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Did you know that you can use an actual e-mail template for a signature, as opposed to using a simple text file? This allows you to use fancy fonts and insert company logos.

First, you must create an e-mail signature template.

1. Select Go To | Document Templates from the top level menu.

2. Select YOUR username from the top left-hand drop down list.

3. Within the left-hand pane, right click on “E-mail Templates”, then select “New”.

4. This will drop you into the template editor. Simply use it like a word processor and type out (inserting pictures as appropriate) your desired signature text.

5. When finished, click the little yellow disk button in the top left-hand corner to “Save”. Make sure your template is listed properly in the Document Templates list.

To set the template to be your default e-mail signature;

1. Select Tools | Options from the top level menu.

2. Select the “E-mail” tab, click on “More Options”.

3. In the lower right-hand corner, use the “Default Templates” drop downs to find and select your signature template. You can set it for “New Outgoing”, “Replies”, and “Forwarded”.

4. Ok your way back out to GoldMine.

5. To test the template, simply start writing an e-mail. The Defaults you set up should take effect immediately.

Did you know that you can add simple GoldMine menu items to the top-level toolbar? This is done on a per-user basis, so each user can have their own “favorite” toolbar items.

1. Click on the “little down arrow” at the right edge of the toolbar;

 

Such a simple question, isn’t it? How can you look at just YOUR historical items without running a report or going from record to record to record?

Easy, it’s all within the Activity List.

1. Select Go To | Activities from the top level menu.

2. From here, you can see both Pending and Completed items on a per-user basis, filtered by Date Range and Activity Types.

3. Use the left-hand pane to drill down to the historical items you want to inspect. (Clicking on the “Closed Activities” folder gives you ALL activity types)

4. Use the top-level drop downs to select Date Range and Username.

5. Don’t forget you can export the list by right-clicking and selecting Output To | Excel.

Try it!

I stumbled across the address autocomplete feature in one of my most recent CRM Online trials. When I set up the trial I was able to choose some of the newer add-ons like Field Service and Project Service.

I learned from other online blogs that the postal address autocomplete feature is added as part of the Field Service solution. Microsoft recommends that you get the trial here and then you can purchase it once you’ve tried it out. 

The basic idea is that it tries to fill in the address once you’ve provided some part of it. For example, after you fill in the street address, it will try to autocomplete the rest of the address by providing potential options. Then you can select the one that’s correct or ignore it and fill in the address yourself. 

The second feature that I wanted to highlight was the addition of self-service portals for non-CRM users. Portals allow your customers to view CRM data, submit support requests, interact on your website forums, among so many other cool features. It can also be helpful if you have a sales team that needs some access to CRM data but not enough to warrant a CRM user license. Portals are an add-on feature to CRM Online but you can request a trial from here. All you have to do is provide some contact information and business justification and they’ll send you a trial key. I received mine very quickly and I can’t wait to try it out!

The first feature I’m going to review is the ability to create and restore backups on your own. Previously you would have had to involve Microsoft to obtain a backup of your CRM organization. Now you can create a backup on demand, although backups are still performed daily, and you can restore a backup at your leisure.

You can manage your backups in the CRM Online Admin Center which you can get to from the Office 365 Admin Center. You can only restore on-demand backups to a sandbox instance. Check out this TechNet article for full details.

Have you had the courage yet to try Zoho CRM 2016?  It can be disorienting sometimes getting used to a new user interface, especially if you’ve been using the application for a while, but I’m telling you it’s really worth it!

Two “Record History” changes in the 2016 version:

LAST ITEMS VIEWED BUTTON:
The new location of the ‘last items’ button (the one that gives you clickable links to the last 10 records you viewed) – it used to be centered off to the left on the screen, now its located at the bottom right of your screen:

Custom buttons got a little bit of a make-over in the 2016 version, and this is the case whether you have switched to the new version of not…

BEFORE, each custom button would be a visible button in the area you selected (List view, View or Edit)

NOW, they are together in a drop down list with ONLY the name of the first button showing.

Also, for buttons placed in the list view, in the new version you must now select at least one record before the buttons become visible:

To show how the process builder works as opposed to the standard workflows, we will create a notification or “email alert”.  However, unlike the standard workflow, you have to create the email alert before you create the process.  Before, we could create criteria and then create the email alert message.  In the new process builder, it’s much easier to add it in before and simply reference it in the process.  There is a button however to make a new alert, it just leaves the process builder which can seem a bit odd and disconnected.

Go to Setup and search for “Email Alerts” (select it).  If you have to pass by the splash page of “what is a workflow”, that’s fine, otherwise you’ll see your list of existing alerts.  Click the “New Alert” button at the top to get to the creation screen.

Here you’ll provide a description, the object that the alert performs or is triggered by and the email template that is used (you may have to create that one in the template area as well first).

Once created, it will look like this in your list.

From here we’ll now spend time on the process builder and reference this email alert based on the order changing status…

Written by Prabha Krishnamurthy