Workbooks blogs

Shared Success - Guaranteed Results

nicole.bunn — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 15:04:52 +0000

Shared Success - Guaranteed Results

Workbooks.com Guarantees Success For SME CRM Projects

Cloud CRM software provider guarantees return on investment

The CRM Lottery

ixisit — Wed, 23 May 2012 20:38:57 +0000

CRM Lottery

‘Will you get the outcome you expect or will you be one of the losers?’

Workbooks Automation in Action

jkay — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 15:20:33 +0000

Automating Processes Is Now Fun!

Since we released support for the automation of Workbooks processes we have had a lot of interest from customers, and we have used it extensively internally as well. It has been interesting to see how many different uses customers have come up with for these features.

4 Tips for Improving Cash Collection

jcheney — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 17:09:39 +0000

Should sales people be responsible for collecting cash?

4 Tips for Improving Cash Collection

Cash is king, every small (and even large) business owner knows this is true. Yet for most organisations cash collection and chasing aged debts is seen as the responsibility of the finance department.

Why is this the case? Often the finance department has no first-hand knowledge of your customer, they haven’t met the people paying the bills and they weren’t involved in negotiating the deal.

January 2012 Release

kwells — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 16:40:18 +0000

January 2012 Release

We're excited to announce that we will be releasing the latest version of Workbooks this coming Saturday, the 14th January.

Our latest release includes some much anticipated functionality, including Workflow and Automation Features and Mailchimp integration.

Read on to find out more about the new functionality...

Workflow and Automation Features

Workbooks now includes the ability to automate common processes using a combination of the Process Manager and the existing Workbooks API.

Is Google Adwords a good use of your cash?

jcheney — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 10:13:07 +0000

Is Google Adwords a good use of your cash?

10 years ago, advertising was the preserve of large businesses with big marketing budgets. In fact a whole ecosystem of marketing and advertising agencies would make money designing, testing and implementing expensive advertising campaigns.

Today however things are vastly different and you can spend much less money, and still reach millions using search engine advertising. In line with these changes, Google and Bing, in particular, have made online advertising easy to use and available to all businesses, even those with smaller budgets.

Our latest, Autumn 2011, release has been successfully deployed!

kwells — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 13:27:30 +0000

Our latest, Autumn 2011, release has been successfully deployed!

Friday evening saw the successful deployment of our Autumn 2011 release, which included some major new functionality, addressing a number of customer enhancement requests and making Workbooks even more flexible to use.

Some of the new areas of functionality include:

5 legal issues to consider when moving to the cloud and choosing a vendor

kwells — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 16:21:30 +0000

5 legal issues to consider when moving to the cloud and choosing a vendor

Philip James, Partner, and Carolyn Butler, Solicitor at Pitmans LLP examine some of the legal issues you should consider when moving to cloud computing and selecting a vendor.

1. Know the Flight Plan (negotiation and contract)

Carefully review the terms on which you are intending to contract with your cloud provider. Is the contract open to negotiation or are you expected to contract on the cloud provider’s standard terms? If the former, consider your specific requirements, and ensure your contract:

Workbooks CRM and Google Apps

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 15:47:10 +0000

Workbooks CRM and Google Apps

Over the past few months we have been integrating Workbooks with Google Apps.

The 1st phase of the integration is now done and we have put together a little video to showcase the functionality.

We hope you like it.

10 Considerations before you purchase CRM

kwells — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 09:24:32 +0000

10 Considerations before you purchase CRM

With so many CRM vendors available, offering broadly similar products, choosing the right solution for your business can be an overwhelming task. We look at 10 questions you should ask yourself before committing to a CRM system.

Summer 2011 Workbooks Release

jkay — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 21:10:17 +0000

Summer 2011 Workbooks Release

We are pleased to announce that the Summer 2011 version of Workbooks is due to be released on Friday 2 September 2011. It includes a number of significant new features.

