Innovations, Business Model Disruption and Digital Leadership -  CDOs Ganesh Bell, GE; and Peter Kim, Chiel Worldwide discuss the trials and realities of global Chief Digital Officers. 
• Lessons Learned From Silicon Valley CXOs - Ben Haines, CIO, Box; Jay Vijayan, CIO, Tesla Motors; Stuart Appley, CIO, SVP, Shorenstein.

Full list of Connected Enterprise 2014 Recordings

• The Collaborative Economy: A Transformative Lens, not a Startup Trend - Rachel Botsman, Partner, Collaborative Lab and Lauren Capelin, Co-founder Collaborative Lab discuss the virtues and dispel myths about the collaborative economy
   
• A Conversation with Mark V. Hurd - Mark V. Hurd, CEO, Oracle, on his vision for Oracle and the future of enterprise software
   
• Constellation Presents David Pogue - David Pogue presents technology uber trends
   
• How Has Sports Changed with Digital? - Paul Greenberg, The 56 Group Panelists: Bryan Srabian, San Francisco Giants; Jerry Drobny, San Francisco Giants; Ashwin Puri, University of California Office of the President; Kenny Lauer, Golden State Warriors; Russell Scibetti, KORE Software 
   
• The Future of CRM with Bob Stutz, Microsoft 
   
• 5 HR Megatrends and the Future of Work - Panelists: Patrick Pickren, Ultimate Software; Debi Hirshlag, Workday; Jason Saba, Ceridian; Naomi Allen, Castlight Health; Gretchen Alarcon, Oracle
   
• What's The Future of Big Data Business Models? - Panelists: Mark Castleman, Bell Labs; Sanjib Sahoo, tradeMONSTER; Ashish Gupta, Actian Corporation
   
• The Future of Work in a Digital Age with Paul Roehrig of Cognizant - Paul Roehrig discusses Code Halos and the forces shaping the modern workplace
   
• Teamability for Digital Transformation - Dr. Janice Presser, The Gabriel Institute
   
• Internet of Things, Analytics, and Future of Customers with John Taschek, Salesforce 
   
• How Does the Public Sector Benefit from Digital Government? - Panelists: David Chou, University of Mississippi Medical Center; David Bray, University of Oxford & FCC; Scott Barnwell, City of Asheville (NC).
   
• Disruptive Technology Demo: Zudy 
   
• Skill Sets For Digital CXOs - Bryan MacDonald, The Digital Board; Kathryn Ulrich, Heidrick and Struggles
   
• What Happens to Humans in the Future of Work? - Steve Gillmor, Salesforce.com; Robert H. Brown, Cognizant Technology Solutions; Bryan Goode, Yammer, Microsoft; Aisling MacRunnels, Jive Software
   
• ?Equality of Opportunity and the Implication for Digital Divide with Raj Chetty - Raj Chetty, Harvard University
   
• Lessons Learned From Silicon Valley CXOs - Ben Haines, CIO, Box; Jay Vijayan, CIO, Tesla Motors; Stuart Appley, CIO, SVP, Shorenstein
   
• Lessons Learned from the Women's Digital CXO Panel - Jennifer Vescio, eBay; Lori Sherer, Bain & Company; Ana Pinczuk, Cisco
   
• Inside the Internet of Things - Richie Etwaru, Cegedim
   
• Beyond Big Data and Analytics, How do we get to Insight and Action? - Don Whittington, Florida Crystals Corporation; Steve Schnur, MGM Resorts International; Graeme Aitken, DHL Express
   
• Data, The Internet of Things, and Sensor Analytic Ecosystems -  Jerry Foster, Plex Systems; Charlie Isaacs, Salesforce.com; Richie Etwaru, CEGEDIM; Rick Veague, IFS North America.
   
