Thursday, May 31, 2018

AWS Announces General Availability of Amazon Neptune

Amazon Web Services (AWS)  rolled out its graph database service in a number of egions including US East (N. Virginia), US East (Ohio), US West (Oregon), and EU (Ireland) on Wednesday. Called "Amazon Neptune," it is one of several offerings introduced during the company’s annual developer event last November.

Database technology may be a debatable segment of enterprise tech, but for Amazon, it is essential in managing increasingly large data groups across various industries. Graph databases like AWS’s Neptune are designed to analyze and create relationships rapidly between different sets of data. Rather than building several queries to obtain information, a graph database simplifies the operation by using structures like nodes and edges to store related data.

Raju Gulabani, AWS vice president for Databases, Analytics, and Machine Learning, highlighted Neptune’s ease of use and functionality. “We are delighted to give customers a high-performance graph database service that enables developers to query billions of relationships in milliseconds using standard APIs, making it easy to build and run applications that work with highly connected data sets,” he said.

Built to recover from database failures in less than 30 seconds, Neptune is also touted for its flexibility. It has support for graph application programming interface (API) like TinkerPop Gremlin and SPARQL, making the fully managed service compatible with numerous applications. Graph databases are useful in social networking, fraud detection, life sciences, knowledge graphs, and network security, among others tasks. To date, Neptune has many high-profile users, namely, Intuit, Pearson, Blackfynn, and Amazon’s own Alexa team.

Amazon Alexa director David Hardcastle pointed out that they use Amazon Neptune to expand the virtual assistant’s knowledge graph of its customers and create associations with data sets. With a well-built knowledge graph, users can discover related information based on their previous and current interests. In turn, this gives a better shopping experience for the customers.

Despite its general availability status, Neptune will only be available online and in other regions in the coming months.

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Walmart May Bring Customer Service Drones to Its Stores Soon, Retailer Files Patents

Walmart has always been known to push boundaries. The company is continuing this innovative culture with its recent filing of patents for keeping track of inventory, a store drone and other technologies aimed at changing how customers shops.

Walmart is no stranger to filing patents. The company has reportedly filed 1,400 patents since 2009, all of which focused on technology that enhances their customers' in-store experience. One of the newly filed patents pertains to a sensing device designed to make smart shopping carts that can communicate with a mobile device. This can make searching for grocery items go more smoothly.

Meanwhile, several of the patents that were filed are geared towards sensing and managing inventory levels and one that can track customers via wearables.

Walmart has also filed two patents for autonomous technology. One is for tech that can detect items or products in containers while the other can gather vehicle information, like size, temperature, pre- and post-delivery weight, using an intricate system of sensors, an interface, and a processor.

One patent that could drastically change how things are done at Walmart is for a drone that could assist customers as they shop in the store. According to the patent outline, a customer can call the drone through a mobile device that's either the customer's own or one that's been provided by the store. The drone can be used to navigate around the store or to verify product price.

The patent detailed how the device can control the aerial drone to guide the user to the location of the item in the store. The drone could also give a visual projection to show the shopper what direction they should take or provide audio instructions.

There's also the possibility of Walmart utilizing a variety of drones to perform different tasks. Each drone will reportedly have its own distinct features based on its assigned job.

While the patents appear promising, there's no guarantee that they will be realized. Most of the time, the patents companies file are never realized.

However, Walmart's recent patent filing underlines just how serious the company is in its bid to compete against Amazon and other established retailers. It has already increased the prices of products bought online and has started producing and selling its very own meal kits. Walmart has also signed an exclusive deal with Rakuten, a Japanese e-commerce company, to sell Kobo e-readers.

Featured image via Pixabay

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Key Web Development Concepts for Marketers

When I work with my marketing team, I know we have the same goal: to provide the users of our site with the best experience possible. Though as a developer I won’t typically be tasked with creating content, there are some key metrics and concepts that I keep in mind when developing that will help both the marketing team and me achieve our goals. Here are some fundamental concepts web developers focus on when building web pages, and what they mean for you as a marketer.

First Meaningful Paint and Time to Interactive

First Meaningful Paint and Time to Interactive are particularly useful metrics in determining the performance of your web page. Essentially, the shorter these times, the faster your users can access and engage with the content on your page. Though your web team does a lot of work to ensure these that the First Meaningful Paint and the Time to Interactive occur as quickly as possible—by using CDNs, modularizing code so only what is needed loads, minifying CSS and JavaScript—there are considerations the marketer can make when working with designers or designing their content that effects these metrics.

Let’s go a bit more in-depth.

The First Meaningful Paint (FMP) is the first time that your web browser renders content on the page that is useful to the end user. Let’s say you have a website all about different types of ducks and on your homepage, you want to feature a “Duck of the Month” as the homepage hero, or rather, main content above the fold. The FMP is the point at which the user can first see the image of your “Duck of the Month” as well as any headline or text attached to the image. 

Time to Interactive (TTI) is closely related to the FMP and will come after the FMP. Using the previous example, let’s say our “Duck of the Month” hero also has the ability to play the quack of the duck when clicked on, and you can swipe from left to right for more images. TTI is the time it takes for these features to become available on the page for the user to use, or when the page or app becomes useful.

So, as a marketer, what can you do to help ensure that the time to reach the FMP and TTI is as short as possible? Lots of things!

Ensure Your Best Content is Always Above the Fold

Though this may seem like a no-brainer, it helps exponentially if any content OR interactivity you want from the site is above the fold. Essentially, developers can leverage techniques like “lazy loading,” to ensure that code/images/features are only loaded once a user does an action that would necessitate the code/images/features, such as scrolling down the page or clicking on a button. To ensure you get your fastest FMP and TTI times, you want to put your most valuable content and features front and center.

Driving Off the Page Isn’t Best Practice

The beautiful thing about Web 2.0 is that we can get assets from other sources at the touch of a button, or er…click of a mouse. But loading too many external assets, or relying on too many styles, fonts, and images that need to be loaded from other places can slow your page down. Try instead to use in-house assets or give the files you need to your devs to cut down on load times.

