We’ve been writing quite a bit recently about the doom-and-gloom mentality that’s gripping the retail community:

• Black Friday Predictions
• The Litany of Retail Woe: 50 Chains Shutting Stores
• 2009 Holiday Retail Forecast: “It’s Going To Be a Disaster.”
  A depressed shopping season may lead to a transformation of consumer behavior — and the disappearance of several brand-name retailers.
• Insight: Holiday Humbug
  Will the Grinch steal retail’s favorite season?

Well, after the jump, we’re taking a quick look ’round the Web for early results of this year’s Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving that’s traditionally seen as the start of the holiday-shopping season. The consensus seems to be that there isn’t any consensus: Having lowered expectations to such a degree, retailers are perhaps getting a bit of good ink for notching a measly 3 percent bump.

In the aftermath, retailers are already steeling themselves for “Cyber Monday,” the online equivalent of “door-buster” sales. (And there’s a phrase, btw, that will have to be retired, following the tragic death Friday of a Wal-Mart employee who was trampled by a sale-crazed mob at a mall on Long Island.)

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In a time when many are focused on the perils of the economic downturn and what it can mean for their bottom line, we forget about those who are less fortunate.

Yesterday, 200 FeedingNYC volunteers congregated at Chelsea Piers to package and transport more than 2,000 Thanksgiving dinners for underprivileged families throughout New York City.

Founded in 2001 by Robert LoCascio (second from left in the photo), chief executive officer of LivePerson — a company to watch in the Web Interaction Management category of CRM’s 2008 Service Leaders — it is a nice change of pace to the doom-and-gloom news we’ve all been bombarded with recently.

In preparation for the upcoming holiday season, what are your organizations doing to give back to your respective communities? I’d love to hear your stories.

(Photo Credit: Jonathan Ziegler/Patrick McMullen Company)

As the Thanksgiving holiday approaches, American consumers have a few main things on their minds: Turkey, Pie, and Deals, Deals, Deals. Black Friday is just three days away and Cyber Monday just a short skip after that. The question remains: Are retailers prepared for the onslaught of bargain-hungry shoppers? Perhaps a heavier question is on the minds of retailers: Will consumers deliver the Black Friday results they need to get out of the red?

Analysts are wagering that 2008 Black Friday deals and doorbusters will entice shoppers to stand in line at Best Buy at 5 a.m and will have them clicking the “Buy Now” buttons on e-commerce sites; however, it just won’t happen to the same degree as it has in the past. One retail expert affirms that this year, it won’t just be the early bird who catches the best bargains. In fact, retailers have been extending discounts and promotions for the past few weeks — and will continue to do so until the inventory is depleted. The reason being that retailers ordered inventory a few months back when the economy was in bad shape — but not this bad. Stores will be frantic to get the stock off their hands, hence, offering deals that extend past the Black Friday “Early Bird Special.”

Web analytics solution provider Coremetrics has had its eye on the retail ball for several years now. Each Thanksgiving season, the company aggregates data from its hundreds of online retailers to relay Black Friday and Cyber Monday forecasts and results. In 2007, the company’s benchmark data showed a 20 percent boost in e-commerce sales for Black Friday. John Squire, chief strategy office at Coremetrics, says not surprisingly, this year will be lower. The Coremetrics predictions and results will be released Sunday night. Look out for an extended write-up on destinationCRM.com early next week. Squires says that a number of factors are pointing to a glum Black Friday:

• A shorter shopping season (Thanksgiving and Christmas are a week closer than last year) has put increased pressure on retailers to come out with promotions and to attract shoppers. 
• Coremetrics data of how much time consumers are spending online and what they are looking at suggests that browsing behavior is significantly lower than in previous years. At this point in time, online retail site traffic is only up by 10 percent. In previous years, that number was between 20 and 30 percent. Squires says it’s interesting to look at where Web surfers are spending time. He reveals that consumers are spending more time than ever on finance and banking sites. 
• Squires estimates that retailers have stocked up on items at lower price-points. Sure, this makes for happier customers, but will obviously affect a store’s performance. 

Sleepy shoppers might be happy to note that the deals will be sticking around. Senior Editor Tod Marks sums it up best in his morning interview with CBS. Here’s an excerpt from a CBS Black Friday news story:

A frighteningly long list of retail closures came across the transom during the last few days, and while I haven’t yet fact-checked every point (stay tuned for links, chronology, etc.), I quickly found enough supporting material to merit republishing and amending the list here. (You may have seen a similar list mass-emailed around; I’ve added several additional points.)

Even if one or two bullet points are off in detail, the sheer breadth of the damage here is breathtaking. The bloodbath crosses every kind of retail sector, and is clearly not just a reflection of the tough times we’re in, but a harbinger of worse times to come.

