GOLDLINK FOR OPEN SYSTEMS

Trusco Manufacturing, a 34 year-old family owned company, manufactures parking lot and athletic field stripe painting machines.

Tracking contacts with a simple R-base, Trusco needed a more efficient system. They desired the ability to take and process product orders online. The system of writing information on paper, inputting the data into the accounting system to create an order, and then inputting customer information into the R-base for customer tracking was too cumbersome. Trusco had been using Open Systems Accounting Software for many years and was looking to upgrade the accounting system. When they upgraded to the latest version of Open Systems, their Open Systems dealer recommended they look into GoldLink because of its ability to seamlessly integrate Open Systems with GoldMine, a top-notch contact management program. Due to this available linkage, Trusco chose GoldMine to supplant the outdated R-base.

With their current setup of GoldMine, GoldLink and Open Systems, Trusco has been better able to serve its customers by having better access to sales records. A large portion of their customer service involves customers ordering parts for their Trusco machinery. "When a customer calls in, we can pull up exactly which model they own and when they purchased it. That way we can quickly assess their problem and ship them the appropriate part without a lot of guessing and wasted time looking up old invoices. Knowing which model a customer owns also helps us to determine which upgrades they may need," said Trusco vice president, Bruce Harris. "GoldLink cuts down on our time on the phone, enabling us to be more productive while letting our customers tend to their business."

GoldMine and GoldLink have also helped Trusco's marketing efforts. "As prospective customers call in, we can record in GoldMine how they heard about us. This helps us determine where to concentrate our advertising dollars," says Harris. "We also do a lot of mailings. With GoldMine, we are able to target each mailing to a particular type of customer or prospect. We market to contractors, property managers, airports, cities and athletic programs." Harris continues, "Whenever we come out with an upgrade of a particular model, having direct access to sales records makes it easy to market the upgrade to customers who own that model."

"GoldLink has been a big help. It has lightened the workload of my assistant and myself by half," reports the vice president. "There would be some tasks that we would have to do three times. GoldLink has enabled us to reduce these tasks to one quick step. Now we can create or update a customer profile, take notes on the call, create an order, and print a shipping label and packing slip immediately as we speak to the customer. We are very happy with GoldLink."