Dana Sosa

ExactTarget and the Event Management Accelerator don't play nice...at first.

dsosa — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:05:00 GMT

As part of Inetium’s CRM Essentials Eduction Series, I demonstrated the Microsoft Dynamics 4.0 CRM Event Management Accelerator at our Inetium CRM Essentials meeting back in May. If you weren’t able to attend, we followed this up with a recorded Webinar in July. You can view and download both the recorded Live Meeting and the PowerPoint presentation from the meeting (with some pretty comprehensive documentation attached) at http://www.crmmn.com (look under Past Presentations and CRM Essentials Webinar Recordings.)

I covered most of what I thought would be important for implementers and end users to understand when planning for a deployment of the Event Management Accelerator. But I also alluded to some of the cool things you could do to extend its functionality…

I want to elaborate on one of those extensions here, specifically, what you should be aware of when you are using ExactTarget for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 with the Event Management Accelerator.

NOTICE

Installation of Event Management Accelerator doesn’t play nice with ExactTarget.
When you install one, it overwrites or “breaks” the customizations of the other.

THE SOLUTION

It’s pretty simple really. So here it is in writing in case you ever need it.

When installing the Event Management Accelerator on top of and existing ExactTarget installation you’ll need to do the following after you’ve installed the Event Management Accelerator following the documentation provided on CodePlex:

1. Modify the Campaign Entity - adding back missing ExactTarget attributes:

et_isemailautomationprogram

et_programid

et_programworkflowid

2. Modify the Campaign Response Entity - adding back the missing ExactTarget:

a. Attributes

Email Details

et_emailname

et_emailtemplateid

et_jobid

et_subscriberid

et_sentdate

et_emailstatus

et_fromemailaddress

et_fromname

et_subjectline

Delivery Statistics

et_lastopened

et_lastclicked

et_totalclicks

et_uniqueclicks

et_bounced

et_unsubscribed

b. Iframe

URL * /isv/exacttarget/login.ashx?ReturnUrl=%2fexacttarget%2furlstats.aspx

c. On Load Event Jscript

function HideField( fieldName, removeEntireRow )
{
                        // Always hide the elements, even if we will be hiding the whole row.
                        // This allows us to show another field in this row later without this
                        // one showing up.
                        var elem = crmForm.all[fieldName + "_c"];
                        if( elem != null ) elem.style.display = "none";

                        elem = crmForm.all[fieldName + "_d"];
                        if( elem != null ) elem.style.display = "none";

                        if (removeEntireRow)
                        {
                                                var elem = crmForm.all[fieldName + "_d"];
                                                if( elem != null ) elem.parentElement.style.display = "none";
                        }
}
HideField("et_trackingurl", true);

And Viola! You’re in business (after you get the Event website configured and hooked up to CRM J!)

Getting Started with CRM Online - Setting Up Your Environment

dsosa — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 13:30:00 GMT

Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online has enhanced its “Getting Started” tools. They’ve included a wealth of information on the new and improved launch page to help you access the resources you need when you need them most.

There’s some excellent information in the new “Getting Started” Dashboard that I want to call out (because I think it’s so useful):

Step 1 - First Steps: 8 steps to get started with Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook provides information from how to install the Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Microsoft Office Outlook add-in to how to use the new functionality provided in the Outlook client.

Step 2 – Load Business Data: Articles about importing records takes you to four articles that are invaluable in helping you migrate you existing customer information into Dynamics CRM Online.

My two cents:

One of the more challenging things for an organization to address when they’re first going “online” with Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online is the process of getting the local user environment setup to work with the new hosted CRM system. Step 1 on the new “Getting Started” page addresses how to install and use the Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Microsoft Office Outlook add-in and gives you access to the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online for Outlook Installation Guide but there are a number of other things to consider that aren’t fully addressed in this document too.

I put together this little roadmap for a project I was recently working on with Microsoft (great fodder for a future blog post on the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step Methodology). It’s a snap shot of what needs to be considered to get from Point A (Yeah! We purchased our CRM Online licenses!) to Point B (Awesome! We’re using CRM Online and we LOVE it!) without missing a step..

Sharing and Cascaded Access

dsosa — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 02:18:00 GMT

A quick follow up to yesterday's post about Dynamics CRM security and cascaded access.

Jeremy Winchell, who I consider the sharpest CRM guru I've ever met and an integral member of the Inetium CRM Team, came across some issues with the cascading features of SHARING recently while working with one of his CRM 4.0 clients. Here's what he shared with our team today:

At this client we share out an Account in CRM with a CRM Team. The relationship behavior between Accounts & Contacts is as follows:

Assign -> Cascade None
Share -> Cascade All
UnShare -> Cascade All
Reparent -> Cascade None

When we share an Account the Share rules kick in and everything below it shares perfectly. However, when a new Opportunity was created for that record it was not being automatically shared. We would have to re-share the Account and let the Cascade rule take over again to reshare the record.

