Some 150 reference professionals from more than 70 firms attended the 2008 Customer Reference Forum last month in Berkeley - by far, our biggest turnout. For a list of companies who attended, please click here.

For more on the event, including pics, a list of companies that attended, and highlights from the event, please click here.

Following are selected highlights from the event, including:
- tips from one of our Peer Exchange sessions on 'Promoting Your Reference Program',
- winners of our Presidents Awards for Top Presenters, and
- an update on our Special Interest Group (SIG) on Metrics.

All the best,
Bill

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ANNOUNCEMENTS

NEXT CAB EXCHANGE SUMMIT IN JULY
Our next CAB EXCHANGE SUMMIT for professionals who manage Customer Advisory Boards/Councils, will take place July 21-23 in San Jose. We'll also be starting a newsletter for CAB professionals. If interested in either, please let me know by replying to this email. If you know of people in your organization who might be interested, please feel free to forward this email to them.

LOCAL REFERENCE MEETINGS
Boston - Kara Manfredi, Customer Reference Manager of Deltek will be hosting a Boston user meeting on March 18th. If you are interested in participating, Kara can be reached at 617.528.2601 or KaraManfredi@deltek.com

Chicago - Bonnie Dziadkowiec, Reference Program Manager for Infor is interested in starting up a user group in the Chicago area, if you are interested or know someone who is, contact Bonnie at bonnie.dziadkowiec@infor.com

San Francisco - If anyone in the SF/Peninsula area is interested in starting a Reference Meeting/Group to meet in either San Francisco or Menlo Park. Sun Microsystems is willing to host both meeting locations and happy to spearhead this. Contact Lara McGurk at Lara.McGurk@Sun.com

CUSTOMER REFERENCE POSITIONS: WHO'S HIRING
NetApp and Projectline Services are currently hiring for Customer Reference Professionals. For more information on these jobs click here.

We can let our community of more than 500+ reference pros know about your position opening. To post a job (for now, this service is free), please click here.

CUSTOMER REFERENCE POSITIONS: WHO'S LOOKING
Epicor's Carol Blumberg is seeking a Reference Management position. Here's a brief description of her background: Interested in an experienced and passionate Customer Reference Program professional? Carol developed Epicor's first formal customer reference program in Epicor's history. Along with IT, developed a strong search engine and database for this program. Grew the reference database single-handedly from 0 to 450 solid referenceable customers within 1 year. The program successfully impacted new sales revenue in 2007 by bringing in Sales worth $14.9 Million. Traveled extensively in EMEA, ASIAPAC, ANZ and U.S. to train all worldwide sales teams. Managed 100% recruitment of customers into the program as well 100% fulfillment of all reference requests by the Sales team. Carol's contact information: carolblumberg@yahoo.com, 858-484-5188

ADVICE
Check out our BEST PRACTICES REPORTS for tips on critical issues like: getting marquee customers to participate in a reference program; getting customers to reveal measurable benefits; developing customer communities; integrating your program with sales; gaining executive support, and more. For more information, please click here.

RESEARCH
Check out our SURVEYS of Reference Programs and the Managers who run them, here:

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2008 CUSTOMER REFERENCE FORUM HIGHLIGHTS

Peer Exchange Workshops
Nothing is more important to our attendees than to interact and exchange best practices with their peers from other programs. In Berkeley, they addressed these critical issues:

- Filling and Leveraging the Reference
- Promoting the Reference Program
- Credible Metrics
- Reference Management with
- Synchronizing the Global Reference Program
- Getting Cooperation from Sales
- Developing a Reference Strategy for the Web 2.0
- Other Successes

We continue working to improve these sessions. This time, only experienced reference pros attended. Newer reference managers participated in a separate track, as did our sponsors and vendors who provided support. Plus each roundtable discussion issue featured participants who could bring solutions to the table based on experience, rather than problems or questions. The results were a collection of tips and insights from experienced reference pros on issues where they've had tangible success. Powerful stuff.

Here's one of the Action Plans - for Promoting the Reference Program - showing results of a Peer Exchange session led by Irene Yam of Riverbed Technology and Lara McGurk of Sun Microsystems. To view click here.

President's Award Winners
These awards go the highest rated overall presentation, and the highest rated breakout presentation, based on post event evaluations by their peers in attendance.

General Session: Rhett Livengood, Chief Reference Officer, Intel, for his presentation on How Intel's Reference Program Gained a Seat at Sales and Marketing's Executive Table.

Breakout Session: Tom Robson, Qwest Communications for his presentation - From 0 to 60: How Qwest Launched a High Impact Reference Program Fast

Just Getting Started Track
This was our first time to present a special track on Tuesday afternoon for reference pros who are new or just starting a reference program. As mentioned above, Tom Robson's superb presentation on starting Qwest's reference program was a big hit.

Metrics SIG Lunch
Led by Oracle's Gayle McClary, some 50 reference professionals met for lunch to address the issue of developing sophisticated metrics for measuring the effectiveness of reference programs. The Metrics SIG is redoubling its efforts to address this issue, with support and guidance from Mainstay Partners' Amir Hartman along with an aggressive approach to recruiting new reference pros to help develop best practices in this area. We'll be reporting on and disseminating their work as they progress in this vital area.

Reference Point is a Customer Reference Forum newsletter about reference programs and how to improve them. To subscribe, please contact me (contact information is below or just respond to this email). To unsubscribe at any time, just reply to this email with "unsubscribe" in the subject line. This email list and your name will never be made available to anyone else, not even to others on the list, unless by mutual request and agreement.