However, the group also receives updated information from public sector contacts, as well as consumers and small businesses, in faxes and voice mail. Staff members manually enter these into Microsoft Access, which then automatically populates the SQL Server database. We don't have to worry about updating four or five different systems. Through Brooktrout's Show N Tel software, Earth's 911 also has set up voice mailboxes for approximately 200 organizations, agencies, and communities around the country. Visitors to the voice hot line leave messages in their community's mailbox and then those communities receive the messages and respond directly to their consumers.
Visitors can also send messages to their communities through e-mail to the Web site.
Earth's 911 also uses Microsoft Exchange to send customized updates to its 4,000 partners to let them know about new programs and services, in addition to requesting information on how the local groups are supporting new programs. Before installing Microsoft BackOffice, the groups either faxed or mailed the updates, which took a considerable amount of time and paper. Tracking Success Because the system can track where people go on the system and the information they download, analysts can look at the time and dates that users accessed the information and get an idea of the response to specific programs. Analysts can then report those results to the local communities so they know what the public response was and how they can use it to improve their own outreach efforts. Tracking results also allows the organization to expand or contract capacity to meet the demands of certain peak promotional periods.