What Can My Site Do For My Business?

Computers are supposed to help you with your business. Period. If you feel like you spend more time fighting with your computer than benefiting from it, something is wrong. Software is supposed to work, and it should work together. For example, you should never have to enter information more than once. That’s just silly.

Your website should be the same way. It should help your business. For the sake of this discussion, let’s create a fictitious company – ABC Services, Inc. They sell service equipment for their customers at a regional level. They created a standard site with their contact information and information about the services they perform. The site has generated a few new leads for them, and has saved them dozens of phone calls from people looking for answers to questions that can now be found directly on the site. Of course, that saves them a little time because their office staff is free to work on other things.

They also have a service request form on their site that allows new and old customers alike to fill in a form and request service from the company. An email is sent to the service department. Everything seems great so far. But here’s where the problems start.

Right now, the service manager -- let’s call him Ron -- copies down the information from the email on a notepad and hands it to Sue, who’s responsible for scheduling. Sue makes a call, schedules the appointment, and enters the information into her local scheduling software. Each day, she prints up a copy of the service schedule. The service technicians come to the office each day to get their assignments, the directions they will need, etc. Let’s say that Bill gets this particular service call. After Bill performs the work, he comes back and hands an invoice to Terri in accounting, who enters the information into the accounting software!

Whew! The company spent more time writing and entering the information than they spent doing the work. It doesn’t have to be this hard. They’re fighting their computers. Their website is only a small part of their business. Let’s look at how it could be.

First thing in the morning, Ron the Service Manager reviews his email and sees a new service request has been generated from the website. He clicks the link in the email and it takes him to a page with a list of all new service requests. He reviews them and forwards our request on to Sue. Sue receives her email and clicks the link to take her to a page of all approved service requests. She uses the information to call the client, and then schedules the appointment right from the site, including assigning the appointment to Bill.

The service technicians can now log into the site and review their daily work log. Bill logs in from his PC at home, and avoids the trip to the office. He prints out his morning appointments, including directions and a map, and heads off to the client. After performing the work, he comes back to the office. He signs on to the site again and updates the information with the work he performed.

Terri in accounting doesn’t have to be involved just yet. She no longer has to worry about entering the information – it’s already there! Two weeks go by and it’s time to send out statements. Terri simply logs into the system with her account, where she can print invoices and statements. However, in this case, the system knows that the client has selected electronic statements to reduce paper costs. An email is sent to the customer’s accounts payable contact letting them know that a new invoice has been recorded and a new statement is available.

The client can visit the site, login with their account, and review the statement. They can choose to either cut a check, or to pay electronically through the site with their credit card!

ABC’s web site is now a part of their day-to-day operations. Their staff uses it, they’re customers use it. The time spent reentering information is gone. All of the customer interaction has a clear trail that can be followed. Management can review statistics on service response time. Customers have a new, cost effective means to receive and pay their invoices, which in turn means that ABC can get their money faster.

While this example was for a service based business, similar savings can be applied to companies with products to sell. The ability to tie your inventory, purchasing, online sales, and accounting together into one streamlined process would present a huge benefit.

So, whether you already have a site or you’re wondering whether or not you really need one, consider your business processes. Are you making the best use of your computer? Are you as efficient as you can be? Give us a call and see if we can help!

Kevin Finke