Life and Times with Sage ACT!

Certified ACT! Genius @ExpertsExchange #SageACT

2012-01-18T18:49:00.001+11:00

GL Computing’s Mike Lazarus has become the first Certified ACT! Genius at Experts-Exchange

Technorati Tags: ACT,Sage ACT!,GL Computing,Experts-Exchange

Is #SageACT! getting too complicated?

2011-10-05T09:11:00.001+11:00

{EAV:5878844ce463310a}
I was reading this article on Mashable: Facebook Is Getting Too Damn Complicated and can see a point.
Like Facebook, Sage ACT! has been the leader in it’s market for some time… and largely for the same reasons. It has had the right mix of ease-of-use and flexibility to deliver the solution – most of the time.
I discussed the typical process that decisions on new versions are made in a previous article:
How Are Product Management Decisions Made?

Priorities are not easy to determine

The setting of priorities (as per above link) is a really difficult line that most software vendors walk… trying to keep the product usable in it’s target market and dealing with the need to create new functions that appeal to potential new users or encourage current users to upgrade. For those with responsibility for the development of Sage ACT!, this line is more fine than most:

The product has consistently outsold it’s competitors (many that are more functionally powerful) because it has had the reputation of being the easiest to use while still maintaining flexibility to cope with most users’ demands. New features should be implemented in a way that doesn’t increase the complexity unnecessarily
There is a large core base of users that have been with ACT! for 10-20 years (or longer). Changes to functions (or worse, removal of them) causes users not to upgrade or even to look elsewhere. This was really evident in the first releases by both Symantec (3.0) and Sage (7.0) when items were left out - either because the new development team didn’t realise people used them, or simply didn’t know the function was there.

Not all the reasons are good ones

This process becomes even more complex when we add some of the less valid reasons for priority selection:

The need to stave off potential competitors by imitation a feature list;
To avoid the perception of being stale; or the worst reason:
To add items that produce PR content, while adding little to the user experience – sometimes this is exasperated by the product management decisions being made by people who don’t use the product “in anger” and don’t fully comprehend the scenarios it gets used in.

When feature bloat is attributed to this last item, new functions are typically plagued with a number of flaws:

They lack the depth of options for real-world use of the feature
The UI makes the operation less obvious to understand and use
They are often not properly integrated with all the current components
Sadly, they are often done at the expense of “less flashy” but more useful improvements

Some examples

There has been a number of times in ACT!’s history where, in my opinion, product management has been guilty of such decisions… where features added that don’t seem to have users requesting them or are implemented in a questionable way that marks a checkbox, produces a press release, but falls short of being usable. Some of these include:

Sales Opportunities in ACT! 2000 (5.0) – these were hardly usable for a few versions
Resources – can’t be used in a sync environment, making them unusable for many sites
Smart Tasks – really don’t go far enough to be usable, can’t be administrated or run as service
Social Networks – doesn’t link contacts to accounts (only search), doesn’t update data or record communications. See: Social Media and CRM – thoughts on how they should connect
Google Integration – it leaves out the most important part, the ability to send and merge emails
Web browser support – doesn’t support Chrome, Safari or current versions of Firefox and doesn’t support Office integration unless using IE
Sage Connect – doesn’t support international phone numbers (neither does Outlook/Google sync)

Both of the co-founders of ACT! (Mike Muhney and Pat Sullivan) feel that the product is losing (or has lost) the essence of it’s direction. You can see Pat’s comment here and Mike’s here

It doesn’t need to be like this

I think Apple are one of the best companies at avoiding this problem. Their iOS operating system (iPhone/iPad) lacks much power functionality that Blackberry has had for years (see this post) and Android are now doing, but their choice to have kept the UI simple (at the expense of those functions) has worked for them. Apple prove that you don’t need specific features for the market to accept the product as “cool”

So, what does Sage need do?

Don’t get me wrong – I still believe that Sage ACT! is the best product of it’s type… but an urgent cultural change is needed to maintain that position. Basically, I think they need to stop relying on focus groups and instead actively engage with users (and the ACT! Consultants who support those users) in public forums.
For a while, when David van Toor was running the product, he did this … and the two versions released under his guidance were the most well accepted on release for his efforts.
Additionally, I think they would benefit from dropping the annual upgrade cycle – with release date dictated by bean-counters’ needs for numbers boost prior to Sage’s end of financial year.
I’m not sure of the likelihood of the current management taking this path, but one can only hope.
What do you feel?

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT2012,CRM,Sage,SageACT!,Sage ACT!

What's New in #SageACT! 2012 – released Sept 1st

2011-09-02T01:03:00.001+10:00

This is the official information from Sage. I will soon post an article on my opinions of the new version.

Update: Sage have release a day-0 Hotfix 1 … Any installs from now will get this update slipstreamed and there will be a download soon for the early birds. As soon as I find out what this fixes, I’ll let you know.