Every closed retail location may represent eventual savings for the company involved (after shouldering the actual costs of the close itself, that is), but also represents dozens or even hundreds of out-of-work employees (who are, after all, someone else’s customers), reductions up the supply chain, and rent and taxes removed from that store’s local economy.

In other words, this is bad news with ripple effects that will be felt for months and years to come. (For starters? According to one report, “Consumers will lose $100 million this year on worthless gift cards, from restaurants and stores that have gone belly up.”)

The list includes retailers that have shuttered (or plan to shutter) their entire chains and filed for bankruptcy protection (Linens ‘N Things, The Sharper Image) and ongoing concerns that have nevertheless announced severe cutbacks (Home Depot, Gap, Macy’s).

Full list after the jump, but feel free to comment below with any other names we should add to this list.

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Just a brief note today, a discussion of social CRM from an anti-social person.

It isn’t that I’m not incredibly jazzed about the possibilities and potential of CRM 2.0 — far from it. The idea of a custom-crafted and individualized relationship between a business and its customers is exciting to me, and I love reading about it, writing about it, seeing demonstrations, and knowing the people who make it a reality. But there’s a cynical, dour, pessimistic side of me that wonders if it isn’t all too much.

Here’s why: There’s a lot of emphasis on customer-driven dialogue, where motivated individuals converse about their experiences and share them with businesses as well as each other. There are usually two times that I’m motivated to do this — when the experience is really bad, or when it’s really good. That leads to a very skewed view of a company, though on the plus side it exposes the very best and the very worst. Any dialogue I have with a business is still going to be fairly transactional — I’ll be talking about what I want, or giving feedback on what has happened recently, but after that I’m done. Leave the ongoing conversation for people who want it.

Also, I sometimes think I prefer the veneer of a relationship to the real thing. Some of it is probably a distasteful brand of snobbery on my part — when the guy who delivers my dinner starts acting like an old friend, I get the willies, and start thinking about changing restaurants because “the help” is getting too familiar. (Never mind that he probably sees me more often than my own family.) Mostly, though, I think it’s because I start to feel like a business expects something of me beyond my payment for good and services received. I guess I just don’t want the responsibility.

Social CRM 2.0 Web enterprise digital client blah blah isn’t going to go away, and it shouldn’t. There will always be people who are motivated to engage with businesses, whether tactically like me or more long-term. As long as there’s a setting in my user profile that lets me dial back the level of pressure in the relationship, I’m cool. And really, isn’t that what personalization is all about?

Yesterday, the Authentication & Online Trust Alliance (AOTA) announced that more than 10,000 Web sites have adopted Extended Validation Security Socket Layer (EV SSL) certificates, up from 4,000 just 10 months ago. By January 2009, AOTA Chairman and Founder Craig Spiezle is confident that the number will reach closer to 12,000.

While the absolute number may not be as large considering the number of sites on the Web, Spiezle says, the mix is comprised of what he deems “the most impactful e-commerce sites,” some of which include:

- Bank of America;
- PayPal;
- Ebay;
- Schwab; and even
- Facebook.

Sites like Facebook aren’t typically classified in the same category as an e-commerce or online banking site, where trust is undoubtedly a more mission critical issue. Nevertheless, Spiezle says, due to the number of online trust issues, sites need to provide a high level of trust to ensure that consumers are communicating with the site they’re intending.

When the EV SSL certificate was launched in early 2007, PayPal was among the early adopters that had deployed the solution in late 2006, before its general availability. The online payment vendor was working on its on anti-phishing strategy around that time in an effort to help consumers “completely, reliably, and unambiguously” know they are on PayPal, says Michael Barrett, chief information security officer at PayPal. In the beginning, Barrett admits they didn’t know whether EV SSL would work (PayPal, at this point, was already 100 percent SSL but phishers quickly adapted and some even acquired their own SSL certificate, Barrett explains, but says it happened roughly only once a month). Sure enough, he says, “EV SSL was a gift from heaven to us.” Since 2006, PayPal has seen significant reduction, particularly in its attendance on the Top 3/Top 10 list for most phished Websites. As an online payment site, however, “we know we have the proverbial target printed on our backs,” Barrett says.

Whether or not the economic recession is motivating brands to beef up the security on their site may be anyone’s guess as consumers are certainly spending less and when they do, they want to know it’s going somewhere legitimate. No doubt, criminals rarely let an opportunity go to waste, taking advantage of “every calamity, every disaster,” Spiezle says, whether it’s seeking donations for earthquake victims in SiChuan, China, or preying on individuals struggling during the current mortgage and financial crisis.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has certainly seen its fair share of spoofed emails and Web sites soliciting personal and financial information from citizens. It announced yesterday, in conjunction with the AOTA’s announcement, that by January 1, 2009, all “authorized IRS e-file providers participating in online filing of individual income tax returns [are required to] possess a valid and current EV SSL certificate,” according to the press release. Moreover, sites are required to provide privacy and information on safeguard policies, as well as to report any security breaches. They are also required to obtain a privacy seal indicating their IRS-approved status.

