DataDirect Middleware Speeds Access to Backend Data and Supports Donor Self-Service System
For non-profit organizations, the Web has become a powerful and efficient means for fund-raising. The September 11 terrorist attacks on America spurred online giving to record levels, reported many organizations, such as the American Red Cross.
Save the Children, a child development and relief organization that provides stet medical treatment, and community development support on four continents, has been revamping its Web site to capitalize on this opportunity. Based in Westport, Connecticut, the non-profit organization has been redesigning its Web site, and integrating it with legacy backend databases to enable the site to provide more services to existing and potential donors, while enhancing the organization's operational efficiency.
Linking Web and Backend
In planning its Web site redesign and Web/backend integration project, Save the Children implemented a variety of new technology components. IBM's WebSphere Java-based application server provides the Java infrastructure for the Web site. Microsoft SQL Server databases reside on the middle-tier layer, capturing data from the Web site. And IBM's Host Publisher and DB2 databases reside on the back-end for data analysis.
In designing this multi-tiered infrastructure, a major challenge for Save the Children was to create a distributed Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) environment that could integrate, access and write transactions to its SQL Server databases. These databases contain all the details about children available for donor sponsorship, including pictures.
In working with IBM, Save the Children learned about DataDirect Technologies and its market-leading Java database connectivity products. After just one call into DataDirect Technologies, Save the Children decided to evaluate DataDirect SequeLink Java to provide data connectivity between WebSphere and Save the Children's SQL Server databases. The implementation went smoothly, and now SequeLink Java plays a vital role in Save the Childen's Web system integration. SequeLink Java is a complete, end-to-end middleware solution that includes a single JDBC driver for accessing data across multiple database systems. Endorsed by Sun Microsystems, SequeLink Java supports the latest JDBC specification and the J2EE platform.
SequeLink Java serves as the critical link between Save the Children's WebSphere-enabled donation Web site and its SQL Server databases. Ultimately, SequeLink provides fast and reliable connectivity between the two systems.
With the integrated system, visitors on the Web site (www.savethechildren.org) access Save the Children's SQL Server databases in real time. Transactions, such as signing up to sponsor a child, are written to the databases via SequeLink in a matter of seconds. And donors can pull up their account information instantly to check the status of a donation, saving a phone call to the organization.
In a nutshell, site visitors can pull up the site and sign in, begin sponsoring a child, make a donation, check their donation history, change their payment preferences and other tasks. "SequeLink Java is helping us do all of that," said Robert Taulty, manager of systems and operations at Save the Children. "It's a key part of our overall solution to bring everything to the Web in a more real-time fashion. This is all-brand-new; we've never done this before."
The new "self-service" Web site and backend integration is a major part of a whole Customer Relationship Management initiative at Save the Children, explained Brian Anderson, a marketing executive at the relief organization. "The new integrated Web site will provide three major benefits to us," he said.
First, the new Web self-service system will reduce customer service costs, as most telephone calls today received today are for donors checking on the status of their donations. And donors now will be keying in much information that formerly required data entry by Save the Children staff.
Second, the user experience will be better, as donors will be able to receive nearly instantaneous access to their information, as well as essentially real-time confirmation of their donations or of other transactions, such as an e-mail they sent to a sponsored child.
Third, said Anderson, the new system will enable faster collection of money and speedier disbursement of funds to the field offices around the world, which ultimately get services and aid to sponsored children and projects.
SequeLink Future-Proofs the Donation Web Site
In addition to enabling fast writing of transactions to SQL Server databases, SequeLink includes several other powerful features, such as client administration capabilities that reduce configuration errors and multiple levels of security to protect the integrity of transactions flowing through the organization and over the Internet. SequeLink also supports ODBC and ADO/OLE DB data access standards. But the two most important features for Save the Children are SequeLink's scalability and reliability. Designed as an enterprise middleware solution, SequeLink can scale to accommodate thousands of concurrent users, ensuring Save the Children that all online donors will be able to access the donation Web site at any time, no matter how many other users are visiting.
Save the Children executives are expecting the new Web site to produce enormous benefits for the organization, its donors, and ultimately for the children who are served around the world. "This whole process shortens the distance between donor and child," said Taulty, who is pleased with the role that SequeLink Java is playing in the new Web system. "DataDirect's SequeLink Java has done a lot of things so far, and it's going to do more."
