About Forrester
Forrester Research, Inc. is an independent research company that provides pragmatic and forward-thinking advice to global leaders in business and technology.

Shar serves Marketing Leadership professionals. She is a leading expert on how businesses can leverage interactive marketing channels and technologies to drive sales and deepen customer relationships. During her 12 years with Forrester, Shar has been instrumental in the development of many of the company's interactive marketing program evaluation methodologies, training courses, and marketing planning tools and has also been part of Forrester's sales and consulting organizations.
Shar's research focuses on overall interactive marketing strategies; crafting efficient, effective interactive programs; organizing for interactive marketing; and integrating interactive channels into the rest of the marketing mix. Specific subjects addressed in Shar's research include email marketing, online advertising, search engine marketing, ad serving and targeting, interactive budgeting and forecasts, and interactive marketing organizational models.
Shar returned to Forrester in 2004 after several years away working in marketing consulting. Shar served as research director for marketing research boutique, TideWatch, where she led internal strategy efforts and client strategy projects. Shar was also a consultant with Carlson Marketing Group's Business Strategy Consulting team, developing CRM and email programs for clients including British Airways, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, and Home Depot. Shar began her career at Forrester in 1997 during the early days of the Internet and has written research on customer loyalty, ad networks, and marketing measurement and planning.
A popular speaker, Shar has been seen on stage at ad:tech, MITX, DMA, and the Email Service Provider Coalition events, among others. She is on the board of SEMPO — the search engine marketing professionals organization — and is also widely quoted in the press including such media outlets as BusinessWeek, Fortune, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal and is a frequent guest on CNBC and National Public Radio.
Shar is a graduate of Harvard University.
These data charts contain the full results of Forrester's August 2012 Global SharePoint Usage Online Survey. The results indicate that weak mobile access and social computing features combined with...
Road Map: The Cloud Computing Playbook
Early in 2011, Forrester made a series of predictions about the future of cloud computing for that year. With 2012 now upon us, it's time to evaluate last year's predictions and introduce new...


What (current and potential) features do patients/providers want to have in a patient-provider portal? How are these features ranked? What do patients/providers look for in their...
They Will Grow Twice As Fast As The Enterprise Application Market
Smart process apps are a new category of application software designed to support business activities that are people-intensive, highly variable, loosely structured, and subject to frequent change....

Tech vendors are likely underperforming in international markets because their central marketing teams do not successfully integrate inputs from their field marketing colleagues about local market...
Five Artifacts Underpin An Effective Program
Architects in any domain have no time to waste creating deliverables that wind up collecting dust on a shelf. Information architects, who have historically had a particularly difficult time engaging...
What is Forrester's take on how healthcare companies have responded to the rise of social media? How will healthcare companies gain traction in the social media space? What are good and the bad...
Canada Is Like The US In Growth, But Different In Mix Of Purchases
Canada is like the US, only different. This bit of doggerel applies as much to the Canadian information and communications technology (ICT) market as it does to Canada's economy or culture. Because...
What vendors offer healthcare incentive management solutions? Specifically, is there a product that can help drive healthy behavior through incentives? Ideally, this product should: 1) be able to...
How Leading Health Insurers Drive Change Inside And Outside Of Their Walls
The health insurance industry faces discontent from both its consumer and provider customers. With new regulations and an elevated national discourse on health reform, the time for change is now. But...
How eBusiness Leaders Should Approach Mobile As A Sales And Service Channel
Across the globe, the mobile channel is growing at a rapid rate. eBusiness and channel strategy leaders at B2B and B2C firms are at the forefront: 94% of eBusiness managers we surveyed are either...
Economic Worries Lead Canadian CIOs To Cut Back ICT Purchases
Canada's CIOs and tech buyers are behaving as if Canada is heading for a recession — and it's not. Indeed, while the Canadian economy is growing at about the same 4% rate (at current prices) as...
A Blueprint On How To Transform People, Process, And Technology Elements To Proactively Address Increasingly Complex Markets
In 2010, Sanofi, a large multinational in the healthcare market, embarked on a business transformation in response to increasing market complexity. Similar market complexities are affecting most...

Case Studies In IT Financial Transparency
Many IT organizations have operated like a black box with the IT budget consuming 3% to 10% of revenues and little to no visibility into how this spending is linked to strategy and value. Even within...
Pharmaceuticals, High-Tech, Professional Services, And Education Will Lead BYOT Adoption In The Coming Years
This report examines how and why bring-your-own-technology (BYOT) varies across 20 industries. BYOT will remain a thorny issue for CIOs in every industry, geographic region, and company size over the...
We would like to know how hospitals are protecting themselves against clinical devices infecting their networks. We have many third-party-owned or -maintained devices, such as PACS, medical devices,...
How Biometrics Enable Smart Computing Solutions
Biometrics is already a growing market today in a variety of applications. Smart Computing will help to fuel biometrics growth as smart applications call for a greater level of security and...
This document provides a comprehensive background of public sector dynamics in the Philippines in order to enable vendor strategists to address market opportunities more successfully. Particular...
How A Focus On User Goals Breaks Down Silos Between Online Tools
In a market where well-established standards define digital capabilities, it's tempting to stay with the status quo and build tools that meet industry norms. But what if industry norms are badly out...
