Enhanced book industry features and full 13-digit ISBN capability now available in IBS Bookmaster Release 7.3News & Events 2006-04-04 IBS Australia recently conducted Customer Information Sessions to highlight the upcoming launch of the new 7.3 Release of IBS Bookmaster The many IBS customers who attended the sessions saw new IBS Bookmaster features and modules designed to meet the changing needs of publishers and book distributors in a global publishing environment - needs that are evolving from the more traditional requirements of the past.
The increasing trend for publishers to become more customer focused has led to the development of the new IBS Bookmaster CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. Originally developed as part of IBS Bookmaster Release 7.2, CRM has been significantly enhanced to help publishers meet today’s intense competition and high customer expectations. The integrated CRM is a sophisticated contact management, activity handling and direct marketing tool that will assist publishers in targeting the right customer with the right product or service and provide world-class customer service.
The publishing process has always been labor intensive and represents a major expense within publishing. IBS Bookmaster’s Editorial and Book Production system is a sophisticated tool designed to streamline the editorial and production process. The latest upgrade sees further enhancements in the areas of budgeting, finance management and estimating which will assist publishers to produce books even more cost-effectively. In addition, the formation of royalty contracts has been further simplified by allowing contracts to be drafted within the Book Production system before being transferred to the Royalties system when the book is completed.
Customers were particularly interested to find out how IBS Bookmaster will handle the new 13-digit ISBN standard. Peter Sioufi, Technical Director for IBS Bookmaster explained that the new version includes some enhancements to fully incorporate the new standard.
“IBS Bookmaster has always had a 20 character ISBN field which has been used to handle non-book products such as CDs, videos and electronic information. However, in order to allow more information to appear on certain screens the ISBN field only showed 10 characters in some cases. We have now changed these screens so that they show the full 13-digit ISBN.
“We have also provided a utility that will convert the old 10 digit ISBN to the new 13 digit ISBN and will store the old ISBN. This means our customers will be able to accept orders using both the old and the new ISBN during the transition period from one to the other.
He added: “From a business perspective the 13-digit ISBN may potentially introduce a lot of procedural changes within a company. While IBS Bookmaster can handle these changes, our consultants will work closely with customers to advise on the procedural aspects and to ensure there isn’t too much disruption to the daily running of their business.”
Other new developments include significant warehouse enhancements such as cubing, zone RF picking and put-away logic enabling increased automation of the warehouse. Improved interfacing to external warehouse handling systems will also provide further efficiencies to high-volume distribution facilities.
IBS Bookmaster customers that provide third party distribution will benefit from the enhancements to the integrated 3PL (Third Party Logistics) module, while enhanced forecasting features will assist publishers to make purchase and printing decisions based on more accurate sales analysis.
There have also been a large number of developments within the e-Commerce system including additional B2B features to allow for increased customer self-service, while new B2C functionality caters for electronic bill presentment and payment for those publishers that sell direct to consumers.
Other enhancements include new Subscriptions features, enhancements to the Royalties solution and the introduction of a Book Clubs feature.
Staffan Wensing, MD for IBS Australia commented: “The many new features of IBS Bookmaster Release 7.3 reflect our ongoing commitment to the publishing and book distribution industry. They are the result of our policy of working closely with our customers to further develop what is already a very strong book industry specific solution”.
The official release date for IBS Bookmaster 7.3 is April, 2006.
For more information on the new IBS Bookmaster 7.3 release, contact:
Staffan Wensing, MD IBS Australia
Mobile: +61 414 559 790
staffan.wensing@ibsaustralia.com
Thomas Brane, General Manager Services
Tel: +61 2 9761 9222
thomas.brane@ibsaustralia.com
Edith Crnkovich, Marketing Manager, IBS Australia
Tel: +61 2 9761 9222
edith.crnkovich@ibsaustralia.com
info@ibsbookmaster.com
www.ibsbookmaster.com
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