For this month’s entry, we thought it would be good to reflect on the last year to review some highlights of the System Integrator platform while at the same time looking ahead to the New Year.
While it’s always pertinent and relevant to discuss such aspects of SI, the focus this time around will be on some key areas that really enhance our users’ experience as well as considerations for team’s that are perhaps not yet using such features yet.
If any of this has piqued your interest, then please keep reading (or listening) as we take a look at some mechanisms of SI that have really helped users in the last year as well as some your team should include in the year to come.
First off, what are some features of SI that really enhanced the overall success of teams in the last year?
While there are many to choose from, here are some important ones to note:
- The Gantt View – Featured in, not just one, but two different Tip of the Month articles this year.
This mechanism will not only, pre-load items from your Project into the corresponding SI Tasks, but it also allows users to set designations such as Milestones, Predecessors, and Successors.
Based on my firsthand experience, working in my role as a consultant with D-Tools, I cannot stress enough how teams that have deployed the usage of this mechanism, have benefited greatly from doing so.
The ability to structure the Gantt View by Levels (the when, where, what of the deployment) gives SI users unprecedented flexibility when dealing with prolonged installation timelines and resultant challenges of the field environment.
- Workflow Rules – While the actual blog entry on this one was done awhile back, it is mentioned often in subsequent entries as this mechanism is really key to keeping other team members abreast of progress with a bid or project as well as keeping the necessary details of each Project’s related activity moving forward in a timely fashion.
Further, this mechanism allows SI users to construct incredibly detailed emails to their team’s recipients via the Insert Field which allows for the inclusion of data points from various Projects, Purchase Orders, Tasks, Service Orders and Service Plans.
- Submittal Reports – In the long line of amazing additions to the SI platform comes the recent inclusion of submittal reports for use with client bids and proposals.
Relying on data from the SI Library, the submittal report mechanism will enable users to generate documentation on the Products in the SI Project for their client’s respective bid.
This can be in the form of separate PDF documents for each item selected in the Project for inclusion or a single report where the links to online documentation are present.
For many more highlights of what SI delivered for ours users last year, be sure to check out our Resource Center where you can find all of our Tip of the Month articles: www.d-tools.com/resource-center.
Secondly, what are some features of SI that could really enhance the overall success of our teams in the forthcoming year?
While there are many areas of the software that merit attention here, I’m going to list another 3 key contributors for success from SI for your consideration.
- Job Cost Reports – To preface, keep in mind that several other components go into the successful use of the Job Cost report module in SI. They may not all be sighted here so be sure to reach out to our team if you have any questions.
If your team is using the Purchase Order mechanism in SI along with Time Sheets for your field deployment Tasks, then you could be well on your way to enjoying the immense benefits of SI’s Job Cost Reports.
The magic here (if you will) comes about as an analysis mechanism of all pricing data in the SI Project combined with billable hours from your field techs that are incurred against the Project itself.
Whether you want to review project data while it’s still in progress or you’re ready for a postmortem on a fully completed project, the Job Cost Reports can give you the numbers you seek.
Applying Purchase Order costs along with approved Time Sheet values in its display, the Job Cost Report allows our users to determine overall profitability of their projects once they have commenced or once they are completed.
Further, this data can be organized by Labor Type or by Phase along with a mechanism enabling users to select to review the amounts filtered by Product, Labor hours, or Labor dollars respectively.
On top of all of that, any of the data presented in the Job Cost Report view can be exported to either Excel or PDF allowing for the ease of sharing these details with your colleagues.
- Service Plans – Still a relatively newer aspect of SI’s features. The Service Plan module presents one extremely compelling and overarching reason for its use…and that is additional revenue.
That’s right, presenting more service plans will directly correlate to additional revenue.
For those teams that are not already engaged in regular service plan selling, imagine if you did include a service plan offering on every quote you submitted to a client. This would lead to more revenue per this inclusion and SI makes it very easy.
Once a Service Plan is created in SI, it can be listed as an addendum to the client report you run (and this does include custom SI reports as well). Your client need only look at the end of the document after the Project summation to see this display.
Seeing as how the mechanism is present, is relatively easy to modify, and can readily be included with your client submissions, it behooves your team to begin use of this immediately if you are not already doing so.
- The Customer Portal – Now while this may seem curious to some to include here, allow me to explain further to see how this can help.
While many teams are already using the SI Customer Portal (or a 3rd-party equivalent), many teams are still not and are still relying upon emails, scanned documents, and ultimately the client themselves to receive confirmation of a bid’s acceptance along with any signature required documents.
It’s not to say that this is not a successful regiment as it was all we had prior to the advent of cloud-based interfaces. But, it would be remiss to say that it is still acceptable to continue to do so though when you have a tool such as the SI Customer Portal at your fingertips.
Within the Customer Portal mechanism, not only can SI users include Proposal documents for their client’s to sign (virtually that is), they can also include system design drawings along with product submittals and any other required specification documents.
This is to say nothing about the ability to receive real-time notifications when a client views, accepts, and signs any submitted Proposal.
Because that’s the real point after all, isn’t it? As I always like to include with such posts, I cannot recommend strongly enough for teams that are not already taking advantage of this amazing mechanism, to do so post haste.
As we often say here, there just isn’t enough space or time here to cover all the relevant features and mechanisms of SI’s v22 that can enhance your earnings and profitability. For more information on that, please visit our online wiki and website.
Now, while we have covered a few usage scenarios and methodologies here, this is merely scratching the surface of what SI can achieve for users now and in the future!
Further, since we know each team will leverage and utilize these aforementioned features in their own unique method, it is recommended for new (as well as experienced) SI users to reach out to our PSG division to gain further insight from our team of industry professionals with extensive SI experience themselves.
And there it is!
Be sure to tune back in here for future installments on SI’s v22 and beyond.
A Perspective
Our team is continually evaluating ways to improve and enhance your team’s usage of and experience with our SI platform. Therefore, it behooves you and your team to explore these (and other features) as well by securing time with our Professional Services Group of SI and integration industry veterans in order to maximize your team’s ability to succeed with the software.
In Summation…
-Update to v22 if you have not already done so.
-Review, utilize, and deploy these newly added features listed above here to ensure success with d-Tools SI.
-Sign-up for webinars, training, or visit our online documentation “wiki” for tutorial assistance.
And, as always…
-Get focused, get serious, and make money.
Enjoy!
With all of that said, there’s still plenty more in store for you with SI and forthcoming product releases so keep an eye out for future updates.
We are always reviewing your Feature Requests to determine our best step forward and next course of action with future SI product releases so…“keep’em coming”!
In closing…
For more information on these and other features of SI, please see this link: D-Tools v22. You can also review our other videos and our usual support documentation.
You can also get more detailed information about v22 via our upcoming webinars and by enrolling in SI training with our PSG team. Further, please feel free to review our “What’s new in v22” webinar that is now available.
And don’t forget, that’s why we are here…to ensure your success with our product! Be sure to check back here next time for more on v22!!!