• How Digital Changed Commerce Forever - Panelist: Alexander B. Karasik, Manager, Onboard Retail, Delta
  
   
• The Dark Side of Technology: Mounting Pressure on a Global Scale - John Hagel III describes the realities of a technology-driven economy
   
• The Age of Context with Robert Scoble
   
• ?Digital Proficiency - What are the Implications of 5 Generations of Digital Workers not by Age? -  Brian Katz, Sanofi; Chris Salles, Guitar Center; Jason Grady, Northeast Georgia Medical Center
   
• How Does Digital Transform the Customer Experience? - Esteban Kolsky, Board of Advisor, Constellation Research, Inc. Panelists: Dan Steinman, Gainsight; George Wright, Thunderhead; Howard Tarnoff, Ceridian; Dave Pennington, Microsoft
   

• Beyond Journey Maps, Delivering Mass Personalization at Scale - Panelists: Andrea Chin, Citibank Mobile & Tablet PMO and Robin Jenkins, RMH Franchise Corporation
   
• 2014 SuperNova Award Ceremony - see who won the 2014 SuperNova Awards
   
• Marketing Funnels Are Dead, What's Next? -  Sandeep Dadlani, Infosys; Bill Dolby, RingCentral; Joe Hughes, E&Y
   
• The Future of Marketing With Suresh Vittal of Adobe - Suresh Vittal, Vice President, Product Marketing & Strategy, Adobe Marketing Cloud
   
• Infusing a Culture of Innovation in an Age of Digital Transformation - Jason Maynard, Wells Fargo; Brook Colangelo, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; Jos Greeve, Boers & Co FineMetalworking Group; Gordon Smith, Intermountain Healthcare
   
• The Chief Digital Officer: The Future of Innovations, Business Model Disruption and Digital Leadership -  CDOs Ganesh Bell, GE; and Peter Kim, Chiel Worldwide discuss the trials and realities of global Chief Digital Officers. 
   
• Navigating the Balance Between Technology Optimization and Innovation -  Jean-Claude Viollier, Capgemini; Pam Murphy, Infor; Jon Roskill, Acumatica
   
• "Leading Digital" with Didier Bonnet - Didier Bonnet discusses his new book, "Leading Digital"
   
• The State of Digital Business Disruption With Capgemini's Global CTO Lanny Cohen 
   
• Analytics and Augmented Reality Inside Constellation's Mobile App - Lawrence Coburn, Doubledutch
   
• Sharing Economy and Customer Experience Implications for Legacy Brands - Banafsheh Ghassemi, Tangerine Lab
   
• Welcome to Constellation's Connected Enterprise 2014 - R "Ray" Wang, Constellation Research

Want full access to these recordings? Ask us about Research Unlimited and Constellation Executive Network.

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Data to Decisions Digital Safety, Privacy & Cybersecurity Future of Work Marketing Transformation Matrix Commerce New C-Suite Next-Generation Customer Experience Tech Optimization Innovation & Product-led Growth Connected Enterprise Chief Customer Officer Chief Digital Officer Chief Executive Officer Chief Financial Officer Chief Information Officer Chief Marketing Officer Chief People Officer Chief Procurement Officer Chief Supply Chain Officer Chief Experience Officer

5 Possibilities for 2015: Our Futures of Work

Terri Griffith

Professor/Author/Speaker
Simon Fraser University

Terri Griffith holds the Keith Beedie Chair in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School of Business. She spent two decades in the Silicon Valley and, in 2012 was honored as a Woman of Influence by the Silicon Valley Business Journal. Terri helps her students and their organizations accelerate performance and prepare for the futures of work. Through her speaking, writing, teaching, and research, she brings evidence-based leadership and innovation to high-tech, education, and global agribusiness organizations. She inspires and coaches groups on negotiating change and uniquely mixing existing and new capabilities. Her most recent work uses a “bottom-up” approach to automation, including artificial intelligence. Her award-winning book, The Plugged-In Manager:…...

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I’ve kicked off 2015 thinking of the “futures of work.” Notice that I did not say the future, but rather the “futures.” No one clear future is on the horizon -- artificial intelligence in the workplace? further integration of global workforces? new technologies? -- but I am certain 2015 will be a year of discovery in each such area and more. I feel these five resolutions will help position you for the nimbleness and lighter touch that has become the hallmark of today’s manager. I welcome your suggestions for further resolutions in the comments field!

1. Use light-weight experiments rather than all-or-nothing approaches to change in your organization. Taking small steps in organizational change is more important than ever these days given the pace of the world around us. In 2015, go to the next level by finding fast, cheap ways to test the leap-of-faith assumptions underlying the adjustments you want to make. Use a crowdfunding campaign to test the market for a new product, for instance, or have half your teams try one form of flexible work scheduling and the other half another -- learn from both. Steer clear of surveys, you don’t want to base your change on someone giving you an answer they think you want to hear. Instead, measure behaviors like prepayments, performance, or repeat business.

