Background
Megan Fox Kelly Art Advisory offers a wide range of services for private collectors as well as artist estates and foundations, including market advice, acquisitions and sales, strategic planning, collection management, and appraisals.
Challenge
Megan and her team began using FileMaker because off-the-shelf solutions she reviewed were inadequate to address her specific needs.
When Macktez first entered the picture, each of the collections MFK managed was siloed into a separate FileMaker database. This protected clients’ privacy and kept their data secure, but created redundant development work anytime a change was needed that applied to all clients (such as an update to the way her reports were formatted or delivered). As MFK’s business grew, updating every FileMaker file separately became extremely cumbersome.
It was also inefficient and frustrating to navigate as an administrator, because research done for one client’s appraisal could not be referenced for another.
And as it was initially set up, clients did not have the option for real-time access to their live data. Megan wanted to make sure that if a client wanted more direct access, that was available in a secure environment. (Megan was clear in directing this part of development: “security is very important to us and to our clients.”)
Solution
Macktez’s approach was to emphasize security, scalability, and functionality, by:
- consolidating data from separate FileMaker files into one database;
- building new permissions profiles to make sure that clients had access to only their data, while MFK consultants could see across their entire portfolio; and
- enabling FileMaker’s built-in web hosting so that clients could have access to their own collections through a password-protected web portal.
At the same time, Jay Ivan, Macktez’s senior developer, worked closely with Megan to make sure that the user interface matched her aesthetic goals, and created an environment for clients that matched MFK’s carefully curated brand.
Macktez also addressed the back-end infrastructure with a new server and backup solution to boost the database’s performance metrics and provide more durable and redundant backups for data retention.
Results
Jay describes the project for MFK as a chance to “bring best practices to a custom database solution” and at the same time to “adhere to a client’s core values and aesthetics.”
Megan agrees that the updates to her collections system have had an impact: “The database streamlines our client work across the business.”
Since the initial system upgrade, Macktez has continued to make updates to the solution as needed, including enhancements to invoicing and ongoing maintenance of the platform, operating system, and backup routines.
