Category: Uncategorized

In an industry as modern and evolving as marketing and advertising, companies may find that their turnover rate is slightly higher than that of other industries. According to a salary survey by industry staffing agent Major Players, this may be due to junior and middle level employees prioritizing their personal career development and seeking out better positions and opportunities.

This also gives solid reasoning for human resources departments to invest in custom software, as high turnover increases the complexity of their workload.

According to the survey, nearly 30 percent of workers moved to different companies in the last 12 months. Of this percentage, 16 percent were at the same level and 13 percent moved up the ladder. In addition, of those that moved, only half received a pay raise and 37 percent stayed on the plane and 13 percent took a pay cut.

Furthermore, one in 6 permanent professionals received an internal promotion while freelancing rose by 88 percent in the “digital technical jobs” field, showing that the market movement isn’t just between companies but has even involved freelancers and internal adjustments.

“In this market, creatives know they have to fight harder and sometimes make sacrifices to gain that top-level experience and stand out from the crowd,” said Jack Grafton, CEO of Major Players, in a press release. “This, combined with the invention required for sophisticated digital, integrated and social media campaigns is creating an increasingly elastic job market, not just in freelance but in perm as well.”

With such an active job market, human resource departments in these firms should be sure to keep a sharp eye on their employee database systems. By consulting FileMaker developers, these firms can invest in custom software that will allow them to more effectively track personnel movement. This can be especially helpful if one firm prefers to hire more freelancers – which require different paperwork and payments – than permanent positions and vice versa.

While many employees are taking advantage of rising remote working policies as well as the new bring your own device (BYOD) trend that's allowing companies to save on technical expenses, it's become critical that businesses have an office manager that is capable of effectively leading the epicenter of the company.

Office supply retailer Staples reports that by maintaining an accurate, company-wide phone list, office managers can help employees stay more connected. In addition, keeping track of disappearing office supplies and saving up a "slush fund" to pay for any emergency expenses are all ways to keep an efficient workplace. This can be especially true when an office is planning on expanding or moving, like a handful of businesses in the Chicago area.

According to data released by the Cole Taylor Business Owners Confidence Index, nearly 60 percent of all businesses in Chicago plan on expanding in the next six months. This is due in part to the fact that 52 percent of respondents say they experienced increases in sales volume in the last quarter. Furthermore, the previous year's survey showed that 70 percent of respondents anticipated a rise in raw materials, while that number has dropped to 56 percent this year.

"We are pleased to see local middle-market business leaders are reporting increased sales and that they are making plans to expand their businesses," said Mark Hoppe, president and CEO of Cole Taylor Bank, in a press release. "Both of these indicators offer encouraging signs that the sluggish economy is improving for the middle market but their pessimism regarding the overall state of economy shows that the recovery is far from complete."

During any business expansion, it's critical that office managers maintain an accurate and thorough account of the company's physical space. By consulting FileMaker developers, these executives can create custom software that allows them to keep an eye on daily expenses, track assets and even manage that necessary slush fund.

While viewers watching last night's presidential debate may have focused on the way each candidate presented themselves and their points of view, the candidates also brought up some points on how they plan to aid small business owners in a recovering economy.

Both candidates discussed measures such as tax cuts and investments in Main Street, but a recent press release from SAP and the Big Data Commission says that the use of big data by both the government and small businesses alike can aid in turning around the American economy by creating more productive organizations.

"Imagine a world where a growing number of elderly and sick people receive better healthcare outcomes at lower costs, where there is reduced congestion on the roads due to real-time insight into traffic patterns and events or greater accuracy in prediction of severe weather events. The challenge lies in capturing, managing and analyzing enormous data streams to measure new signals that lead to transformational insights," said Steve Lucas, the co-chair of the commission and global executive vice president and general manager for database and technology at SAP, in a press release.

Lucas' examples focus mostly on government applications of big data, but businesses can also leverage this information to yield effective outcomes – whether it's a major corporation or a small marketing firm.

