Jun 1, 2006 | Richard Bird | 0 Comments
Pay No Attention To That Man Behind The Curtain
Some of the tools that help run R.BIRD
Oracle’s NetLedger lets our office manager, account executive and accountant make and share bookkeeping entries in real time. Reports are instantaneous and always up to date. When our bankers ask for P&L or Balance Sheet, they are only minutes away from delivery by email. NetLedger suites are pricey, but we’ve offset the cost with reduced accounting firm fees. They have less menial work to do and are called on, instead, where it really matters: tax planning and management outlooks.
Quicken fills in the data gaps. NetLedger doesn’t download transactions, for example. Quicken downloads, then NetLedger imports.
TIME & BILLING
FileMaker Pro
We needed a time tracking and reporting application that followed our phased approach to project tracking and worked across Mac and PC platforms. There was no such thing. R.BIRD became a certified Filemaker Pro developer, gaining the know-how needed to write our own solution. FMP is accessible and flexible. In 3 months we had our solution that is still in place today (see visual for this post). Time tracking, budget reports and invoicing are on-demand versus the 30 to 40 hours a week we were previously spending on client reports.
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Basecamp
When we think “project management” at R.BIRD, we are most concerned with client engagement. Basecamp is one of the best things we have ever done. Why? Because our clients and designers actually participate. We’ve lived through several other solutions - some costing as much as $15,000 annually. Learning: more features doesn’t necessarily mean better. You must learn to love SIMPLE.
MARKETING
Campaign Monitor
Daylite
R.BIRD uses Campaign Monitor for all managed communications that are email. We do this for ourselves and by contract for our brand clients. We’ve tried the rest, including Microsoft offerings (no comment). CM is the most simple and elegant solution we’ve encountered. The learning curve is virtually non-existent and reporting is automatic. We are able to respond quickly to data on who clicks what and when.
Marketcircle’s Daylite tracks contact information, letters, mailings, email, sales pipelines and more for nearly 10,000 prospects. We know when and what was said the last time we called or mailed any one of them - and when we plan to act next.
EMAIL
Webmail.us
DNS Made Easy
For more than 10 years we’ve hosted our own email server, DNS and everything related… until now. When our beloved Cobalt RaQ server died from old age, we decided to outsource both email and DNS for our domain and those that we support.
Webmail.us looks to be the straightest line from point A to point B for email. We’re only a few weeks into the transition and so far, we like it. (Honestly, the integration of email into corporate process has yet to be nailed - opportunity remains.)
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There’s more to tell. Of course.
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