Now Your Customers Can Personalize Multiple Items
InOrder now features an Item Personalization enhancement. With this new feature, you can give your customers the option to personalize any item in inventory.
What we like about this enhancement is that it’s so flexible. Let’s say you’re a fulfillment solutions provider and one of your corporate clients has a company store. Employees can go to the online store and place an order for company branded polo shirts — and indicate that each shirt needs to have individual names.
What this means is that the Item Personalization enhancement lets customers order the same personalization across multiple items and at the same time personalize individual items in the same order. Very cool!
With the Item Personalization enhancement, you decide if you want your personalization fields to run horizontally or vertically or to appear via a pop-up. And, you can let customers edit personalization to an item even if the item is already in the cart.
Setting up the enhancement is easy. Click the “Misc” tab in the Inventory module to add personalization fields to any inventory item, identify display preferences, and enable/disable web.config settings.
Have you put this enhancement to use? Let us know what you think of it.
Increase Sales with InOrder’s In Stock Notification
You know what it’s like to anticipate purchasing an item, only to learn, when you get to the store or Website, that it’s sold out. You feel disappointed! Of course, you can go to another store or another company’s Website, but sometimes, the item you want is available through one company only.
Now you can alleviate your customers’ disappointment — and increase sales — by notifying people when items become available with InOrder’s new Email Marketing Enhancement. Used with InOrder’s List Management module, the Email Marketing Enhancement allows you to send emails to people who requested to be notified when an item is back in stock.
With the Email Marketing Enhancement, you can also promote related items as alternatives.
Setting up emails is fairly straightforward. You can send text or HTML-based messages (or both!), and you can use email marketing messages with InOrder Web cart templates. The enhancement lets you use timers to control the burst size and timing of your outbound emails. You can also test messages via the “test mode” feature.
Have you started using the Email Marketing Enhancement? Have questions? Want to share your tips? Leave your comments below.
Fulfillment Strategies International Maintains 99.9% Accuracy with InOrder
We love customer success stories — and we especially love this one from Fulfillment Strategies International. The Georgia-based fulfillment company can see orders spike up to as many as 4,000 units per day. This can be quite challenging as the company works very hard to maintain its 99.9% packing and shipping accuracy rate.
Oh, and did we mention they have 100+ clients and 25,000 SKUs? Our heads swim just thinking about it.
They keep track of each client — and each and every SKU — with InOrder. The company realized they had outgrown their original file-based system, and after looking at a number of ERP systems, including OrderMotion and ProMail, chose InOrder — for three reasons:
One, the solution had to be SQL-based.
Two, the system had to be expandable, meaning the ERP vendor had to be willing to make enhancements.
And three, the system had to work the way FSI did business – including the ability to provide FSI’s clients real-time, Web-based reporting.
“Since our initial purchase, Morse Data has developed custom project plans that have effectively tailored InOrder to our business,” says FSI’s Vice President and General Manager Forrest Marbutt. “It’s also clear that Morse Data puts serious resources into continually updating the software, such as the recent upgrade to support PCI compliance – which is very important to us since our clients rely so heavily on e-commerce.”
FSI relies on InOrder’s barcoding technology to manage the over 25,000 SKUs in its warehouse. “We’re able to keep track of thousands of transactions and supply packing slips and other items with our clients’ branding,” says Marbutt. “Most important, we do all of this without having to log in and out to see each client’s account. We simply switch between accounts right inside of the software.”
FSI’s customer service team uses InOrder’s API to import orders from a number of FSI’s shopping carts, including those not directly powered by InOrder – which frees the team from the tedious task of importing new orders.
Forrest, thanks for sharing your story. If you’re looking for a fulfillment house — one that takes your business seriously enough to strive for 99.9% accuracy — then be sure to check out Fulfillment Solutions International.
How Shorter Lines at the Cash Registers Transferred into More Sales
The folks at Rod’s Western Palace were used to long booth lines. A regular exhibitor at the All-American Quarter Horse Congress in Columbus, OH, the popular western wear outfitter would see long lines as people lined up to purchase clothes, accessories, and tack from the company’s 20,000 foot booth.
