Microsoft Dynamics CRM

CRM Personal Contact Management

CRM software solutions not only manage a business process, they are used to make individual staff members more effective by coordinating activities between users such as scheduling meetings and conferences for example.

When you are considering a CRM software solution consider the following Personal Contact Management features to make the most of it - as a minimum it should include the following:

Private notes and activities

In order for users to manage their schedules you have to allow for personal blocking out of time in the scheduling for instance to accomodate doctors appointments, flexible working standards and vacations. This should allow privacy to be enabled so others who share thae users calendar can see they are not available but the reason for it is not disclosed.

Group Scheduling

Ask whether the CRM solution being proposed can enable coordination of meetings within the business ? What happens if changes are made to group meetings and will all attendees be notified of these changes ? Can attendees be invited as optional or mandatory and can attendees accept the invitation ?

Resource Scheduling

Consider whether the CRM solution can be used to allocate meeting rooms or company equipment used for instance in presentations. It makes sense that if you are using the CRM solution to manage staff scheduling that it can also be used to manage resource allocations as well.

Shared Calendar

Can the CRM solution share calendars across a work group or across the company, and how easy is it to look up another staff members schedule ? Is it possible to restrict access to a users calendar and how about being able to look at several calendars side by side for ease of use in setting scheduling dates ?

Task Delegation

Is it possible to delegate a task and monitor progress to completion with the CRM solution?

Private E-mails

Depending uppon where you are situated, privacy is an issue - can a CRM solution that is capturing emails have the ability to highlight those that are private emails if they make their way into the CRM database ?

Hopefully this will have given you an array of questions and issues for you take on board and consider - asking a potential CRM partner such questions will help you determine how experienced they actually are before you take on board their advice or commit to using them.

Microsoft CRM Software Provider