No doubt increased site security is a relatively new issue site owners are having to address. A year ago, Spiezle, who is also the director online safety and security at Microsoft, notes that only one Web browser supported EV SSL and that was Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. At one point, Microsoft, he says, was identifying over 1,000 unique phishing sites on a daily basis. Now, nearly every mainstream browser (e.g., Firefox, Chrome, and Safari) supports the certificate. “It’s a great example of how the industry and businesses are working together to protect their brand and the consumer,” he says.

Keeping employees engaged and signed on to the team concept is one of the main themes here at the sixth annual North American Conference on Customer Management here at the Disneyland Hotel in balmy Anaheim, Calif.

Who better to talk about teamwork than Joe Torre, manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers? Yesterday he wowed the crowd by opening up his speech into a question-and-answer session allowing the crowd to pick his brain about anything from his thoughts on the Chicago Cubs to handling George Steinbrenner, his former boss when he managed the Yankees to four World Series championships. “You have to understand, you never handled George,” Torre said. “You dealt with him.”

Whether he liked Steinbrenner or not is inconsequential. Torre explained that being able to actually sit down and talk with him made a big difference. “Managing in New York, I was able to speak with George and I really made the most of those conversations,” he said. “When I managed the Braves and Cardinals, I rarely got to speak with [respective owners] Ted Turner and August Busch III.” The takeaway — if you’re a contact center supervisor or manager, make sure your door is open and you’re willing to hear your employees’ concerns. You may learn something.

In connecting with the primarily CRM audience, Torre spoke about how handling a customer service team and a baseball team can be parallel to one another. He explained that in tough times, it is important to keep your cool and try to bring perspective to the situation at hand. “I try not to forget what it was like being a player,” he recalls. “You have to respect your employees, and try to understand why they reacted the way they did as opposed to blindly responding to their actions.”

Torre went on to explain that our society is predicated on looking at the sexy statistics, in baseball that can be home runs, strikeouts, number of hits, or consecutive games played. For the contact center, that could be individual agent key performance metrics such as average handle time or first call resolution. While stats should play a role, Torre stressed that it is important that everyone works together — fantastic individual numbers or not — to help the team win in the end. “You need a group of unselfish people who care about winning and not just their individual performance,” he said.

Leaving the crowd with one more nugget, when asked how he deals with players who are paid exorbitant salaries he made it very clear that when you walk into his clubhouse the Swiss bank accounts are checked at the door. “Never forget blood runs through everyone’s veins,” he said. “You have to deal with people as human beings no matter what they get paid.”

Hello from Denver and the Sage Summit afternoon keynote. Assuming I have wireless or some sort of ‘Net connection (pretty please, Sage?), I will be live-tweeting the event, so if you follow me on Twitter, I apologize for clogging up your stream. If you like that sort of thing, you can follow me @laurenmizzou, or search Twitter for #SAGE for more Sage micro-bloggers. In addition to Sage product announcements and strategies at today’s keynote, Olympic decathalon winner (and recent reality TV star) Bruce Jenner is here to talk about finding the champion within during tough economic times. (Something tells me that Jenner didn’t collaborate with step-daughter Kim Kardashian on this presentation.)

Just yesterday, Sage altered its branding a bit, dropping “Software” from its title to align more closely with the Sage global operations, Sage Groupl plc. Also yesterday, the business management software provider hosted a run and walk along the Cherry Creek Greenway in Denver led by Jenner, of course.

Early this morning David van Toor, general manager for Sage CRM, delivered a CRM-specific keynote that introduced new features and enhancements to the three Sage CRM products: SageCRM and SageCRM.com, SalesLogix, and Act! by Sage. Look out for a detailed destinationCRM.com news story on the new releases early tomorrow. To whet your palate, here are a few highlights which I expect will be expanded by the Sage exective team during the keynote:

• A greater commitment to Web 2.0 and Social CRM in all three products. The basis of this will be through the use of mashups. 
• SalesLogix 7.5 will “spoon feed” users who struggle with filtering through data and accounts. Includes new filters, tabs, groups, and timelines, to see the whole picture of the customer.
• Act! Mobile Live supports new operating systems. Sync Act! to virtually any handheld — even the new Blackberry. 

I expect much of this conference to focus on how to get the most out of your business given the economic climate. I attended a presentation this morning given by Sage CRM champion, Bill Hoffman on using CRm to drive business value in a tough economy. Hoffman had a unique view on the role SMBs can play — and he doesn’t see scaling back as an option. “In the small-to-midsize business market, we have an opportunity to thrive,” he says. “Your competition does not have CRM systems and you competition does not have communicative sales skills. They are backing off on marketing and training … When they back off, move full speed ahead.”

