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We offer a range of workflow & data management consulting services to help businesses increase their profits and efficiency by working smarter, faster and with fewer errors. From developing custom FileMaker databases to recommending changes to process, we’ve been helping businesses and organizations run smoother since 2006.
The key to an organization’s efficiency is having workflows without bottlenecks and redundancy. An organization can have the best custom software money can buy and still run inefficiently if the software is designed around inefficient processes.
The reason that many organizations continue to have inefficient workflows even after they’ve implemented their own improvements is because it’s difficult to have the objective of an outsider when you’re on the inside.
We provide that “fresh set of eyes” that recognize inefficiencies that escape notice by insiders. We perform analyses without any preconceived notions. We ask questions. Our perspective isn’t clouded by the “this is how we’ve always done it” trap that’s so common in workflows it’s become cliche.
We started off as a FileMaker consulting business in 2006 and it’s still our go-to favorite for building robust database solutions that can be quickly modified as needs change. Our projects have ranged from simple apps to keep track of memberships to complex databases that are mission critical to global corporations.
We build FileMaker solutions for speed, ease of use and reliability. In addition to the skills you should expect from a professional FileMaker consultant, we also have experience with uncommon requirements such as localization (language specific to the user), right-to-left language display (e.g., Hebrew, Arabic), and automated error reporting and nightly data integrity checks that ensure that complex transactions have completed successfully.
Did we also mention that we design user interfaces that are super-intuitive and easy on the eyes?
We’ve been building simple relational databases with Airtable since 2016 and we’ve found it to be the perfect platform when an organization’s database needs are simple. In fact, we use it in-house in conjunction with our FileMaker databases to help manage our projects.
If the data needs within your organization are as varied as ours you may find that an Airtable database is the perfect solution for simple data needs while your FileMaker database handles its more demanding needs.
Let us know how your organization would like to streamline working with data and we’ll let you know if Airtable would be a good option.
Whether you need to work with live data from a mySQL or Oracle database directly from FileMaker or manage your MailChimp data directly from Airtable, we can make it happen.
Integrations between databases and apps can provide some of the biggest bangs for the buck for your organization.
Do you want to create invoices in Quickbooks directly from FileMaker? We can do it. Create brochures in InDesign with a click of a button in FileMaker? Check that one off the list too.
We’re proficient in setting up integrations using ODBC connections, API calls, plugins, and integration services like Claris Connect and Zapier. If it can be done there’s a good chance we’ve either done it or can figure out how to do it.
There’s been a seismic shift in the past few years in how businesses and organizations deal with servers. The trend has been to move away from in-house servers to cloud hosting, and for good reason. It’s often less expensive than having physical server machines in-house and cloud hosting services like Amazon make server setup and management easier and less time consuming.
Let us take care of setting up and managing your FileMaker Server for you on AWS.
We believe that the quality and value from a service provider can be measured in large part by the level of support they provide. Our own experiences have shaped our philosophy of what good support looks like.
We know from experience that the best way to become someone’s trusted advisor is to earn that trust and one of the ways of doing that is providing top quality support. Whether it’s a question about a database we just delivered or reporting a problem that’s impacting your workflow, we understand the importance of getting back to you with an answer or a solution as quickly as possible.
We also provide technical support to Airtable & FileMaker developers, either on an as-needed basis or chunks of prepaid time that’s a better value for developers who anticipate an ongoing need for support.
One minute you’re at your desk, an hour later you’re at a job site or in your warehouse. And your data goes with you.
We can setup your data solution to run on computers in the office and on mobile devices in the field.
This is the question we get asked above all others. And the only correct way to answer it without doing any sort of discovery process beforehand is “It depends.”
Just like a house, a database solution can be tiny or enormous, simple or complex. The best way to get an idea of how much a database solution will cost is to contact us and tell us what you’re trying to accomplish.
Absolutely! We assist in-house developers with their solutions whenever they’re trying to do something that goes beyond their expertise or when it’s crunch time and they need an extra developer to meet a deadline.
Another request we receive frequently is pick up where another developer left off. If this is something you need, drop us a line so we can figure out if
We specialize in FileMaker, but we also develop AirTable databases. Sometimes a simpler AirTable database is all that’s needed to boost efficiency. We can help you figure out if either platform is the best one to meet your needs.
One of the first questions we ask potential customers is why they don’t use something off-the-shelf.
More than once we’ve steered potential customers away from having us build them custom software after we’ve found something that works for them for much less than they’d pay us for custom software.
We’re in business to help businesses, not waste their money.
From a technical standpoint, no. Our customers only need to know about their businesses and the problems they’re trying to solve.
No. No one can make that claim. If they do, run for the door.
Here’s what we do with respect to bugs –
We’re glad you asked because we have an answer you’re going to like.
First, when we build a custom database we do it with extensibility, i.e. the ability to modify it, in mind. We separate data into small tables which not only increases performance, but also provides a certain level of future-proofing.
Second, both FileMaker and Airtable are “low-code” platforms that allow modifications to be made in a fraction of the time compared to other database platforms.
We love diversity! Our data solutions can be setup to run on Mac, Apple mobile devices, Windows and Android.
We grant our customers a perpetual, world-wide, non-exclusive, non-assignable license to use custom apps we build for them for all uses contemplated under under our standard agreement.
In plain English, this usually means that you can do just about anything you want with it except sell it. You’ll have full access to the code in case you decide to have a different developer work on it at some point.
If you’re contemplating having an app built for resale let us know and we can discuss the terms & pricing for that.
Yes, most likely. This is something we always discuss with potential customers.
In order to build custom software to fit an organization’s precise needs and do it well, we need information. Lots of it.
Oftentimes answers to our questions lead to more questions. We try to limit assumptions in order to deliver a product that has the maximum value to our customers’ investments.
We’ve learned from experience that making guarantees like that is too risky. It would mean committing to doing something right and on time when we don’t have any control over a couple of very important factors.
Here’s what we do instead. We let our customers know exactly what deliverables they can expect from us by a certain date on the condition that they fulfill their obligations that we deem necessary for development of the deliverable. One example of an obligation we routinely ask for is for the customer to be available and able to answer our questions in a timely manner (it’s impossible to build anything custom if one doesn’t know what the requirements are).
If everyone lives up to their obligations, history tells us that there’s a very high likelihood that we’ll meet that deadline. But as the COVID-19 pandemic has showed us, all bets are off when the unforeseeable happens.
We’ve built custom FileMaker databases to meet a wide range of needs including ones for managing memberships for non-profits & government agencies, video projects for filmmakers, scheduling for urgent care clinics & temp worker agencies and complex inventory management.
Our most complex project was a custom app that merged text from one external database with digital product photos from another external database, which was then sent to InDesign to produce brochures and also sent to a web server for displaying in web browsers. It was localized for about 20 languages and used by departments on every continent except Antarctica.