Workbooks secures additional investment taking the total value to £5.4m

jcheney — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 13:09:08 +0000

Workbooks secures additional investment taking the total value to £5.4m

19th July 2011 - Workbooks.com has secured a total investment of £5.4m from Angel investors. This business was able to raise the additional capital in less than 60 days, in part because Angel investors were able to take advantage of the recent EIS tax relief changes, which makes investing in business like Workbooks more tax efficient for private investors.

10 things SME's should look out for when purchasing CRM

kwells — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 09:55:43 +0000

10 things SME's should look out for when purchasing CRM

The expectations and requirements of a CRM system for small and mid-sized organisations are similar to the deployment of a CRM system for a large corporate. The difference is that unlike larger organisations, smaller businesses tend to have limited resource available to them, in terms of both budgets, and time available to ensure the implementation of the CRM project is a success.

We believe that there are a number of key factors that every SME should look for when purchasing a CRM solution.

Spring 2011 Workbooks Release

kwells — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 14:16:37 +0000

Spring 2011 Workbooks Release

Last Friday (3rd June) saw the successful deployment of the latest Workbooks release. The Spring 2011 release includes some fantastic new functionality, including the ability to bulk update records using the import tool as well as ‘right-click’ functionality to support copy, paste and spell-checking. As always, the release also included a number of enhancements made to existing functionality and the resolution of several bugs.

Some key areas of new functionality include:

Data Liberation at Workbooks

jkay — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 19:00:00 +0000

Data Liberation at Workbooks

This may surprise some readers: we think it's important that it's as easy as possible for users to get all their data out of our service.

It's your data, after all.

People often don't think about how they can get data out of a product or service before the day that they want to leave or when they decide they need a local backup copy of their data. Here are four important questions:

Which web browser?

jkay — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 20:30:00 +0000

Which web browser?

We're often asked which web browser works best with Workbooks. You can use any of the main browsers with Workbooks - Firefox, Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Safari or Opera.

Because we deliver a compelling rich User Interface in the Workbooks Desktop, the better the browser, the better the user experience will be.

5 Reasons why CRM projects fail in small and mid-size businesses

kwells — Tue, 31 May 2011 10:51:34 +0000

5 Reasons why CRM projects fail in small and mid-size businesses

Implementing a CRM system for any sort of business is not without its challenges, but for small and mid-size companies without dedicated IT teams or budgets it can be even more difficult.

We often come across organisations whom prior to implementing Workbooks have tried and failed to successfully implement an alternative solution. Having listened to the issues such organisations have faced, we've pulled together a list of 5 common mistakes SME's often make when implementing a CRM solution, and have offered some helpful advice on how these mistakes can be avoided.

Information Commissioner Publishes Guidance on the New EU Cookies Law

kwells — Thu, 12 May 2011 12:57:27 +0000

Information Commissioner Publishes Guidance on the New EU Cookies Law

On 9 May 2011, the Information Commissioner’s Office published initial guidance on the practical steps UK businesses need to take in order to comply with the new Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations. The Regulations govern the use of cookies or the placing or accessing of any information stored on a user's device. With so many businesses now using cookie’s to identify and track visitors across their websites we thought it important to highlight these new regulations.

When do the Regulations come into force?

The buck still stops here

jkay — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 17:01:00 +0000

The buck still stops here

Amazon have suffered a number of problems in the last couple of days.

Workbooks Availability

jkay — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 16:38:46 +0000

Workbooks Availability - the last 12 months

Ensuring that our service is available for use whenever our customers need it is our top priority.

There are two parts to this: reducing unscheduled downtime (outages) and also reducing the scheduled variety.

Beginning with the unscheduled variety, in the last 12 months we've achieved a headline availability of 99.997% (this is 14 minutes). In reality we did a little better than that:

The common (and expensive) mistakes and how to use Workbooks CRM to reduce your internet marketing CPC spend...

kwells — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 14:37:07 +0000

The common (and expensive) mistakes and how to use Workbooks CRM to reduce your internet marketing CPC spend...