Never underestimate the power of making your customers feel welcome. I’m not talking about the employees who welcome patrons to the local chain store, but a real sense that the staff wants you there for more than just what’s in your wallet. It’s not easy to achieve — and it makes the case for letting human resources under the CRM umbrella — but if you can do it, you’ve got gold. Call it customer experience.

(Yes, I’m going to write about another one of my shopping experiences. You got a problem with that?)

A month or two ago, my beloved Meaghan decided she needed some nice boots for fall/winter, and we went to check out John Fluevog down in SoHo. She knew they had things in her size (she’s a tall woman, so her feet aren’t small), plus she’d had a good experience with their Boston location. The staff immediately won us over by welcoming us, engaging us in conversation (not just asking if we needed help with anything), and by not treating Meaghan like a freak because she wanted something in an 11 or 12 women’s.

I say they won us over, and I mean it. Great experiences in two locations made Meaghan a lifetime customer. Treating me well even though I wasn’t there to buy — plus seeing the great experience she had — got me to come back when I was ready. In fact, it was the only store I considered. I wanted to go back, and buying shoes felt secondary to that purpose.

The shoes, man. The image doesn't do them justice.

Yes, they have absolutely beautiful footwear. But a good product isn’t always enough. They befriended me, to the extent that I’d be pleased to see any of them socially (it turns out we all hold Barcade in common esteem). When it turned out they didn’t have what I wanted in the color I wanted, they immediately offered to send an order to another location, for delivery to wherever I wanted, free of charge. I chose to have them sent to the store so I could come back to pick them up. The place is just that good.

Readers of my column know I’m no stranger to nice clothing. Still, I’m not made of money, and this isn’t the best economic climate to be spending extra on necessaries that could be had for less. That said, I happily and unreservedly plunked down more money than I’ve ever spent on a single pair of shoes in my life. And I will do it again.

BONUS CONTENT!

For those of you who get the title of this post, and even for those who don’t, here’s the inspiration. (Vulgarity makes it NSFW, but clicky.)

Edit: Fixed (I hope) the nonfunctional video link.

Let’s face it — the economy is a mess. Cost of living is up, stock shares go on hourly roller coaster rides you normally have to wait in line for hours to ride at Six Flags, and now people are trying to figure out how to buy gifts this holiday season while still being able to keep the lights on. In sum, consumers are impatient, perturbed, and trying to find exactly what they need when they need it.

For companies, this means personalization — and St. Louis-based customer experience systems provider Amdocs is looking to meet this growing need, particularly in the mobile phone world with its acquisition of Dublin, Ireland-based ChangingWorlds for $60 million, which is expected to close during Amdocs’ fiscal quarter ending December 31.

ChangingWorlds’ mission, according to its Web site, is to “pave the way for all types of personalized information services over mobile, from personalized portal navigation to smarter search and highly targeted mobile advertising to ensure that mobile subscribers enjoy content and services that are relevant to their true needs.”

Judging by the fact that the term “mobile” is mentioned three times in a single-sentence statement, ChangingWorlds is focused on that customer touchpoint. However, James Patmore, vice president of EMEA and Asia Pacific for Amdocs stresses that this move is not solely for the sake of mobile content. “This is about adding relevancy and personalization for all of the touchpoints a user might have with a service provider,” he says. “One is mobile, but others can be with a customer management team in the call center or the experience they might have purchasing [or updating] a service plan by using the online portal. ChangingWorlds’ business is really an expansion on what we bring to personalization technology.”

Elisabeth Rainge, director of next generation networks operations at Framingham, Mass.-based global market intelligence firm IDC, believes this is a smart move for Amdocs. “It’s about expanding the reach of the [the customer experience systems provider's] platform and providing more value to the consumer by being responsive in the way the subscriber prefers to interact,” she says. “It’s a bigger competitive footprint for Amdocs … but one with more values for [its clientele].” Rainge sees this as a largely technological acquisition, and as a result expects ChangingWorlds’ capabilities to be integrated into Amdocs’ core assets.

Consequently, Patmore does not foresee any massive layoffs and believes this is a way to also expand ChangingWorlds’ — there are no plans to change the company name at this point according to Patmore — competitive footprint. “This is an accretive acquisition,” he stresses. “The people are the key assets and we expect to assimilate all the employees into our organization.”

Rainge believes this move is well-timed and will force Amdocs’ competitors to rethink how they are providing personalization. “This shows [the company] is paying attention to the subscriber which is so important because sometimes the discussion becomes one of efficiency,” she says. “The kind of challenge operators face today in this economic climate is that they need to touch their customer as best they can with as rich an experience and reliable system possible.”