How much flexibility do I have over web-content and the look-and-feel?
You have a lot of flexibility.
You can display your own graphics and images. You have your own style sheet permitting you to control colors, fonts and text sizes. The content on each page is under your control. The only constraints you face are in the layout of certain pages that are dynamically created by the system.
Do users need any downloads or plug-ins to run your software?
No. End-users are served pure HTML.
All they need on their desktop is a browser. Administrators who use our web-based administrative interface will need to have Sun Microsystem’s JRE (Java Runtime Environment) preloaded in their browser.
Can I use your service to send emails to prospects who have not yet registered?
Yes, you can.
Our service permits you to distinguish between active registrants and inactive names that have been loaded into your registrant tables. The system gives you the ability to send personalized emails, as either HTML or plain text, to anyone on the database.
How will my existing registration system interface with your services?
Very well.
For our delegate networking services, the minimum information we require from a registrant is a name and email address. The simplest interface is a link from your registration system to ours, with data passed as “name=value pairs” appended to a URL. If a more complex interface is required, we are able to communicate using custom-built web-services.
Does your software use cookies?
Our software does not rely on the use of cookies.
Rather, it uses server-side session variables to maintain conversationality with users. The only time a cookie is employed is when a user chooses to have the computer remember his/her log in details.
What training and support do you provide?
We provide on-site training in the UK and web-based training globally.
We provide email and telephone support and are able to respond to inquiries received during normal working hours within one hour. Call us for details.
Can we have custom reports created for us?
If required, yes
Our reporting tool allows you to perform a large variety of searches on your data and export the results to Excel. However, if you need further reports, we can create these for you.
How easy is it to switch between the various services you offer?
Very easy.
Switching between services can generally be accomplished through changes in the configuration settings.
Do you support your service in the US?
Yes.
We have a partner in the US who is able to provide support to customers throughout North America.
As an ongoing customer, will we benefit from new enhancements to your software?
Yes.
New enhancements are being incorporated on a continuous basis and in a manner that maintains backward compatibility. Existing users will be able to automatically benefit from new features.
Can I run your software on my own servers?
Our software is available primarily as a hosted service, running on our servers.
However, we also offer a bespoke hosting service, where we run our software on your servers. Alternatively, the software is available as a licensed product to enterprises and larger event organizations that have their own IT capability. Contact us for details.
How scalable and resilient is your service?
As scalable and resilient as you want it to be.
Our web-based architecture makes the service extremely scalable. As for resilience, that depends solely on your requirements and budget. Our basic hosted service runs on multiple servers at a secure data center. This service suffices for most customers’ needs. However, if you tell us that you want to run a fail-safe service for 30,000 registrants, with data mirrored on servers across three continents, we will happily set that up for you.
Can I brand your service as my own?
Yes.
The pages that are displayed to end-users are created to your look-and-feel and carry your own logos and branding. Effectively, therefore, the web-pages are already branded as your own. We display our logo in the bottom right-hand corner with the strapline “Software created and hosted by Delegate Select”. To replace this with your own logos, you would need to run our software as a licensed product or engage us to host a bespoke service for you.
If I run multiple events, do users have to re-register each time?
No.
Providing that the type of registration and profiling information you collect for each event remains fairly constant, a user’s data will still be available the next time he or she attends one of your events.