Use Images Optimized for the Web, and Proper for Your Situation

Essentially, it boils down to this: JPEGs are good for smaller images and times when you don’t need your images to be pixel perfect. For example, they make good thumbnail images, background images (depending), icons, etc. PNGs are good to use when you need absolutely pixel-perfect images and are better for pictures of people, larger images on your site, images with text attached etc. Furthermore, many image modification applications, like Photoshop, usually have an option for optimizing images for the web. Since loading assets can take up the bulk of loading time for your page, you want to make sure you are cutting down file size wherever possible, and that usually means using JPEGs wherever won’t affect your user experience.

Bounce Rates and Exit Rates

Bounce and exit rates are key marketing metrics for your site, as they tell you essentially how users are interacting with your pages, how quickly they leave, and where in your conversion funnel they opt out. Your dev team can use these metrics too as a way to see if there are particular issues with the site.

For instance, high bounce rates could be indicative of long loading times. When we talk about how quickly the page should load, we’re talking about a page loading at a maximum of two seconds, and a goal of under half a second. So, pages that take longer than that to load are likely to see users abandon the site before the page even loads, increasing your bounce rates.

Exit rates might be more indicative of a problem with the functionality of a page, or a page layout, later on in your conversion funnel. For instance, a user gets all the way down to some of your awesome gated content, and when they go to submit the form to get access to that sweet, sweet content, if the form times out, or doesn’t submit, or takes a long time to submit, they will leave frustrated.

Since these metrics are typically used by your marketing team, GA or SEO specialist, you might want to draw attention to these particular metrics to your dev team so they can take a look at how to make those particular pages better. They might see something that looks okay on the surface but could subtly affect user experience. Or they might notice that this particular functionality looks fine and shiny on Google Chrome but is a nightmare on Safari! Either way, don’t be afraid to bring these metrics up and have your team investigate.

Responsiveness:

Your front end developers know that responsive design is a must. As a marketer, this is probably also one of your biggest concerns. We want to be able to reach out and engage with our users anywhere, anytime, and on any device. The implementation of responsive design is often placed on the shoulders of the front end developer, but they can’t do it alone. Often times, what looks good on a desktop or what functions well on a laptop, aren’t going to be what looks and works well on someone’s phone or tablet.

Ensure Your Designs Are “Mobile First”

This is more of an instruction for whoever is designing the layouts for your web page, but you can consider this too when making content. Essentially, any designs for mobile device sizes need to be in place before the designs for tablet and desktop can be considered.

The reasons for this are fairly simple:

  • There is less space on a smaller screen.
  • A touchscreen has different functionality from a mouse
  • Frequently, phones may not be connected to Wi-Fi, so your FMP and TTI times become even more important.

Make sure you have all your mobile designs and needs to be considered first, and then work from there. By considering the mobile use case first, we free ourselves up to add to the desktop experience instead of limiting that same experience for mobile devices. It allows us to create more and constrain less when making the website.

Scaling Content

Some of your content is bound to not scale to mobile well. Look at this image of the cast of LOST:

LOST 1

Even here, it is a bit too small. Primarily, you can tell it’s the cast of LOST because the image is large enough that some of the faces and people are recognizable. This is great for your desktop or laptop, where the average viewport size is around 1000 to 1400 pixels wide.

Let’s shrink this bad boy down to mobile size though, shall we?

Lost 2

Oh boy. Look at it now. Can’t really tell what it is at all, except a bunch of people standing around under a moon. Could be for anything, Twilight, Vampire Diaries, Harry Potter (that one guy looks like Hagrid doesn’t he?) Phone widths range between 320-pixel viewports for smaller devices and 400 – 475 for the larger devices. That’s not a lot of width when you consider some of the assets we use in our content.

Now, I know you might say “well, there is explanatory text for the image.” This doesn’t help all too much since images should help clarify the purpose of your site and, in doing so, be self-evident. When you need one element, text, image, video, sound bite, whatever, to explain—not enhance—another element on your site, that is no good. So, when thinking responsively, consider how you might have to change your assets and content to ensure the best experience over multiple device sizes, even going so far as to have different assets for mobile and desktop experiences if absolutely necessary.

To Conclude

As a marketer, you know how to best engage with your customers and your development team knows how to best create a platform for that content to reach them. By ensuring you are using the correct types of assets, and thinking responsively, you can help enable your web team to cut down on loading times and get your users engaged more quickly. You also can help them to find places to improve your site by sharing the metrics that matter to you. When you and your dev team work together to make either large scale or incremental changes to your website, you ensure that users visiting your site have the best and most engaging experience possible.

Are there any tactics you’ll be taking back to your marketing team to help you work with web dev in a more cohesive way? I’d love to keep the discussion going in the comments!

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Microsoft Surpasses Google’s Alphabet to Become World’s Third Biggest Company

Microsoft gained a lead over Google parent Alphabet for the first time in three years, becoming the third most valuable company following market close on Tuesday.

Over the past 12 months, Microsoft’s stock price continued its rally and surged by 40 percent to $98 per share. Valued at $753 billion, it finally surpassed Alphabet’s $739 billion market capitalization. It is still behind online retailer Amazon’s market value of $782 billion and Apple’s $924 billion as the largest publicly traded US companies.

More investors were willing to bet on Microsoft’s cloud-first strategy under current CEO Satya Nadella. When he assumed the top post in 2014, the tech company focused on cloud computing instead of manufacturing phones. Since then, its stock price has been on an uptrend but continued to trail Google’s after the latter’s restructuring in 2015.

Microsoft and Google continue to be direct competitors in several technological advancements, such as artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Second only to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft’s public cloud business under the Azure platform and Office 365 subscription remains relatively bigger than Google’s.

Although the tech giant has always been associated with the Windows operating system, Microsoft announced a reorganization of its legacy Windows and Devices Group back in March. This prompted the company to reallocate resources from Windows to its cloud infrastructure and artificial intelligence businesses.

It looked like the gamble paid off as third-quarter revenue increased by 16 percent to $26.8 billion compared to prior year, largely driven by the Microsoft Cloud segment. Net income amounted to $7.4 billion, 35 percent higher than 2017’s third fiscal quarter.  