We finally figured out why it was not making the new Opportunity immediately shared. The issue had to do with the Reparent privilege. For some reason if this is set to Cascade None, any new records created will not automatically be shared even if the parent is shared. As soon as it was changed to All, Active or User-Owned everything started to work like a charm.

Who would’ve thought? Just thought this might be a useful piece of information.

It is! Thanks for the heads up JW!

Dynamics CRM security concepts you should know!

dsosa — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 22:29:00 GMT

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM security model is a role-based security model, where a role is conceptually some group of users (i.e. Marketing Professionals, Sales Managers...). CRM allows you to create a very granular security structure, with support for sharing and assignment of record ownership to a particular business unit. Depending on your role and sharing information, you can have access to a record even if you’re not the owner. The following concepts illustrate this:

Privileges:

What a user can do with a record

In general, each user in the CRM system can be granted permission to carry out one or more of the following actions on a particular record type. This permission is referred to as a privilege:

•    Create – Create a new record
•    Read – View or open an existing record
•    Write – Save changes to an existing record
•    Delete – Delete an existing record
•    Append – Append this record to another record
•    Append To – Append another record to this record
•    Assign – Assign this record another user
•    Share – Share this record with another user

Access:

Which records the user can work on

Users can have different privileges on different record types. The ability to execute a privilege (e.g. open a record for viewing) on a given record type is referred to as having access. A user is granted access based on who owns the record and how close the user is to the owner within the CRM organizational structure. There are 5 defined access levels in Microsoft CRM:

•    No Access – Simply put, the user is not granted access.
•    User Access – The user is granted access to only records they own
•    Business Unit Access – The user is granted access to records owned by anyone in their current business unit.
•   Parent Access (a.k.a. Deep Access) – The user is granted access to records owned by anyone in their business unit and to records owned by anyone in a child business unit within the organizational hierarchy
•    Organization Access – The user is granted access to any records owned by any user within the organization.

Access and privilege work together to define what a user can do to a given record. For example a user may be granted User Access for the create and write privileges and Business Unit Access for the read privilege, which allows the user to view records that are owned by any user in their business unit, create their own records, and edit their own records. The user would not be able to view or edit records owned by users that were not in their business unit.

Roles:

How privilege and access are managed

Microsoft CRM provides security roles as a way to manage access and privilege for each record type in CRM. Roles are analogous to Windows security groups: each CRM user is assigned one or more security roles and each security role defines the access levels and privilege for each CRM entity.

When a user is assigned more than one security role, the user is authorized the least restrictive access/privilege combination from all of the assigned roles. So if a user is assigned the Sales Person security role which allows User Access for the create, read, and write privileges on a contact record and the user is also assigned the Sales Manager security role which allows Business Unit Access for the read and write privileges, then the user would have Business Unit Access for the read and write privileges since is the least restrictive combination.

Cascaded Access:

If you own the “parent” you own the child

There is a loophole to the security model that I call Cascaded Access. Cascaded Access basically means that if a user owns the “parent” record in a relationship then that user will inherit User Access to “child” records associated with the parent. It is important to note that when you receive Cascaded Access to a record, you have no more privilege than you would if you owned the record. This is best explained by example.

Assume a CRM organization with two peer business units. Each business unit represents a sales division within the organization. Company policy is that all sales representatives are granted Organizational Access for the read, append, and append-to privileges and Business Unit Access for create and write privileges on account and contact records. Additionally, sales representatives are granted Business Unit Access on the read, append, and append-to privileges and User Access on the write and create privileges for opportunity records. All users in the organization are granted User Access for the create, read, write, and delete privilege on activities.

In this organization, Gail works in the business unit 1 and Jim works in business unit 2. Given the security setup, you would expect Jim to be able to see Gail’s account and contact records but not her opportunity records and you would expect Gail to see Jim’s account and contact records but not his opportunity records. You would also expect that they cannot see each other’s activities. You would be correct.

However, here is the loophole. If Jim is working on an opportunity associated to an account that Gail owns, then Gail will be granted User Access to the opportunity record, even though it is owned by a user from a different business unit (which appears to violate the security role setup.) After all, if I were Gail, and Jim was working on an opportunity for my account, I would certainly want to know about it and track it.

