eGain EMEA User Conference -Windsor, 18th May 2010

eGain hosted a day for all users to collaborate around the customer. With the conference title "The Customer is Still King" this was certainly in evidence throughout the day.

Ian Rawlings, The eGain marketing director played host to the event which opened with an excellent key note speach from Ed Thompson at Gartner

In 1 hour Thompson completed a whistle stop tour on everything to do with CRM and customer care. Intersting information from the CEO research completed at the start of 2010 which identified that retaining customers is the number one item on the to do list for CEOs and that 4 of the top 10 items on the CIO list were about the "customer".

Hot topics include mobile, self serve, and social networking and Thompson took us through these.

We were then given an excellent presentation on the implementation of eGain at Vodafone Portugal. An important project for Vodafone and one which seemed to be delivering great benefits to customers and Vodafone alike. As Joao Cruz stated, a real win win.

This was followed by similar presentations from customers about the implementation of eGain at Netrada in Germany and MTN in South Africa. A truely global solution. The Netrada solution required at least 10 different laguages to be supported, if not more.

In the afternoon we were then split in to tracks to find out about new product innovations. One of the key interesting features was the eGain social module that will take in feeds from Twitter, Facebook and even your own community website and help you to evaluate, respond and report on activity happening in the wider social network. A great tool and one that companies should embrace.

Finally, we were given an overview of some of the solutions delivered in the USA and the benefits gained here.

The day was a complete success, opening up new opportunities for many. The breadth and depth of coverage was amazing from functionality to projects to geographic coverage.

Attendees then took a breather before an excellent dinner was served.

Everyone should have left thinking about the next project to help their customers. Remembering that the "Customer is Still King".

I certainly did.