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| Executive Summary |
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Is your business moving at net-speed? This short brief will help
you decide quickly if IntelliMerchant bears further investigation
or if your time would be better spent elsewhere.
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Background |
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IntelliCatalog, Inc. was founded to offer a brand new service to firms which are
far-seeing enough to realize that not only a web-presence, but a true full-scale online
catalog and order processing system is required in order to survive in the future.
IntelliCatalog, Inc. offers an online catalog and ordering
service to firms which do not want to be in the software development business; which
do not want to have to learn or keep up with rapid-fire technology changes; which
can't afford to locate, hire, train, and retain expensive programming talent but which
nevertheless can't afford to abandon ecommerce sales to their competitors.
Face it, the web is rapidly making immense changes at the very core of product
distribution. Geographical boundaries are being
dramatically eliminated. Competition
for customers, your customers, is not just coming from down the street or from across town
any more, it is literally coming from any and every where in the world.
Now (later will be much too late) is the time to get in on the 'power of the web'.
Competition invariably forces extraneous costs out of every distribution chain.
It is incredibly expensive to dispatch sales-reps and retail buyers on cross-country trips.
The power of the web will rapidly send these traditional purchasing methods the way
of the horse and buggy.
The new culture is of ‘convenience and speed’. You are
busy -- so are your customers, that is exactly why they are turning to online purchasing.
You may try to stick your head in the sand and
delay the inevitable, however competitors that you aren’t even aware of aren't standing still.
IntelliCatalog, Inc. provides its manufacturing, distributing, and retailing customers
the ability to quickly, easily, and inexpensively create an online catalog at extremely
low risk. This catalog in turn allows our customers to increase sales by
expanding their own customer base and, by reducing their customer's cost of buying, generate
increased volume from their existing customers. Importantly, the exact same
online catalog can be used to support retail and wholesale customer bases simultaneously
greatly reducing your costs and opening other sales channels.
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Your Online Catalog |
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The online catalog you need can not be graphics intensive. Studies have shown
that people will not wait much more than 12 seconds ("speed and convenience") for a page
to load; any longer than that and their attention is lost and they "surf" off elsewhere.
A catalog is 'business'. You want your 12 precious graphics
download seconds to be invested where it counts. Not on the catalog itself, but
rather on its pictures of the merchandise that you are selling!
The online catalog you need is not an ‘artsy’ static web-site thrown together by your
neighbor's second cousin who sort of wants to learn about HTML, who once actually accomplished an FTP
download, and who’s never even heard of cgi-bin :-) .
Something as important to your success as your catalog has to be
under your control. When your inventory changes -- your catalog has to change.
Now! Not next week when your 'web designer' decides to get around to it.
This is, after all, your business.
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Technological Core |
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IntelliCatalog, Inc. operates the IntelliMerchant catalog and order processing software
system on servers connected to the internet. The IntelliMerchant user
interface of easy-to-use fill-in-the-blank forms allows its customers to make changes to their catalog and process
received orders from any computer
with access to the internet. The changes to the catalog are made instantly without
requiring the customer to manipulate templates or upload results to the server.
The IntelliMerchant software system is founded upon a powerful relational
database management system. And of course it uses Secure Socket Layer communications
for the encrypted transmission of sensitive customer data such as credit card numbers and
passwords. But IntelliMerchant advances customer security to the next level
by keeping the information stored encrypted in its database.
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Major IntelliMerchant Features |
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The software is self-contained on IntelliCatalog, Inc. servers; there is no software to
buy, install, configure, or upgrade on your computers.
Extensive shipping, handling, and insurance calculation abilities.
Extensive purchase quantity, order volume, and customer specific discount calculation abilities.
True customer credit limit enforcement.
Customer-specific minimum order sizes.
Real-time credit card transaction processing through
Electronic Clearing House, Inc.
Product inventory availability checked as the customer orders.*
Product price and S&H charges can be calculated based upon an attribute or
feature of a product such as style, size, length, component, edition, etc. For
example, a silver necklace chain available in
different lengths would be displayed in the catalog as a single product with the
customer's price determined by the length they select. This is a significant
advancement in online catalog technology.
The product price can be tied to a commodity market price or index price. When
changes to the index price are made, the catalog price of products tied to the index are
immediately changed.
Provides the shopper with a convenient search capability of the catalog's contents.
The catalog permits multiple pictures of each product and multiple pictures of each
of the product's attribute choices (e.g., style, color, shape, component, etc.) available to the
customer.
Provides both product and product category cross-selling!.
The catalog allows products to be associated as options to another product (e.g. accessories).
When the product is viewed by the customer, the optional products are displayed also,
but can only be purchased if the main product is purchased. This gives you an easy
mechanism to provide and enforce product purchase based promotions. This 'associated'
purchase is recorded in the customer's account; important information for the proper handling of
returns.
Customer account, order payment, and order shipping status record keeping.
Customer selection and broadcast email facility supports target marketing, product promotion,
special announcements, quality assurance efforts, etc.
Affiliate program management integrating the catalog with affiliates' enrollment, banner
provisioning, and commission tracking.*
Allows you to prevent access to the catalog from the general public if you choose.
Catalog product changes can be made but withheld from the shopper until a later time.
This permits extensive work to be done on the catalog over a period of time and then released
to the shoppers en masse such as when a new season's merchandise is offered for sale.
Similarly, the date on which a product is to cease being shown to shoppers can be
entered in advance.
Intelligent 'help' facilities -- help text is placed right on the form that is being
filled in!
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IntelliCatalog, Inc. Shared Goals Philosophy |
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IntelliCatalog, Inc.'s shared-revenue pricing plan ensures that its goals are
aligned with those of its customer. By offering its service using this model,
IntelliCatalog, Inc. prospers only when its customer does.
For firms which are more comfortable with a known flat-rate monthly fee rather than
a varying commission based fee, contact us to get a
quote based upon estimated disk space requirements.
*Inventory module and Affiliate Program module are optional components
of IntelliMerchant and priced separately.
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"It works ... plain and simple"
© 1998-2006 IntelliCatalog, Inc., All rights reserved.
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