Back in March, investment bank Morgan Stanley gave a bullish outlook on Microsoft’s growth forecasts, underscoring the increasing preference of several businesses for cloud computing over local network services. According to the analysts, the software company is on track to reach the $1 trillion market cap within a year's time if it maintains its dominant position on the public cloud market. Furthermore, its stock price was expected to reach $130 from the previous forecast of $110.

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5 Best CRM Mobile Apps for Doing Business on the Go

Entrepreneurs today are busier than ever, working even when they're away from the office. A good Customer Relationship Management (CRM) program goes a long way in helping to keep track of client information, manage data on deals (both past and present) while still having access to all the tools they require to stay productive.

But with more businesspeople professionals on the go, there is a growing need for comprehensive mobile CRM apps that will give them a competitive edge. Here's a list of the top five:

1. Agile

Image result for agile mobile crm

This CRM platform can easily automate your company's marketing, sales, and customer service. The Agile mobile app also lets users get a real-time idea of your business process, track deals and manage relevant milestones. Managing tasks becomes simpler as the app allows users to check pending items, create new tasks, manage and respond to social media mentions, start email campaigns, place calls to customers and jot down notes minutes before a meeting. This CRM app is available for both Android and iOS. While it's free for up to 10 users, you'll need to sign up for the Premium plan if you want more people to use the app. Price: Starts at $8.99/month/user (also offers free service)

2. amoCRM

Image result for amocrm mobile

This cloud-based CRM solution assists users in managing their sales pipeline. They can receive reports and feedback regarding the performance of other people on the team, sales analytics, email integration, and lead scoring. AmoCRM also lets users organize their contacts and deals using unique tags and customized fields. Existing customer details are also uploaded from databases like Gmail and Outlook. The app can be downloaded on any Android or iOS devices. Price: Starts a $15/month/user

3. HubSpot CRM

Image result for hubspot crm mobile

HubSpot initially made its mark developing marketing automation tools. Now the company has brought its expertise to customer management with Hubspot CRM, widely considered one of the best free CRM apps today. Get the information you need about a client or company by simply adding a contact's name and email address or a company's domain name. You can also customize fields by dragging and dropping them in the order you want. Use Hubspot CRM alone or alongside the company's premier marketing services. Price: Starts at $50/month (also offers free service)

4. Pipedrive

Image result for pipedrive crm mobile

Sales teams will undoubtedly find Pipedrive a godsend. The CRM platform is designed around activity-based selling. The app's primary interface allows users to stay organized and in total control of the sales process. With the Pipedrive app, you can arrange and manage your contacts and to-do lists via a simple search. Get access to your deal history, create new tasks and take down notes wherever and whenever. What's more, any changes made using the mobile app is immediately synced to the Pipedrive web platform. The program runs on both iOS and Android systems. Price: Start at $15/month

5. Salesforce

Image result for salesforce mobile crm

Salesforce is the largest CRM platform out on the market today. And now the company is extending its features to mobile. Take advantage of its easy to assemble custom apps and create features that are perfectly aligned with you and your client's requirements. The app also allows you to easily access crucial CRM information, productivity tools, and customizations anywhere. Your dashboards and reports are also on-hand whenever you need them, thus ensuring that you have everything you need to make an informed decision. Salesforce is available for both iOS and Android systems. Price: Starts at $25/month

A mobile CRM app can do wonders for your company's productivity and sales pipeline. While the five mobile apps we listed above work well for most entrepreneurs, there are dozens of CRM systems on the market to choose from. Depending on what you need to track and how you manage your team, you may find other apps that suit you better. So do your due diligence and carefully research your options before choosing.

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PayPal Will Soon Integrate More Payment Options Into Google Services

Google's rebranding of Google Pay this year was done to make twofold transactions go more smoothly. Now, the company is integrating PayPal into the mix. This will enable PayPal users to pay bills and make purchases without having to log in or out of Google services.

The integration between Google and PayPal will go live later this year. It will cover any services and apps using Google Pay, like Gmail, the Google Store, and YouTube and will also work with peer-to-peer transfers.

The two companies working together is not new. PayPal has already been a payment option for Google Play since 2014 and in online and in-store transactions that are handled by Google Pay since 2017. Google is also working with other payment partners like Braintree, Cybersource, Mastercard, Stripe, and Visa.

The expanded relationship between Google and PayPal will undoubtedly benefit the two companies. For the former, it will mean a reduction of users leaving the site just to complete a transaction, a move that more often than not results in abandoned purchases. This will also give buyers more payment alternatives, ensuring that more sales are completed. As for PayPal, the union will also give its members an incentive to use its services to buy things, thereby leading to higher transaction revenue.

This partnership also underlines the changes and challenges happening to online payments. A large number of consumers are already willing and ready to pay for services and items online. The problem is that with so many payment options and shops, it's difficult to keep consumer interest. The challenge now for app publishers, shop owners and platform owners is how to keep people engaged in the product and not migrate to another site.

The solution is to introduce services where payment transactions are already enabled at the point that they're needed with minimum fuss. This means no jumping to another site or app, no logging in several times or taking additional steps just to finalize a payment. 

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Facebook 'Weaponized' User Data, Says Bikini Photo-Finding App Developer

Facebook is facing accusations of gathering more user data than disclosed. According to court filings, former start-up Six4Three claimed that the social media company conducted mass surveillance on its users and their friends alike.

Based on the lawsuit documents, Facebook reportedly had access to its users’ text messages, photos, and microphones. It can even track their locations by remotely activating the Bluetooth on mobile devices without permission. All of these accusations were detailed in Six4Three’s fifth version of the complaint, initially filed in 2015.

The court document read, in part:

“Facebook continued to explore and implement ways to track users’ location, to track and read their texts, to access and record their microphones on their phones, to track and monitor their usage of competitive apps on their phones, and to track and monitor their calls.”

