We are always investing in better infrastructure and performance for our clients. It is not always about features, its also about portability, mobility and connectivity. That was soooo 15 seconds ago!
What has changed isn’t readily visible, however, a lot of performance tuning has been applied under the hood. Here is a partial list of what has changed:

  • Data security can now be customized on an install by install basis.
  • Security Roles can now have their nicknames changed or be completely removed from the UI.
  • SalesCloser role has been removed, replaced with SalesAgents. (v6.6)
  • Sales Dashboard role (NEW ROLE!)  is available for deployment to all installs. (v6.6)
  • All user pick-lists have better filtering and typeaheads for speedy picking.
  • The “Unscheduled” tours are automatically excluded of all reports except for Marketing Detail Report (MDR), Call Center Detail (CCD) (NEW MODULE!) and Tour Status Efficiency (TSE) reports.
  • The search bar is defaulted to partial match searching instead of exact match, causing wider, less filtered results. (e.g. ” joh” search returns ” john, Johnson, johnny”).
  • The search bar now includes the guest-name and the secondary phone number fields. The search bar can be customized by install for a date period or range, to full matches only and/or to exclude searching sales info such as purchase ID and contract number (for marketers only). The more you filter, the faster it flies.

Faster, Better.   In testing, a text string search of nine combined fields on 2,000,000 records went down from an average of 14 seconds to about 2.6 seconds (amazing how long 11.4 seconds feels when you’re in pain).
Our goal is to remain the vacation ownership industry’s only easy-to-use performance analytics and instant report builder with fast results. Any clients noticing performance changes (positive or negative experience) are encouraged to comment to us using the Contact Us form.

 

ARDA World 2012 , TrackResults’ software analytics received the prestigious and coveted ARDA supplier certification.  Certification requires in-depth knowledge of the industry, along with testing and classes administered by the AIF (ARDA international Foundation).

Read more

Take your Business intelligence OUT of the hands of the I.T. department !

Once the knowledge base is published, it can be used to examine and cleanse other data. Once the user is done cleansing the data, it can be exported to Excel, to a csv file, or to a database. You can see in the screenshot below that the exported results show the source data and the output (cleansed data).  In this way, the business data owner can document what has been changed and share those results with other business users.

Notice that I said this was being done by the business user or data owner.  This is a key aspect of DQS: the business data owner, not the IT admin, DBA, or developer is doing the work since they know the business.   TODD GO READ MORE

What do you measure in your sales and marketing? How do you determine success and failure within your company?  In other words, what do you measure to get quantitative results?

I’m sure you’ve heard time and time again that “knowledge is power.” In the past acquiring knowledge and converting that knowledge into power was easier said than done.  We are lucky enough to be witnessing the unfolding of the Information Age creating billions of dollars from information transactions each day.  Recently, news broke of the upcoming IPO offering from the social media giant: facebook©.  In addition to connecting people via the internet thru status updates, check-ins, and photo sharing facebook collects information about its users, and monetizes this knowledge not by selling this information but by selling the right to target advertising at its users.  This model of collecting information, then monetizing the acquired knowledge is a tactic that is expected to bring facebook $75-$100 billion in the initial stock offering later this year.  Using this example the evidence is undeniable: financially speaking knowledge is indeed power. 

Read this entire amazing article ! – [more]

That’s great news for facebook and there share holders, but, “What does facebook have to do with the vacation ownership industry?”  Just as facebook collects and uses marketing information from its users, so should you.  Collecting invaluable information from potential customers and existing customers or your company’s statistics such as your sales and marketing department has never been easier.  What’s more is that you can easily monetize the information you have collected.  Being able to collect and report your numbers on a daily or even hourly basis was a mere fantasy just a few years ago.  Now, the most progressive organizations within the vacation ownership industry are doing this everyday by using Business Intelligence software, and so should you.  By utilizing more of their acquired knowledge these companies are turning more of their knowledge into revenue by being more efficient, increasing margins, and growing stronger sales teams.

Using spreadsheets and paying a staff to pour over mountains of data is a thing of the past when it comes to collecting and managing sales data to pinpoint KPI.  There are applications available that use technology instead of labor to identify your KPI in seconds.  Take the TrackResults Software’s Business Intelligence for timeshare application for example. Since no one wants to allocate funds to unnecessary outlets Developers and PDs are asking themselves (or should be asking themselves), “How can we shave a few points here and a few points there to MAXIMIZE RETURNS?”  One answer is actionable business intelligence.  If you are using an app to generate your business intelligence reports at the speed of business then you are on the cutting edge, if you are not it’s time for an upgrade.   

It is universally understood that increasing efficiency is on the agenda of every business.  So with maximizing returns, actionable business intelligence, and turning knowledge into revenue in mind, the question you should be asking is, “Am I able to quickly track the metrics that define “success” for my business?”  This begs a more important question, “Are we doing it?”

