RIGHTSLEEVE is an online promotional products company. Utilizing a unique mix of design, technology and promotional media, RIGHTSLEEVE develops promotional products programs for leading corporations across North America.
RIGHTSLEEVE has used technology in every aspect of its business model, from how clients interact with the company to how employees process orders and collaborate with one another.
RIGHTSLEEVE began in 2000 with the founding premise of wanting to do things differently in a mature and commoditized industry. The promotional products business was primarily a catalogue-based, paper-intensive industry at the time, with tremendous opportunity for introducing technological innovation.
RIGHTSLEEVE built the business in the beginning with a basic website, then started a massive technology push in 2004. This culminated in launching a proprietary software system in 2006 powering both the front end of the website as well as the back-end operating system. The technology has evolved to provide online corporate store offerings to help companies manage their promotional needs across multiple offices, departments or countries.
Our goal was, and continues to be, to improve the overall end-user experience in the promotional products arena from the perspective of both process and quality of product.
Our biggest business challenge initially was developing a way to streamline the components of our production process, as well as getting a tremendous amount of product information into the hands of all our sales reps in a manageable way. The development of our database and software interface addressed these issues and has reduced the turnaround time for preparing quotes and managing orders. A process that previously could take up to an hour for a multiple product quote now takes minutes.
The ongoing challenge on this front is keeping product information current. We are working on ways to develop interfaces with our suppliers so product information can be updated automatically rather than the current manual process.
Our next challenge will be leveraging the intensive data our website currently generates to create useful insights for our clients and sales team. Speed and security of data remain key areas we continue to focus on.
Technology is the corner stone of our business. Without it we could not currently process the volume of transactions we manage without a significantly higher headcount. Technology forms the basis of how we interact and engage with our customers, both in managing their promotional needs as well as developing a community.
By developing our own software, RIGHTSLEEVE has been able to retain all data, allowing us to leverage this information to create useful customer solutions. We are currently building out an advanced search tool to lever this data along with Google search terms, in order to be able to return highly relevant results to clients. The degree of data we store on our servers creates the basis for analysis, generating more intelligent business decisions.
Mobile and cloud computing has been fundamental to our strategy, allowing any of our staff to login in to the back-end of our software anywhere in the world. A Facebook-style newsfeed automatically generates posts each time a staff member enters anything in the system or contacts a client. This creates an intensely collaborative environment and a customer-focused mindset, as all staff are in the loop with what is going on across the company. The software also allows for real-time reporting which has been very powerful in generating key performance indicators to manage sales performance, overall company performance and cashflow.
RIGHTSLEEVE engages heavily in social media to build brand presence and develop deeper relationships with our clients. We are continuously looking at ways to utilize technology to engage our community of users.
Technology will continue to be central to our strategy going forward. We are continually updating and innovating to respond to client needs.
Our next major challenge is looking at a separate Software as a Service model with our technology for other distributors in our industry. Server management, data storage and security will become critical as we consider this move to a multi-tenant model and as this business evolves.