Telemarketing Industrial Parts Distributor

Need: This telemarketing distributor of industrial parts had, and was continuing to receive, a large number of prospect lists in varying formats (spread sheet, text documents, etc.).

While the client had GoldMine^® (a commercial, small-business customer relationship manager) installed, adding all of the unqualified prospects directly to GoldMine^® would add significant and unmanageable clutter to the contact manager system and render it virtually useless.

The client needed another method of importing and managing both the new and existing prospect lists, and qualify them prior to inserting the prospects into GoldMine^®.

Solution: After working closely with client management in defining their needs and expectations, a Prospect Management system was developed allowing the Sales Manager to analyze, distribute and track the progress of the imported prospect names as they worked their way through the qualifying process. During the requirements definition stage, additional needs were identified and were to be included in the system as development occurred. The requirements:

• Import prospect lists from different sources (e.g., Trade Groups and Dun & Bradstreet) in different formats (e.g., spread sheets, comma delimited files, etc.),
• Analyze the imported names for possible duplicates already in GoldMine^®, contained in the list being imported, and/or contained in data previously imported,
• Enable the manager to electronically transfer selected prospects to specific sales representatives for qualification,
• Allow the manager to monitor the activity of each salesperson in following up on the leads,
• Permit either the manager or the sales representative to electronically insert contacts directly into GoldMine^® or to flag a prospect as rejected, and
• Enable the manager to validate certain data already contained in GoldMine^® and produce specific reports based on information within GoldMine^®.

Conclusion: The client received a robust and highly functional application that enabled them to accomplish precisely what was needed. The client expressed great satisfaction in both the application and our ability to understand their needs by delivering a wider scope of highly productive functionality then they initially anticipated. Additionally the underlying design of the system has enabled functional additions without significant modifications to the basic system, but simply building on top of it.

Start-Up, On-Line Specialized Search Company

Need: A start up company had been struggling to develop a web site focused on providing searches into public records for locating family members and/or near and distant relatives.

The goal was to allow information such as births, deaths, marriages, and divorces to be available 24 hours/day. A robust front-end method of searching would enable rapid location of records that meet the search criteria. Searching would be enabled with the purchase of a block of time (e.g., 24 hours, 30 days, etc.). Unlike other search sites charging for each search, this system would permit unlimited searching during the purchased time period.

Previous attempts by others had not materialized into an operable site and the client was becoming extremely frustrated.

Solution: Using the latest technology from MicroSoft^®, iSTEPS Consulting, LLC. developed a site for initial review and proof of concept within 2 weeks. The test environment included application code written in ASP.Net^® and VB.Net^®, and utilized SQL2005^® with a limited amount of data.

Conclusion: The site has begun Beta (preliminary) testing and the client is extremely pleased with the results:

• All items associated with an interactive web site are included: UserID and Password log in; Newsletter sign-up; User Account management; Contact Us e-mail; and a PayPal^® link for accepting payment. A testing data base of roughly 200,000 data records (including SS Death Index) is currently active,
• The ability to rapidly load additional data to bring the database to an estimated 15 to 20 Billion records,
• A robust search capability allowing for advanced search techniques, and
• Data confidentiality and a strict privacy policy for use of e-mail address and user information.

Large Project Contractor

Need: construction contractor specializing in sheet metal and glass used in major construction projects, employs engineers to review and itemize all materials and dimensions (“take-off’s”) of very complex design and construction drawings.

This detail was manually entered into spread sheets for calculations (e.g., material costs and labor rates)

On most major projects the stacked collection of drawings was well over 4” in height and included hundreds of very complex drawings of the project details. The task of transferring the detail to work sheets took hours to accomplish.

The “take-offs” were manually performed by trained engineers. However, the calculations of the required data could be edited for validity and totals calculated by an automated application. The information could be saved in a database for later retrieval by anyone concerned with the projects and for summarizing in preparing the final bid.

Solution: After working closely with the client to determine the detailed requirements of the application, iSTEPS created a highly structured Bid Management application for managing the estimating and bidding process of these very large and complex projects.

