Blog : Customization

User Spotlight: Mygazines

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 21:54:00 GMT

Last week, I had the exciting opportunity to visit one of our local Method customers, Mygazines. Mygazines is a digital publishing software-as-a-service provider that literally resides no more than a few blocks away from our office! Over the past year, Mygazines has quadrupled its staff and Method has been one of the tools they’ve relied on for day-to-day activities during its growth. I had the pleasure of meeting with Chief Marketing Officer, Randy Frisch, and Bookkeeper/CRM expert, Ian Chen (pictured below).

Like Method, Mygazines is a web based company that offers innovative online services. They are leaders in the digital publishing industry and you’ve probably stumbled across their products without even realizing it. You know when you visit a website and view an online flyer, clicking to flip through the pages? Well, that is one of the services provided by Mygazines, along with online brochures, catalogues, newspapers, documents, guides and the like. This company makes producing, distributing and tracking content an easy task for publishers, professionals and corporations.

Mygazines has more in common with Method than simply being a SaaS company. Customers can brand the Mygazines platform so that viewers see a branded image, not Mygazines’, when they browse their digital publication. Similarly, as you can see in the following screenshot, Mygazines has branded Method to appear as an extension of the Mygazines platform.

Like many Method users, Mygazines has a strong focus on productivity in the workplace. Real-time synchronization between Method and QuickBooks has helped Mygazines to increase efficiency through the elimination of double entry. This was especially important for Mygazines’ remote Sales Representatives working out of the US. With Method, Reps can login and generate orders, update customer information, utilize the CRM tools, etc., with changes being reflected in Method and QuickBooks in real-time. For the same reason, Method has also made it easier for staff to work from home.

Mygazines has also customized some screens and templates to ensure no steps or information slips through the cracks (as you can see in the nicely branded screenshots). The customization that Randy and Ian love the most would have to be their re-creation of the Products and Licenses Agreement (which is just like a Sales Order, but since they call them PLA’s instead of SO’s, they changed the name too! Gotta love it!).

Mygazines’ long-term vision with Method includes using the API to tie Method with their internal Mygazines system. This will result in even less data entry and will further increase the efficiency in the sales and ordering process.

Thanks again to Mygazines for letting me pop by for a visit, and if you’re in the market for digital publishing, please reach out to Mygazines for more information on their services!

Mygazines - info@mygazines.com; Toll-free: 1-888-694-2946

Have a great day,

Katie

New: Picture Objects capable of Actions

Method_Danny — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 16:00:00 GMT

When pictures are used tactfully in applications, a designer can enhance a user’s experience and in many cases make it easier to navigate. Up until now, you were able to add pictures to Method screens but that was where it stopped. Not anymore.

Picture objects in Method now have the ability to have actions assigned to them, just like other objects can. So what’s the big deal? As the lead geek in the new Method Expense Report app (currently being beta tested by Method Solution Providers), I ran into a wall when I wanted to use images instead of traditional buttons on a welcome screen for the new app. Yes, I could have used images and placed buttons at the bottom of each image, but to be honest, it didn’t look good and I’m all about the details. I wanted to make the image the button and make it so the user just had to click the image to be taken to where I want them to go. Since actions can now be directly assigned to images, a developer can choose to perform any sequence of events they choose when the “click” event happens on an image.

Danny

Actions and Objects Reference Guides – Now available

Method_Danny — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 14:05:00 GMT

Actions and Objects are the meat and potatoes when looking at how any Method screen is built. The new Actions and Objects Reference Guides provide you with:

A detailed description of each action/object
An example of where you would use the action/object
Steps for adding the action/object

This is the perfect accessory when designing any screen and aren’t too sure what a specific action or object is supposed to do, or how to implement it. As more actions and objects are released, we will try our best to keep this document up to speed.

You can view or print these documents by visiting our Self Service & Documentation section of the Method website.

http://www.methodintegration.com/web/self-service-documentation.aspx

Happy reading!

Danny

Learn Method through Community Webinars

Method_Danny — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 21:04:00 GMT

Here at Method we strongly believe in a sense of Community and this is always something we keep in mind with everything that we do. Our community members are rapidly implementing Method into their business and seeing the benefits of doing so.

Having been in the IT and software business as long as I have, I am used to seeing the different stages a company goes through when implementing new software into their business. The process can be very exciting and scary at the same time but in the end, when you start to see the results, it is SO rewarding. I still and probably always will, get a kick out of hearing success stories from community members, who have embraced the power of Method and leveraged it in their business.

To help expedite the learning process with Method, I am excited to announce that starting next week; Method will be hosting Community Webinars. Want to hear the best part? These webinars will be offered FREE of charge.

Each webinar will last approximately 30 minutes every Wednesday at 1:00pm EST and will be taught by one of our very own Business Systems Consultants. New topics will be discussed and we will be recording all of the webinars so in case you miss it, you are able to view it at your leisure.

So how do you stay up to date and join the webinars? Just be sure that you are subscribed to the RSS feed on the Method Blog which you can do by clicking the link below. The RSS feed will notify you whenever a new blog entry is made and will contain the link to the next webinar.

Want to register for the RSS Feed? Click HERE!

Ryan Bell will be teaching the very first webinar this coming Wednesday so lookout for the blog on this webinar to be release shortly.

Cheers,

Danny Do Couto
Method Integration

Demo: Customization - get your creative juices flowing

Method_Paul — Fri, 09 May 2008 11:59:00 GMT

We're back in Toronto now, after our visits to the Intuit offices in Plano and Tucson. Though we'll miss the TexMex & Mexican feasts and catching up with other Intuit Developer partners, it is good to be back home. Based on the feedback we received from Intuit staff, Method is in for quite a ride over the next year, as the business problems it will solve for QuickBooks users are far reaching to say the least.

As promised, here is the next set of movie tutorials. I broke it up into 3 parts, each about 10 minutes.

PART 1: Customization Overview
Introduction into the built-in features of grids, and overview of each customization area of Method:
http://www.methodintegration.com/blogmovies/MethodMovie2/MethodMovie2.htm

PART 2: Creating your own 'Customer Contact' table and screen
Here I create a very simple screen that tracks phone calls in from customers. I show how to create a table and fields, and how to customize the screen it created:
http://www.methodintegration.com/blogmovies/MethodMovie3_CreateTable/MethodMovie3_CreateTable.htm

PART 3: Creating Actions for the Save button
This is where things get more fun. In this movie I create an action that looks at which employee the Customer Contact was assigned to, figures out their email address, and sends them an email letting them know that a customer contact has been assigned to them. This touches on "actions", what an "Action Result" is, and how to use the "Retrieve Value From Table" action.
http://www.methodintegration.com/blogmovies/MethodMovie4_Actions/MethodMovie4_Actions.htm