Athletes Not the Only Ones Highly Trained and Going for Gold in Sydney; VuePoint and Carlson Marketing Group ensure employees are ready for 2000 Olympic Games.

Business Editors/Hi-Tech Writers

LONG ISLAND, N.Y. & MINNEAPOLIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 25, 2000

VuePoint, a comprehensive e-learning company with a business savvy approach, and Carlson Marketing Group, the world leader in Relationship Marketing, utilize the power of e-learning to train 500 employees to provide "gold medal" client service during the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney.

Carlson Marketing Group is the world's largest Olympic services agency and has been hired by 21 companies, including IBM and Kodak, to maximize their Olympic sponsorships during the 2000 Summer Games. VuePoint's Learning System (VLS) 2.0 software ensured Carlson Marketing Group's employees left for Sydney as finely tuned and trained as any Olympic athlete.

"With half of our employees in Australia and the other half throughout the United States, VLS allowed us to train all of our employees without flying them halfway around the world," said Alain Thiry, vice president, Event and Sports Marketing, Carlson Marketing Group. "Using VLS 2.0, we were able to give our employees a superior training program and saved both time and money in the process. One of the keys to providing world class service for our clients and their guests is premium employee training."

"We also linked VLS to MyWorkLinkSM," said Ira Kasdan, vice president of Employee Marketing, Carlson Marketing Group. "MyWorkLinkSM is Carlson Marketing's Group's groundbreaking modular, Web-based solution for improving employee engagement, performance and company profits. Carlson Marketing Group and VuePoint have been working together to bring the benefits of e-learning to corporations, and this just another example of our great relationship."

"We were looking for a leading edge partner and an innovative way to train our people so we could provide world class service to our clients and their guests," added Kasdan. "By using VLS 2.0, our employees could learn all of the subject matter - which included how to manage 30,000 Olympic guests and process 300,000 tickets - in hours rather than days. Saving us and our clients, a tremendous amount of time and money."

The new VLS 2.0 version adapts to each learner to create a unique experience and thereby increase knowledge transfer and retention. The system personalizes learning by giving users the option to test out of subject matter they already know and focus on areas of need.

"The Olympics are the stage on which the best in the world can shine," said VuePoint CEO and founder Ara Ohanian. "Through our premium software and services, VuePoint and Carlson Marketing Group have worked to ensure that this is true not only on the field but also behind the scenes."

Carlson Marketing Group also had the opportunity to benefit from a recently developed Offline Viewer feature that allows users to learn anytime or anywhere. Developed in response to customer feedback as a way to deliver knowledge to mobile workers, the Offline Viewer gives a learner the option of taking a course while traveling on a plane or even hiking in the Australian Outback.

Not only does the VuePoint system provide a personal experience and allow employees to learn at their own pace, Carlson Marketing Group and VuePoint worked together to design a system that automatically rewards high-scoring employees with gifts such as sweatshirts, hats, and debit cards.

Beginning last January, three separate VLS courses were rolled out one by one to allow time for employees to fully learn the content, rather than just memorize the answers. The first, entitled "Challenge of the Pentathlon," taught Carlson Marketing Group employees the history of the Olympic Games.

The second course, released in June, familiarized employees with company-specific information - such as culture, corporate history and expectations of Carlson Marketing Group - about its 21 Olympic clients. The third course, released in late July and entitled "Countdown to Victory," gave employees final logistical information about the city of Sydney and travel arrangements.

"The games are well underway and we are putting our newly gained knowledge to the test each and everyday," said Thiry. "This is a very important aspect to demonstrating that Carlson Marketing Group's Relationship Marketing expertise is making an impact in the Olympic marketing arena."

Editor's Notes:

VuePoint is a software and professional services company focused on creating competitive organizations through a business-savvy approach to e-learning.

VuePoint Learning System (VLS) incorporates dynamic knowledge management into an e-learning environment and has helped leading organizations such as Deloitte Consulting, 3Com, Carlson Marketing Group, A.T. Kearney and Toyota to achieve speed-to-market advantages, improved productivity, employee retention and streamlined costs.

Incorporated in 1996, VuePoint's management team is comprised of experienced professionals who come from the ranks of global leaders such as Procter & Gamble, KPMG Peat Marwick and Telerate, Inc. (formerly Dow Jones Markets) as well as experts and scholars from the e-learning industry.

Carlson Marketing Group, ranked by Advertising Age magazine as the largest marketing services agency in the U.S., is a Relationship Marketing company with international capabilities that span 23 countries.

The company helps global Fortune 1000 clients improve their sales and profits by designing marketing strategies which create and strengthen relationships with the audiences its clients depend on for success: employees, channel partners and consumers.

Carlson Marketing Group is one of the major operating groups of Carlson Companies, Inc., a $31 billion company consistently recognized by Fortune magazine as one of the largest privately held corporations in the U.S. Corporate headquarters are located in Minneapolis, Minn.