Auditing is a new feature that provides for tracking of changes to your Dynamics CRM business data.  Auditing can be configured by record type and by field to track create, update, and delete events including who made the change, when was the change made, what was the old value, and what was the new value.   Auditing can also track things like user access, changes to security roles, record sharing, and record association and over 70 other system events.  Audit history can easily be viewed for each record providing a complete account of all changes made.

Auditing can be used to provide for better data while maintaining user accountability.  For example, instead of denying users the ability to update certain records for fear incorrect data, why not implement auditing to allow users to update important data while maintaining a complete record of changes?

Auditing can provide the basis for individualized user training and improved business processes.  It can also be used to ensure compliance with internal and external regulations or standards.  Be aware that enabling auditing will take up additional space in your database.  For this reason, audit logs are managed and can be deleted on a quarterly basis as required. Click for a brief video demo on Business Data Auditing in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011.

If your organization could benefit from the power of Microsoft Dynamics CRM for auditing changes to your data or to address any other business objectives you might have, please contact NexusTek, Colorado Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner at 303.773.6464.

Track Data Changes in Microsoft Dynamics CRM with the Auditing Feature is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Businesses either succeed or fail based on their ability to provide a great customer experience and Microsoft Dynamics CRM has a hearty service module to help businesses deliver products and optimum service to their customers.

You can use Microsoft Dynamics CRM to track cases, contracts, service agreements and schedule service calls. It also features a document library to help keep track of standardized policies and procedures. With a 360-degree view of your customer’s history and preferences, your agents can resolve issues quickly and reduce handling times.

Cases
Perhaps one of the easiest ways to make a customer angry is to delay their issue, or worse yet, forget the issue entirely. While a customer’s request may be only one of fifteen tasks you have scheduled for the day, from your customer’s perspective it is the only thing that matters. Your responsiveness determines how the customer will perceive your entire company.

One of the most helpful tools Dynamics CRM has to offer is Case Management. Once a case is entered into the system, it can be tracked, and escalated in the event of a delay. Case Management partnered with a well-constructed workflow can be automatically escalated, reminder emails sent automatically after a specific time period, or even transferred to upper management, ensuring issues are being handled quickly and effectively and most importantly – not forgotten.

Articles
If forgetting about a customer request is the easiest way to make a customer angry, speaking to a customer service employee who doesn’t know what’s going on could easily be the second most rage-inducing event. At some point, we’ve all been on the phone with a customer service representative whom is clueless about how to resolve an issue.

While Cases in Dynamics CRM provide the ability to provide insight and documentation about specific customer issues, sometimes higher level information is needed. “What is your company’s return policy?”; “Is this covered under warranty?”; “I have a GX1000 and the power light is blinking orange and it’s making a sound, what does that mean?” All of these issues seem simple to an experienced representative, but a customer given an, “Ummm… I don’t know” response or the wrong information can cause some real damage to the customer service standards you are trying to uphold.

Articles in Microsoft Dynamics CRM feature four basic document types that can help a customer service representative resolve almost any issue. Procedures, Q and A’s, Solutions, and KB Articles are easily searchable to provide quick references for common issues. You can use Articles to document standard information, fixes, troubleshooting steps, and even company policies. Managing documents in Articles allows them to be approved, revised, and easily found at all times.

Service Calendar
Tracking dozens of engineers, technicians, or salespeople can feel a lot like herding cats. Add vacation requests, doctor’s appointments, and customers rescheduling appointments to the mix and it is easy for your day to spiral out of control. If you consider the consequences of a poorly managed schedule, your company could be losing out on important revenue due to under-utilized or overworked technicians as a result of general inefficiencies.