Not this year.
“At first we were concerned that our booth traffic was down over 2011,” says Phil Minix, the Executive Vice President for Rod’s Western Palace. “We didn’t have as many lines of people at our registers waiting to make purchases. But we quickly realized that our sales were on an upward trend and ended up almost up double digits over the 2011 show.”
In fact, Rod’s realized a 9% increase in booth sales over 2011!
How did they do this? With their recently installed InOrder’s POS cash registers. “The smaller lines were due to the increased efficiencies of our new cash registers,” says Minix. “They’re so much faster and pricing was more accurate, so people didn’t have to wait in long lines as they have in years past.”
The Point-of-Sale add-on, part of InOrder’s Order and Inventory Management ERP module, is designed for touch screen order processing. You can quickly look up inventory items and if an item is out of stock on the floor, have it shipped directly from its warehouse. The inventory database is updated in real-time, so each cashier – or anyone at Rod’s – could see at a glance how much inventory existed for any item.
Rod’s cashiers were also able to sell and redeem house gift cards and loyalty rewards right from the show floor — and across all their channels. This functionality allows the company to build relationships with customers they meet at shows and recognize existing customers who visit their booth.
Welcome to the InOrder family, Rod’s! We’re thrilled you were able to increase sales and improve customer service. Woo hoo!
Run InOrder Desktop from any Windows Browser
How many times have you been at another PC in your company (or at home, or on the road) and you need to get into InOrder quickly to check something?
Because InOrder is a client program, a familiar way to use it is to run the setup.exe on the PC to install it locally. But this doesn’t help if you’re using an unfamiliar PC or a PC outside of your corporate firewall.
One approach is to setup your PC to allow “Remote Desktop” connections. This is as easy as right-clicking “Computer,” selecting “Properties,” and then enabling “Allow connections” for the Users who should be allowed remote access.
The trouble with Remote Desktop is that:
(a) If someone is using your PC, you can’t remotely connect at the same time (except for advanced versions of Windows that allow several logins at the same time)
(b) You see the entire desktop and then you need to run InOrder, which can be confusing, and (c) Your system administrator needs to open port 3389 on your firewall, but this isn’t a secure internet connection unless you’re also using a virtual private network (VPN, a remote connection that often leads to frustration).
When many people need to connect remotely and run the same program, such as InOrder Desktop, they will often set up a server dedicated to these connections. This server is a Windows Server that has “Terminal Services” running.
Often this is incorrectly referred to as a “Terminal Server,” which actually means a computer that allows many green screen terminal connections. When Microsoft released Windows Server 2008, they renamed “Terminal Services” to “Remote Desktop Protocol” (RDP). RDP Servers allow you to install InOrder (and other programs) one time, to be shared by many people at the same time. This capability is built into Windows Server, but you need an extra RDP access license for the number of connections you will have. (Also, if there will many connections, then the server will need extra memory installed.)
Using another Windows Component called “RD Gateway” and an SSL security certificate, you can enable secure connections over the Internet, without a VPN. RD Gateway also allows you to use Internet Explorer as the RDP Client (except you still need additional third party software if you are connecting from Mac OS X).
When you have hundreds of users connecting to InOrder this way, you will typically want to have several RDP Servers in a “farm” with “Load Balancing.” This means that you connect to Remote Desktop Connection Broker (another component that comes with Windows Server), and it decides which RDP Server you connect to. When you’re using this type of environment, it’s vital that you install, configure, and upgrade everything identically on each of these servers in the farm.
Typically problems arise with print drivers and print queues, and eventually you’ll find that one of the RDP Servers had an out of date print driver. The symptoms will be sporadic because users who print to that printer will randomly connect to the RDP server with the problem, based on the number of other connections on each RDP Server at the time they log in that day.