In response, Facebook refuted the claims by saying that these “have no merit and we will continue to defend ourselves vigorously.” The company clarified rumors back in March that it was monitoring calls and messages of its users. Rather, they only collected call and text message history as part of its opt-in feature under Facebook Lite and Messenger on Android.

The former start-up also contended that Facebook had access to several photos on iPhones. But the social media company pointed out that users can opt-in to the photo syncing feature of the app for easier uploading.

Allegations of breaching user privacy and data collection remain touchy subjects for Facebook,  following its involvement in the Cambridge Analytica fiasco. Prior to the scandal, the social media giant has removed the access of third-party developers to personal information. This policy change reportedly led to the failure of Six4Three’s controversial paid app Pikinis, where users can find their Facebook friends’ swimsuit photos.

Along with accusations of causing its financial ruin, Six4Three claimed that Facebook ‘weaponized’ its ability to access user data, sometimes without explicit consent, to earn billions of dollars. There was also a mass surveillance scheme, details of which were redacted from the latest filings per Facebook’s request. These documents, such as email correspondence among senior executives, contain confidential business matters and were sealed from public view until further notice. 

Facebook has continued to deny the purported claims, filing a motion to have the case dismissed by invoking the free speech defense under the law in California. Six4Three, on the other hand, is trying to stop the social media giant from getting the case thrown out. As the legal battle wages on, Facebook still faces continued scrutiny over its users’ paranoia on weak data privacy and protection controls.

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Facebook Improves Admin Tools for Groups, Introduces Enterprise Collaboration

Facebook has launched several updates for its Groups to help admins manage them efficiently and keep communities safe. The rollout of new tools, controls, and additional features are in line with the company’s focus on creating engagement in various communities on the site.

With more than a billion members across millions of active groups, Facebook is putting in an effort to help community managers handle nearly every activity each day. That’s why admins will now have a dedicated customer support service to handle queries and reported issues. And with more people on board, Facebook intends to give quick feedback as well. For now, the free service is only available to selected group admins on iOS and Android in English and Spanish but will continue its rollout in the coming weeks.  

Another tool that will benefit group admins is the launching of an online educational resource. The live site contains short tutorials, product demos, and actual case studies drawn from the experience of fellow admins. Done in audio and video formats, content on the learning portal aims to give a better understanding of how Facebook and Groups work.

As Facebook promises to build resources according to its users’ needs, the company has introduced two admin tools. One new feature will allow community admins and moderators to inform members of their rule violations that merited removal of the post. Admins and moderators can even add comments in the activity log when a post is taken down.

Another update is allowing admins and moderators to choose certain Facebook users, otherwise called pre-approved members. Whenever they post, their content will no longer require approval since they are tagged as trusted members. This means less moderation of content for managers and more time in connecting with others.

Apart from creating communities, Facebook wants to bring social networking to the workplace as well. Called Workplace by Facebook, the collaboration tool is one of the many available in the market now. It faces stiff competition from Slack, Atlassian’s Stride, and Microsoft’s Team, but none of them have a userbase that comes close to Facebook's over two billion.

Facebook is banking on its partnership with identity management developer Okta to bring in more business accounts and convince larger companies that Workplace is an enterprise app. With the proposed integration, employees can securely sign in Okta and gain easy access to Workplace and other cloud apps.   

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Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Microsoft Surpasses Google’s Alphabet to Become World’s Third Biggest Company

Microsoft gained a lead over Google parent Alphabet for the first time in three years, becoming the third most valuable company following market close on Tuesday.

Over the past 12 months, Microsoft’s stock price continued its rally and surged by 40 percent to $98 per share. Valued at $753 billion, it finally surpassed Alphabet’s $739 billion market capitalization. It is still behind online retailer Amazon’s market value of $782 billion and Apple’s $924 billion as the largest publicly traded US companies.

More investors were willing to bet on Microsoft’s cloud-first strategy under current CEO Satya Nadella. When he assumed the top post in 2014, the tech company focused on cloud computing instead of manufacturing phones. Since then, its stock price has been on an uptrend but continued to trail Google’s after the latter’s restructuring in 2015.

Microsoft and Google continue to be direct competitors in several technological advancements, such as artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Second only to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft’s public cloud business under the Azure platform and Office 365 subscription remains relatively bigger than Google’s.

Although the tech giant has always been associated with the Windows operating system, Microsoft announced a reorganization of its legacy Windows and Devices Group back in March. This prompted the company to reallocate resources from Windows to its cloud infrastructure and artificial intelligence businesses.

It looked like the gamble paid off as third-quarter revenue increased by 16 percent to $26.8 billion compared to prior year, largely driven by the Microsoft Cloud segment. Net income amounted to $7.4 billion, 35 percent higher than 2017’s third fiscal quarter.  

Back in March, investment bank Morgan Stanley gave a bullish outlook on Microsoft’s growth forecasts, underscoring the increasing preference of several businesses for cloud computing over local network services. According to the analysts, the software company is on track to reach the $1 trillion market cap within a year's time if it maintains its dominant position on the public cloud market. Furthermore, its stock price was expected to reach $130 from the previous forecast of $110.

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5 Best CRM Mobile Apps for Doing Business on the Go

Entrepreneurs today are busier than ever, working even when they're away from the office. A good Customer Relationship Management (CRM) program goes a long way in helping to keep track of client information, manage data on deals (both past and present) while still having access to all the tools they require to stay productive.

