RightNow Technologies is preparing a key upgrade for its fast-growing on-demand customer relationship management (CRM) platform for December.

Although not so well known as fellow software host Salesforce.com, RightNow has a more sophisticated set of users and the RightNow 8 release –- four years in development and pegged by the company as its most important yet - will focus on deeper workflow and analytical capabilities to recruit more blue-chips to join BA, BT and EasyJet as customers.

Key new features include a Customer Experience Designer that lets users create graphical workflows and scenario models, and a Feedback module that supports the development of action points based on information gleaned from customers.

“You could be Black & Decker getting feedback about your new power drill and route that information to product design,” said Jason Mittelstaedt, RightNow vice-president of marketing. “Software as a service is not just for small and medium-sized businesses anymore, it’s growing up in the enterprise.”

Analytics capabilities have also been enhanced with historical trending and customisable dashboards and home pages; and pre-developed templates for vertical solutions and job roles are available.

RightNow’s architecture has also been revamped to integrate with Microsoft Outlook. “We were finding over 90 percent of our customers were using Outlook so it just made sense,” said Mittelstaedt.

A subsequent release, due next year and codenamed Emerald, will integrate salesforce automation and workflow capabilities collected with RightNow’s purchase of Salesnet earlier this year.

The RightNow release comes as CRM spending is growing, partly as buyers replace and upgrade first-generation systems. Gartner research suggests European CRM revenues grew almost 10 percent in 2005, spurred on by the boom in subscription-based online software.