GPS Tracking ROI

OK, fellas and gals … the weekend is nearly here, eh?  You know what day that is … that’s the day I always try to publish something interesting to look at … usually involving how to get a better handle on your business’s bottom line and an ROI on GPS tracking.

Today I came across the website of a decent-looking US GPS tracking provider known as S&L Services.  I immediately liked what I saw because unlike so many companies in the industry, SLS provides live demos of their products … no log ins, “email squeezes” and other annoying pushy sales techniques … and they publish their prices.  Refreshing.  Go here: http://70.169.216.3/map.aspx?cid=slservices, ignore the login boxes and click on live demo.  You can hover your mouse over any vehicle and see details on it, with the time mapped to the time zone you are logged in from.

Looking over SLS’s offering brings up something I’ve been meaning to writer about for along time now … update frequency or “ping rates” for vehicles … tune in Monday and I’ll discuss this subject in a little depth.

Happy viewing and enjoy your well-earned weekend.

As always, I welcome comments, disagreement is encouraged, and you can also email me direct at: davestarr (at) gmail (dot) com or call me on 1-719-423-8872. If you liked this article, please subscribe to my RSS feed so you get all my news and views.

I write often about GPS ROI success stories … they aren’t hard to find, just set a Google News Alert for those keywords and you’ll get reports almost every day. Here’s another one, which once again points up my oft-made point that virtually any business or government agency will save, and save big … especially in productivity and reduction in overtime:

“We knew there was additional overtime being booked and that vehicles were being used for private mileage, which concerned us greatly as we couldn’t actually prove it. … we also saw some inefficiencies in the way our van fleet operated – an aspect that would have been impossible to see if not for the clarity of the vehicle tracking system…. “The Remote Asset Management vehicle tracking system is a common sense business tool that is saving us lots of money. It’s safe to say that it pays for itself many times over,”… Read the full release here:

My question for the day is … why do I continually read these reports from companies and agencies overseas and so seldom see similar reports from US entities? You know what shows up day after day in these alerts from the US? Using GPS on the golf course, either with handheld golfing aids or as course management tools on golf carts.

There’s nothing wrong with golf … and you certainly can get an a ROI from tracking golf carts. But there is so much more that could be done and I see so little of it. Do my fellow American businessmen just enjoy wasting $3 a gallon fuel? Do they just consider wasted employee hours as an unavoidable cost of doing business. Do they consider it an acceptable risk to let 90+% of our school children in buses travel unsupervised?

The answer, folks, is not money. If you integrate GPS tracking into your operations you will earn back the investment in less than a year and you’ll reap benefit after benefit in years to come. So what is the reason so many of you won’t position yourself for extra profit?

As always, I welcome comments, disagreement is encouraged, and you can also email me direct at: davestarr (at) gmail (dot) com or call me on 1-719-423-8872. If you liked this article, please subscribe to my RSS feed so you get all my news and views.

David Gow
Tuesday July 10, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

Artist’s impression of a Galileo GPS satellite. Picture: ESA/AFP

A fresh Franco-German row over the funding of Galileo is threatening to derail the EU’s most ambitious project, the €3.6bn (£2.4bn) global positioning satellite system designed to rival the American version, a senior executive in the private sector consortium due to run the system said yesterday.

Olivier Houssin, head of the commercial and security operations of French electronics group Thales, said Europe runs the risk of being left behind in key commercial and military applications by the US, China, Russia and India… more info on this exercise in self-aggrandizement here:

I’ve written several articles (try here, here and here for some background) in the past about the overpriced, over-hyped and (in my view) totally wasteful Galileo program. I may, in fact, have been too hard on French telecom giant Alcatel (what do you call a beltway bandit in France?). I have a distinct dislike for Alcatel mainly because I formerly worked with and was a satisfied customer of innovative companies that Alcatel bought and then killed. Don’t innovate, annihilate ideas … that’s the way to protect yourself in the market. (more…)

I was looking at the web site of a large GPS Tacking organization tonight. Just after I left the business they were doing some partnering with the company whose products I used to handle and I was checking on what they might have rolled out new. They had an excellent little assessment quiz that every business owner ought to take … just 5 questions.

Go ahead, try it, no salesman will call…

Interesting? What part do you think made me chuckle? Yep, the fact that four out of the five questions had an “I don’t know” response. I really ought to dig up some of my old contacts and see if they have any records on how many business owners honestly answer that way.

