WORLD'S FIRST CRM INNOVATION WORKSHOP - Revitalizes Customer Relationship Management for a New ROI*

ASPIRE, a leading Customer Lifecycle Management firm and SolutionPeople, a leader in Creativity and Continuous Innovation solutions today announced that they have co-developed and are delivering the worlds first CRM Innovation Workshop, which will held March 26 in Chicago, IL at the Thinkubator, recognized as one of the worlds most innovative meeting spaces. The CRM Innovation Workshop (tm) will be the first ever to apply best practice creativity and continuous innovation tools, techniques and processes to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) to produce new and better ideas, action plans and results. The Workshop is designed as the essential first step in planning, optimizing or restarting any CRM initiative and will be facilitated by Tim Sullivan, a 15-year CRM industry veteran and Gerald Haman, an award-winning creativity and innovation developer, trainer and consultant.

CHICAGO, IL. -- March 13, 2003 -- ASPIRE, a leading Customer Lifecycle Management firm and SolutionPeople, a leader in Creativity and Continuous Innovation solutions today announced that they have co-developed and are delivering the worlds first CRM Innovation Workshop, which will held March 26 in Chicago, IL at the Thinkubator, recognized as one of the worlds most innovative meeting spaces.

The CRM Innovation Workshop (tm) will be the first ever to apply best practice creativity and continuous innovation tools, techniques and processes to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) to produce new and better ideas, action plans and results. The Workshop is designed as the essential first step in planning, optimizing or restarting any CRM initiative and will be facilitated by Tim Sullivan, a 15-year CRM industry veteran and Gerald Haman, an award-winning creativity and innovation developer, trainer and consultant.

"Companies that master innovation will inherit the future. We have delivered Creativity and Innovation programs for the worlds most innovative companies and over 120 of the Fortune 500. What these leaders want is the new ROI - Return On Innovation*, implementing the most creative ideas into the most valuable and profitable solutions. We developed the CRM Innovation Workshop in anticipation and response to the growing trend of companies who are looking for new and better ways to understand and improve their relationships, value and results with customers," said Gerald Haman, Founding Partner of SolutionPeople"

"Organizations approach CRM from a logical, technical "left-brain" perspective, suffer "gridlock" and miss out on tremendous, innovative "right-brain" opportunities to improve their customer relationships. Until this CRM Innovation Workshop, there has not been any program that applies a Creative and Innovative solution to improving Customer Relationship Management results, says Tim Sullivan. Traditional CRM approaches have primarily been "half-brain" application implementation plans. Now is the time to realize the customer-centric potential that can be unlocked and fulfilled with a new "right-brain" and "whole-brain" approach."

CRM Innovation Workshop attendees including sales, marketing, service, support, strategic planning, business development, CRM , E-Business and IT management, professionals and project team members will work on current top-priority customer relationship management goals and challenges using several award-winning tools and techniques including: the 4-Step Diamond Solution Innovation Process, Recordian Note Taking Tool, KnowBrainer Planner, KnowAction and the KnowBrainer Tool 2.0 which they receive and can reuse.

According to ASPIRE Managing Consultant Tim Sullivan and Haman, the CRM Innovation Workshop is built upon a successful current Innovation seminar, and was focused to help organizations who also:

*   Need to better plan, rethink or rebuild their business around their customers and needs.
*   Want to better integrate their sales, marketing and service strategy, process, people & technology.
*   Have begun a CRM initiative, but have encountered challenges and need to better problem-solve.
*   Have skipped or not properly addressed critical stages of the Creativity and Innovation Process in their CRM initiatives, and are not receiving sales, marketing and service Return On Innovation*.
*   Have not identified, evaluated, trained or motivated the best people for their CRM initiatives.
*   Need to successfully define and implement their best and most valuable customer and CRM ideas.
*   Equate CRM to software and believe it will "automatically" improve their business and results.
*   Are rushing to implement CRM quickly because their competition has, but need success and ROI.

The CRM Innovation Workshop will help attendees generate new Ideas, Strategies and Action Plans to:

*   Better connect organizational thinking, communication and experience to consumer needs and benefits to better satisfy, delight and excite their customers.
*   Better develop customer and CRM initiatives from their customers perspectives.
*   Better identify and develop their most valuable customer and CRM opportunities and initiatives.
*   Better define their customer strategy and CRM strategy to improve customer understanding, relationships, value, loyalty, share, profitability, revenue, market share and shareholder value.
*   Better identify where CRM initiatives could or did go wrong and help problem-solve and generate corrective action plans.
*   Better define the business strategies, technologies, operational processes, and organizational structures that will cut costs and increase customer acquisition, retention and evangelism.

Pre-registration for the one-day public CRM Innovation Workshop is required due to seating limitations. A special individual introductory tuition of $399 is good only through March 24th, after which tuition is $850. To Register: call Sarah: (312) 829-2852, or email: RegisterCRMIW@solutionpeople.com . The CRM Innovation Workshop and Thinkubator are located at 312 N. May Street 6A, Chicago, IL 60607. For more information on the CRM Innovation Workshop visit www.aspireto.com/crmiw.htm

Upon completing the 8:30am-5:30pm CRM Innovation Workshop attendees can schedule a CRM Innovation IlluminAction, a private company two-day, large group workshop, at the Thinkubator for CRM stakeholders to further develop their CRM break-through Ideas and Action Plans.

About ASPIRE
Tim Sullivan is a Managing Consultant with ASPIRE. Prior to co-founding ASPIRE, Mr. Sullivan co-founded one of the worlds first exclusive Customer Relationship Management consulting firms and has held consulting, marketing, sales, training and product and business development management positions in the CRM and Interactive Marketing industry for 15 years. ASPIRE helps companies improve their customer acquisition, retention and evangelism results with innovative Customer Lifecycle Management solutions, leveraging CRM and Interactive Marketing services. ASPIRE client successes are based upon Total Customer Development (sm), a Quality-based methodology designed to improve customer knowledge, relationships and value by optimizing and integrating sales, marketing and service strategy, process, people and technology. For more information on ASPIRE visit www.aspireto.com or call (773) 252-4140.

About SolutionPeople
Gerald "Solutionman" Haman is the Founding Partner of SolutionPeople, Developer of the Thinkubator in Chicago and an Adjunct Professor of Innovation at Northwestern University. Mr. Haman is the Facilitator of the World-Record-Setting Brainstorm that generated 454,000 Ideas in 60 Minutes, and is the award-winning Inventor of the KnowBrainer®, Pocket Innovator®, and the Pocket Persuader® planning tools. He is the Designer of Thinkathon, Idea Exchange and Know Your Brain Game and Developer of GoBrainer Software for Palm Pilot. Mr. Haman coauthored the New Product Development Handbook, and has written articles for the Journal of Innovative Management and Training Today magazines. His Continuous Innovation and Diamond Solution Process models have gained acclaim around the world. For more information on SolutionPeople visit www.solutionpeople.com or call (312) 829-2852.

# # #

For additional assistance, journalists, analysts and professionals may contact kelly.a.sullivan@aspireto.com to schedule interviews or for additional information.