Nail IT

More companies are starting the year 2010 with websites that are souped-up with more content, interactivity, knowledge transfer and a better online experience for customers. Accraply, a manufacturer of automated labeling systems and label converting and finishing equipment, recently launched its redesigned website that offers visitors product information and an expanded parts, service, and upgrades section. Séamus Lafferty, VP of sales and marketing, says the “website is often the first impression our customers get of who we are and what we do”.

Early this month, Key Technology introduced its new online training program for its sorters with an interactive, multimedia curriculum. I have also attended a press briefing with TetraPak CEO and journalists from Asia and Europe in the comfort of my office. By posting my questions through a web browser and hearing his responses through a telephone, I was updated of the trends in the dairy market.

Information technology (IT) and the Internet are viable tools for companies to present themselves in the crowd, offer autonomy to online users in their search for information, empower operators in their day-to-day activities with know how and link markets of the world together. Possibly the next avenue for marketing and customer service, explore and harness IT for greater cost savings (think less printing and delivery) and efficiency (think instant information retrieval regardless of time zones and timely response to customers using instant chat rooms and online voice communication).