About

William Elvis Sloan, founder of Sloan Valve Company and the inventor of the Flushometer was born in Liberty, Missouri. After serving as an apprentice pipe fitter, he traveled to Chicago and became a foreman, a superintendent, and finally, an independent contractor. Through intense self-education, Mr. Sloan developed a superior knowledge of electrical circuitry and hydraulics, which led to a total of 64 inventions during his long, productive life.  Among these were a relay booster for telegraph lines and a fire-safety curtain for theaters.

Mr. Sloan then developed the idea for the Royal Flushometer with its revolutionary design and ingenious simplicity. The Royal is a diaphragm-type valve and was the original product of Sloan Valve Company when the business was established in 1906. It is still the largest selling Flushometer in the Sloan line (literally millions are in use throughout the world). While there have been many refinements and improvements in component parts over the years, the working principle and fundamental hydraulic design have not changed.

Challenge

Sloan Valve’s greatest challenge was allowing content creators to create and manage their information. In the past, IT was the sole editor/contributor of content for the sites.  This proved to be less than efficient, as resources were lean and created delays in content time-to-market.

Inefficiency increased as new products were introduced calling for additional marketing initiatives to support the launch of products. It was difficult for IT at Sloan Valve to coordinate the creation of traditional marketing materials (i.e. brochures, magazine advertisements, etc.) through the online Web site. Additionally, content was inconsistent with regard to its look and feel as it was not controlled by a true system.

Content for the Sloan Valve Web site was created by several people consisting of internal employees as well as external marketing companies.  Information was emailed with detailed instructions on how it should look and feel.  The webmaster who was responsible for adding new technical functionality to the Web site, would update the site upon receipt of information.

Prior to Implementing the RedDot Content Manager Server (CMS), Sloan Valve experienced the following challenges:

• Sloan needed content creators to manage their own information
• The Webmaster was the only person who was able to update content to the site resulting in a  content bottleneck
• Workflow functionality was needed to ensure proper approval of information internally and through third party contributors

Solution

Sloan Valve’s goal was to quickly enhance the Web site to create a product specific site that would support new products being launched to the public. The site is approximately 40 pages and rapidly growing. It is updated daily.

“RedDot was selected after serious considerations of several different CMS platforms,” said Sultan Ghahtani, Web site Manager, Sloan Valve Company.  “The main decision factors were based on effective customer service, stable platform, ease of use and strong recommendations from independent research groups.”

By implementing RedDot’s Content Management Server (CMS), Sloan Valve was able to release a product site quickly and efficiently. “Content was created by our external communications company, and was seamlessly approved through the RedDot workflow functionality by Sloan’s marketing director and product director, which allows the IT department to focus their efforts on technical development of the site,” said Ghahtani.

The team at RedDot quickly embraced Sloan Valve’s situation and RedDot’s CMS solution quickly addressed their issues by:

• Providing workflow functionality that streamlines the information approval process increasing business productivity
• Eliminating webmaster bottleneck, enabling timely posting of information
• Ease of use so strong that any person on the team, regardless of technical experience, could master RedDot’s CMS

Results

The launch was an extremely successful experience. Sloan will use RedDot for all future Web sites, as well as migrate the existing corporate site (about 4,000 pages) to the RedDot platform. Due to RedDot’s simple method for managing content, and the control the system has over how content will look via the use of templates and style sheets, content is consistent throughout the site.

The marketing team works directly with the site designer to create exciting, informational content. The external communications company updates the site with the proper approval workflow, freeing the webmaster to enhance the site technically.

Upon implementing RedDot CMS, Sloan Valve quickly experienced the following Return on Investment (ROI):

• RedDot is saving Sloan Valve 75% in time savings in comparison to the methods previously used to manage online information
• Users were quickly able to adopt the system which gave them immediate ownership of content
• Content and company branding are consistent throughout the site due to Sloan’s RedDot workflow functionality and seamless use of templates and style sheets
• The simplification of managing content has increased the efficiency of business processes