Honestly? Yep, because if you aren’t measuring with somebody’s tracking system, the “I don’t know” is the only honest response. (more…)

I’ve been a little remiss in the past about aknowledging thos who help me make this blog a success. Some pay money, others help for free and I few I even pay, but they’re well worth their modest fee.

First and foremost, since I just renewed my contract for the coming year, let me thank the great guys at http://www.qualityhostonline.com/ who keep the server for www.satviz.com and my other on-line efforst running flawlessly. The link above, by the way, is not an affiliate or paid link, I wish they did have an affiliate program becuase I’d represnt them in a heartbeat … I read day after day about blooggers with hosting problems and I’m just thankful I havea great hosting company … no “juice” involved, they’re good, they’re inexspensive, they’re responsive to your needs and I recommend them.

Now of course it’s easy for me to say my hosting company is good … it’s just my opinion, right? Well, I don’t operate that way. I spent many years of my life watching over contractors to see to it that they did the job right and make sure they met standards. This is also the way I operate my on line businesses. How many bloggers do you see posting their uptime stats each month? how many even know their uptime stats, for sure? I do, simply becuase you can’t manage what you can’t measure

From: Jun 01 2007 12:00 AM (GMT +8:00)
To : Jul 01 2007 12:00 AM (GMT +8:00)

1. SatViz
- uptime: 100.000%
- downtime: 00min
- outage: 0

I get these stats from a really excellent little company that will be happy to monitor your uptime also …. http://www.hyperspin.com/

Hyperspin monitors any or all of your websites and servers as frequently as you want them scanned, and they do it reliably, from multiple locations around the world, so you’ll know if your readers in one country are having connectivity problems, even though you can see your sites locally. This happened to my good friend Brendon a couple months back and cost the charity he was organizing a fund drive for actual dollars and cents. If you’re on line to make money in any way, it doesn’t pay to let things happen by chance … and since Hyperspin’s service starts out at a free level, you certainly will get a Return On Investment (ROI) if you sign up. Don’t “think” your host is good enough, make sure they are.

Of course if you have a site and you want to be able to make it self supporting, plus make sure your visitors find relevant ads in the same niche you are writing about, you can not go wrong with Google AdSense. I’ve been a satisfied AdSense publisher for years now and I recommend them highly.

If your problem is getting people to notice your product or site, then you need the other side of Google’s solution, AdWords. You pay only for what works and you get results. Click on either the AdSense or AdWord buttons in the sidebar to learn more.

And for a last hurrah, there are a lot of talented and dedicated bloggers out there who have helped and encouraged me selflessly. One, in particular is Yaro Starak who published a great resource this month about making money on line … it’s free and you’ll learn a lot.Click here to download the Blog Profits Blueprint
Yaro is also having some fantatsic success with a real-time mentoring program for those seious about blogging … you can learn more about it here:Click here to join the Blog Mastermind Mentoring Program
Both links are highly recommended

None of these programs and resources however can hold a candle to you, my faithful readers, so thanks ever so much for sticking with me and here’s hoping we have alot of fun in coming months..

Since it is the last day of the month, a big holiday weekend … Canada Day, and the beginning of the US 4th of July celebration … and since I notice alot of people read these “wrap-up” posts to check on what thye may have missed over the past month … (by the way, you cna just click on the big orange “Feed” sybol in the top left corner and subscribe to my RSS feed so that you never miss a single post) here we go with the June wrap-up in reverse chronological order:

