Suitable for businesses with 1 to 50 employees
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AIM is an online database for all your customer's records. Regardless of where or by whom the information is updated, all sales and service staff have immediate access to the following information:
This information being readily available in real time ensures that visiting service engineers or sales staff can always pick up where previous staff left off seamlessly. When a new "Wish-list" item machine is entered, you can choose to do a "Machine Search" and it will instantly review all stock.
AIM is an online database for storing all your machines details. This can be either owned stock, consignment stock or machines offered for sale in-situ. Regardless of where or by whom the information is updated, all sales and service staff have immediate access to current data. This information Includes:
When a new machine is entered into stock, you can choose to do a customer search and it will instantly review all "Wish-lists" AIM will raise a pro-former purchase order when you first buy a machine, it will raise a Sales Order when it is sold and a pro-former invoice when it is sold. Once the machine is sold it moves from being "In Stock" to the ownership of the buyer.
Since AIM knows your customers details, it knows the machine details and it knows your service engineers details. Allocation and managements of service becomes a great deal easier and more efficient. Select the customer who is booking a service, you are then offered a list of the machines they own, select the appropriate machine. Allocate the Service Tech. Give the job a priority rating and finally enter the symptom or fault as originally explained by customer (this can be updated if Service Tech finds the description was incorrect).
Once this is done multiple things happen automatically:
Once received the following actions take place:
AIM knows the machine details including brand, model, machine type and now it has also built up a database of service reports based on the symptoms or faults reported. This information is of great value as the years go by and Service Techs come and go. On-site, via the internet your Service Tech can log on, enter any brand and/or model and/or fault and find previous solutions to the same problem. Also the Service Tech can simply check the service history on the machine prior to starting the job. This will also be very useful, particularly when you have multiple Service Techs attending different machines.
This history is priceless as the years go by and Service Techs come and go. On-site, via the internet, your Service Technician can log on, enter any brand and/or model and/or fault and find previous solutions to the same problem.
When you advertise, you pay for every shot, for every bit of shrapnel whether it hits the target or not. Consider what you spend in magazines, sales cold calling or at trade shows. It's frightening! This was the original driver for AIM and is still the "MONEY" feature. AIM allows you to develop lists based on precise known criteria.
Such as...
From this criterion you can email directly or develop mailing lists or print a run sheet for your sales staff
If you are looking to sell or buy a particular machine, there is no need to spray that out to every one you know.
You will get a much better response with a short simple email aimed directly to the appropriate customers. 90% of the time only people in the HVAC industry want to buy or sell a Lockseamer.
So why advertise to a repetition machine shop? If you are selling an NC Punch Press it's a pretty good chance the customer will already own a Press Brake.
AIM provides basic reports that may be useful to managing your business including your sales staff and service staff. Reports include:
One of the latest modules developed for AIM is the quotation module. This was developed to reduce the wasted time spent recalculating the prices quoted on machines every time the exchange rates, shipping rates or the customer's requirements changed.
There was also found to be a necessity to build a safety net to ensure all costs were captured when quoting a machine. As you would know it is easy to miss some of the subtle charges that end up catching you out in the end. Like forgetting the 100 gallons of hydraulic oil you should allow for. Most of the values are preset in the quotation by your administrator eg Exchange rate, Supplier discount, Steel surcharge (if applicable), Shipping cost etc. The salesperson preparing the quote (where ever they may be, remember it is an on line system), needs only enter the following items:
Any extra ordinary discount, surcharge or overcharge to accommodate trade in. The rest is preset, a price is calculated and a quotation is generated. Quote can be printed or emailed as a PDF attachment. Date and customers details are all automatically dropped onto quote. When the exchange rate, shipping charges, steel surcharge change, your administrator makes a global change that then will effect all quotes made in future.
We have found that this doesn't stop you doing skinny deals but at least you are aware of all your costs and enter the deals with your eyes open. With AIM all possible charges are built into the template as a reminder. You can choose to ignore them but at least you won't forget them!
When you enter any machine into stock you tick a box if you want that shown on your website. You tick another box if you want the price shown. When you sell the machine it is automatically moved to the customer's ownership file and is therefore removed from the website. Therefore managing the "What's in stock" portion of your website becomes automatic.
Click here to see a working example A.I.M. integrated into a website.
Included in the price is basic skinning of AIM to your company colors and logos. Within certain design parameters both your internal work engine and the external public site will be set up to reflect your corporate colors and trade marks.
Benefits