First and foremost – choose the right keywords. Before switching on a campaign, think about the unique products or services your organisation offers that will encourage the potential visitor to click your advert. By identifying and leveraging your USP, you can easily rise above the competition by using keywords or phrases unique to your business. Always have a look at what you consider competition, see what keywords they are using (www.keywordspy.com offer free information on this).

2011 UK Budget - Good News for UK Tech Companies

jcheney — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 18:04:33 +0000

2011 UK Budget - Good News for UK Tech Companies

Having just read through the highlights of the budget I wanted to point out some good news for all us high tech UK businesses.

Three changes in the budget caught my eye:

Improvements to the EIS Scheme - 30% Relief

The Enterprise Investment Scheme is a government scheme designed to encourage private investors to invest is UK limited companies. There are significant tax breaks associated with the scheme, which include income tax relief.

Workbooks Winter Release

kwells — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 10:19:22 +0000

Workbooks Winter Release - Successfully Deployed!

Today, we're pleased to announce that the Winter (February 2011) release of Workbooks has been successfully deployed.

Our latest release includes some fantastic new features, including the much anticipated 'Contract Management' module and some exciting new custom field developments.

Here's a brief overview of some of the great new functionality;

New! Workbooks Community

kwells — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 17:27:46 +0000

New! Workbooks Community

This week we have introduced our new 'Workbooks Community' site, a place where Workbooks users can find help and documentation on how to use Workbooks, discuss issues and keep up to date with the latest Workbooks news and information.

There are 4 key areas that make up the Workbooks Community;

Knowledge Base - Fin
read more

Do you understand the return you're achieving from your Marketing?

kwells — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 10:42:27 +0000

Do you understand the return you're achieving from your Marketing?

Are leads alone really the end game? what about the quality of sales opportunities? Or a campaign's overall return?

Adopting a fully integrated web analytics and CRM approach, is the only way organisations can truly understand Marketing ROI.

The overall objective here is to easily understand what’s working and what isn’t, so that marketers can better allocate marketing budget towards those keywords, channels and platforms that achieve a more realistic and useful Key Performance Indicator.

New! Contract Management functionality

Product Management — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 12:08:52 +0000

New! Contract Management functionality

In the next release of Workbooks, currently scheduled for the end of January 2011, we will be adding a new module called Contract Management.

This will be an optional module which can be added to either the CRM Edition or the Business Edition for a small fee. We have been working alongside a number of customers to define the functionality of this module and it has been designed to address the following types of problems:

Tracking the success of your online marketing with Workbooks CRM

jcheney — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 10:11:53 +0000

Tracking the success of your online marketing with Workbooks CRM

The combination of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and Pay Per Click advertising has made online marketing one of the most effective ways for small and medium-sized business to build a brand and generate new sales leads.

Workbooks CEO, John Cheney talks to Startup TV

kwells — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 16:07:44 +0000

Workbooks CEO, John Cheney talks to Startup TV

Last week John Cheney, CEO of Workbooks, drove all the way to sunny Bristol to meet with the team at Startup TV. With the camera rolling, John discussed topics including, how start-up businesses can benefit from CRM and why Workbooks is different to many other CRM solutions on the market. The interview will be 'showcased' in the 15th issue of Startup TV Magazine, a digital video magazine targeted specifically at start-up businesses and entrepreneurs.

Refer a Friend, Receive an iPad!

kwells — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 14:55:36 +0000

Refer a Friend, Receive an iPad!

Here at Workbooks, customer referrals are incredibly important to us and we love it when our customers share the same enthusiasm for Workbooks as we do – after all, who can provide a more accurate, unbiased review, than our customers who use the system day in, day out.

To show our gratitude to our loyal customers that continue to recommend Workbooks to friends and family, we have introduced a customer referral programme, whereby our existing customers can now benefit from evangelising about Workbooks!

Workbooks.com is looking for CRM Resellers and Integrators

rawnet — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 14:21:06 +0000

Workbooks.com is looking for CRM Resellers and Integrators

How do SMB customers choose a CRM or business application solution?