With the Service Calendar in Microsoft Dynamics CRM you can easily keep track of off-site appointments and technician schedules. Appointments can be transferred from one technician to another with minimal effort to help prioritize requests as they are received. Even if your company isn’t service based, the Service Calendar can be used to manage appointments from a central location to efficiently coordinate schedules company-wide.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM isn’t just limited to Sales and Marketing departments. It provides the tools to bring structure and organization to your customer service departments as well. To find out more about how Dynamics CRM 2011 can empower service and contact center teams to provide superior customer service, visit nexustek.com or review the Customer Experience datasheet for an overview of Microsoft Dynamics Customer Service Features.

by Nexus Tek, Colorado Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner

Provide a Great Customer Experience with Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Let’s Face it, to Succeed You Must Adapt
Keeping pace with market shifts and innovations is all the more challenging in periods of constrained budgets. Business agility is a major driver for cloud adoption and the ability to respond quickly to changing business requirements is a critical advantage of the cloud model.

Software Licensing Models Will Change
According to IDC, the world’s leading technology media, events, and research company, traditional packaged software and perpetual license revenue are in decline and a software industry shift toward subscription models will result in a nearly $7 billion decline in worldwide license revenue in 2010. As a result, a permanent change in software licensing regime will occur. This means the traditional software upgrade/update models will permanently change.

Consumers Have More Power
People have greater access to information these days and they shop around. Consumers are more savvy and educated. The focus is not simply to acquire a product but to get the product at the lowest price with as many value-added features as possible. The traditional channels of influence have been broken by social media, and people seeking information have many different sources for advice on their purchase decisions. Reading this blog post is a perfect example. Businesses must continuously seek new ways to differentiate their products and services to stand out in a sea of opinions.

At an event held to discuss the impact of Customer Relationship Management and the importance of CRM Strategy, David Beard of Sage UK, stated “More than ever customers are expecting higher levels of personalized and exceptional services. To do that, businesses need to understand their customers’ behavior and reaction to their business messages, tailoring them accordingly. They need to understand how to retain their customers and give a better experience. CRM technology should enable greater customer insight and provide greater customer interaction. The technology becomes the enabler to the strategy.”

What’s Your Strategy?
Does your CRM strategy involve social media monitoring, business intelligence, mobile access and company-wide business process integration? As the marketplace becomes more competitive and consumers become smarter, tracking customer data and sales opportunities isn’t enough anymore. To gain a true competitive advantage, you need a holistic approach where marketing, service, and sales aren’t viewed as separate entities. The move to the cloud is part of a global shift where companies must reach beyond the confines of the office and learn to manage the interconnected web of relationships on which their businesses now depend.

Is your head spinning yet?

Believe it or not, you’re actually at an advantage if you are looking to implement a CRM system or adapt your CRM strategy at this time because we are on the cusp of the movement toward real-time, cloud-based customer relationship management solutions. In my last post, I wrote about Microsoft’s plans to add Dynamics CRM to its Office 365 offering. This is pretty remarkable in terms of value. You now have the option of getting a robust and adaptable CRM solution bundled with the tools you most likely use every day, and if you really want to get the most out of your CRM system, integration should be part of your strategy. With a cloud-based CRM solution:

• You don’t have to purchase software or hardware to support your solutions—you just need a supported web browser.
• You don’t have to dedicate IT personnel to management. There is no maintenance; deployments are faster, upgrades are instant, and all users have access to the latest software.
• You pay one simple subscription cost per user, per month—and that includes access to support services.
• You can scale up or down as your business demands.
• You can access it anywhere and collaborate online.

Right now, a deployment of Microsoft Office 365 plus Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online together costs less than HALF the monthly subscription fee of Salesforce.com’s Enterprise Edition. Enterprise Edition is currently priced at $125 per user/ per month and Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online + Office 365 is under $50 per user/per month.

The emergence of cloud computing can’t be considered a fad; it has the IT industry abuzz for a reason. It is slowly turning enterprise level applications such as CRM into commodities that are universally accessible, delivered on-demand, and on our terms. If your goals include keeping your business software costs way down and your flexibility way up, deploying solutions in the cloud is the way to go. If you are looking for a Microsoft Certified Colorado technology partner, contact NexusTek.

Resources:

PRWEB (April 22, 2011). “Marketing Elite Put CRM at Heart of Business Agenda“. Press Release. Retrieved 2011-07-06.

BUSINESS WIRE (July 26, 2010). “SaaS Revenue to Grow Five Times Faster Than Traditional Packaged Software Through 2014, IDC Finds“. Press Release. Retrieved 2011-07-06.