Cascaded security appears to apply to all user-owned record types; however, I have only verified it on accounts, contacts, opportunities, incidents and activities. In my tests, the cascading worked down three levels (i.e., I could see activities related to opportunities related to contacts related to my account) but it may have worked even deeper in the record hierarchy. One thing to note with regard to activities is that cascading only applies to activities that are actually regarding a record. Access does not cascade based on recipients.

Sharing and Teams:

Granting access across the organization

If you look at the way the access levels are setup (user, business unit, parent, organization) you see that the pattern is up and down the CRM org chart. Sharing gives you a way to grant privilege across the org chart. Teams give you a way to define groups of people from anywhere on the org chart.

Going back to my earlier example, let’s add a few more players. Kevin and Janice work with Gail in business unit 1. They both have a lot of experience with Special Sales and therefore, get brought in on certain opportunities to assist other sales reps. In order to give them access to the opportunity records they have both been added to the Special Sales Team.

Jim is working on an opportunity that involves a special sales and he needs some help. In order to get help, he sends an email off to Kevin and then goes into CRM and shares his opportunity record out to the Special Sales Team.

Jim shares the record by selecting it and then going to the Actions menu and selecting Sharing. This opens a window that allows Jim to select the team and define the privileges he wants to assign to the team. (Note that he cannot share access that he doesn’t have, so in this case he could not actually share access to the delete privilege.) Jim grants the team access to the read and write privileges on his opportunity record.

Once this is done, Kevin (and Janice) can open the opportunity record and modify it. Additionally, because of Cascading Access, Kevin can also view all of the activities related to the opportunity that he could not have viewed previously. However, Cascading Access through sharing is more restrictive than regular Cascaded Access. Since Jim only shared access to read and write privileges on the opportunity, Kevin only has Cascaded Access to the read and write privileges on the related activities and he cannot append the activities.

In addition to a scenario involving teams, sharing also gives users a way to temporarily turn over a record management to another user. Rather than assigning all of my accounts to another user when I go on vacation, I can just share them out and only give the level of access needed.

Sharing is also used by the CRM system during record assignment to grant previous record owners access to the record. When you assign a record that you own to another user, the record is automatically shared back to you with all 6 privileges. This gives you the opportunity to reclaim ownership of the record (at least until the new user removes your sharing rights.)

Graphically this scenario plays out like this:

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM Team Blog is a bountiful resource of information. http://blogs.msdn.com/crm/archive/2007/01/17/cascaded-security-privileges-and-sharing.aspx

A Great CRM Success Story

dsosa — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 18:05:00 GMT

Rachel Lockett, IT Director at IGH Solutions, offers an excellent testimonial for the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform and for Inetium as her partner of choice.

Last November, Microsoft flew Rachel out to Redmond, WA to participate in a video case study showcasing her company’s implementation of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. What makes IGH Solutions' Dynamics CRM story so compelling is the unique way in which IGH Solutions, its sister companies and their parent company, Taylor Corporation, leverage each other’s resources to utilize CRM as a shared service. This strategy creates cost saving across all of the Taylor Corporation entrepreneurial businesses that use the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform.

Watch the Video...

YES! You CAN maintain multiple CRM entity views in a single Dynamic Excel Workbook!

dsosa — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 18:20:00 GMT

Nick Elders, one of my favorite clients who works for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 user Community Reinvestment Fund, USA taught me something awesome today.

I was under the impression that you needed to create ODBC data connections to Microsoft Dynamics CRM filtered views manually in Microsoft Office Excel to create links to multiple Microsoft Dynamics CRM views in a singe dynamic Excel file on multiple worksheets (tabs). Not something you’re average CRM end user is equipped to do.

But Nick proved me wrong. And it’s so simple. If you know how to export to Excel from Dynamics CRM and if you know how to copy and paste data, then you can do it too!

First, what is a “Dynamic Excel Workbook”?

When you export Dynamics CRM data to Microsoft Excel, you have the option of exporting a STATIC worksheet or DYNAMIC worksheet. Exporting a static worksheet means that it’s a point in time snapshot of the data from CRM. A dynamic worksheet becomes an Excel file that refreshes the data from the Microsoft Dynamics CRM database each time it’s opened.

Furthermore, if you export a dynamic worksheet (or PivotTable) that you think will be useful to other Microsoft Dynamics CRM users, you can add the list as a Report in CRM, and then share it with others, or make it available to all users.

And, if the recipients are in the same domain as you, and are also Microsoft Dynamics CRM users, you can e-mail a dynamic Excel file, or store it as a shared file. When recipients open the dynamic file, they will see only the data they have permission to view in Microsoft Dynamics CRM (based on their security role), so the data they see may be different from what you see. But you’re all accessing the same dynamic Excel workbook!

