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BookWriter™ Professional Bookselling Software
Development has resumed on BookWriter Professional and will continue as time and resources permit to deliver a quality finished product. Further announcements will be forthcoming as events progress.
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GENERAL INFORMATION
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FULL SCREEN DISPLAYS
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BookWriter Professional is a complete bookselling environment, taking booksellers to the next level of productivity. The program offers inventory, database and contact management, wants, accounting, composition and upload features for the professional book seller. Nearly four years in the making, BwPro is a next-generation, multi-purpose tool combining the best features of our legacy software, plus input from book sellers around the world. It offers a host of innovative new capabilities targeted specifically at reducing the number of steps required to accomplish critical business tasks. Major features include:
- Fully-integrated Inventory management with image support.
- Configurable ISBN Lookup capability for rapid data entry.
- Price Comparison feature for competitive sales management.
- Fully-integrated Contact management with USPS-address validation.
- Multiple-database capability allows multiple-business uses.
- Advanced data entry capabilities reduce steps, save time.
- Integrated Invoicing, Purchase Orders and Custom Reporting.
- Upload-on-Demand© sends records to multiple destinations.
- Dozens of utilities including integrated Backup/Restore.
- Integrates with BookWriter Web™, automatically updates web site.
- Imports records directly from Homebase™ and other databases.
- Built-in support for Book Prices Realized™
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BwPro can be configured in a variety of ways and the desktop area can be customized. You can have as many or as few windows open at once as you like. Here are just a few samples:
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BookWriter Professional provides the freedom to conduct your book selling activities however you choose. Aside from its extensive Inventory, Wants, Contact Management and Accounting features, BwPro manipulates data in ways that are very difficult or even impossible to accomplish with other software — particularly in one program.
A good example is BwPro's Upload-on-Demand© system. When uploading to multiple locations, BwPro not only handles the login, FTP upload and logout for each location, but it also automatically formats each upload file according to the individual requirements of each destination. This means that each file is as each location expects and needs it to be — data integrity is assured. You can combine, substitute and/or intelligently truncate records fields as needed. Send a UIEE file to Alibris, a delimited file to Amazon, and a new batch of composed web pages and images to your own web site -- all with a single click.
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VERSATILE, EASY TO USE, SCALABLE
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There are several core design elements that set BwPro apart from other online selling programs. One of these is its multiple-database capability. As many databases can be created as you like. Within each database, you can set up an individual set of field names and define personal & business identities, custom reporting and all other fundamental components that comprise a business. Inventory, Contacts, Wants and Accounting are all handled on a per-database basis. Thus, you can use one program to sell books, antiques, stamps, beanie babies, industrial equipment — whatever you like, in multiple locations!
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A great deal of effort has gone into organizing BwPro such that the controls most likely to be used in any area are readily available. You seldom have to hunt and peck through menus to find what you need. We've found through trial-and-error with real booksellers that imposing the least possible number of steps is by far the most productive way to get things done. This may seem obvious, but it's surprising how few programs take this into account during user interface design.
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EMPOWERMENT MEANS FREEDOM
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For many sellers, listing their inventory through multiple sales venues like Amazon, Alibris, AbeBooks and others means an ever-increasing burden of fees, restrictions and competition. Booksellers are frequently required to jump through a myriad of hoops to service their sales venues, often using programs not well-suited to the tasks. And, an increasing number of sellers are offering their books both directly to their own customers and through their own independent web sites — which must also be serviced and maintained. Needless to say, these activities can eat up time quickly, sometimes leaving the seller feeling frustrated and exhausted.
 
Your time is your most precious commodity. Ultimately, the value of any sales venue must be measured by the revenue derived for the resources expended to service it. Doing this effectively means having the right tools for the job at your fingertips.
