Boca Computer Explains Web Design

Web design is such a huge factor in a successful web site. If the site is confusion or too flashy, you will lose customers. On the same token, if it’s dull and boring, customers will not be impressed either. There is a happy medium that only a professional web design company understand.
There are several reasons that you should design your site for your VISITOR rather than for appearance. Consider the below key points when designing your site:

Web Design

If you think about your web design for your visitors, all of the pieces will come together easily. The most important piece of design advice is to keep it simple and to the point (yet not dull and boring). Don’t distract customers from seeing the main product or service that you’re trying to sell.
Design your site so that every aspect supports your underling point – not takes away from it.

Images

Images directly affect your page download time. Customers are impatient and will leave it if takes more than a few seconds to download.  As with design, don’t clutter your site with images. This is distracting and unprofessional. Images should be the appropriate length and format – allowing fast downloading!

Construction

Construction basically means “Navigation Friendly” or “User Friendly” Your site should be constructed so your customer or visitor can easily navigate and browse your individual pages.

Web Design by Boca Computer

Fleet GPS Tracking Simplifies the Trucking Industry

Many companies are under the impression that they must have a huge shipping company in order to benefit from Fleet GPS Tracking programs. This simply isn’t true. These days, if your fleet consists of even two or three vehicles, you can still help your company by looking into Fleet Tracking solutions.

If you own a company (or manage a company) that has two or more vehicles, keeping track of this fleet is a huge factor. Especially if you are in the delivery or service industry. When drivers utilize their fleet GPS tracking in your vehicles, you can modify and customize delivery routes to better service your customers.

Not only does Fleet GPS Tracking programs help you to simplify driving routes, it also helps you keep an eye on your drivers. For example, if a truck has been sitting idle for too long, you are notified and able to access the situation. Fleet managers have the benefit of knowing where each truck is, at all times of the day or night. 

We have discussed simplifying routes and correcting drivers, however something that may not have crossed your mind is safety. Safety issues are a major concern for fleet managers and law enforcement agencies. Fleet GPS tracking is a valuable tool to help keep track of mileage, maintenance, and state regulations for each of your fleet vehicles. The biggest safety benefit? Most insurance companies will lower insurance costs if you are using a Fleet GPS Tracking program.

Fleet GPS Tracking Program

Fleet Manager Tips & Advice

Hiring a Qualified Fleet Manager
Whether you have a huge fleet, or just a small fleet, the future of that fleet depends solely on the fleet manager. This is a huge responsibility. This means that hiring the right manager is a necessity. The resume should be filled with multi-tasking abilities, experience and the ability to handle stressful situations.  The duties of a fleet manager are endless. They include keeping in contact with every vehicle, seeing to it that the deliveries or appointments are met on time, vehicles are maintained, insurance and liability costs are reasonable and more.
Assistance with Fleet GPS Tracking Technology
In recent years, the fleet management has been enhanced by companies such as Driver’s Alert. Driver’s Alert released a top of the line Fleet GPS Tracking program which has been used by huge fleet companies. Fleet managers benefit greatly by using tracking programs. With the help of one program, managers can keep an eye on every vehicle, locate problem areas, reduce insurance rates. Such technology can also guide any driver to locate the most efficient route to their destination, from the help of the technology he can avoid the traffic and choose the alternative route.  Fleet GPS Tracking also releases an alert if there are chances of accident.
Vehicle Maintenance
On top of all of these tasks, fleet managers are generally also responsible for vehicle maintenance. In fact, this is one of the most important areas. If vehicles aren’t maintained properly, you risk accidents or vehicles breaking down – both of which are extremely expensive. Vehicle tracking programs can help you keep track of which vehicle is due for maintenance as well as help to reduce fuel consumption per week.

Fleet GPS Tracking

Fleet GPS Tracking Program by Driver's Alert: Scott's LawnService

I was very impressed with the work that Driver's Alert did for Scott's Lawnservice. I decided to share! 

 The Company

Scotts LawnService is a full service professional lawn and landscape company specializing in the area of fertilization, weed/pest control, and landscape services. The company currently deploys approximately 1,200 service delivery vehicles from 84 branches located throughout the United States. The company offers a wide variety of services such as lawn, tree and shrub fertilization, weed control, pest control (lawn and in home), aerations, over seeding, and landscaping services included mulching, edging, and irrigation systems.

The Challenge

At Scotts LawnService all at-fault vehicle accidents are viewed as unacceptable. Most service delivery vehicles are considerably larger and heavier than other vehicles on the road.  Additionally, the weight, and thus the handling of the vehicle changes throughout the day so development of safe driving habits are critical to allow the drivers to react to constantly changing road and traffic conditions.  Lastly, the service vehicles travel within neighborhoods where pedestrians and children are encountered.  Training techniques, such as video and workbook training and commentary drives, were not sufficient in significantly reducing the number of accidents to management’s satisfaction.  The company acknowledges that associates have developed routine driving habits over time and that some of these habits can lead to accidents. The company further realizes that these habits will continue or worsen until they are identified, the associate is retrained on the acceptable performance standard, and the associate is held accountable for their at-risk behavior. If this problem could not be solved, unsafe driving patterns would continue as well as unnecessary and costly accidents and injuries. Although the company’s toll free number was displayed on our trucks, calls concerning the drivers were infrequent and did not allow the feedback to be tracked back to a specific vehicle, branch or driver.
The company realized that the only way to identify the driver’s unsafe driving habits was to implement a program that would make it easy for neutral third party observers (other motorists) to report unsafe driving incidents.

The Solution

In July of 2008, Jason Johantges, Manager of EHS&S Scotts LawnService and I spoke with Gina Lee, Senior Vice President Customer Relations. She explained in great detail how she felt Driver’s Alert could assist us with meeting our fleet safety needs. Jason and I were impressed with the features of the Driver’s Alert system and how they seemed to support the development of a more robust fleet safety program and overall contribution to driving the safety culture in the branches.
Gina Lee worked tirelessly with us to get the program up and running, while educating us on the system and the many benefits it provided. We found it extremely insightful to listen to the calls as they were received from the call center. It allowed us to identify with the emotion of the caller as well as use first hand descriptions to investigate the location of the call and validate the authenticity of the alleged incident.
Additionally, the training courses have been extremely beneficial by increasing driver awareness and with helping to change habits by setting specific performance expectations. Each course is assigned based on each incident cause.  Additionally, the training courses have been used proactively by assigning training to the drivers to address negative trends, increase awareness and alter behaviors prior to receiving a call from the public.
The reporting tools are robust and easy to use. They allow us to identify the leading causes of calls by branch, region or division. We can quickly identify at-risk branches to schedule visits, and identify repeat offenders within these branches.

The Results

Within the first 60 days of launching a new comprehensive fleet safety training program that utilized the Driver’s Alert program as a key management tool, Scotts LawnService began to experience a shift in driver behavior in the field. The drivers began to see management’s commitment to safe driving when they were assigned immediate training on their incidents and were held accountable for their at risk behaviors and as well as receiving coaching on future expectations. The drivers also began to realize that the other motorists had expectations of their driving behaviors now that calls were being made to Driver’s Alert to report unsafe driving incidents.

Fleet GPS Tracking