But with more businesspeople professionals on the go, there is a growing need for comprehensive mobile CRM apps that will give them a competitive edge. Here's a list of the top five:

1. Agile

Image result for agile mobile crm

This CRM platform can easily automate your company's marketing, sales, and customer service. The Agile mobile app also lets users get a real-time idea of your business process, track deals and manage relevant milestones. Managing tasks becomes simpler as the app allows users to check pending items, create new tasks, manage and respond to social media mentions, start email campaigns, place calls to customers and jot down notes minutes before a meeting. This CRM app is available for both Android and iOS. While it's free for up to 10 users, you'll need to sign up for the Premium plan if you want more people to use the app. Price: Starts at $8.99/month/user (also offers free service)

2. amoCRM

Image result for amocrm mobile

This cloud-based CRM solution assists users in managing their sales pipeline. They can receive reports and feedback regarding the performance of other people on the team, sales analytics, email integration, and lead scoring. AmoCRM also lets users organize their contacts and deals using unique tags and customized fields. Existing customer details are also uploaded from databases like Gmail and Outlook. The app can be downloaded on any Android or iOS devices. Price: Starts a $15/month/user

3. HubSpot CRM

Image result for hubspot crm mobile

HubSpot initially made its mark developing marketing automation tools. Now the company has brought its expertise to customer management with Hubspot CRM, widely considered one of the best free CRM apps today. Get the information you need about a client or company by simply adding a contact's name and email address or a company's domain name. You can also customize fields by dragging and dropping them in the order you want. Use Hubspot CRM alone or alongside the company's premier marketing services. Price: Starts at $50/month (also offers free service)

4. Pipedrive

Image result for pipedrive crm mobile

Sales teams will undoubtedly find Pipedrive a godsend. The CRM platform is designed around activity-based selling. The app's primary interface allows users to stay organized and in total control of the sales process. With the Pipedrive app, you can arrange and manage your contacts and to-do lists via a simple search. Get access to your deal history, create new tasks and take down notes wherever and whenever. What's more, any changes made using the mobile app is immediately synced to the Pipedrive web platform. The program runs on both iOS and Android systems. Price: Start at $15/month

5. Salesforce

Image result for salesforce mobile crm

Salesforce is the largest CRM platform out on the market today. And now the company is extending its features to mobile. Take advantage of its easy to assemble custom apps and create features that are perfectly aligned with you and your client's requirements. The app also allows you to easily access crucial CRM information, productivity tools, and customizations anywhere. Your dashboards and reports are also on-hand whenever you need them, thus ensuring that you have everything you need to make an informed decision. Salesforce is available for both iOS and Android systems. Price: Starts at $25/month

A mobile CRM app can do wonders for your company's productivity and sales pipeline. While the five mobile apps we listed above work well for most entrepreneurs, there are dozens of CRM systems on the market to choose from. Depending on what you need to track and how you manage your team, you may find another app that suits you better. So do your due diligence and carefully research your options before choosing.

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The Fearless Girl Across Generations—Just How Fearless Are We?

Sometimes you look at something and know it’s a teachable moment. Maybe it’s because you are the mom of a 16-year-old boy, and there have been many teachable moments in his lifetime. Maybe it’s because you see yourself in your 21-year-old intern, or your Millennial PR manager who takes on any challenge with a smile. Maybe you just love the theme of Marketing Nation Summit, “The Fearless Marketer.” Maybe it’s divine intervention. Or maybe it’s just dumb luck.

But when I saw the breakout session at this month’s Marketing Nation Summit on “The Fearless Girl” I knew it would be a moment I couldn’t resist. It was the only breakout that my team had time to attend, because of the busy schedule at Summit, but it was the best 40 minutes of the entire week.

I asked Lynnie Lucas, our new corporate communications intern at Marketo to write a blog about it. Yes, Lynnie is Steve Lucas’s daughter, but she is also an aspiring communications pro who has three years of college classes in communications, PR, digital marketing, and a ton of enthusiasm for learning.

Below is a back and forth from me, with 20 plus years of experience, and Lynnie, a senior in college with her entire career ahead of her, about what The Fearless Girl means to each of us.

A Fearless Marketing Tactic

Lynnie:

If you do a simple Google search, it is rather easy to find an inspirational quote or two about what it means to be “fearless.” Eleanor Roosevelt, Martin Luther King, and Taylor Swift, all have their own versions of what it means to be courageous. While I believe I could just copy and paste one of those quotes here and call this post “good,” I learned as an intern at Marketing Nation Summit what a different kind of fearlessness looks like, and it resonated with me in a way I was certainly not expecting.

I attended a breakout session about the inspiration behind The Fearless Girl statue in New York. As an avid Twitter user seeking a blue “verified” checkmark, I have been aware of the statue’s notoriety for some time, so when Lori asked me to attend the keynote and write a blog post on it, I jumped at the chance.

I barely knew any information about Fearless Girl other than the barrage of posts I had seen of friends standing by her side, so the session was illuminating, to say the least. In summary, we have State Street Global Advisors and their amazing team to thank for the beautiful image of a young girl staring down the Charging Bull, inspiring women worldwide. I was unaware, however, that Fearless Girl was created with an agency in an effort to drive executive diversity. Their marketing, truly what is the epitome of “fearless marketing,” began with a basic model and cost far less than one might think. The purpose was pure, the course was clear, and the original timeline of seven days on display was expanded into one, powerful, provocative, Year of Women.

For me, a college student pursuing a degree in strategic communication, The Fearless Girl brought up emotions of fighting to be equal. No matter where I apply, what organization I want to be a part of, or how good my resume is, someone doesn’t think I am as qualified as the men around me.  

The point is that as a woman in marketing who is looking to be just like her dad someday, I hit roadblocks every day. It’s very hard to be a Fearless Girl when at every turn, you’re treated more like the Shove Me Around and Call Me Cute Girl.

Fearless Girl Beginnings

I too have experienced that for 20 years, Lynnie. My first job in television news required me to be a “one-man-band” reporter. Notice it wasn’t “one-woman” band. It was me, my camera, deck, tripod, lights, and microphone—about 50 pounds of gear that I carried around with me. Actually, lugged with me is a better description. People would ask “Where is your photographer?” and I would say “Oh, he’s sick today.” Never did they think the photographer was a woman, and never did they think I could do the job by myself. I’ve worked with some great photographers, men and women, over the years and I’m proud that people don’t still ask that question when they see a woman behind a camera. Some things have changed.