The best part is that, InOrder 9.x supports “Remote App,” which allows you to set up InOrder so that you can run it from any Window PC without installing it first, even over the Internet. When you’re using InOrder (Desktop or Point-Of-Sale), it looks and acts like it is installed locally on your PC. Instead of installing InOrder on each PC, you give each user an RDP file to click from their desktop as a shortcut, or, you can even give them a browser URL that will start InOrder from any browser. The nicest thing about this is that users don’t have to see the RDP Server’s “desktop” anymore.
IT Administrators: For easier upgrade deployment, we recommend setting up your RDP Servers so they point to a generically-named InOrder instance. Then, whenever you install an InOrder upgrade, you can test it against the Play database using a full RDP login session, and deploy it by copying the InOrder program directory over the folder with the generally named instance (but don’t copy the InOrder.ini file). A .bat file works best for this, as long as it checks to make sure that the Copy only proceeds if the old InOrder.exe file can be safely deleted first.
InOrder Powers Fulfillment Strategies International
With clients ranging from small start-ups to Fortune 100 companies located around the globe,and a comprehensive services offering that includes individual order fulfillment (pick-pack-ship), large-scale kit assembly (kit-pack), order processing, e-commerce, inventory management, assembly and promotion and data services, Fulfillment Strategies International is B-U-S-Y!
How does the company successfully meet the complex needs of such a wide variety of clients? They use InOrder software. The great thing about InOrder, for a company like FSI, is that it has one database – and one login. This means FSI account managers don’t have to log in and out to see individual client accounts. Sweet!
To see FSI (and InOrder) in action, have a look at “A Day in the Life of FSI” video.
As FSI Vice President & General Manager Forrest Marbutt says, “Just imagine all those InOrder-powered orders going out the door!” Thanks, Forrest!
Morse Data Adopts Ducks to Benefit the Special Olympics
Quack! Quack! 35,000 yellow rubber ducks will splash into the Chicago River from the Columbus Drive Bridge in downtown Chicago and race down river towards the finish line starting at 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, August 9th, 2012.
The Rubber Ducky Derby is the annual signature fundraising event that benefits the Illinois Special Olympics.
This year we’ve adopted a duck for each of our employees and you can adopt one, too — just visit www.duckrace.com/Chicago to learn how to enter the race. The cost to adopt a single duck is $5.00 or you can purchase a Quack Pack at $25.00 which consists of buying 5 ducks and getting 1 duck free.
In addition to the pride and glory of winning the race and beating out 34,999 ducks, you also have a chance to win several nice prizes including a 2012 Chevy Equinox LS and a Caribbean Vacation.
Please join us in supporting the Special Olympics and the Windy City Rubber Ducky Derby. Hopefully the 35,000 yellow rubber ducks will “Get InOrder” and ours will swim the fastest and win the race. Wish us luck — and please do join in the fun for this great cause!
2012 Windy City Rubber Ducky Derby Promo With Athletes
2010 Windy City Rubber Ducky Derby – Duck Drop
Using Prospect User-Defined Fields to Make List Creation More Powerful
Many InOrder users are familiar with User-Defined Fields (UDFs) on Prospect records. These can be used to collect demographic information about your potential customers. They can be exposed on your web interface for your visitors to enter information such as age, gender, interests, where they first heard about you, or any other type of question that helps you target specific prospects and provide them with a more personalized experience.
Because these UDFs are all available as Selection Criteria in [List Creation], you can use these fields to pull very specific mailing lists.
But what if you want to make [List Creation] more powerful and include more prospect-based criteria than exists as built-in choices? These Prospect UDFs don’t have to be merely the Q&A fields your prospects answer themselves. You can also have UDFs as “concept” fields; updated regularly using a scheduled “SQL statement” job that categorizes customers based on buying behaviors or patterns that you are looking for.
InOrder client Rod’s Western Palace wanted to do just this. They needed lists of people who purchased any product from a specific department. But they also wanted to be able to pull a list of people who had purchased any product that was NOT in that same department. We worked with them to achieve this by adding two “concept” fields, both simple Yes/No fields that are recomputed by a nightly job that reviews each customer’s order history.
