Migrating to new CRM software is the perfect time to address any imperfections with your data. Microsoft Dynamics, as well as other CRM’s on the market, have tools available that make it easier to go through the review and cleansing process.
Below you’ll find best practices suggested for cleaning and maintaining your data.
Finding and Removing Duplicate Records
Duplicate records can be inadvertently be created during high paced times. Set-up the “Check for Duplicates Wizard” to run a bulk clean up job to find and remove the duplicate records.
On the main screen go to the wheel widget in the top right of the screen and select Advance Settings
The Business Management screen will appear but select the dropdown arrow beside Settings and click on Data Management
Go to Duplicate Detection Jobs
Step 1: click on New and then the Wizard box appears on the screen. Step 2 click Next
The “Look For” Record Listing box will appear next. Using the drop box, select the record type you would like to deduplicate/cleanse. (In this example, I’m going to choose Accounts.) At the bottom of the Record box, click on Next.
You can specify a new name for the file or accept the naming convention provided as well as the default date and time that the reconciliation is run. In addition, an email notification can be sent to you as well as others once the deduplication job finishes running. Select Next at the bottom of the screen.
The following message will appear and select Submit.
The following messages will appear on your screen as the deduplication job processes. Once it completes, you’ll be able to address duplicate items accordingly.
Create Duplicates Detections Rules
Once data has been cleansed and reconciled, it’s important to maintain data integrity. A great tool that Microsoft Dynamics has that can be utilized is Duplicate Detection rules. Default duplicate detection rules exist for Accounts, Leads and Contacts but Custom rules would need to be created for other record types. Having data cleansed regularly eliminates errors and can keep relationships with clients happy and healthy.
*Before attempting to create or update system settings, please verify your administrative access.
On the main screen go to the wheel widget in the top right of the screen and select Advanced Settings
The Business Management screen will appear but select the dropdown arrow beside Settings and click on Data Management
Go to Settings and click on Data Management and click on Duplicate Detection Rules
Once inside Duplicate Detection Rules, existing Duplicate Detection Rules will appear on the screen (below are some examples)
As an example, I’ll use Contact Susan Summers with an email address Summers@Time.com and a phone number (310) 777-4444. There are Contact rules which look for duplicate first and last names, business phone and email address. If a User attempts to create a Contact with any of the identical information that a rule exists for, an alert will appear like the one below. The User DOES have the option to continue to add the Contact by selecting Save.
To create a new rule, Step 1 click on New, Step 2 select the Base Record Type and Step 3 Name your rule and provide a Description (Status Reason will remain Unpublished until the rest of the rule criteria is completed, saved and published to be usable.)
Complete all rule criteria and add Notes which could be helpful for audit trail and other historical purposes.
After entering required information, click on Save and then Publish the Rule so that it becomes usable.
If you and your team have any questions or would like to discuss how to improve your Business processes, please contact us at The Marks Group. Thank you for your time and consideration.