By Natalie Wilcox, NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Certified Partner.

Office 365 and CRM Online – Less Isn’t More, More is More is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Before I get into the details, let me take a moment to explain. Office 365 is the new name for the Microsoft service offerings previously known as Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS), Live@edu, and Office Live Small Business. The basic Office 365 package is an upgrade to the 2010 versions of Exchange, SharePoint, Office Communications Online, and Live Meeting (note: Office Communications Online and Live meeting have been combined as Lync).

Office 365 is not a new version of Office that will be hosted in/on/via the cloud, but rather a rebranding effort for BPOS. As of now, BPOS is no longer available for purchase. Microsoft Office applications are the core of Office 365. Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, OneNote, Outlook, and other Office applications connect to Microsoft Exchange, SharePoint, and Lync.

One of the key advantages to CRM Online being added to the Office 365 suite is the Azure platform. Azure is an operating system for the cloud based on a pay by use model, eliminating the need to buy servers or dedicate resources to infrastructure management. Azure’s automated service management protects businesses from the caveats of hardware failure and routine maintenance. Currently some components of Office 365 are still run on servers in Microsoft’s datacenters and are not Azure based. However, Microsoft has a goal to eventually move Office 365 and all of its components to the Windows Azure cloud platform.

This means that businesses will have the ability to receive updates and upgrades with minimal effort because the Microsoft Dynamics CRM team is focusing efforts on an agile release model approach to efficiently deliver products to users. Previously, major product releases were 2-3 years apart. Now a single codebase across all versions of the product will enable shorter development cycles and the ability to deliver updates and enhancements bi-annually to both on-premises and online customers.

Additionally, as part of ongoing Dynamics development Microsoft promises to meet the demands of new generation devices like smartphones and tablets by providing anytime, anywhere access to Microsoft Dynamics CRM, creating consistency across the user experience whether on the road or in the office. Some examples of these capabilities will include intuitive cross-device functionality and multi-browser support.

The inclusion of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online in the Office 365 offering will provide greater value for businesses. The fully integrated experience gives workers easy access to familiar solutions that are designed and built to work together which can lead to increased efficiency and more effective collaboration. For more insight on Microsoft’s plans for Dynamics CRM, be sure to read the May 2011 update of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Statement of Direction. If you are looking for a Microsoft Certified Colorado technology partner, contact NexusTek.

 By Natalie Wilcox, NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Certified Partner.

Microsoft Plans to Add Dynamics CRM Online to Office 365 is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Why would a company need an RPA? A well-implemented RPA can enable a business to operate more intelligently. As business data is accumulated through various channels, there will always be disparate information, data silos, and lack of communication among employees. Ideally workers, regardless of role,  should be able to easily and securely share information in order to optimize business relationships whether it is with customers, vendors, partners, etc. The Relational Productivity Application facilitates alignment, collaboration, and the ability to access valuable data across an organization.

Employees (software end users) can be classified as information workers and task workers. The RPA enables information workers to engage effectively with task workers. An information worker is defined as a person who uses information to assist in making decisions or taking actions such as Sales Managers, Executives, and Project Managers. Task workers are the source of that key information; they produce and enter the most critical data using spreadsheets, CRM systems, forms, etc. They are the front line of your business – interacting with your customers, partners, and employees. The RPA should enable everyone to know who is who, who is doing what, and where to find specific information.

When should a company go with an RPA? When is it better off to focus on the relational LOB application or emphasize a collaboration solution? Companies in a market that require a customer-rich experience, competitive pricing, and a cost-cutting mandate are good candidates for an RPA.

An organization that must provide a high level customer experience but which is not under as much pressure to cut costs would be well served by a collaboration solution, such as Office SharePoint Server, and does not necessarily need an RPA.

The need for an RPA is driven by the organization’s demand to provide relevant, real-time views of key operational information. In a client-focused business, working faster and the ability to be more engaged with the client creates a competitive advantage. For more information about leveraging Microsoft Dynamics CRM and SharePoint for enhanced business impact, download the white paper here.

By Natalie Wilcox, NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Certified Partner.