The Sage ACT! 2012 release is focused on a number of significant enhancements including Google® Integration, Scratchpad, Connected Services, Universal Search and much more. All this enables you to work and communicate more effectively, become more productive and efficient, and better serve your contacts. Click on one of the links below for more information on the specified topic.

New Features and Functionality

For details regarding each new feature, click the link for Knowledgebase article for that feature.
Google Contacts, Calendar and Gmail Integration

Contact Synching capabilities from Google to Sage ACT! and Sage ACT! to Google.
Contact Sync set capabilities to allow users to select a sub-set of their Sage ACT! contacts to synch over to Google.
Calendar synching that allows users to update both their Google and Sage ACT! Calendars and have them synch regardless of where events were created or modified.
The ability to choose which systems alarms display in for events.
Users can select whether they want Sage ACT! or Google to “win” for conflict resolution when both calendars have been changed.
Activity type synching options allow users to choose which activity types will synch. The defaults options are Appointments and Meetings.
Scheduling synching options as frequently as one minute is available, but to limit performance impact, the suggested synching interval is 10 minutes.
A new Google Integration synchronization panel from the Tools menu is available to set up both Contact and Calendar synchronization at once.

Knowledgebase article: 27988

Sage ACT! Scratchpad

Provide Sage ACT! users with a virtual piece of paper on their desktop to do the following tasks:
- Quickly jot down notes, reminders, and to-dos in one simple user interface, with or without Sage ACT! running
- Organize items in the list
- Check-off or delete items
- Print the list so you can take it with you
- Add items as notes, history or activity in Sage ACT!
Items from Sage ACT! Scratchpad will be sent to the Sage ACT! database that the user is currently logged into.

Knowledgebase article: 28077

Universal Search

Users now have the ability to find that key documents or piece of information they need in their contacts, groups, companies, opportunities, notes, history, and attachments, because search is faster and more expansive than ever.
The ability to perform advanced search using operators
Filter search criteria by all dates, last 24 hours, last week, and last month
View search results displayed by relevance and double-click on the item of interest to be taken to that particular field or attachment.
Users can also filter search results for secondary contacts and products

Knowledgebase article: 28034

Services Discoverability/Connections View

A new Connections view within the Sage ACT! application that helps users sign-up and learn more about Connected Services that could improve their bottom line and efficiencies in running their business.
Users can manage their existing Connected Services through this view.

Knowledgebase article: 28094

Installation/Getting Started

For new customer installs, third party applications such as Microsoft® Office, Microsoft Outlook® and Internet Explorer® do not need to be closed before Sage ACT! installation. Users can now continue to be productive while Sage ACT! installation is progressing.
Installation panel that provides prerequisites and average times to install before installation begins.

Knowledgebase article: 27964 (Sage ACT! Pro), 27971 (Sage ACT! Premium)

Database Administration

Improved usability in opening and sharing databases
Shows all databases attached to the local SQL Server® instance and the most recently used databases in a dialog.
Users can also share databases from within this dialog – no need to find the buried menu.

Knowledgebase article: 28142

Import

Import logs are now available to give counts of successful records imported and details of what records failed.
Import log is displayed at the final stage of import.
Users can quickly get out of the import process (no need to confirm that they want to cancel an import process)

Knowledgebase article: 27976

Outlook Integration

When Sage ACT! detects that the user is attempting to integrate Microsoft® Outlook® 64-bit with Sage ACT!, a message dialog will be displayed that states that Microsoft Outlook 64-bit is not supported, and that the 32-bit version is supported.

Web Administration (Sage ACT! Premium web client)

Ability to manage critical administration tasks from Sage ACT! Premium (access via web) client.
Manage users
Manage teams
Lock/unlock a database
Manage password policy

Knowledgebase article: 28095

Fixed Issues for Sage ACT! Pro and Sage ACT! Premium

Synchronization – Remote Databases

In previous versions, changing fields to a different drop down field list does not sync to remote databases. This issue has now been resolved.
In previous versions, updates on the parent database do not get synchronized to remote if both sides modify the same contact. Original data on the remote replaces the changes on the parent. This issue is now resolved.
The changes made in the document attached to a contact in the remote database are not synchronized to the document on the parent database. After editing and syncing to parent, a GUID number is added to the file and updated properly on the remote database. On the parent, the document is still linked to the original file name. On remote, the document is linked to the edited attachment. This issue is resolved.
Outlook contacts are removed from the remote database after syncing to parent. Issue is now fixed.
Resolved issue of not being able to change settings on multiple remote databases.

