TIDBITS on Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Differences: Dynamics CRM Online vs. Dynamics CRM On-premise

There are some very minor differences between CRM Online and CRM On-Premise that are worth mentioning.

The one that tripped me up yesterday was my inability to import a new report extracted from one of the new accelerators. I was thinking about running a quick test and not thinking about my rule changes in the CRM online world. Doing what I normally would do in one of my test VPC images I moved forward only to be stopped.

You can not upload custom reports into the world of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online.

You can use the Report Wizard, the Power extraction of Dynamic Excel pivot charts and spreadsheets and much, much more so don't go screaming away. Still there are some benefits to having total control of the source.

Getting the Most out of User Groups

I am a firm believer in information shared, information gained and as such over the years I have participated in, created, moderated and invented many a user group. I have also seen both success and failure when it comes to the time invested.

Here are some top tips for really finding that sweet win!

1. It is not just about joining. Time invested = higher returns on the investment

2. Although you might be an incredible wealth of information it is highly likely that most people in the room know something that you do not know. Egos need to be checked in at the door.

3. If you feel like you are constantly offering information and not getting much in return then perhaps you are talking too much :)

4. A user group is not a training session. It is an interactive discuss. Come to the meetings ready to have a conversation.

5. Never hesitate to follow-up after any meetings with those that you met. If you didn't get a specific card or e-mail address reach out to the organizer.

6. If a side conversation was of value  to you, then it might be valuable to the rest of the group. Share.

7. Preparing for a user group meeting by gather tidbits of interest during the week helps jump start a meeting that might consist of a crowd of strangers.

8. The best presentations are the ones where you get to work with real software or solve real problems and the solving is a team activity. Share the keyboard, mouse or choose a driver that gets input from all.

9. Providing pizza and soda tend to be a necessary evil that works ;) 

10. Go ahead and stick your neck out - there are no dumb questions and someone else in the room will be thankful that you asked.

 So you ask what about Microsoft Dynamics CRM User Groups? Are there any available in my area? What do they offer? Can I participate even if there is not a group close to me?

The answers Yes, very possibly, tons of resources and yes! For more details check out CRMUG.

Ah The Cloud

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is in the cloud and was built to run happily in a variety of environments. This includes at the Microsoft data center, through a partner hosted offering (including additional bundled in goodies), within your office or even within a footprint managed by your Microsoft partner of choice.

If you are thinking of organizing your contacts, documenting and managing a process, building on or out your network of people and yet you are not really sure if you want to put all the infrastructure in place. You might dip your foot in the water with the cloud.

Did you know that despite the cloud, your data still integrates and can synchronize with Microsoft Outlook running in your office? I am not talking about Export and Import - I am talking about realtime sync (or close to real time sync). You don't have to do anything other than to get the intial configuration right. 

Driving on the super WWW highway

I was doing a bit of research and review and I was reminded that there is a Dynamics CRM user community. If you have not checked it out lately take a look.

http://crm.dynamics.com/

Bulk Editing

One of the best features of Microsoft Dynamics CRM is Bulk Editing, but the option might not be enabled for your role by default. Certainly you do not want to give the power of bulk edit to everyone, but offering it for the right situation can be very powerful.

For instance if you want to reassign all the leads from a previous employee to a new employee or if you want to mark a selected set of contacts with a new category or classification.

Bulk Edit is a wonderful and yet sometimes unknown feature of Dynamics CRM v3.0

Opportunties

What is an Opportunity?

I have found that the concept of an Opportunity and the Opportunity Record can sometimes be hard to grasp. What my standard line tends to be is that an Opportunity is actually the tracking of the dollar value or the actual "sale". This sale has a potential of close and for any given Account or Contact you can have unlimited opportunities.

One thing to keep in mind with regards to opportunities is how they impact the sales analysis reporting. Consider this when creating an opportunity. Are you comfortable enough with the realistic expectation of close around that opportunity to report it all the way up to perhaps a venture capital team. A team that (even if you assign a 5% probability) would expect those dollars to be considered revenue even at 5%.

If you are dealing with a sales funnel with thousands of prospects I would argue that not every prospect should be classified as an opportunity.  At some point they cross the line, but until that time you don't necessarily want to have a huge dollar value of potential mucking up your weekly reports.

In general people tend to fall on one side or the other in this argument. It is really a matter of style.

What is a Lead?

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM the database contains a table for Leads. Leads are generally classified as UNQUALIFED contacts. A lead could easily not exist in the real world. You purchase a list or you get a list from a trade show. This list contains hundreds of people who no one at your company has had any contact with. This is what would truly be classified as a lead.

Once a call is made and the lead is qualified you would then "Convert" them to a regular Account record/Contact record in the Microsoft Dynamics CRM system. The type on this record would be PROSPECT and as you worked this prospect you might add more and more contacts and/or more and more notes and actions.

Needless to say in most of our historical references LEAD and PROSPECT are interchangable, but in the world of using Microsoft Dynamics CRM the concept of LEAD and PROSPECT are unique and need to be defined based on how your company does business.

Could it be your Anti-Virus

I heard a comment the other day, that McAfee's system for scanning for viruses is a bit tough on it's neighbor, MS Dynamics CRM. I gave up McAfee and Symantec in 1999, because at the time many of my clients keep running into issues with the supported Line of Business application I was working with and these two major vendor products.

Now in the last 5 years Symantec has caused some real issues for the micro-clients. Norton on the desktops can be a very bad neighbor and as such I have had to clean it up more than once. So despite the improvement of applications over time I still hesitate about these two products.

This is a good time to really consider the impact that your bundled security has on your web applications! Including MS Dynamics CRM.

Do you know? If anyone has a link or two on some white papers or articles on this subject please share. I suspect we could nail down some dogs with just a little bit of tuning and knowledge sharing!