June 2007

• 29: A Company Who Offers Real GPS ROI — I Like
• ICOP GPS in-car first responder video … something to seriously consider.
• 28: GPS Isn’t A Solution To Stupidity — Yet Again
• A not-to-bright woman is saved by her GPS cell phone.  privacy issue?
• 27: GPS Sing Along — Hot or Not?
• How not to clutter a car’s dashboard … or maybe you do want one of these.
• 26: The Why, What and How of GPS
• A look at some GPS background and history courtesy of Garmin.  More follows.
• 25: “Morons” — When The Judge Says That, GPS Won’t Help
• Another “Stupid Criminal” story … when burglarizing houses, bring along your GPS.
• 24: GPS, Maps and Medicine — Happy For What I Get
• A doctor proposes innovative uses for maps in medicine … geography awareness.
• 24: Teen GPS — Mini-System Review
• A very nice (and cheap) teen GPS tracker integrated system … looks good.
• 23: Even A Bridge Needs GPS Tracking
• If you’ve ever lost a bridge, you know tracking is important.
• 22: GPS Teen … More Than GPS To Keep Them Safe
• A web site that sells GPS plus many other teen safety items … worth a look.
• 21: Air Mile Radius Maps
• Why you need these maps and how to get Dave to draw you one, free.
• 20: It’s Not Idle To Think About Idling
• How many gallons per month go out the exhaust pipe totally wasted?
• 19: So Are These Guys Being Spied On?
• A contractor “makes his own luck” in winning contracts and keeping jobs … Spying?
• 18: Can You Believe This Guy?
• A business owner explains why he feels GPS helps his business … and employees.
• 17: Keys To The Kingdom #99 … GPS-GIS-Open Source … Maps 2.0?
• Using viral marketing techniques to improve a product, not just sell it.
• 16: The Quiz Answer — How Many Tractors?
• John Deere never saw a single tractor … and other factoids.
• 16: Not GPS But Too Good To Miss
• Hot air for the weekend … experimental lighter thna air
• 15: Australian Readers … Map THIS On Your GPS
• How Australia might have (ought to have?) looked.
• 15: Some More Keys To The Kingdom “Escape” To The Real World
• John Deere shows us how to make overhead imagery and GPS affordable.
• 14: Interesting Map … Not Available (yet) On Your Pocket GPS
• What if your state was afoeign country … who would you be?
• 13: Why GPS Tracking And Maps Are Real Important
• How far can you drive, legally, without a log book?  Surprising answers.
• 13: GPS Tracking And Privacy … Heartwarming
• GPS tracks a herat to give a boy life … still so sure it’s about privacy and goofing off?
• 12: Hours Of Service For Local Drivers …. Why You Need GPS
• So your drivers don’t need a CDL and a logbook.  Home free, eh?  Better read this.
• 11: Don’t Neglect The Legal ROI Of GPS
• How GPS can cut your legal exspense .. there’s more than gas mileage at stake.
• 10: Eye Candy With A Purpose
• Google maps new “Street View” service.  Amazing and useful, too.
• 10: You Don’t Have To Be Aussie To Use GPS … But It Helps
• Some great freeware software and resources from Oz … and a recommended book.
• 09: Does The State Patrol Manage Your Company, Or Do You?
• These guys rely on police to supervise their drivers … whom do you rely upon?
• 08: Hey, Why Not? The US Isn’t Unique In Wasting Government Funds
• France and Alcatel don’t care about expense, as long as it’s not their money.
• 07: There’s More Than One Way To Get ROI From GPS Tracking
• Using GPS to support charity … will it work?
• 06: May 2007 GPS Tracking ROI Round-Up
• Where we traveled last month.
• 05: You’d Be Surprised What _Isn’t_ Being GPS Tracked
• You would think GPS is widely used in Air Traffic Control.  You’d be wrong.
• 04: GPS Tracking of Offenders … Six P’s
• Prior Preparation Prevents Piss-Poor Performance … or maybe six other “P”’s
• 03: Why Those Motorhome Drivers Are Smiling
• Glass dashes, with and without GPS.
• 02: Tracking Air … With or Without GPS
• Tire pressure?  Yep, safety, mileage and more business (and personal)  advantages.
• 01: More “GPS” That Isn’t
• A little about the GIS side of the house and tracking business by Zip Codes.

High-tech navigation devices such as Global Positioning System units specialize in giving directions, but William Folk thinks the GPS gizmos can also help guide high school students to a better understanding of living cells.

Folk, a professor of biochemistry and a senior associate dean for research at the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Medicine, and a small group of colleagues plan to incorporate GPS and other devices into a science curriculum they are developing called Maps in Medicine….

Interesting read here. I’m not 100% clear on the concept of the connection between the way cells “know” their place and how to get to it and the way GPS knows it’s position, but then if I already was, what would there be for professor Folk to teach, eh?

Given the abysmal level of science education most US high school students get steps like Dr. Folk’s plan are to be rewarded, in my view.

GPS and GIS (Geographic Information Systems) can certainly be of great value to the medicine and public health fields in ways beyond cellular (that’s the cells in you body, dude, not the Nokia that’s glued to your ear) behavior. Tracking the domiciles of patients with infectious diseases, locating they mysterious “pockets” where some forms of cancer and birth defects seem to develop, right down to the nitty-gritty aspects of providing better, faster and cheaper emergency medical transport being just a few that come to mind.

map On!