So, how do you do it?

It’s simple:

1) Export View 1 as a “dynamic worksheet” to an Excel workbook.

2) Add a new sheet to the workbook created in step 1.

3) Export View 2 (from the same or a different entity) as a “dynamic worksheet” into a new Excel workbook.

4) Copy all rows and columns from View 2’s worksheet to your “clipboard”

5) Paste the contents of the “clipboard” (the copied rows and columns from View 2’s worksheet) into View 1’s new sheet, created in step 2.

Note: When you’re opening with the Microsoft Office Excel file:

If you are using Excel 2003, click Enable automatic refresh when prompted.

If you are using Excel 2007, you get a message that says the file you are trying open is in a different format than specified by the file extension. Click Yes. Then if you get the security warning Data connections have been disabled, click Options, and then click Enable this content, and then click OK.

What Happens To CRM When I Delete a Record in Outlook?

dsosa — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:52:00 GMT

So… you say you’re using Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 and you’re using Microsoft Office Outlook… well, then you’re naturally using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook client! (If you’re not, you can download it from the link.)

One of the most common questions I hear when I’m training our customers on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook client is a variation on this one:

WHAT HAPPENS TO CRM WHEN I DELETE A RECORD IN OUTLOOK?

Well, here’s an answer:

The outcome is the same whether you’re using Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook or Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access when you delete a record that is linked to CRM. The only difference will be in the timing of the deletion from the Dynamics CRM database if you are in Offline mode with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access client when you delete the record in Outlook.

This table describes the various conditions that will apply when you delete records in either Outlook or Microsoft Dynamics CRM and how they will be synchronized.

Object Deleted	Record Status	Results
Object Deleted	Deleted in Outlook
Outlook Contact	Any	Remains in CRM when deleted from Outlook. Note: If the remaining CRM contact record is subsequently modified, it will synchronize back down to the Contact Owner’s Outlook Contact list again if the default Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook client local data groups are used.
Outlook E-mail	Any	Remains in CRM when deleted from Outlook.
Outlook Task	Open in CRM	Deleted in CRM when deleted from Outlook.
Outlook Task	Completed or Cancelled in CRM	Remains in CRM when deleted from Outlook.
Outlook Appointment	Open in CRM	Deleted from CRM when deleted from Outlook by the CRM appointment Owner or Organizer. Remains in CRM when deleted from Outlook by other CRM users/attendees.
Outlook Appointment	Completed or Cancelled in CRM	Remains in CRM when deleted from Outlook.
	Deleted in CRM
CRM Contact	Any	Remains in Outlook for Contact Owner, but is no longer linked to a CRM Contact record. Deleted from Outlook for all other users when deleted from CRM (upon next sync).
CRM E-mail	Any	Remains in Outlook when deleted from CRM.
CRM Task	Active in Outlook	Deleted from Outlook when deleted from CRM.
CRM Task	Completed in Outlook	Remains in Outlook when deleted from CRM.
CRM Appointment	Open in CRM	Deleted from Outlook for all users when deleted from CRM if Appointment start time is in the future.
CRM Appointment	Completed or Cancelled in CRM	Remains in Outlook when deleted from CRM for all users.

A few other things to be aware of when you’re working with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook client:

· De-activating a Contact in CRM has no impact on the contact record in Outlook.

· The synchronization process only updates Outlook records when the linked CRM record has been modified since the last synchronization.

A good example of this is:

Dana Sosa is a Contact of yours under the Inetium Account in Dynamics CRM. You and other users synchronize Dana Sosa to your Outlook Contacts.

You update the Inetium Account in CRM to reflect its legal name: Inetium LLC.

When you and your colleagues synchronize CRM and Outlook next, Dana Sosa’s Company Name has not been changed in the Outlook Contact record.

You’re perplexed. Dana’s “Parent Customer” name looks accurate in the CRM Contact record….

This is because the CONTACT record was NOT modified in CRM. The Account record was modified by the name change in CRM – not the Contacts related to the Account. Accounts do not synchronize with Outlook objects, only Contacts (e-mail, tasks, and appointments) do.

In order for the Company Name change to be accurately synchronized to Dana Sosa’s contact record in Outlook, a change must be made and saved to my CRM contact record (thus changing the modified date.)

This is a great use for a “Company Name Change” manual workflow… but that’s a topic for another blog post…

· The “local data groups” option on the CRM Menu add-in is used to configure BOTH what data will be taken Offline if you’re using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access AND which records will be synchronized to your Outlook Contacts, Mail, Tasks and Appointments from Dynamics CRM.

Be cognizant of this if you intend to synchronize Outlook with your PDA!