By consulting FileMaker developers to create custom software, companies can begin to aggregate and analyze this data on their own. This will help marketing firms gain clarity into the confusing world of digital analytics and social media. It can allow healthcare providers to spread information and research to other physicians in a timely manner and it can give law firms the ability to store and open client records and transcripts with ease.

According to J.D. Power and Associates, customers are more satisfied this year with independently owned, brick-and-mortar pharmacies then their large chain or mail-order counterparts. This may be due in part to the mail-order businesses’ inability to adapt to new market demands, which have been met by their competitors.

As such, independently owned pharmacies such as Health Mart, Good Neighbor and the Medicine Shoppe were awarded the highest satisfaction scores by consumers, all of them receiving more than 840 points out of the possible 1,000 in the report’s rankings.

“These findings come amid a growing problem with medication adherence,” Lonny Wilson, president of the NCPA, said in a press release. “These twin forces of medication non-adherence and increasing dissatisfaction with mail order pharmacies should prompt health plan sponsors to support plan designs that allow patients access to the pharmacy of their choice, where pharmacists can help promote proper medication use and maximize the cost-savings from generic drugs.”

As these findings become public, many independently owned pharmacies may start to note an increase in customers. As such, the new workload may challenge their current database software systems, which might not be able to handle the increased activity.

By consulting FileMaker developers, pharmacists can create custom database software that can allow them to maintain a more accurate account of prescription orders, pickups and refills. Furthermore, this new system can be used in a mobile context with FileMaker Go, which can allow for pharmacists to update their database and information while out of the office, creating a happier workforce to go with the satisfied customers.

With Bring your own device (BYOD) policies rising in popularity and so many workers sharing computers for personal and work-related tasks, many IT employees and everyday workers are becoming increasingly nervous about security and privacy.

In fact, according to a Harris survey, 82 percent of regular employees consider the ability for their digital activity to be “tracked” as an invasion of privacy. And 76 percent say that they would not allow their employer to view which applications may be installed on their own device. This creates a divide between employees wanting to use their own computer and smartphone and employers’ ability to make sure that these tools are suitable for work.

“Bring your own device policies are commonplace across most organizations. The survey results show that the vulnerability of personally identifiable information is a significant concern, and that organizations need to be just as concerned about user privacy as they are about the security of corporate data,” said Christopher Clark, president at Fiberlink, which commissioned the survey. “However, the situation can be easily solved by IT by using a mobile device management solution that can set privacy settings to stop collecting personal data from staff members, but these measures are rarely put in place.”

As BYOD policies begin to rise in popularity, companies may benefit from consulting a FileMaker developer to create custom database software that allows employees to store and access key documents and project task lists, which can be kept separate from the personal documents that may be on their device.

As smartphone and tablet ownership increases with the the percentage of employees who continue to work after hours or at home, it may also benefit these companies to implement a FileMaker Go custom application for workers who will use a mobile device to complete tasks. This can allow for increased security and efficiency when out of the office.

As reported by this blog, big data is becoming an increasingly relied upon source for information and intelligence to help managers and executives make better decisions regarding their businesses. One example of this comes from the popular video streaming website, Netflix, which gave a $1 million prize to the two development teams that were able to use mountains of customer data to improve its movie recommendation algorithms by only 10 percent, showing the power of how just the smallest improvements can be invaluable.

While many companies may be investing in data software that can aid them in these initiatives, Harvard Business Review says that there are ways that companies can get the most out of collecting data, regardless of company size. The underlying theme on these tips emphasizes the symbiotic relationship between the capabilities of new technology and the analytical talents of a human workforce.

According to the source, the first step to using data more effectively is by actually collecting it. This can be done from any number of sources – social media to website analytics.

While it’s critical to acquire the information, it must also be properly stored and aggregated. This is one way businesses can maximize custom database software through their big data efforts.

Visibility is key, and possessing collected data output in a clean dashboard custom created with a database vendor makes it easier for an organization and its key contributors to have a better understanding of the business decisions that need to be made.