At the end of the day, despite what I or anyone else tells you, it is up to you to figure out what will improve your sales performance in both the short and long term.  To help answer this final question I have included a list of items that a sales center should be tracking more importantly be able to access these reports real time reports at will.  Most of us have this data or at least a rough idea.  But ask yourself, “Am I able to access these numbers in minutes?”  The fastest growing companies in the industry can. 

 

Marketing

Marketing funnel: Inquires – Marketing Leads both in-house & vendor ,Incentive cost,% Tour show,% Tour Q vs. NQ ,Campaign success,Customer,demographics,% Revenue by marketing source/rep/vender,% Outbound mail drops conversion,Bookings/Confirmed tours,Q to NQ by marketing source,Tour Flow,% of generated leads converted  to Qualified tours, VPG by in-house vendor or Referrals  ,
Sales

Bookings,Cash Collected vs. Financed Deals,Avg Deal Size,Sales from Qualified leads,Sales from Not Qualified leads,% of volume by team/plaza/rep,% closed by day of the week/time of day,% closed by Rep by day/time of day,,% closed by Rep paired with TO,% pending by marketing source/rep,Conversion % by Country/State/City/Zip Code,Gross VPG vs. Net VPG,VPG sorted by marketing source/Rep/TO

Finance

Revenues Profits,Operating margin,Cash Flow,% of deals CXL,% CXL by Marketing source/sales rep/sales team/VLO,% of deals saved by VLO

TrackResults just doubled its capacity in the Cloud. TrackResults is a flexible and scale-able platform, which allowed us to  double capacity within a short maintenance window with no downtime. We added 4 more servers, each with 8 processors and 16 gigs or RAM… This is ” on demand” scalability and elasticity.

 Database server clones were deployed ( hydrated), as well as web servers,  and every TrackResults customer will see an immediate benefit with faster reporting, booking, exporting and importing.  The increase in capacity also supports the record growth TrackResults and its clients have been experiencing.   

This increase in resources was a smart move to preempt bottlenecks in performance.  With all the new features in version 6.5 , like the major API build we just completed, we can connect to existing legacy systems like TimeshareWare and with custom modifications, most CRM’s. Clients with multiple Trax systems can also automatically talk to one another , if desired.
Read about details about these new features  [more]
The API is great because its been designed to do all the heavy lifting for the developer, following the same philosophy as the rest of our applications, easy to use with powerful results.
  • Version 6.5 also has the ability to activate additional modules such as
  • Pender Come Good analysis,
  • Call center efficiency,
  • Courtesy tour as “Q”‘s calculations
  • Security log auditing
  • Graphical displays for charting and reporting and more.
Additionally,  thousand of users are logging on through thier smartphones daily, so we decided to be proactive to make thier mobile access faster. In essence,  we pumped up the volume and bandwidth.

Take the TrackResults Business Intelligence test.  We dare ya !

 

Sat, March 26, 2011- TrackResults arrived in Orlando today for the American Resort Developers Association ( ARDA) annual convention held every other spring in Florida. ( Odd years held in Florida, Even years in Las Vegas).

Drew Reynolds, Co-founder says””We are very excited to continue bringing more and more Sales Buisiness Intelligence to the Industry. We were the first to develop it, and so far, since 2006 , we still are the only ones who offer it as a sole focus”. We love being the best in our niche, We just have a passion for our analytics.
Once upon a time,  Developers used to see our name ” TrackResults software” , and incorrectly think ..oh, more resort timeshare software. Nowadays, 6 years later, its different , and Business Intelligence is almost synonymous with our name.
Todd says: “We were offering our SaaS application before people understood it. Now with the “Cloud” getting media attention, and validated by the giants like Google, Twitter, Facebook ,et al,  clients are embracing our technology. They are ALL cloud applications, Software as a Service.  We don’t sell ” software”, we sell service. The service is what counts.

 

More details on the features being debuted at ARDA 2011 are available here

 

1) Google style type ahead suggestions for searches everywhere
2) Day of the week specific filtering read more
3) Monthly comparitives. ( This month but last year)
4) Appointment Time / Tourtime filters
5) Multiple value slection in picklists
6) Performance Spotlighter – Highs are colored in TrackResults famous “Orange” ( of course we were “Orange” before the other guys) and low performers displayed in the TrackResults “Blues”. read more
7) Fast Report View Switching
8) VLO Module – Track Cancellations, Reasons, Officers, Proven to reduce recision rates !
9) New Security Roles
Team Executive role, for Non director type managers overseeing multiple marketing teams.
Loan Officer role – for those handling private data  , perfect for VLO’s ,
Specialist
role – when you need to track a unique position type)
10) Owner / Non Owner predesignations

