Advantage Announces the Release of New Features, Including Innovative Project Management Tools and Employee Utilization Dashboards
Largest release introduces new enhancements that help agencies and in-house marketing departments increase speed to market through operational efficiencies.
Mooresville, NC, August 04, 2010 --(PR.com)-- In an effort to help customers to better streamline their operations, the Advantage Software Company, a leader in workflow automation solutions, announced the release of Advantage 6.2/Webvantage 3.2, the latest version of its scalable solution that connects critical advertising processes like project management, financial management, and media buying functionality using a single source database. Highlights of the release include new Alert Assignments for Project Management that facilitate task and issue routing, Employee Utilization Dashboards, and Phase II of the Billing Command Center.
“For almost 30 years, Advantage has met the diverse needs of the marketing communications industry through product innovation and great customer service. The latest release incorporates over 100 enhancements to the system, and is our most significant release to date,” said President Ellen Coulter, “We've listened to our clients, and as a result of their guidance, we've created applications that streamline processes, more efficiently automate every task, and provide crucial management information to Agency Leaders in formats they can translate effortlessly.”
New, Innovative ways to Manage Projects using Alert Assignments, and More. Several new features have been released that extend Advantage’s leadership in deploying project management systems in the marketing communications industry. Version 3.20 introduces Alert Assignments, a new feature that enables project managers to maintain schedule timelines at a higher level and use Alert Assignments with built-in, user-defined workflow to 'route' tasks and issues automatically to team members. Project managers can spend more time managing and less time entering data while gaining complete visibility into all projects from a single, interactive view. Task and issue routing are automatic based on the state assigned by each team member and the workflow defined. This feature can be used to track any task or issue that requires routing, accompanying documents or collaboration, including the creative and production processes, contract or RFP participation, and issue tracking on digital or other programming projects. This slick feature speeds time to market and tracks progress, but eliminates the need to update every interaction in the project management schedule manually.
Employee Utilization Dashboards for Agency Leaders
The new release underscores Advantage's commitment of pushing real time information to the web by introducing employee utilization dashboards. These new dashboards enable Agency Leaders and other key personnel to view employee productivity, realization (billability) and even client fee analysis by company/office and department at the macro and detail levels from a single, interactive browser-based application. View things like direct and indirect time, goal vs. actual, direct time by client, billed and adjusted time by client, and much more, all without printing a single report.
“These new features provide information that enables Agency Leaders to analyze key utilization metrics quickly, through easy-to-read charts and graphs, so that they can adjust staffing or fees accordingly,” added Coulter.
Media Billing Now Available in the Billing Command Center
In Phase II of the Billing Command Center, billing professionals now have a centralized location where they can review, adjust and bill media orders as well as production jobs. The flexible media selection feature allows billers to select billing information at different levels of granularity, from all orders, to client, client/division, client/division/product, client purchase order, market, campaign, order number or even line number.
Billers can perform a variety of tasks from the Command Center, including income recognition and closing jobs without leaving the screen. By having all the information and tasks in one place, billers will experience a quick learning curve and become more efficient.
Availability for existing customers
Advantage v6.20/Webvantage v3.20 are available for beta testing now. The releases will be available to all customers upon completion of the beta period. For existing customers, webinars highlighting the features of these new releases will be held at no charge. For more details and a schedule of the webinars, customers can visit the Users Portal at www.gotoadvantage.com/portal/.
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About Advantage
The Advantage Software Company is the leading provider of advertising workflow automation and media buying tools for advertising agencies and in-house marketing departments. For over 30 years Advantage has led the industry with a wide range of solutions including browser-based solutions that accommodate both PC and Mac workstations. Advantage has the largest and most active Users Group in the industry. Its members play an active role in the software enhancement process and are a continuous source of innovation.
“For almost 30 years, Advantage has met the diverse needs of the marketing communications industry through product innovation and great customer service. The latest release incorporates over 100 enhancements to the system, and is our most significant release to date,” said President Ellen Coulter, “We've listened to our clients, and as a result of their guidance, we've created applications that streamline processes, more efficiently automate every task, and provide crucial management information to Agency Leaders in formats they can translate effortlessly.”
New, Innovative ways to Manage Projects using Alert Assignments, and More. Several new features have been released that extend Advantage’s leadership in deploying project management systems in the marketing communications industry. Version 3.20 introduces Alert Assignments, a new feature that enables project managers to maintain schedule timelines at a higher level and use Alert Assignments with built-in, user-defined workflow to 'route' tasks and issues automatically to team members. Project managers can spend more time managing and less time entering data while gaining complete visibility into all projects from a single, interactive view. Task and issue routing are automatic based on the state assigned by each team member and the workflow defined. This feature can be used to track any task or issue that requires routing, accompanying documents or collaboration, including the creative and production processes, contract or RFP participation, and issue tracking on digital or other programming projects. This slick feature speeds time to market and tracks progress, but eliminates the need to update every interaction in the project management schedule manually.
Employee Utilization Dashboards for Agency Leaders
The new release underscores Advantage's commitment of pushing real time information to the web by introducing employee utilization dashboards. These new dashboards enable Agency Leaders and other key personnel to view employee productivity, realization (billability) and even client fee analysis by company/office and department at the macro and detail levels from a single, interactive browser-based application. View things like direct and indirect time, goal vs. actual, direct time by client, billed and adjusted time by client, and much more, all without printing a single report.
“These new features provide information that enables Agency Leaders to analyze key utilization metrics quickly, through easy-to-read charts and graphs, so that they can adjust staffing or fees accordingly,” added Coulter.
Media Billing Now Available in the Billing Command Center
In Phase II of the Billing Command Center, billing professionals now have a centralized location where they can review, adjust and bill media orders as well as production jobs. The flexible media selection feature allows billers to select billing information at different levels of granularity, from all orders, to client, client/division, client/division/product, client purchase order, market, campaign, order number or even line number.
Billers can perform a variety of tasks from the Command Center, including income recognition and closing jobs without leaving the screen. By having all the information and tasks in one place, billers will experience a quick learning curve and become more efficient.
Availability for existing customers
Advantage v6.20/Webvantage v3.20 are available for beta testing now. The releases will be available to all customers upon completion of the beta period. For existing customers, webinars highlighting the features of these new releases will be held at no charge. For more details and a schedule of the webinars, customers can visit the Users Portal at www.gotoadvantage.com/portal/.
###
About Advantage
The Advantage Software Company is the leading provider of advertising workflow automation and media buying tools for advertising agencies and in-house marketing departments. For over 30 years Advantage has led the industry with a wide range of solutions including browser-based solutions that accommodate both PC and Mac workstations. Advantage has the largest and most active Users Group in the industry. Its members play an active role in the software enhancement process and are a continuous source of innovation.
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The Advantage Software Company
Bob Bruce
502.742.8985
www.gotoadvantage.com
Bob Bruce
502.742.8985
www.gotoadvantage.com
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