CRM Update – May 30 : 1:13 pm

The Apple Store is currently down, which could signal that new Apple products are about to be launched.
The sign on the Store says “We’re busy updating the Apple Store for you and will be back soon.”
It’s interesting to note that the “Store Down” sign has changed significantly from the sign Apple used in the past couple of years. Furthermore, the sign seems to be slightly crooked — somewhat odd for Apple, a company known for perfectionism.
Recent rumors pointed to an update to Apple’s MacBook lineup…

A rumbly tummy can be blamed for many an act of frustration, but please, don’t drive into buildings just because a $0.99 taco is missing from your combo meal. A man in a suburb of Dayton, Ohio did just that, even after regretful employees replaced said taco.

ABC 22 in Dayton says the Huber Heights man pulled into the drive-thru just after midnight with his girlfriend, and ordered a combo meal.

“He was already peeling his tires, being cute whatever he was on, and came through got his food…

Content Marketing & SEO
Content marketing and search optimization are intricately interwoven. Content provides context to better understand products and services.
Going beyond text descriptions, Content marketing answers consumers’ questions at every step of the purchase process. Great content enriches your audience persuading them to choose your firm’s product through a variety of different formats and keywords.
Sixteen experts give their advice for leveraging content marketing to support your search optimization plans…

Michael noticed a sign at the TD Bank ATM informing customers that postage stamps would no longer be available at that location. Aw, too bad. It’s fair if a business wants to discontinue a service because it’s unprofitable or problematic to offer. What annoys customers and insults their intelligence is when the change is spun as some kind of favor to customers.

No more stamps at the ATM. I guess it’s their right to discontinue a service, but please don’t act like you’re doing me a favor by doing so…

A new report suggests that structure, size and timing all matter. Here’s how to get the details right.In most small firms, sales proposals are the heart and soul of selling. They’re also time consuming, though–so when you get the opportunity to write one, you want it to be a winner.Here are five simple rules to help ensure your proposal generates business, based upon a study of sales proposal success rates conducted by Bidsketch, a start-up that helps companies write them:1. Write a proposal, not an estimate…

Beware if you receive a file purporting to be an Olympics-themed PDF. It may actually be malware.
That’s the warning, at least, from F-Secure, a Helsinki-based security firm. F-Secure warns that the PDF, which is supposed to be a copy of the 2012 Olympic schedule, is a decoy file.
Once downloaded, the file (see image below) attempts to make a network connection to a “student travel” site in Baotoushi, China. The download exploits weaknesses in old versions of Adobe Reader and Acrobat…

A retail strategy proves successful in online billing trial.

Chances are you’re not using your creativity to the full, says the director of Stanford’s entrepreneurship center. Here’s how to fix that.Vanishingly few of us are born Mozarts or Rimbauds, with symphonies or poems bursting fully formed from our brains before we’ve even reached an age at which you could legally buy a beer in America. So what are us non-prodigies to do, simply accept our modest level of creativity and get on with life?One solution for those of us with less than stellar creative gifts is practice…

Assess?and act on?your strategic intent for optimum results.

Some companies spend all their time chasing huge accounts. But big customers make me nervous. Here’s why.At 37signals, the software company I co-founded, we like to keep one particular figure in mind:$150 a month.What’s so special about $150? That’s the most that any single customer can pay for Basecamp, our Web-based project-management and collaboration app. It doesn’t matter if you’re a company of 100,000 or a sole proprietor working at your kitchen table–$150 a month is our top pricing tier. And that’s not $150 a month per person…

Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world. Today, we’re looking at three particularly interesting stories.
Tim Cook Hints at Apple’s Next Steps
In an interview with All Things D, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the company has a “very solid” relationship with Facebook, hinting at deeper integration with the world’s largest online social network in the future.
He also said Siri would be getting some enhancements in the near future, but didn’t confirm or deny that Apple is working on a TV set or a related product…

Futurists, meet your car of tomorrow.
We know plenty about how digital technology is reshaping computing, smartphones, personal relationships and business. But what about something most of us depend on every single day — the automobile? Digital tech is also changing how we use and interact with our cars, and in more ways than you probably realize.
Vehicle-to-vehicle communications, for example, could help automobiles detect one another’s presence and location to avoid accidents. That could be especially useful when it comes to driverless cars — another advance already very much in development…

UK designers Ben West and Felix Heyes have released an odd project that provides a Google image for all 21,000 words in the English dictionary.
The Google Book as it’s known, is composed of the first image that comes up for each word. West told Creative Applications Network that the pair used two PHP scripts to create the book: “The first one takes a text list of dictionary words and downloads each image in sequence, and the second lays them out into columns and outputs a PDF.”
And the point of this, exactly? “Conceptually it’s whatever you make of it,” West wrote to Creative Applications…

Are you using LinkedIn to grow your business?With 161 million business members, LinkedIn provides a lot of opportunities.The real value of LinkedIn for businesses is to connect one-to-one with other business professionals.Why LinkedIn for Networking?The Start-Up of You, a recent book co-authored by LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, notes that companies don’t give you business – people do.Many of your LinkedIn connections can introduce you not only to business influencers and partners, but also refer your company to new customers…

Attention, Facebook millionaires: Money can buy happiness–if you know the right way to spend. (Hint: Skip the yacht.)What would you do with a heck of a lot of money? Would you be happier? How much so?In recent days, we’ve watched the aftermath of the Facebook IPO, and paid close attention as news broke that SAP is acquiring Ariba. We’ve been thinking about what happens when entrepreneurs come into a windfall. The classic advice is that you should do very little at first–no major lifestyle changes…

Google+ rolled out on Wednesday a new ‘Local’ tool that allows users to share and find information about nearby places — from museums and spas to restaurants and hotels. In addition to tapping a user’s network or “Circles,” the new service also incorporates information from Zagat, which Google bought last year.
The new “Local” tab, located on the right-hand side of Google+, encourages users to learn more about the places around them. For example, by searching for a restaurant or store through the tab, a Google+ page will appear with photos, as well as Zagat scores and summaries, reviews from people you know and other information such as addresses and hours of business…

As demand for customizable goods and rapid comparison shopping increases, people of all ages flock to e-tailers and online auction houses.Why it’s hot:The ability to compare prices across different platforms gives e-commerce outlets a leg up with shoppers. In particular, more and more customers look for one-of-a-kind vintage duds, organic goods, and travel deals. According to Plunkett Research, travel sales alone have grown in the United States at a 16% rate in 2012 and are projected to reach $125 billion by the end of the year…