How Microsoft SharePoint + Microsoft Dynamics CRM + xRM = RPA. Part 2 of 2 is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Microsoft Dynamics CRM is designed with the functionality to manage your customers and their life cycles from marketing, to sales, to customer service. What if you want to manage your other business relationships in the same system, such as employee records, vendors, distributors, or properties? That’s where xRM comes into play. xRM stands for “Xtended” Relationship Management. The “x” part of the equation stands for any and all aspects of business, not just relationships with customers. It refers to any important relationship information a business needs to manage. xRM applications are created by modifying the existing capabilities, services, and point and click extensibility of Microsoft Dynamics CRM to quickly create customized line of business applications that suit the specific needs of your business.

Most business share a common goal of trying to improve quality, service, and the customer experience while minimizing operating costs and realizing profitability – easier said than done in most cases.

Another commonality among businesses is the use of Microsoft Office products for daily activities. Applications like Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint have become standard in most organizations. I’m sure throughout your career you have shared documents, spreadsheets, and presentations on an internal server with multiple users, versions, and edits. As a business grows, it becomes increasingly difficult to manage that information. What you may not know is that Microsoft SharePoint is a solution designed to solve that problem. With SharePoint 2010, users are able to work simultaneously with the same documents, data, and information to share ideas with colleagues, partners, and suppliers, and to deliver results regardless of where they are, or if they are connected to the internet or on the go. The best part is users can access documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and notes without worrying about whether the computer they use has the latest Office programs installed. The Office Web applications for Word, Excel, Microsoft Office PowerPoint®, and Microsoft Office OneNote® are all accessible through SharePoint.

What happens when you combine the power of SharePoint with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM, xRM framework? The answer is another acronym! Introducing… the RPA (Relational Productivity Application). The concept of the RPA is to integrate a collaborative application, i.e. SharePoint with a relational LOB application, i.e. Microsoft Dynamics CRM, to enable an even greater perspective on valuable customer information, tasks, and workflows. It centralizes disparate silos of information with one view and easy access (which can be restricted by user role or whatever security/compliance measures are required).

In part two of this post, I will discuss assessing your business needs for an RPA and whether or not to concentrate on pure relational LOB applications or put more emphasis on collaboration solutions.

 By Natalie Wilcox, NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Certified Partner.

How SharePoint, xRM, and Dynamics CRM Make an RPA. Part 1 of 2. is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Enter the “Marketplace” concept.

With growing popularity, Microsoft has recently expanded on the Marketplace concept in a big way. With the X-Box, Zune, and Windows Mobile marketplaces, even Windows Vista and 7 have Gadgets stored in a single, convenient, easy to use website. For the first time both first AND third-party developers could submit an application and have it sit side by side on the digital shelves with other first and third party apps. This central repository allows for a one stop shop, broken down by specific versions without the time and hassle spent on scouting these applications yourself.

The recent release of Dynamics CRM 2011 brought the same marketplace concept to Dynamics CRM with Dynamics CRM Marketplace . Based on the Microsoft Pinpoint market, Dynamics CRM Marketplace promises to make finding and reviewing CRM software even easier. Like other marketplaces based on Pinpoint, there is also a convenient rating system to quickly narrow in on the software most likely to do the job.

With the new Dynamics CRM Marketplace, Microsoft has made it even easier to customize and ultimately help users realize efficient and productive CRM solutions that improve their businesses.

By Ryan Bettale, Dynamics Consultant at NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

Expanding the functionality of Dynamics CRM with the Microsoft Dynamics Marketplace is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Dashboards are a great way for managers to track business performance with instant access to key performance indicators and critical metrics. Executives can maintain a single corporate scorecard that covers sales, marketing, and service. Users can save time by embedding frequently used charts or report segments on a single page. With up-to-the minute information, users can spot potential problems and identify opportunities early on.

There are a variety of ways to build custom dashboards in Microsoft Dynamics CRM and your users can quickly configure multiple dashboards to monitor business performance. The dashboards can be set up for individual or shared use, and can include inline charts with drill-down intelligence to visually navigate data, identify trends, and uncover new insights.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 has a powerful and easy-to-use dashboard designer. It so flexible that dashboard can be easily integrated directly into your views or your data entry forms. Dashboards are easy to create and simple to revise as your changing business needs require you to access new information.