Topics / features proposed from clients for discussion this year are ” document storage”, ” integration” , ” all-in cost per tour ” , “preferred agent” , “Goal dashboards for each rep” , “Rankings” list,” weekly State of the Industry metrics ” and ” Lead pipeline assignment”

We put up a website with a blog, ( weB LOG )   www.tracksalesresults.com  so prospects can learn about using SaaS for Business Intelligence.  We still wear our Orange Poloshirts and flip flops. Jesus has contributed alot to TrackResults and has bult some great relationships with clients. BI is critical to maximize every dollar , so we get tons of personal satisfaction watching our clients succeed. That’s our favorite part.  It’s sink or swim out there”

More details on the features being debuted at ARDA 2011 are available here

 

The most obvious appeal of such cloud services, of course, is the potential to save money. Business buyers have gone through decades of technology transitions, tacking new hardware and software onto the old. The average corporate IT department has to deal with the dreaded 70/30 rule where they spend about 70 percent of their technology budgets just trying to keep this jumble of products running, leaving only 30 percent to chase new ideas.

Chief information officers have to buy equipment by the ton to meet spikes in computing demand or prepare for disasters, and then watch as that gear sits idle most of the time. While companies struggle to deal with this mess, they’ve become overwhelmed by the influx of data in the Internet Age. The promise of the cloud is shoving the costs of dealing with all that off the bottom line.

The cloudpeople suggest a daring complement to the cost-cutting: Adopt the rapid-prototyping, beta-testing lifestyle of the new era. Relinquish control of your technology infrastructure—you don’t need it anymore. Let employees toss out new services and see what sticks. Innovate with impunity. “In the cloud,” says Tony Scott, CIO of Microsoft, “there’s no penalty for guessing wrong.”

Read The Cloud : Battle of the Tech Titans 

March 11, 2011:

TrackResults Software concluded a 3 day conference at the RIU resort in Cancun with the Resort Developers Association and its Resorts of Distinction brand resort developers. Hosted by Dave Mokry, President of RDA and Steve Lamb, Executive Director, quality roundtables and focus groups made the event a real eye opener. Some of the learning experiences were:

RDI 1

  • Increasing Effectiveness and Productivity through Time Management and Team Meetings
  • Building and Running a Referral Marketing Campaign
  • How to Find, Interview and Hire Sales Superstars
  • The new Instant Travel Sites and Distinctive Exchange benefits
  • Revamping and Running A Tradeshow/Event

RDI 2

This loyal group of resort owners have contributed to the success of TrackResults , and we in turn have contributed back. They truly are ” hooked on business”. Tracking sales, tracking lead performance, sales analytics, and overall business intelligence applications were obviously a primary focus, since only the top tier of resort personnel (ie:developers and owners) were in attendance.
TrackResults has been the “preferred” software of the RDA and ROD since 2007. Friday night, after the conference closed , a small group of 37 of us went to Coco Bongo Disco and Show for a VIP experience where ” a good time was had by all”.   TrackResults would like to extend its deep gratitude to the RDA for hosting us. Roughly 200 verses of “Happy Birthday Kyle Hartough” ( social media specialist ) resounded throught the resort !

logo_rda

 

 

Force multiplication, in military usage, refers to an attribute or a combination of attributes which make a given force more effective than that same force would be without it. The expected size increase required to have the same effectiveness without that advantage is the multiplication factor. The source of the increase is the Force multiplier.
In Technology terms, if a certain technology like GPS enables a force to accomplish the same results of a force five times as large but without GPS, then the multiplier is 5. Such estimates are used to justify an investment cost for force multipliers. A force multiplier refers to a factor that dramatically increases (hence “multiplies”) the effectiveness of an item or group.

Some common force multipliers are:

Some factors may influence one another, e.g. enhanced technology improving morale or training improving reputation.

It seems clear that force multiplication existed before anyone had a name for it. While the Mongols used swarming tactics coordinated by non-electronic communications, such simple tactics nevertheless made them notably effective. In the Middle Ages, stakes were often driven into the ground to protect archers. This is an example of “combined arms,” a doctrinal development and another example of force multiplication.

 

Departmental / Business operations savings

  • Savings through improved application functionality, process improvement, automation and integration – TrackResults has never suffered form an incident of data loss or extended downtime. That means availability of our software is waiting for your people, not the other way around. Using our software will maximize your Sales and Marketing efficiencies, increasing revenue
  • Savings through higher worker productivity – Our Cloud solution is designed to scale to meet your computing demands, allocating more resources to your environment when you need it.
  • Faster Time to Value – With SaaS / Cloud applications, there is no hardware or software to procure, install, configure, optimize or test. In your implementation timeline which takes about 24 hours, you skip all of these steps – which offers both cost and time savings