Here is how you can implement this type of Prospect UDF at your company.
First, create one or more Prospect UDFs in the [Client Setup] window. Make sure to set the ‘Data Type’ appropriately (YesNo, Text, Number, etc) for the type of information you will be populating into the field.
Rod’s used two UDFs set to the YesNo data type. The first (UDF Field 1) was called ‘Tack Buyers’ (customers who ordered items from the Tack department) and the other (UDF Field 2) ‘No Tack Buyers’ (customers who placed an order but never ordered any items from the Tack department).
In the screenshot, we show you how to do this using our test database with “Chocolate Buyers” as the example:
Next, determine the criteria to calculate the computed value for this field on each prospect record. If the criteria is based on items ordered, what distinguishes the items? SKU? Inventory Type? Inventory Status? One of the 21 Inventory User-Defined Fields? Do the items need to be part of a posted shipment in order to be used in determining the calculation? This criteria will be used to build your SQL statement.
Next, if you know SQL then you can build the SQL statement, otherwise contact Morse Data Technical Support for assistance. If you build this statement in-house, remember to always have Morse Data Technical Support approve your statement before executing it against your live database, to avoid unexpected results, and to stay within the terms of your software agreement. (We recommend having Morse Data help you the first time, and then consider trying it yourself if you ever need to make adjustments or add new fields.)
Here is an example update statement that uses inventory types, with a description of what each step does.
1) Insert the two Prospect UDFs into prospect records where they currently do not exist, and set the values to ‘N.’:
Insert tblProspectUserField (lab_KEY, lab_FIELD_NUMBER, lab_USER_DEFINED)
Select lab_key,’3′,’N’
from tblProspect pro
where not exists
(Select * from tblProspectUserField prev
where prev.lab_KEY = pro.lab_KEY
and prev.lab_FIELD_NUMBER = ‘3’)–Chocolate Buyer Prospect Field
Go
Insert tblProspectUserField (lab_KEY, lab_FIELD_NUMBER, lab_USER_DEFINED)
Select lab_key,’5′,’N’
from tblProspect pro
where not exists
(Select * from tblProspectUserField prev
where prev.lab_KEY = pro.lab_KEY
and prev.lab_FIELD_NUMBER = ‘5’) –Non-Chocolate Buyer Prospect Field
Go
2) Update the value on the first UDF to ‘Y’ if: there exists a posted order associated with this customer, and that order contains a posted line item of an inventory item belonging to one of three inventory types:
Update puf
Set lab_user_defined = Case
When Exists (Select * from tblPostedOrder por
INNER JOIN tblPostedLine pli on por.por_ORD_KEY = pli.por_ORD_KEY
INNER JOIN tblInventoryPrimary inp on inp.own_OWNER_CODE = pli.own_OWNER_CODE
and inp.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER = pli.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER
Where por.cus_key = puf.lab_KEY
and inp.ity_INVENTORY_TYPE_CODE IN (‘DK’, ‘MK’, ‘WT’))
THEN ‘Y’
ELSE ‘N’
END
From tblProspectUserField puf
Where puf.lab_FIELD_NUMBER = ‘3’ –Chocolate Buyer
Go
3) Update the value of the second UDF to ‘Y’ if: there exists a posted order associated with this customer and there exists no posted orders associated with the customer containing a posted line item where the inventory item belongs to one of three inventory types:
Update puf
Set lab_user_defined = Case
When Exists (Select * from tblPostedOrder por
INNER JOIN tblPostedLine pli on por.por_ORD_KEY = pli.por_ORD_KEY
INNER JOIN tblInventoryPrimary inp on inp.own_OWNER_CODE = pli.own_OWNER_CODE
and inp.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER = pli.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER
Where por.cus_key = puf.lab_KEY)
AND NOT Exists (Select * from tblPostedOrder por
INNER JOIN tblPostedLine pli on por.por_ORD_KEY = pli.por_ORD_KEY
INNER JOIN tblInventoryPrimary inp on inp.own_OWNER_CODE = pli.own_OWNER_CODE
and inp.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER = pli.inp_SHORT_ITEM_NUMBER
Where por.cus_key = puf.lab_KEY
and inp.ity_INVENTORY_TYPE_CODE IN (‘DK’, ‘MK’, ‘WT’)
THEN ‘Y’
ELSE ‘N’
END
From tblProspectUserField puf
Where puf.lab_FIELD_NUMBER = ‘5’ –Non-Chocolate Buyer
A regularly-scheduled SQL job similar to this one allows Rod’s Western Palace to perform targeted mailings to their buyers of specific items. Once you are back in the [List Creation] window, these fields are available for use as Selection Criteria.