By Tejal Patel, Consultant at NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

Business Intelligence Made Easy with Dashboards in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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In particular, integration has a number of benefits for both the sales and marketing teams. Integration will provide the sales team with a “big picture” view of larger company marketing campaigns. This means that they can better time their sales conversations by understanding what offers and messages have recently been shared with prospects. The sales team can focus their efforts on the prospects that marketing analytics show to be the most engaged and responsive to email marketing campaigns.

CRM/database integration with email offers email marketers many benefits, from seamless campaign targeting, to maintaining consistent data between multiple locations, to better productivity for the marketer. The marketing team has a clearer understanding of which messages and campaigns are having the biggest impact on the bottom line, allowing them to target their email messages even more effectively. By taking advantage of this data, the marketing team can further segment email lists rather than trying to create a workaround within the sales program. And while the sales team is focused on closing hot leads, marketing can focus on developing the warm leads via trigger campaigns and other communications until the prospects are closer to making a purchase.

Depending on your CRM system and email marketing tools, the integration requirements can vary. Be sure to take the time to do your research so you have a strong understanding of the capabilities, possibilities, and the resources needed for integration.

By Tejal Patel, Consultant at NexusTek, Inc., your Denver, Colorado area Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

Advantages of Email Marketing Integration in Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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Businesses using Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online can get up and running quickly and without a lot of upfront capital investment. Dynamics CRM Online enables companies to easily port their deployment to Dynamics CRM On-Premise or Dynamics CRM Partner Hosted deployment models (if or when it makes sense to do so).  This level of flexibility in deployment is not available with other CRM solutions like Salesforce.com. Download the Dynamics CRM Online Datasheet to learn more about how you can begin transforming your business right away using Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online without complicated technology server set up.

Dynamics CRM Online features all of the same great visual customization and extension tools as the On- Premise and Partner Hosted versions.  However, Dynamics CRM online has had a limitation; clients and partners could not upload custom code to the deployment servers.  This limitation manifested itself in primarily three ways:

• Complex Reporting – Dynamics CRM Online includes the Report Wizard for creating custom reports with charts and the ability to easily export data to Excel for reporting.  More complex reporting might require a custom report to be written in SQL Server Reporting Services or another reporting tool.  These custom reports could not be uploaded to the Dynamics CRM Online deployment.
• Third Party Add-On Components – There are many great third party add-on components for Microsoft Dynamics CRM that have been developed by the vast Microsoft Partner ecosystem to meet specific horizontal and vertical requirements.  Since these add-ons normally involve server-side code, they could not be installed to a Dynamics CRM Online deployment.
• Custom Developed Code – Microsoft Dynamics CRM also provides very extensive customization and extension capabilities via its SDK (software development kit).  Partners and customers can use this SDK to enhance and extend the core Dynamics CRM functionality to meet specific requirements.  This custom server-side code could not be uploaded to a Dynamics CRM Online deployment.

All of that is about to change.  Microsoft recently announced support for uploading custom code to Dynamics CRM Online deployments.  This major enhancement (along with other enhancements included in the Dynamics CRM 2011 wave) will be rolled out to Dynamics CRM Online customers via regular service updates beginning in September 2010.

Along with the roll out will be the introduction of the Dynamics CRM Marketplace which will allow customers to quickly purchase and deploy Microsoft and third-party add-on enhancements to their Dynamics CRM Online deployment. You can read more about the 2011 Dynamics CRM roll out in this press release, Microsoft Demonstrates Next-Generation CRM Release at Worldwide Partner Conference.

With this announcement, Microsoft has taken another giant step forward in providing the best CRM product on the market, delivered in a SaaS deployment model, with flexibility to move to an on-premise or partner-hosted model at any time.

By: Randy Bristol, NexusTek, Inc. Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner in Denver, CO

Microsoft Announces Support for Server-Side Code for Dynamics CRM Online is a post from: CRM Software Blog

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