When I left television news, I worked in public relations at a manufacturing company. While we made cool technology like cooling systems for laptops, I was often the only woman in meetings. We had one woman on our executive leadership committee, and one woman on our 10-member board of directors. The Fearless Girl statue, which came many years later, was about getting more women in leadership at Fortune 500 companies and on their board of directors. Not only did The Fearless Girl garner all those likes on Twitter, but it began a movement to change the faces of boards across the land—and it worked. In the past year, 150 boards in the US added more members who are women. Still a long way to go, but there is much progress to report thanks to a little girl defiantly looking at Wall Street. Progress that Lynnie is already seeing and feeling…

Fearless New Voices

Lynnie:

In the three days I spent in San Francisco at Marketing Nation Summit, I was never in a room with fewer than three women at one time. In fact, there was a time when my dad was the only man in the room. That has never, in my entire life, happened to me. I am used to being the minority, not the focus of an entire keynote with Olympic medalist Lindsey Vonn! I didn’t know it was possible that I could grow up to live in a world where every day, bit by bit, women are commanding positions of leadership and authority. We are astronauts, scientists, designers, engineers, developers, salespeople, CMOs, and creators. 

We are suddenly a voice that is credible, taken seriously, and held at higher value. Fearless Girl is the face of a legacy that began with the right to vote and will come to its culmination when we are all held at equal value among humanity. State Street Global may not have known what exactly the future of their little creation would hold, but Fearless Girl holds in her tiny, bronze hands the future of an entire generation of women, men, and human beings of all kinds.

A Fearless Future Together

Amen, Lynnie. I hope when I have a granddaughter—not for a while of course, because my son is only 16, but when I do, I hope that The Fearless Girl is still on display. I hope we can all stand next to her and say thanks. Thanks, because her tiny, determined face led the nation to a huge change. A change that allowed half the population to be considered exactly like the other half. A symbol for young women like Lynnie and the hundreds of others who joined us to hear about The Fearless Girl story, who dream of big things. One step, and one fearless face at a time.

Two weeks after the conference on a trip to NYC, Lynnie posed with The Fearless Girl, excited about what the future would hold.

Lynnie Lucas and Fearless Girl

 

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Tuesday, May 29, 2018

PayPal Will Soon Integrate More Payment Options With Google Services

Google's rebranding of Google Pay this year was done to make twofold transactions go more smoothly. Now, the company is integrating PayPal into the mix. This will enable PayPal users to pay bills and make purchases without having to log in or out of Google services.

The integration between Google and PayPal will go live later this year. It will cover any services and apps using Google Pay, like Gmail, the Google Store, and YouTube and will also work with peer-to-peer transfers.

The two companies working together is not new. PayPal has already been a payment option for Google Play since 2014 and in online and in-store transactions that are handled by Google Pay since 2017. Google is also working with other payment partners like Braintree, Cybersource, Mastercard, Stripe, and Visa.

The expanded relationship between Google and PayPal will undoubtedly benefit the two companies. For the former, it will mean a reduction of users leaving the site just to complete a transaction, a move that more often than not results in abandoned purchases. This will also give buyers more payment alternatives, ensuring that more sales are completed. As for PayPal, the union will also give its members an incentive to use its services to buy things, thereby leading to higher transaction revenue.

This partnership also underlines the changes and challenges happening to online payments. A large number of consumers are already willing and ready to pay for services and items online. The problem is that with so many payment options and shops, it's difficult to keep consumer interest. The challenge now for app publishers, shop owners and platform owners is how to keep people engaged in the product and not migrate to another site.

The solution is to introduce services where payment transactions are already enabled at the point that they're needed with minimum fuss. This means no jumping to another site or app, no logging in several times or taking additional steps just to finalize a payment. 

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What Brand Colors Can Reveal About Your Business

Your brand’s colors can tell more than you can imagine about your business. The psychology of color can help your business establish trust and familiarity by eliciting the right emotions. It’s no surprise that the most popular brands in the world have a strong association with their logos. Their colors tend to reflect their branding, even when they don’t involve any text on them.

This is due to the power of colors and their ability to increase the brand recognition with the desired reactions that they may provoke. Studies have found that a product’s color influences 60 to 80% of a customer’s purchasing decision. This means that the right choice of color does not only strengthen the brand association, but it can also affect your total sales.

As a marketer, it is useful to explore how the psychology of colors can send the right message to your target audience. Your brand’s colors should be integrated across your site, your landing pages, your logo, your product, and any other collateral that you’re creating. Stronger branding increases the impact of seeing the right use of colors making an impact on your business.

We’ve decided to have a closer look at all the colors and how each marketer can use them to connect with their audience.

Analyzing the World’s Top 100 Brands

We wanted to analyze the world’s top 100 brands, defined by their brand value, to explore the most popular uses of colors.

Here’s what we’ve found.

Blue seems to be the winning color, as it shows up in 33% of the top 100 brands. Red comes second by showing up in 29% of the brands, and black or greyscale make the third most popular choice with 28%. Finally, 13% use yellow or gold.

What’s interesting is that 95% of the top 100 brands only use one or two colors. This can be explained as an attempt to maintain consistency by staying simple in their branding.

Moreover, text is not important to many of these brands, as only 41% involved it in their logos.

This serves as proof that a strong logo can make a connection with the audience, even with no use of text to supplement it. In fact, 9% of the brands didn’t even feature their company’s name on their logo, going one step further with the simplicity of their logos.

How Do People Respond to Brand Colors?

Every color elicits a different response from humans. Colors can be divided into two main categories: warm and cool. Warm colors tend to be associated with energy, while cool colors are linked with calmness and security.

But how do each of the following colors affect us and what does that mean for your brand? Here’s an overview of what differentiates each color and how your brand can pick the right mix of them.

Red

Red evokes a passionate and visceral response. It is a color that increases your heart rate, makes your breath faster, and is generally associated with energy, excitement, and passion. It’s one of the colors that is attention-grabbing, while it can also be provocative and excitable.

Color code: aggressive, energetic, provocative, attention-grabbing, passionate

Purple

Purple is a sophisticated yet mysterious color. It tends to be used with higher-end products due to its association with royalty and elegance. Purple’s mysterious element is also linked with spirituality, and it can bring a magical element to your branding.

Color code: royalty, sophistication, nostalgia, mystery, spirituality

Blue

Blue is the most popular color choice for the top brands. It is thought to put people at ease, as it reminds them of the sky and the ocean. Blue is also associated with trust, security, and confidence which make a great combination for the brands that want these elements in their message.