BookWriter Professional empowers booksellers by providing features designed specifically for booksellers. These include Hit List capabilities, Multi-Level Sorting, Global Editing, Instant Zip Code Lookups, Book Data Entry Wizard, a full-featured Document Editor, Invoices, Purchase Orders, Customized Reports, ISBN Lookup and Price Comparison features, Upload-On-Demand, extensive built-in context-sensitive Help with index and search capabilities — and more!
All of BookWriter Professional's features are intended to help improve productivity and make the most of your valuable time. You'll find ways of doing things you never imagined. You can implement your own simple procedures and follow them repetitively, or explore the full scope of possibilities. And, BwPro interacts seamlessly with all other BookWriter modules under development, including Auction Management, POS and BookWriter Web. This dynamic interaction provides unprecedented freedom to compose virtually any kind of file or document on demand, as well as manage your online inventory and offerings.
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ADAPTABILITY YIELDS PRODUCTIVITY
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The ability to adapt to different business requirements is a key design component. For example, BookWriter Pro is network-compatible right out of the box. This means you never need to worry about paying an inflated price for a network-compatible version — the same database can be shared by multiple users across a network (the database will be located in a folder designated as a shared resource in a designated host computer). One person can be doing data entry on a laptop, another can be composing and e-mailing catalogs, another can be performing accounting, and still another can be doing record maintenance and updating. Or, multiple users can be working in multiple databases. It all depends on your environment and your business needs.
BwPro contains special utilities which can potentially save thousands of hours of work. For instance, the ISBN Extractor tool scans all your records, locates and extracts any ISBN codes you've previously entered in other description fields, validates the ISBN's using Modulo-11 math, and populates the dedicated ISBN field in each record. Try doing that by hand! Still another utility converts HomeBase™ Tagged Data directly into UIEE format for distribution to multiple sales venues. Still another converts UIEE files into tab-delimited formats. Or, convert old BookMate™ Preview files into UIEE. You can also import and export data in multiple formats, at will.
On the technical side, all BookWriter software is designed to be as stable and reliable as possible. There are minimal dependencies on Microsoft and 3rd-party libraries. Downward compatibility is assured — you won't have to buy a new computer just to be able to run it. BookWriter is stable on everything from Windows 95 all the way through the latest Windows operating systems. Even Apple/Mac users can generally run BookWriter in O/Sx Windows Emulators without difficulty. And, BookWriter is designed to operate as a stand-alone program — this is not a "thin client" that relies on a full-time Internet connection and a distant server to perform its tasks. Your database records reside on your computer and YOU have control.
Users of our legacy software (BookMaster™, BookMate™, Record Manager™ and others) will happily discover that not only will all of their existing book data and accounting records be preserved, but no import is required to work with the new software — simply select the legacy database and BookWriter intelligently reads it and performs all transitions in the background, prompting you only when needed to make decisions. There is no loss of data and most field sizes have been expanded, offering a much broader range of data-manipulation and compositional capabilities.
Finally, BookWriter Professional interfaces seamlessly with BookWriter Web to compose documents, web pages or even a complete web site from your records. You can even update your site automatically as part of the upload process, or do it separately — whatever works best for you.
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SCREEN SHOTS
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Inventory Management
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Contact Management
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Wants Management
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Accounting & Reports
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Composition & Production
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Uploading
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Tools & Utilities
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Help & Support
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Click on any area above to see some sample dialogues. Please note these are PRELIMINARY views of portions of the entire program. Additional features are being added as each area is finalized.
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TAKE THE TOUR
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The fundamental premise driving BookWriter is that your time is valuable! A bookseller's day should not be squandered performing repetitive, tedious computer-related tasks mandated by selling venues, using programs not really designed for those tasks. We do not pretend that BookWriter Pro is a magic bullet solution to all conceivable issues you'll encounter in your online selling and in-store sales and marketing activities. But, we believe it will take you three giant steps closer to achieving real productivity — and maybe even make it enjoyable!
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See for yourself how BookWriter Professional can address your needs in one, comprehensive, easy-to-use database & composition package...
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