2. Take advantage of the on-demand global workforce for addressing your temporary, cyclical, or even long-term needs. In March, two of the most visible online freelance job markets merged to become Elance-oDesk. They offer managers everything from on-demand software development to virtual receptionists and business card design. The combined company has grown to 9.3M freelancers worldwide -- a big move from the Kelly Girls of the 1940s.

3. Combine the growing trend of “wearable computers,” with personal responsibility for productivity (and perhaps light-weight experiments) to create a more healthy, productive workplace. Smart watches, fitness trackers, and the like can serve as more than just gizmos for your employees in their personal time. The US Centers for Disease Control notes that workplace health programs can increase productivity . Consider a contest in which your employees conduct experiments showing the effects of walking meetings, or short walking breaks on performance. The most effective experiment can become a permanent fixture of the workplace. I hope to do this myself: I’d like to connect my fitness tracker data to number of quality articles written and my students’ engagement in class. If I walk more before class, do they learn more from our sessions together?

4. Move away from once a year or once a quarter performance reviews and instead focus on feedback tied to projects and “check-in” style peer review. With the infusion of millennials into the workplace, demand has grown for managers to shorten the distance between goal-setting, feedback, and coaching. Similar to a Facebook post, managers who use Salesforce.com’s Work.com tool can post feedback when it’s most useful -- right after (or even during) a project.

5. Consider making IBM’s Watson (the artificial intelligence that won Jeopardy!) your next employee. If your business is health care, finance, retail, or the public sector, subscribing to this AI technology could be a great addition to your team. Watson can play a role in customer interactions, the management of big data, or accelerating research. My colleague Christine Isakson and I are just starting to look into the issues of whether we should think of artificial intelligence as a full-on member of the team, a consultant, or a tool. No doubt Watson will be covering more industries soon and I hope he will soon help us with our research. Another technology that I predict you’ll be finding ways to integrate in the near future: drones. Unmanned vehicles (drones) in the air, on the land, or in the water have the potential to conduct mission-critical tasks including photography, surveying, environmental research, package delivery, security, and cell tower and road inspections. Perhaps a drone crew will loom large in your 2015 future!

Click here to provide your comments. I would love to hear about your own futures of work.

Many thanks to Deborah Lohse. She asked me if I had ideas for managers looking forward in the new year and kept me on the straight and narrow through the development, including helping see the connection to drones!

"Futures of work" image care of CoolText.com

Future of Work Chief Executive Officer

Medallia Releases Next-Generation Module to Help Companies Systematically Eliminate Recurring Customer Issues

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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Medallia® Customer Experience Management (CEM) provider announced the release of Medallia Resolve, an advanced customer experience capability that helps companies quickly find the root causes of recurring customer pain points so they can be addressed at the source of the problem. One of the biggest issues is that companies don’t keep track of what reoccurring issues their customers have and use that feedback to correct things in their company. As a result, the same problems happen over and over and over again, waisting thousands and sometimes millions of dollars. Closing the ‘inner loop’ with customers has become standard practice for some companies resolve individual customer issues. And even more difficult is the challenge is to increase the strategic impact of customer feedback by closing the ‘outer loop,’ or aggregating feedback to uncover business improvement opportunities that provide tangible value for large groups of customers.

To assist companies in figuring out what those reoccuring issues are, Medallia Resolve’s new features include:

• Best-practice-tailored case management tools that help companies engage in a productive dialogue with customers when things go wrong: by alerting the employee who is closest to the problem to close the loop with the customer, helping them better understand the issue, and letting them record findings for systemic learning and analysis.
• Enhanced internal collaboration tools: which aggregate historical data from all touchpoints to give employees the context they need to solve customer problems — and allow them to pull in teammates for help.
• An upgraded reporting dashboard: which opens the ‘outer loop’ by identifying root causes of recurring customer pain points — includingbroken processes, common misunderstandings, and training gaps.
• A real-time mobile app: which alerts employees about customer issues on the go and provides the ability for them to respond directly even if they’re away from their desk.

In a time where margins are thin and customer expectations are higher than ever, it only makes sense to learn from a brand’s mistake, fix time and try best not to repeat them. Having this process automated can accelerate the ability of the company to better meet the needs of their customers and provide better customer experiences and engagement. How does your company find and resolve reoccurring issues?

Next-Generation Customer Experience Chief Customer Officer