Case Studies

Librarian's Yellow Pages

Case Overview
LYPOnline, its companion print buyers guide, The Librarian’s Yellow Pages, and the INFOcus monthly E-newsletter help librarians to make informed purchasing decisions and connect with suppliers quickly and easily.

Just a few years ago, LYPOnline and The Librarian’s Yellow Pages were faced with a dilemma. They employed “Smithsonian-worthy” technology, complete with an archaic database structure and an inefficient “spaghetti-code” web presence. The job of migration and conversion was daunting, and would have made even the most seasoned online content experts shudder.

Results
Yet, under the direction of Jim Fidler and his team at Fidler Consulting, The Librarian’s Yellow Pages moved to a state-of the art online data collection and management system. This system resides on a robust secure server supporting a scalable site boasting functional architecture and design.

During the technology transformation, Fidler Consulting extracted the listings from an extremely outdated database system that was no longer supported by the manufacturer.
In addition, the Fidler Consulting team also restructured the print database. Too, while redesigning the front-end web site, the team added many facets of functionality and usability beyond online data collection and content management.

The current site, at www.lyponline.com, is sophisticated, and offers:

• advanced search capabilities;
• advertiser enhancements, including the ability for logos and banners to appear at different places and for different requests;
• back-end functionality, whereby advertisers have several unique listings depending on what buyers guide category is searched and requested;
• email links for users to link directly to advertisers;
• online subscription capabilities; and
• web trends and site statistics.

“Fidler Consulting has allowed us to make more money and make it faster,” says Mark R. Kimmel, President and Publisher of the LYPOnline and The Librarian’s Yellow Pages. “Our E-newsletter and Web site track response and activity, thus enabling us to provide measurable results to advertisers. The ability to track Web activity, right down to the number of click-throughs on individual listings, ads, banners, categories, and so forth, allows us to demonstrate value to our advertisers, which translates into revenue. And by automating our systems, Fidler Consulting has saved us thousands of dollars a year in data entry and data management.”

“Thanks to Fidler Consulting, we also have an advertiser management system that allows The Librarian’s Yellow Pages to deploy targeted e-marketing to advertisers. We can track response, including open rates and click-through rates,” Kimmel goes on. “Too, we now have a broadcast email system that sends emails to listees for updating listings, thus saving in postage and printing.”

“Jim is there 24/7,” Kimmel finishes. “When you work with Fidler Consulting, you’re getting more than a vendor, you’re getting a partner. He treats your product as his own and gives 110%. He’s there when you need him, and even when you don’t think you do.”

ASIS International Buyer’s Guides

Case Overview
ASIS International, located in Alexandria, Virginia, has more than 32,000 members and is the largest international organization for professionals responsible for security.

ASIS International's Security Industry Buyer’s Guide (SIBG) has been the standard resource that security industry professionals have relied on for twenty years. The Buyer’s Guide lists over 3,000 manufacturers and suppliers of security-related goods and services in 80-plus categories.

Just four years ago, ASIS had been updating the Buyer’s Guide via a cumbersome paper process. ASIS would send out listing forms via regular mail. When the forms were returned, updates were entered manually. No web presence for SIBG existed.

Enter Fidler Consulting.

Results
Fidler Consulting migrated the entire data gathering and content management process for SIBG online. Now, every spring, ASIS sends out emails to its listees via email, requesting updates to listings. These emails include the listee’s user name and password, which helps to increase listee response rate, and puts the listees in control of the updating process, thus reducing errors in the listee information. Likewise, those listees that have gone out of business are easily culled out of the data pool.

With the entire process online, ASIS saves on the high costs of printing and postage and the staff hours that had been dedicated to manually updating listing information. Too, errors in updating have reduced significantly, since listees now control the updating process.

“Jim Fidler and his team made sure that the process was efficient and secure. Privacy is key,” says Mike Moran, Special Projects Editor at ASIS. “Fidler Consulting streamlined the process and it is now much more efficient, which has freed up staff to do other things, which generate revenue for us, like our new budget survey”.

“Our website traffic has tripled, ” Moran continues. “SIBG has a tremendous advantage over the competition because our information is constantly updated, and this is thanks to our online process.”

In addition, Fidler Consulting worked with ASIS to create a subscription-based new product release system to complement SIBG. ASIS members can subscribe to product release system by category, and any time a company listed in the directory posted a new product news release, subscribers immediately receive the release via email.

"Our web site traffic has tripled since [Fidler Consulting] brought the process online.”

ASIS Salary Surveys
Case Overview
ASIS had been conducting a much-requested salary survey of its members via regular mail. However, the process was very expensive considering the cost of printing and mailing the surveys. The response rate to these surveys was abysmal – only between 200 and 300 responses, which also cast doubt on the quantitative validity of the results and analysis. But, based on the sensitivity of the data being collected, ASIS had some trepidation about moving the process online.

Results
Fidler Consulting worked with ASIS to migrate the whole surveying process online. Now, the survey tool resides on the ASIS site, and members are solicited via email and asked to participate in the survey. Results are computed online, eliminating the need for manual tabulation. Best of all, response to the surveys has increased ten-fold, making the sample valid. Privacy and security of the data is assured via a strict log-in process.

“Fidler Consulting helped us to move the process online, and increased our results 10 times to 2000 usable responses,” reports Mike Moran of ASIS. “We’ve been so successful that we now create an entire book of results that can be categorized geographically and demographically – not just a simple survey. We’ve been so pleased, that we’re working with Jim and his team to launch another survey product based on budgets.”

Broad Street Magazines
Case Overview
Broad Street Magazines, a subsidiary of the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper, publishes magazines specializing in housing communities for the Mid-Atlantic region. Many of these communities target the 55+ age demographic. When Broad Street created an online presence for its two magazines, Communities Magazine and Adult 55+ Communities, it found that it needed a system to capture and then maximize their online lead-generation process to its advertisers, which typically are the builders of these communities.

Results
Broad Street Magazines turned to Fidler Consulting. Based on Broad Street’s specifications, Fidler Consulting crafted a lead-generation system that brought the advertisers face-to-face with the readers. Likewise, this same system provides Broad Street – and its advertisers -- with leads instantaneously, thus reducing the amount of lag time between a reader expressing interest and Broad Street receiving the lead and then forwarding the lead onto its advertisers for follow up.

The process works like this: Each time that site visitors request a subscription to Communities Magazine, they then are prompted to specify what geographic area they are most interested in as well as which housing community they’d like. Once this information is received by Broad Street Magazines, its server processes the request and delivers them directly to the advertiser, who receives a lead within seconds of the contact data being available. Too, since Broad Street sends the customized information containing the lead contact data, the advertiser can easily track where its leads are coming from. For more details: www.communitiesmagazineonline.com. 

In tandem to building this powerful lead generation system, Fidler Consulting also built a web-based content management system for Communities Magazine. Broadstreet staff can now add, change or delete content, specifically data about new communities and advertisers, directly to the site using a secure database platform. This content management system has streamlined Broadstreet’s editorial process, saving staff time and helping to lower costs.

50/50 Design
“Jim Fidler and Fidler Consulting has been able to do everything that we’ve thrown at them,” says Rob Hudgins, Founder and Owner of 50/50 Design. “I’ve worked on a variety of projects with [Fidler Consulting]. One includes a white paper repository that feeds into 12 high-tech websites, which required an enormous amount of development of a multi-dimensional back-office content management system that could include RSS feeds.”