The team at Akcelik & Associates had successfully sold proprietary software to transportation professionals around the world for over ten years and needed to ensure that they could handle additional growth generated by new product releases. In addition, they needed to demonstrate to potential new and existing customers that their sales process was as tech savvy as their advanced SIDRA SOLUTIONS traffic engineering software and training products. Smart eCommerce operations with SOLO Server™ improved efficiencies, aided growth and preserved that hard won success.
The Problem
The problems started to become very clear to Marketing and eCommerce Manager, Umut Akcelik who led the charge to examine the company's operations. They knew they had the best software on the market in their niche but their internal operations were antiquated, "The fact that we were still taking orders by fax was simply not acceptable!" Too much valuable time and staff resources were eaten up in processing orders which included shipping a physical software product through the mail.
Umut spent six months detailing the company's wants and needs and after several rounds of searching, he and his Senior Software Engineer, Darren Thompson were skeptical that there were any vendors that could meet their specific requirements. They needed to automate the sales process and expand the sophistication of their licensing system while integrating it with what was already working within their organization. They held their skepticism even after finding the SoftwareKey System™ website because they knew they needed substantial customization including strict requirements on the look and feel and functionality of the shopping cart and the customer license portal.
Umut and his team considered building everything they needed from scratch but, if anyone could help them avoid that monstrous task, they thought it would be Concept Software, so they investigated further.
The Solution
Accustomed to vendors overselling their capabilities, Umut remained skeptical even with confirmations by Concept Software founder and CTO, Mike Wozniak. Umut outlined the scope of the project and Mike listened intently, as he is known to do, consistently saying, "Yes, we can do that. Uh huh. Sure, we can do that too."
Umut and Darren came to realize that SOLO Server, the flagship product at Concept Software (the licensing and eCommerce powerhouse of the SoftwareKey System) was the answer to all their problems. SOLO, combined with the expertise and responsive service SoftwareKey developers would deliver every step of the way over the course of a year of design and implementation.
Umut credits Mike's expertise and professionalism for making so many of their customization requests a reality. Explicit comprehension of what needed to be done was a critical component to success. It was also critical to the success of the project that Mike was accessible and willing to provide Umut with support when he had to internally sell the merits of the licensing and automation improvements. The Directors at Akcelik & Associates were being asked to have confidence in the plans as the changeover to the new eCommerce system was virtually a complete redesign of the sales system.
The Result
Everyone involved with the project at Akcelik & Associates couldn't be happier with the hard working team at Concept Software and the SOLO Server product. Expectations were exceeded with the following deliverables along with the extensive standard capabilities of SOLO:
- Improvement of the customer experience across the board for both small and large office software customers and training workshop customers when they interface with SIDRA SOLUTIONS including these website improvements:
- Seamless navigation and aesthetics of shopping cart and customer license portal with the rest of the site.
- Custom-developed a number of important pages including the software maintenance renewal page, upgrade page, customer account pages and a variety of automated emails including the account signup email and software maintenance renewal notice.
- Helping customers get the simple answers they need more quickly and easily with an online support center.
- Got out from under the limitations of an inept licensing product they were using. Enabling ability to offer trial downloads, crucial in the software industry.
- Reducing order processing handling time:
- Automating and streamlining user sales information into user database.
- No more orders by fax; smooth online ordering.
- Eliminating manual processing of credit card details.
- Eliminating the manufacture and manual shipping and delivery of product by providing customers safe and efficient software downloading.
The Benefits
Customers maintain a high level of confidence when purchasing products online using the new SIDRA SOLUTIONS eCommerce site. The SOLO shopping cart and customer account pages are easy to use, looks and feels secure (because they are secured utilizing the latest web technologies) and keep customers coming back regularly for re-orders and online account management.
Internally, operations are running smoothly and the new efficiency saves time in order processing allowing the staff to focus on other important sales activities. The team at Akcelik & Associates is confident that their new state of the art infrastructure can handle whatever the market may throw at it. Tracking the effectiveness of software trials aids in bringing Akcelik & Associates into a closer relationship with these potential customers, and the new trial user data makes for a stellar list of leads. The information SOLO provides about customers and the automated email response system has allowed Umut to engage customers with a variety of online email marketing initiatives.
The SOLO Server shopping cart was customized to match the SIDRA Solutions web site.
'Cover Renewal' page with SIDRA Solution's maintenance renewal business logic.
Customer License Portal login page.
Payment method selection.
Page that editing of the customer information.
Portal showing custom customer information.
Invoice and order confirmation.
Printable version of the customized SIDRA Solutions invoice.
'Quote' invoice page for manually processed orders.