Color code: trustworthy, dependable, secure, responsible, confident

Green

Green is a color that is synonymous with calmness, safety, and freshness. Its various shades can create a unique brand identity for your company. Green tends to be associated with health along with the feelings of peace and serenity.

Color code: Wealth, health, prestige, serenity, generosity, safety

Yellow

Yellow is a popular color choice for brands that want to evoke a feeling of positivity in their identity. Its association with the sun on its different shadows brings out hope and optimism. Yellow also stands out among other colors, which makes a yellow brand identity creative and appealing.

Color code: positivity, light, warmth, motivation, creativity, happiness

Orange

Orange makes an ideal color choice for brands that want to blend the optimism and the brightness of yellow and the passion and the energy of red. It is a creative and cheerful color that evokes a friendly and adventurous feeling.

Color code: vitality, fun, playful, exuberant, outgoing

Brown

Brown represents the earthly simplicity and it is usually preferred to reflect stability and strength. It’s comforting in its simplicity and is preferred by brands that want to be classical and trustworthy, without proceeding to bold moves. Brown is associated with the earth and can also remind people of dirt, so there needs to be a careful use of it, especially if it stands out as the main color for a brand.

Color code: earth-like, natural, simplistic, durable, comforting

Black

Black is another popular color option for brands and it tends to be one of the most classic options. It’s both classic and sophisticated and it can make a brand identity stand out. It seems to work perfectly with luxury products, blending the classic and powerful elements. Black is one of the colors that can be combined with others to add a stronger emotion, without losing the classical appeal.

Color code: Prestige, value, timelessness, sophistication, power

White

White represents simplicity, purity, and also cleanliness. These three make it extremely popular in the healthcare sector, in the cleaning business, but also in the child-related businesses. White can also bring out a feeling of trust by tapping in to purity and simplicity.

Color code: pure, noble, clean, soft

Moving Ahead

It’s useful to understand the psychology of each color when creating your brand’s identity. Your color choice can build your brand’s aesthetic while also bringing you closer to your target audience. Use the colors that will highlight your brand’s strengths, evoking the right feelings for the right audience. 

Do the color choices you’ve selected for your brand align with the feeling you’re trying to give to your customers and prospects? I’d love to hear about why you chose the colors you did for your brand in the comments.

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Friday, May 25, 2018

Facebook 'Weaponized' User Data, Says Bikini Photo-Finding App Developer

Facebook is facing accusations of gathering more user data than disclosed. According to court filings, former start-up Six4Three claimed that the social media company conducted mass surveillance on its users and their friends alike.

Based on the lawsuit documents, Facebook reportedly had access to its users’ text messages, photos, and microphones. It can even track their locations by remotely activating the Bluetooth on mobile devices without permission. All of these accusations were detailed in Six4Three’s fifth version of the complaint, initially filed in 2015.

The court document read, in part:

“Facebook continued to explore and implement ways to track users’ location, to track and read their texts, to access and record their microphones on their phones, to track and monitor their usage of competitive apps on their phones, and to track and monitor their calls.”

In response, Facebook refuted the claims by saying that these “have no merit and we will continue to defend ourselves vigorously.” The company clarified rumors back in March that it was monitoring calls and messages of its users. Rather, they only collected call and text message history as part of its opt-in feature under Facebook Lite and Messenger on Android.

The former start-up also contended that Facebook had access to several photos on iPhones. But the social media company pointed out that users can opt-in to the photo syncing feature of the app for easier uploading.

Allegations of breaching user privacy and data collection remain touchy subjects for Facebook,  following its involvement in the Cambridge Analytica fiasco. Prior to the scandal, the social media giant has removed the access of third-party developers to personal information. This policy change reportedly led to the failure of Six4Three’s controversial paid app Pikinis, where users can find their Facebook friends’ swimsuit photos.

Along with accusations of causing its financial ruin, Six4Three claimed that Facebook ‘weaponized’ its ability to access user data, sometimes without explicit consent, to earn billions of dollars. There was also a mass surveillance scheme, details of which were redacted from the latest filings per Facebook’s request. These documents, such as email correspondence among senior executives, contain confidential business matters and were sealed from public view until further notice. 

Facebook has continued to deny the purported claims, filing a motion to have the case dismissed by invoking the free speech defense under the law in California. Six4Three, on the other hand, is trying to stop the social media giant from getting the case thrown out. As the legal battle wages on, Facebook still faces continued scrutiny over its users’ paranoia on weak data privacy and protection controls.

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Facebook Improves Admin Tools for Groups, Introduces Enterprise Collaboration

Facebook has launched several updates for its Groups to help admins manage them efficiently and keep communities safe. The rollout of new tools, controls, and additional features are in line with the company’s focus on creating engagement in various communities on the site.

With more than a billion members across millions of active groups, Facebook is putting in an effort to help community managers handle nearly every activity each day. That’s why admins will now have a dedicated customer support service to handle queries and reported issues. And with more people on board, Facebook intends to give quick feedback as well. For now, the free service is only available to selected group admins on iOS and Android in English and Spanish but will continue its rollout in the coming weeks.  

Another tool that will benefit group admins is the launching of an online educational resource. The live site contains short tutorials, product demos, and actual case studies drawn from the experience of fellow admins. Done in audio and video formats, content on the learning portal aims to give a better understanding of how Facebook and Groups work.

As Facebook promises to build resources according to its users’ needs, the company has introduced two admin tools. One new feature will allow community admins and moderators to inform members of their rule violations that merited removal of the post. Admins and moderators can even add comments in the activity log when a post is taken down.

Another update is allowing admins and moderators to choose certain Facebook users, otherwise called pre-approved members. Whenever they post, their content will no longer require approval since they are tagged as trusted members. This means less moderation of content for managers and more time in connecting with others.

Apart from creating communities, Facebook wants to bring social networking to the workplace as well. Called Workplace by Facebook, the collaboration tool is one of the many available in the market now. It faces stiff competition from Slack, Atlassian’s Stride, and Microsoft’s Team, but none of them have a userbase that comes close to Facebook's over two billion.

