Quantum Art Support Newsletter

CEO describes variety of applications created for QPublishing customers; customer case study: Eton website; hints for working with Customer Support; latest QP7 release notes

Limitless Content

The most overused term in the information economy, is «information economy».  Yet it's true that anyone sitting in front of a computer is always dealing with information. It comes in different shapes, sizes, and formats. But at the end of the day, all computers process bytes and bits, and present them to us in the form of letters, images, and sounds. Sometimes we call them data, but most of the time, we use the word «content». We constantly produce and consume it.  And as the amount of content grows, we look for tools that help us plough through those boundless fields of data.
 
Quantum Art is lucky enough to be helping hundreds of businesses deal with their content management needs, find solutions for delivering content on the web, and streamline internal publishing processes. Everyday we speak with customers about ways they want to use our systems, and we are always excited to hear about new applications our customers propose or discover.
 
For example, we have a large customer that uses QP7 as a solution for training their distributed salesforce.  The solution they built, together with our professional services team, delivers video training sessions to thousands of people on a daily basis, and then quizzes them on content of those videos, assigns grades, and recommends improvements in their product and sales process knowledge.  In essence, the solution is an online learning system; the foundation is a content application server.
 
Another customer example is an online registration system, used by a mid-size non-profit organization.  The solution provides new members an ability to join, processes their payments, helps them learn about their benefits and responsibilities, and serves as a hub for coordinating every participant's activities.  All of this is being done through a single web interface, accessible any time.  All the content delivery and processing is being handled by QP7.
 
In fact, there are many more solutions and applications that can be handled by a well-designed content application server.  The email you are reading right now was also sent using QP7.  Think of it as a Swiss Army-knife of the content management space.  Think of a new application you need and it will be there.

etón

Quantum Art Professional Services Helps Etón Transform Its Website Into an Interactive Marketing Tool

Marketing and sales staff often have to go through their IT department to change web content, which can sometimes create bottlenecks for the web administrator and other IT staff. Does this sound familiar? Etón, an established leader in consumer electronics radio products, had a similar problem until they implemented QP7.Framework. Now Etón’s marketing and sales professionals are empowered to change and publish web content themselves, which frees up their web team to focus on more pressing issues. Here’s how Etón did it in only four months.

Etón decided to upgrade their corporate and e-commerce website from a custom content management solution (CMS) requiring significant IT involvement to make basic changes, to a new CMS which would enable rapid deployment of multi-brand, multi-language and user-friendly interactive functionality. They decided to coincide this project with the company’s new product and corporate branding launch at CES 2007 in January.

After interviewing a half dozen web content management vendors in July and August 2006, Etón’s Marketing team chose QP7 as their platform and Quantum Art Professional Services as their developer in September. Communication Director Jesse Kearney says “We chose QP7 because it was exactly the right software for our problem and business architecture. The other reason was Quantum Art’s Director of Professional Services Mark McGee. He analyzed our problem and showed us the right examples. So our choice was really 50% QP7 and 50% Mark!”

In September and October, Etón and Quantum Art began working together to define the design and functional requirements, developed and tested the new CMS through December, and provided training and documentation to end-users in time to migrate their content for the CES show in Las Vegas in early January.

Going into the web project, Quantum Art knew that Etón’s project needs were ambitious. Since the website is multilingual and because the company sells so many products to different markets, the site needed to accommodate and manage multiple correlating products, brands and languages. In addition, the site had to be completed within a short timeframe, as the CES event was a must-do launch.

“It all added up to a very complex task, however Quantum Art's team didn’t flinch,” said Jesse. “Instead of spending lots of time reviewing procedures, they sat down, rolled up their sleeves and began work immediately. There's a category of people who talk very glowingly about their approach, but don't do anything. Quantum Art had the right strategy, put it to action, and kept their promises and that's exactly what we needed.”

The week of January 8, Quantum Art and Etón launched their new multilingual e-commerce site http://www.etoncorp.com/ at CES.

