Johannesburg, 18 Aug 2011
South-African based business intelligence (BI) vendor, Alchemex, having recently celebrated the 2 000th registration on its rapidly growing BI Community, announced today the launch of an online group to share free reports developed by third-party consultants.
Launched by Alchemex in September 2009 as a social network for users of BI software powered by Alchemex, this online community has grown to over 2 000 members in less than two years, realising the vision of Gary Boddington, Alchemex CEO.
He says: “Having worked extensively in a business intelligence context, we knew that directors and staff members alike, together with the growing global base of Alchemex Business Partners and Certified Professionals, had so much knowledge to assist people in using Alchemex software and Excel smartly for business reporting. Distributing that knowledge though had always been a challenge. With the growing use of Facebook and other social media platforms some two to three years ago, we recognised that social media could provide a way of getting that knowledge 'out there'. We introduced the BI Community and invited people to join for free to exchange ideas with Alchemex software users around the world on a host of BI, reporting, software and Excel issues.”
Hosted on the Ning platform, the BI Community allows users to access documents, tips, videos and how-to guides, join groups of like-minded business people and interact via discussion forums. Says Leo Gopal, Alchemex Web Administrator: “We chose the Ning platform because of its proven track record, robust features and the ability to customise it to our needs. It has proven very successful and we have built up to an average of 5 000 unique page views and 350 interactions per week.”
This week saw the introduction of a new group on the BI Community, whereby members can obtain or share free report templates. A number of free report templates have been posted and are freely available for Pastel BIC and Sage Intelligence users to access and customise accordingly.
Boddington sees this as a significant step in the evolution of this online community, stating: “The availability of free reports should provide business partners and report writers with a tool to reduce the time spent on writing select reports, enabling them to customise and on-sell any pre-built reports to customers. Although these reports are not subject to any quality assurance by Alchemex or Alchemex's OEM partners, we are supportive of this becoming a forum for best-practice thinking, while facilitating business partners' speed to market and reducing the cost of developing content. We also see this as an opportunity for business partners to showcase their skills and engage customers. In addition, as more reports become freely available, this will add tremendous value to businesses around the world running Alchemex Smart Reporting software, or any of our BI products on the various Sage platforms, as they can now download free reports and customise them accordingly with little or no cost involved.”
According to Loren Taljard, Alchemex Marketing Director, social connectivity is on the rise in the commercial world. “Doing business,” she says, “is really all about managing a complex Web of relationships with customers, suppliers and others. Professional networks make it easier for people to maintain such relationships and forge new ones.”
She cites that LinkedIn, for instance, has over 800 000 groups on specialised subjects that people can join to share ideas and make new contacts. “The BI Community allows people to connect on all things 'Business Intelligence in Excel',” she continues. “It is an important vehicle in delivering on Alchemex's whole product philosophy, whereby we do not simply develop and sell BI software, but are passionate about adding value and empowering SMEs with the necessary skills to efficiently produce timely business reports and gain instant visibility into meaningful business data. The BI Community allows members to help themselves to learning material and connect with each other to share ideas and ask and answer questions as participants in a thriving online network. Now the availability of free reports will create even more value for business partners and customers alike.”
Join for free today at http://community.alchemex.com. To get or share free report templates, go to http://community.alchemex.com/group/freereporttemplates.
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