If you are using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access client, you will need to take into consideration how much CRM data you want to take Offline with you (think Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities and their related Activities so you can work with it ALL when you’re on an airplane) versus how much data you want to synchronize with your mobile device (think Contact records for phone numbers and e-mail addresses – you probably really only want to see the Contacts you work with regularly on your phone.)

Because “Local Data Groups” define the synchronization for BOTH the Outlook objects and the Offline CRM database, you may have to get creative with how you configure your “Local Data Groups” if you have a complex record ownership model.

Dynamics CRM E-mail Features and Options

dsosa — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:41:00 GMT

Despite what Ted H said about me in his glowing introduction last week, I have not managed to memorize every Microsoft CRM book, blog post, whitepaper, what-have-you that I’ve read in my tenure here at Inetium. I get lucky once in awhile with a quote here or there… but I’m no Rain Man by a long shot.

In fact, for quite a while, I struggled to understand all of the ins and outs of E-mail functionality in Dynamics CRM from an end user’s perspective. And none of those techie books I’d been reading summed it up in one place for me.

Outlook client? Web Client? Mail Merge? E-mail Templates? Campaigns?

Since it’s my job to know this stuff inside out and then help my customers translate it into their business processes, I took it upon myself to summarize all of the E-mail features and options that I thought were important to understand in a format that helps me help my clients grasp it.

And there are a LOT of different possibilities when it comes to sending E-mail from Microsoft Dynamics CRM. The path you take when you distribute those messages will depend entirely on the outcome you’re aiming for!

This chart explains some of the most commonly used features and options available when sending email from CRM and how they work if you’re using Word Mail Merge or CRM e-mails.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM E-mail Features and Options (Follow this link to see the full chart if your browser isn't supporting it now)

A few other things to consider about Dynamics CRM e-mail that are important but not explicitly listed in the chart:

§ The only difference between sending E-mail via a Quick Campaign vs. Marketing Campaign is the ability to send the E-mail to recipients on multiple Marketing Lists at the same time from a Marketing Campaign (i.e. you can include leads and contacts, and accounts). E-mail sent via a Quick Campaign can only be sent to recipients on a single Marketing List or in a single entity list view.

§ Using Word Mail Merge on Leads, Accounts, Contacts or Opportunities in a list view (or from a Marketing List) from the Web Client does not create a CRM E-mail activity in History. To avoid this, there is a System Setting to disable the ability to perform Word Mail Merge from the Web Client as an option.

§ Direct E-mail is a means of sending a bulk e-mail to a group of CRM Leads, Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, Cases, Contracts or Users from an entity list view in Dynamics CRM. It always requires the use of a CRM E-mail Template. And BEWARE! When you click the send button – the email is SENT immediately!

So you can see that what you are trying to achieve by sending the email will determine what features and options you will use to send the message, for example:

§ If your goal is to capture campaign response activities, you will have to send your e-mail messages from a Quick Campaign or Marketing Campaign.

§ If you must send the emails on behalf of another CRM User, you’re e-mail message must be a CRM E-mail activity and you will not be able to use Word Mail Merge.

§ If your email must include an attachment and will be sent to more than one recipient, you’ll need to create a workflow.

§ If you’re simply sending an e-mail blast and don’t wish to create a CRM E-mail activity in the recipient’s history a Word Mail Merge will do the trick.

Happy e-mailing!

Hi. My name is DANA.

dsosa — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:18:00 GMT

Hi! I'm Dana Sosa, another member of the Inetium CRM Team. I sit right next door to Ted H, who graciously introduced me, along with the rest of our colleagues in his blog last week. I think it's high time I started blogging for the CRM Team too – after all – gotta keep up with the Rock Star!

I recently found out about an initiative from Microsoft that I’m hoping you’ll spend five minutes to participate in. Microsoft Pinpoint is a site sponsored by Microsoft that helps customers find partners to work with when they are looking for help with their Microsoft solutions.

Would you be willing to login with your Windows Live ID and offer some comments about your experiences working with Inetium? Or if you’re not a current Inetium customer, please, feel free to take a look at how our customers are rating us - we're pretty proud!

You’re feedback might just land us our next Dynamics CRM gig if another company like yours is looking for a partner they can trust to help them through the implementation process. If you’ve got time to drop a line, my whole team would appreciate it!

To connect to Microsoft Pinpoint and rate Inetium, just click this link: Rate Inetium!

If you do, you’ll see this at the bottom of the summary of our company:

If you click on the “Share my Opinion” button, you can rate us on several different factors and make any comments you’d like to share.

Thanks for your time. I look forward to joining my other CRM Teammates on the blogs!