At the IBM Impact 2011 conference, the company delivered new software and services offerings in support of its Smarter Commerce initiative.
LAS
VEGAS-IBM has extended its Smarter Commerce strategy with new software and
services to help businesses swiftly adapt to rising customer demand in today's
digitally transformed B2B and B2C marketplaces.
Big
Blue made the announcement at its IBM Impact 2011
conference here before more than 8,100 clients and business partners.
With
its Smarter Commerce initiative, IBM is defining and leading a new market that
it estimates will grow to $20 billion in software alone by 2015. Smarter
Commerce transforms how companies manage and swiftly adapt to customer and
industry trends across marketing, selling, and service processes that span the
entire commerce cycle, putting the customer at the center of their decisions and
actions.
"Customers
use social networks, mobile devices, Websites and influencers to make buying
decisions today," said Craig Hayman, general manager, IBM Industry
Solutions, in a statement. "These businesses must connect to these customers
where and how they prefer to buy to be successful. At the same time, they need
to make sure they have the means of effectively managing their supplier and
trading partner network to ensure they have the products at the right time and
place to meet this new customer demand."
Moreover,
new commerce imperatives are bringing non-traditional IT buyers, such as
marketing officers and procurement executives, into pivotal roles that are
supported by Smarter Commerce, IBM said.
Thus,
IBM has announced Smarter Commerce offerings to help these clients deal with
these new challenges. These services include a Customer Value Strategy
Accelerator service, where IBM's industry and strategy specialists will work
with clients to envision, evaluate and prioritize a set of new business-value
possibilities. Customers receive a roadmap and prioritized recommendations for
new business models that address the changing needs of the social, digital and
mobile consumer. The new cross-channel Experience Assessment service is where
IBM's industry and channel specialists will analyze current customer experience
by channel; identify pain points and limitations; and map customer expectations
and behaviors. In addition, through a customer experience workshop, IBM
explores cross-industry leading practices and creates design principles for the
target customer experience across channels.
In
addition, building on its R&D innovations and acquisitions, IBM has also
announced new Smarter Commerce software offerings that meet a range of other business
demands, including:
- Advanced Analytics-WebSphere Commerce and Coremetrics Web analytics is said to enable
customers to gain faster insight from statistics, charts and dashboards to
determine the effectiveness of their marketing programs, call-center
performance and cross-selling initiatives.
- Cloud Computing-The new Coremetrics Lifecycle offering is a cloud-delivered
product that helps IBM clients track key customer-advancement milestones,
allowing them to better target investments in marketing programs, content and
products.
- Cross-Channel Commerce-Through the integration of Coremetrics Intelligent Offer
and WebSphere Commerce, organizations are said to gain insight into online
buying trends, while Sterling Configure, Price, Quote with embedded business
intelligence by Cognos can help companies streamline the quote-to-cash process.
- Social Business-The integration of Coremetrics Social Analytics with WebSphere
Commerce allows enterprises to measure the impact of social activity on their
commerce Website, including social referrals and the usage of social features
such as product reviews.
- Supply Chain Planning & Execution-Through the integration of WebSphere
Commerce and Sterling Order Management, IBM's Smarter Commerce is said to enable
businesses to better optimize inventory investments by providing enhanced
visibility and intelligence around current inventory positions and sourcing options.
Darryl K. Taft covers the development tools and developer-related issues beat from his office in Baltimore. He has more than 10 years of experience in the business and is always looking for the next scoop. Taft is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and was named 'one of the most active middleware reporters in the world' by The Middleware Co. He also has his own card in the 'Who's Who in Enterprise Java' deck.
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