Is this what panic looks like? Eloqua's fixation with Loopfuse
I'm biased on this one, but I had to laugh when I read the Loopfuse blog today. It turns out that Eloqua, Loopfuse's most direct, proprietary competition, is totally unconcerned by Loopfuse as a competitor.
The problem, unfortunately, is that the data says otherwise:
Mapping the time Eloqua spends fixated with Loopfuse
Those are the page views that Eloqua has been tallying on Loopfuse's site. I don't think I've ever been to Documentum's, Interwoven's, Microsoft Sharepoint's, etc. websites. (These are my competitors.) I'm serving customers, not competitors. Only the paranoid may survive, but only the customer-centric thrive.
Loopfuse has 20 pages on its site. The people at Eloqua must have to go back and forth between pages for a refresher course.
By the way, I've said it before but you really, really need to start using marketing automation software. Eloqua, Loopfuse, or something else. The chart above demonstrates the slightest power of this type of software. You're not running your business well if you're not leveraging web analytics and web automation.
Disclosure: I'm an advisor to Loopfuse.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
We must be doing something right :)
Roy / Magento
www.magentocommerce.com
To reiterate what Thor Johnson said in the original interview, Eloqua has well over 400 customers in almost every vertical and the company's primary focus is on making them successful. The awards and recognition that they receive is clear proof of this.
Is Eloqua customer-centric? You be the judge. Find out what Eloqua's customers have to say at http://customersuccess.eloqua.com/
To clarify, from a business perspective, Eloqua is not distracted by the activities of its competitors. But the company is aware of the landscape. That's what gives it an edge.
It's interesting how Roy Russo twists the comments made by Eloqua's Thor Johnson and turns a few hits to his site as "a constant state of panic". I will go so far as to stay that some of those hits may have been caused by Roy's own activity on www.eloqua.com. After all what are hits? Didn't that metric go down with the dot.com era? I just looked at Roy's own visits to www.eloqua.com. He visited 10 pages and downloaded 2 pieces of content on a single day, with steady activity before and after. Now, how would you interpret that?
Try harder. They're knocking on our door.
"After all what are hits? Didn't that metric go down with the dot.com era?"
We not only know aggregate traffic data ("hits"), but exactly what your company is looking at on our site. This is a valuable tool for us to gauge what you're most panicked about us doing... or not doing.... and maybe even misinforming competitors on what we may do... or may not do. Think out-of-the-box, Shawn. ;-)
"He visited 10 pages and downloaded 2 pieces of content on a single day, with steady activity before and after. Now, how would you interpret that?"
How else do you think we've managed to build a better product? Research, silly.
But seriously, good luck to you and your venture. There is a market for all flavors of the product which is why it is so full of players of akll shapes and sizes.
Good luck to you, Roy!
BTW for the benefit of others, I must disclose that I am on the marketing team at http://www.eloqua.com.
Loopfuses privacy policy states that the data it collects is used for reasons other than public humiliation. Specifically it states ?The information we collect is used to improve the content of our Web page, used by us to contact consumers for marketing purposes.? If loopfuse is going to be a player in personally identifiable web behavior market it needs to understand that what is has just done is improper. You cannot release data like this to the public. It is in direct contradiction to your privacy policy and opens you up to a lawsuit. Beyond that it is just childish. The amount of time companies spend on each others website is staggering and not surprising. Everyone is interested in what a new competitor is doing and this isn?t all that many clicks when you consider 100s work at eloqua. Loopfuse is obviously run by some techies that have no idea how to act socially acceptable.
Random note. I have always found open source companies fanatically believe they are more ethical than proprietary software companies. This sure blows that idea out of the water.
And who is this Matt Asay? Is this the first time you have seen web data? You act like this is something special. Did you all sit around in awe at the fact that a competitor came to loopfuses website? What a bunch of losers.
PS thanks for making our industry seem so ?up and up?
PS. Patent trolls in our industry have little right to call Eloqua or LoopFuse names. ;-)
Its part of Eloqua's duty to have a finger on the pulse with their own Marketspace as it is yours. Take the battle to the customer instead of each other!
- by AllisonCooper February 25, 2008 5:25 PM PST
- Wow, this guy Roy Russo sounds like a real jerk. Does he really work for a company that is trying to sell things to business people?
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