Etón now has a much easier time managing their web content. QP7 allows different marketing staff and administrators to update and publish new content themselves. Now Etón is able to maintain better control of their product and brand information as it is fully user-owned, database and workflow-driven. Their IT staff can focus on assuring stability and performance and introduce new features as the market requires. New products can be launched and markets can be served much faster than before.

Eton is already receiving positive feedback about the new website from their direct clients, retailers, and end users. Recently, Jesse’s team used QP7 to create a newsletter, and performed a test run with 200 customers who subscribed from the website. The response was so positive that Etón decided to publish a second newsletter in April to 1,200 contacts. “People really like it, and we think it will encourage them to use the website in a much more active way.”

Jesse adds “With QP7, we’ve transformed our site into a useful information tool for our customers in all their languages, and it has become a powerful marketing tool and channel for all of Etón’s brands as well. The solution now fulfills all of our needs.”

Quantum Art Services

Quantum Art helps customers make the most of their QP7 solution in a number of ways. This article describes our different services and how to take advantage of them. For further information about specific services, terms and prices, please refer to the Quantum Art Solution Agreement and the Quantum Art Maintenance Support Agreement.

Product Support

With the purchase of QP7 and an annual support maintenance agreement, customers are eligible for free product updates (7.1 to 7.2 to 7.X), which include product bug fixes, security patches, and additional features such as Visual Studio integration, as well as a discounts on upgrades (QP7 to QP8). Additionally Product Support covers questions about usage of the product and assistance in troubleshooting problems. Support can be reached at support@quantumart.com and at 888-899-3303 during business hours Monday through Friday.

Product Training

Quantum Art recommends customers purchase 8 to 16 hours of training, and additional training after a major upgrade, to better understand how to use, develop and administer QP7. Customers who will administer the site and use it for content management only can become fully trained in 8 hours or less. Customers who plan to do their own template development will need up to 16 hours. Training is segmented into sessions of 2 - 4 hours and delivered through web collaboration software. Sessions are $175 per hour and can include multiple attendees per session for the same cost. Training is interactive and customized to fit your particular solution on QP7 when Quantum Art has developed it. Training can be reached at training@quantumart.com

Project Consulting

When customers decide to use Quantum Art Professional Services to design and develop sites and web applications on the QP7 Framework, the Consulting team will perform project management, requirements analysis, design, html development, content structure and template development, testing and installation, all at competitive daily rates. Quantum Art has deployed over 100 web sites and content applications on QP7, including www.scubadiving,com , www.loghomesnetwork.com , elearning.diageowines.com , www.bernco.gov , intellesse.quantumart.com , www.ggra.org , www.nmshtd.state.nm.us , www.ci.eagan.mn.us , www.answersingenesis.org , and many more.

To add new features or modules to your existing site on QP7, or to start a new web content management project including integrations with other systems, you can contact us at projects@quantumart.com .

Getting the Most Out Of Customer Support: Tips and Tricks

For Quantum Art customers who need QP7 set up or administration assistance, there are a variety of ways to obtain help and answers to your questions. For your benefit, Quantum Art has compiled a list of tips and tricks to get you back on track:

• Does Your Answer Already Exist? -- Before contacting Customer Support, check the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page on Quantum Art’s ODC site. It’s located at http://odc.quantumart.com/faq.asp?p_pagealias=knowledge. More often than not, your answer may be there.
• Email First, Call Second -- For quicker resolution, email your inquiry to Customer Support at support@quantumart.com or fill in and submit a Customer Support form at /stage/support. Our international support folks will respond immediately. The second best method is to call 1-888-899-3303 extension 2.
• Describe Your Issue in Detail –- When submitting a request for assistance via email, describe all the steps leading up to the issue. Also, please provide your QP7.Framework Backend version details and log-in information. The more explicit information you provide, the more likely we can solve your problem quickly and accurately.
• Setting Up Users, Permissions and Notices -– One of the most frequently asked questions is how to set up users, permissions and the ability to publish notices in QP7. For answers to these questions, go to http://guide.quantumart.com.
• Other Help Sources -- On the QP7.Framework Backend, click on the Help button to show contextual help with QP7.