The nicest part about these SQL statements is that they can consider more complex logic that you might want to build into a UDF, like only considering sales that occurred in the last 120 days, sales that were not returned, or sales of specific items that were placed where the order was responding to an abandoned cart email campaign. If you can think of it, there is probably a way to compute it. And amazingly, these SQL statements can evaluate hundreds of thousands of customers and their respective order history, usually in a matter of minutes each night!
Lancaster Archery Supply Visits Morse Data
Based in Lancaster, PA, Lancaster Archery Supply is the respected leader in the industry — having fueled the growth of archery by providing archery equipment to businesses, organizations and individuals worldwide since 1983.
Lancaster Archery relies on InOrder to manage its online, catalog and retail orders — and a group from the company were in town last week for InOrder upgrade training and project design. In the picture below are (left to right): Ted Houser, Director of e-Commerce, Eric Eschbach, Operations Manager, and Mike DiClemente, Magento Developer.
Once work was done, Morse Data VP Tony Marchese took the Lancaster crew out for some Chicago fun.
Mike DiClemente, Eric Eschbach and Tony Marchese
The tour included a visit to Millennium Park in downtown Chicago where everyone enjoyed a free concert by Third Coast Percussion.
Eric Eschbach at Millenium Park
Then it was on to Grant Park where alternative band Death Cab for Cutie was playing. The group also managed to squeeze in a visit to the John Hancock Center for dinner and a view of Chicago from the 95th Floor. Whew!
Thank you, Ted, Mike, and Eric for visiting Chicago! We enjoyed having you. And, thank you for the ongoing partnership with InOrder.
The breathtaking view from the John Hancock Center.
Did You Get Your Duck at IRCE 2012?
We’re back from IRCE — three days of learning, connecting, and schmoozing with customers, partners and friends. Now that we’ve dug out from under email, we’re ready to post a few pictures.
Traffic was brisk to the InOrder booth where people stopped to pick up their Blues Saxaphone duck to add to their collections. (We frequently have customers stop by just for their duck!) We also gave lots of demos of InOrder version 9.1.
Also exhibiting were InOrder partners Advanced Pricing Logic and Kalio. In the photo below is David Leonard, CEO of Advanced Pricing. He attended IRCE to showcase his Pricing Promoter Software that works with InOrder. (He also owns Original Parts Group, an InOrder client).
Pricing Promoter allows you to intelligently analyze and set your inventory sales prices on thousands of SKUs, based on actual product data.
The next photo is of Kalio’s striking new booth. Kalio is a front-end e-commerce platform that offers an InOrder integration option. According to their IRCE 2012 write up, their new booth featured a 14′ tall arch, various demo stations, and a “Speed of Change Challenge” presentation backdrop.
The company wanted to make sure people got to know Kalio, what they mean by “Speed of Change,” and what their new “Zero Upfront Fees” business model is about. Be sure to take a peek at their fabulous video if you meander over to their blog.
We also were happy to see our partners Avalara Tax and Magento! Be sure to catch Avalara’s “crowd-sourced” IRCE wrap up. The top tweeted words, according to their Twitter hashtag analysis: ecommerce, online, Internet, retailers, and mobile. That just about sums it up!
Do you have a picture of your InOrder duck collection you’d like to share? Let us know! We’ll feature it here on the blog.