As the “take-off” items are entered into the system, labor rates are determined automatically based on project plan dates with each line total calculated at the time of entry. Project summaries are maintained dynamically and are instantly available for immediate viewing.

Conclusion: The implementation of the application has been highly successful and has proved extremely beneficial to the client:

• The system has paid for itself in a matter of a few months by allowing the contractor to bid more jobs in less time with existing personnel, and to have greater control over the accuracy in the bidding process,
• Because of the underlying technology and structure used, significant enhancements have been added to the application with relative ease,
• Extensive project management control has been enhanced with the ability to copy similar jobs in their entirety or partially into a new project, and
• The System includes extensive reporting and built-in exporting of project bid to bid proposal summary for preparation of bid submittals.

Buyer and Seller of Metals for Recycling

Need: The recycler buys scrap metal of varying types and resells the material for reprocessing. A system was previously installed, but support was no longer available and did not provide adequate management information. The client wanted to replace the existing system with a more reliable solution with added capability.

The system needed to have the ability to reverse the normal weighing process: the loaded vehicle had to be weighed first, unloaded with material types (e.g., copper and aluminum) being identified, then the emptied vehicle weighed again to determine the empty weight.

Solution: After working closely with the client’s executive and operational management in defining their needs and expectations, a replacement system was designed and developed to allow for greater functionality and management reporting. During the requirements definition stage, additional needs were identified and were to be included in the system as development occurred. The requirements:

• Be able to electronically capture the weight the incoming vehicle first to establish the total weight including the material, identify the vehicle and expected material, and save the uncompleted ticket for later retrieval,
• Retrieve the vehicle’s uncompleted ticket and electronically capture the empty weight of the vehicle after unloading to determine its empty weight,
• Allow the scale operator to indicate a second material in the load and manually establish and enter the proper weights for both material types,
• Produce a ticket with the purchased materials, the loaded and empty weights, and the calculated material weights and material pricing for reimbursement,
• Save all pertinent information in a database for later reporting and analysis.

Conclusion: The client received a robust and highly functional application that enabled them to accomplish precisely what was needed. The application reads the output directly from the platform scalehead, displays it to the operator, and allows for capturing with a mouse click. Five interactive displays are available to the operator: a Calendar; a list of all Commodities and their respective codes; a listing of all Pending (open) tickets awaiting completion; a listing of current Closed (completed) tickets; and, a list of Notes that are unique to the ticket. Information from any of the interactive displays can be retrieved with the click of the cursor and, where appropriate, inserted directly into the ticket.

Chiropracter/Accupuncturist

Need: An Indepence, MO chiropractor wanted a Web Site developed to fit his needs. He wanted a design that was contemporary, simple and functional. It was important to him to not only present basic information about his group, but to answer questions both about the practice of Chiropractic and Acupuncture.

Solution: After working closely with the the Doctor and his executive staff the following requirements were determined. The requirements:

• Provide a Web Site where his existing and future patients could obtan information about his background, insurance coverage accepted, address, and the methods employed,
• Allow for about both chiropractic and accupunture questions to be answered on-line and interactively,
• Provide a method of “registering” with the availability of a printable/downloadable form to be filled out by a new patient prior to the first visit to minimizing the wait time for a patient upon arrival for consultation and treatment,
• Allow for patients to contact the office through the use of e-mail,

Conclusion: The client received a robust and highly functional Web Site utilizing state-of-the-art technology to provide the above information.

The Web Site is hosted on the Doctor’s own server resident in his. It has been developed utilizing MicroSoft ASP.Net and is AJAX enabled allowing the user to click on any question and have the answer available immediately for viewing. When a question is selected, the answer panel fades in and stays until the user has completed viewing it. When completed, the user clicks on the close button, the panel fades away, and another question can then be selected and aswered.

Should a new patient wish to register in advance, a .pdf form appears in another screen and allows either downloading the form or printing it to the user’s home computer.

In the event patients have a question or comment, they may e-mail the clinic directly through the use of an embedded e-mail server (no loading of Outlook, Outlook Express, or Word which the user may or may not use) and, upon completion, the send button is clicked and it's sent.