As technology advances, so does the way many industries go about their usual operations. For healthcare, imaging machines have become a critical component to gain an understanding of what is going on within an individual’s body. As such, a recent report by Global Information Inc has shown that the medical imaging industry is burgeoning with developments.

Some of the main catalysts for the industry’s projected growth are nontraditional uses for diagnostics and monitoring for new therapies and minimally invasive procedures, according to the source.

“The dynamics of imaging agents are changing and significant growth lies ahead,” says the report’s press release. “Among the key trends: ultrasound contrast media is a rising star in the quadrant; PET is a prime growth driver for radiopharmaceuticals; nuclear medicine provides a potential growth avenue for radiopharmaceuticals; and fledging market battles teething challenges.”

Clearly, technology development and research is taking a priority in the healthcare industry. As such, biomedical engineering firms and other developmental companies may want to invest in custom database software to ensure that they are able to keep up with the rising competition in these fields.

By consulting FileMaker developers, companies can create a research database that can be used to help manage projects and spread information between departments. This software can also be accessed via mobile devices through using FileMaker Go, which can be very valuable in laboratory settings where researchers may need to move from stations and machines and record insights and observations.

By using FileMaker and FileMaker Go for research and development teams, companies can ensure they can stay ahead of the pack and not fall behind the competition.

According to a study by IBM and Broadridge, financial market firms are experiencing a “1-2 punch” of regulatory compliance and customer demands that are forcing the companies to change the way they manage digital information.

According to the study, the companies that are excelling in these times of change are focusing externally. They’re looking at how they can differentiate from competitors, improve “marketplace agility,” and expand their companies geographically, allowing for increased worker flexibility and supporting local industries.

“Based on regulatory, competitive and margin pressures facing financial services firms today, current operational systems are challenged to deliver the needed scale and cost efficiencies,” said Charles Marchesani, corporate vice president of securities processing solutions as Broadridge, in a press release. “Increasingly, financial firms are looking externally to adopt more flexible and scalable operating models to quickly respond to new growth opportunities and the continuous regulatory changes.”

In addition, the source states that the current leaders are at least three times more client-focused than those falling behind and 2.5 times more collaborative across departments than industry laggards. These essential characteristics can be improved by investing in custom database software.

By consulting FileMaker developers, companies can create custom applications that can be used across all departments to store and share information. Customer relationship software can hold necessary details about demographics, which can then be shared throughout the company, allowing for greater collaboration as all departments will have a greater understanding of their clients.

Furthermore, by using custom database software to mold the program to their specific needs, companies will be able to comply to the regulations while still maintaining a close watch on consumer demands and trends.

Mobile is on the rise as the latest iPhone is being predicted by many analysts to reach 27.2 million units sold by the end of the September quarter, according to CNet. Despite the increase and availability of this technology, a survey by vSplash, a data and analytics company, has found that nearly 98 percent of small to medium-sized business' (SMB) websites are not optimized for mobile use.

According to the press release, 76 percent of SMB mobile websites do not have a privacy policy, which can put them at risk of not being trusted by many search engines. Furthermore, 44 percent of mobile homepages do not contain a phone number or point of contact for customers to immediately access and 78 percent don't have a Facebook or social media marketing link.

"Some experts are predicting smartphones and tablets will account for around one-third of all website visits coming holiday shopping season," said Umesh Tiberwal, CEO of vSplash, in a press release. "According to our current data, nearly SMBs will be challenged to capitalize on this mobile commerce opportunity due to their incompatible websites."

In order for small businesses to take advantage of this rise in mobile usage, they may need to update their custom mobile software. Whether this is being used by employees to access data and key information from their mobile units, or customers to access the site and its call to action from a smartphone or tablet, improving a mobile site's capabilities in the near future can be incredibly useful for businesses.

By consulting FileMaker developers to assist with this process, companies can fully implement technology such as FileMaker Go into their daily operations as a custom application that can be molded to fit their specific needs.