Appello Chooses Array to Power their forms

Appello were using Microsoft Dynamics CRM for data capture with their customers. However Dynamics was presenting a fundamental problem for Appello as it did not help them mobilize their field team and the cost to give the whole team access to the services it needed was too high.

How Array met Appello specific needs as a business wanting to integrate a data capture solution into their current CRM platform

The Array platform offered a scalable low-cost solution to Appello data capture needs, with powerful yet simple-to-use forms which could be built and configured by non-technical staff. The API offered by Array was straightforward to integrate into Appello Dynamics environment. The flexibility of Array means that Appello  now have the capability of capturing data directly into Dropbox, pulling the data via the API, and have configured PDF’s of the captured data. Appello  have also handed Array forms over to thier customers who find it simple to use, and yet the branding options of the web application make it look like an in‑house product.

Apello usage results:

“Field staff are able to submit data which is written into an Excel spreadsheet which is in use by the back- office staff supporting the field team. An integration sees the data submitted to Array, and then an automated process reads the data via the Restful API and pushes the data directly into our database. The flexibility of integrations coupled with the branding and styling of the web application have give the business a cost-effective portal which looks and feels like a mature application developed in-house, yet in reality was just a few mouse-clicks from conception to delivery.” 

“The flexibility of Array integrations has enabled the business to integrate data in a number of different ways"

Chris Hind

The result of implementing Array as a data management system and what it means for Appello daily work processes

Appello field staff use Array data capture forms for a number of different types of application. One of the best features for Appello is the combination of conditional routing, and being able to make fields mandatory. This ensures that the minimum set of data is always captured on the form, since the form cannot be submitted without it. Appello is now able to self-serve password resets which removes the overhead of IT support staff who were initially worried about the adoption of a new platform, but it has not required in any additional work on their behalf.

There were two alternatives to using Array: either payment of the user license fee to Microsoft for Dynamics access, or to build an in-house version of Array and use that as a front-end to the database. Both would have required a significant cost far beyond the Array license fee, and the Array feature set is far more comprehensive than either of these solutions could have offered.