Facebook is banking on its partnership with identity management developer Okta to bring in more business accounts and convince larger companies that Workplace is an enterprise app. With the proposed integration, employees can securely sign in Okta and gain easy access to Workplace and other cloud apps.   

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Royal Wedding was Fifth Most Popular Event Ever Streamed on YouTube

YouTube reports that the Royal Wedding this past weekend was the fifth most popular event ever streamed on YouTube. At its peak, it had 1.29 million people watching and a total of 32 million views so far. While live, the event was viewed a total of 11.2 million times.

The top five countries viewing on YouTube were:

  • United Kingdom
  • United States
  • Germany
  • Russia
  • Australia

Check out some of the clips:

More highlights are available on The Royal Family Channel.

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5 Ways to Use FoMO in Your Online Marketing Strategy

It's human nature to want to be “connected” or “in the know.” In the past, not knowing where new water and food sources are could result in death. The situation now isn't as dire as it was before, but the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is causing people to become afraid of missing out on the latest trends, products, and ideas.

Why FOMO Works as a Marketing Strategy

While FoMO was only included in the Oxford dictionary in 2013, the idea has been around for a long time. Every generation, from Baby Boomers to Gen Xers, has always had the desire to be in the loop, but it could be argued that the rise of social media has taken this fear to new levels. According to a MyLife research, 56 percent of social media users are afraid that if they're not active, they'll miss out on the latest news, upgrades, events, and status updates.

 

Marketers can, and have been, leveraging this fear and incorporating it into their strategies. This makes particular sense considering that studies have shown that 69% of millennials experience FoMO and more than half have made reactive purchases because of it. In short, these consumers have bought something just because they're afraid of missing out.

5 Ways to Use FOMO in Your Online Marketing Strategy

Knowing how to utilize FoMO is an effective tactic for marketing your product or service. Luckily, there are several tried and tested techniques that can create a FoMO effect. Here are five examples:

1. Have Flash Sales

The flash sale is a very common FoMO marketing campaign. The idea of limited stocks and/or a limited time period naturally creates a sense of urgency. It also creates the feeling of scarcity when it comes to products. This leads to a major boost in conversions, as seen during Black Friday sales, end of season sales or anniversary offers.

2. Organize Limited-Time Events

Event organizers have also taken advantage of FoMO by limiting the number of seats or participants allowed in specific events. Some even offer exclusive seats and bank on the idea of a limited special offer to push people to purchase tickets. While this has been proven effective in music shows or conferences, a lot of businesses are now incorporating this idea to drum up excitement and interest in their podcasts or marketing webinars.

3. Introduce Loyalty Reward Programs

Loyalty programs are another sure-fire way to ensure long-term customer retention. By giving customers timely rewards and the odd special prizes, companies create a FoMo effect among those who are not customers or loyal members yet. This fear of missing out on special gifts and freebies will result in more people joining a company's loyalty program scheme.

4. Promote User Experience

Letting your users or customers help is another good FoMO strategy. Some companies utilize user-generated content (UGC) to let site visitors and potential customers see and experience how “real people” use their products and services. This, in turn, leads to others wanting to experience and share their experiences too. Examples of these are marketing campaigns where consumers submit their photos or use certain hashtags.

5. Give Rewards to Early Purchasers

Giving away free products is undoubtedly a great way to attract customers. But you can make it even more compelling by limiting the freebies you give away. This is why some brick-and-mortar stores only offer a special discount or give a free gift to the first 200 customers. This then forces thousands of people to line up for the product.

The fear of missing out runs deep in most consumers. However, the desire for instant gratification and the popularity of social media has given this fear an added dimension. No matter how you decide to use FoMO, you should incorporate it in some of your marketing campaigns in order to generate more sales and keep your brand relevant.

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Slack Lets You Get Even More Work Done With New 'Actions' Tool

In its bid to become more than just a messaging platform, Slack has been collaborating with several companies to building integrations across apps. Called "Actions," this simple shortcut lets you work with productivity tools like Asana, Zendesk, Jira, and Hubspot, among others without leaving the app.

Similar to Slackbots, Actions let users turn any Slack conversations into tasks, messages, or follow-ups via the integrations. You can even add comments to tickets and pull requests as well as save information for review later. All you have to do is click on the drop-down of any Slack message to choose the appropriate action, without typing a slash command or messaging a chatbot.

It seems like integrations with third-party apps make for a better user interface and easier Slack experience. With Actions, users save time since detailed information is automatically sent out to the corresponding app. This means that if you create a new ticket or assign a new task based on a Slack message, Zendesk or Asana generates the same on its platform by mirroring information.

To date, Slack has eight million daily users on its platform, three million of which are paid accounts. And with 200,000 developers on board, Slack wants to improve user experience on the platform through deeper integrations with popular apps. For others, this may be a better alternative than memorizing commands or sorting through hundreds of productivity Slackbots in the app directory.

Not content with being just a messaging service, Slack wants to position itself as the de facto collaboration tool in the workplace. As more companies rely on several enterprise software to handle various tasks like project management and customer service, there’s logic and value in integrations.

“There’s such a demand for specialized software, and for great tools that are easy to use and interoperable with all applications you use,” Slack chief product officer April Underwood pointed out. “We think this is good, and we think more tools means customers have more choice. Ultimately there’s more competition in the marketplace, that means the best tools, the ones that truly help companies do their best work, rise to the top.”

In fact, Slack is facing increasing competition from other companies out to build simpler but well-constructed collaboration tools. Atlassian, for instance, has made its team communications platform Stride open to developers, allowing customization for your team. On the other hand, Microsoft has continued to improve Teams, its collaborative software. It is fully incorporated into the company’s various applications, such as Microsoft Office and Skype, and features extensions allowing integration with non-Microsoft products.

Slack’s flexibility and continued addition of numerous features make the platform a favorite amongst smaller, niche companies. But as these companies expand, Slack might need more action to convince them of the collaboration tool’s indispensability in the larger workplace.  

[Featured image via Slack website]

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