Outlook Integration

There was an issue where Contact and Calendar sync were failing with the following combination of conditions: User Account Control (UAC) in Windows® is turned ON, sync is run from the Sage ACT! menu or sync is run from the Sage Integration menu, and both Outlook and Sage Integration are run as/by a Windows Standard user. This issue has now been resolved. In other user privilege combinations and if a failure occurs, the proper messaging guiding users on how to resolve the issue is displayed.
Issue where the Outlook add-in for Sage ACT! displays a runtime error during loading when upgrading to Sage ACT! 2011 SP1, is now resolved.
Performance degradation when loading task list after sending an email using Outlook. Specific to Windows 7 and Office 2007 environments. Issue has been resolved.
In Terminal Services environment, Act.Outlook.Sync.exe errors display when logging in with multiple users. Multiple users can now log on to the same machine and sync Sage ACT! and Outlook simultaneously.
When attempting to send an email to two separate distribution lists on the same email, the email will not attach back into Sage ACT!. Issue has been resolved.

Contacts/Companies

Issue of not being able to continue using Sage ACT! without saving company name has been resolved.
Salutation field is deleted when users have set a preference to not fill the salutation field. Issue has been fixed.
Error while editing data in Company list view while in customize columns mode. Issue has been fixed.
In the Company detail view, if a user creates a company with divisions and then expands the tree view in the left navigation to show divisions and then switches the layout of the detail view to another layout, the expansion in the left navigation collapses.
Company name is right justified after performing a lookup. Issue is now resolved.

Import/Export

If contact with several names is not mapped in the multiple contact name dialog, nothing is imported into the database. Issue has been fixed.
Contacts of Opportunities are not exported when export from one database to another database. Issue has been fixed.
Import from Microsoft Excel® showing incorrect date format. Issue has been resolved.

Security

Emails sent to other users incorrectly adds the file to the attachment supplemental files folder. Issue has been resolved.

Lookups

No response after clicking Go to Advanced Query link on Lookup Opportunities view. Issue has been fixed.
Record Manager listed as Manager when doing lookups. Issue has been fixed.

Copy Database/Save As/New

The issue of not being to delete users in empty copy databases after applying Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 has now been resolved.
The issue of not being able to change default duplicate checking criteria in empty copy database after applying Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 is now resolved.
Teams created when setting team level security in empty copy database.

Reports

Gross Margin by Product calculated total cost incorrectly. Issue has been fixed.
Opportunity by Product does not display correct information. Issue has been fixed.
Issue of Group reports coming up blank when all sub groups are selected for selected groups is now resolved.

Smart Tasks

Deleting or changing an attachment to a Smart Task step after that Smart Task has been set to auto-run will result in no attachments being included in the Smart Task step. Issue has been resolved.

Activities/Notes/Histories

When adding a resource to an Activity in Sage ACT!, the activity is duplicated in the task list if the filter criteria for the task list is set to “all users”.

Restore

Database Restore does note restore custom layout.
Workaround: Use "Restore As" function instead of "Restore".

Sage ACT! Email Client

Attaching emails to contact history is not working from the Sage ACT! Email client. History recording to Groups or Companies does not work as well for emails from Sage ACT! Email.

Other

Error message displays when users select “Add Permissions” link in Manage Users dialog. The link now opens correctly without error message.
Sage ACT! Office Add-in disables Quick Print function in Microsoft Word 2007/2010 after applying Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 update. Issue has been resolved.
Company Web Info tab links are not refreshed with current entity data if Web Site field has never contained data. Issue has been resolved.
Information on relationship between two contacts is not saved when using the Relationship hyperlink. Issue is now fixed.
When printing calendars using Quick Print, data from days other than those showing on the screen are printing.
When using the Facebook® and Google® links in Internet Explorer® 8, information will not display in the web info tab because of changes made by these sites to not display in frames. Issue has been resolved.
OLEDB Provider – Ambiguous Column Name when querying table with spill-over tables.
Alarms – Snoozing alarms causes error: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
Follow up activities not marked private even though the preference of "Make new activities public" is unchecked. Issue is now resolved.
If a user edits a layout within the first two minutes of opening Sage ACT!, Sage ACT! will switch between views and the layout designer 5 times. This behaviour is intentional; therefore we do not have plans to turn off background loading at this time.
Workaround: Wait for more than two minutes before editing layouts after opening Sage ACT!.
When performing a mail merge to a Microsoft® Word document using Microsoft Word 2010, no history record is created for the record.

Fixed Issues for Sage ACT! Premium (access via web)

Installation/Uninstall

Syncconfigfile.xml file not copied during install, resulting in not being able to set up the Sage ACT! Internet Sync service. Issue has now been resolved.

Contacts/Companies

Contact Detail view is blank after selecting contacts from the contact lookup list, and when users navigate to other views, they are logged out of the database. Issue has been resolved.
Clicking on an email address in contact list gives a 404 error. Issue has been fixed.
When Customizing Columns in Contact List view, the dialog is in a distorted view that displays only the Available Fields. Issue is not resolved.

Activities

Resolved the issue of not being able to sort activities by date or time from Web client when start time is after 5:00 PM.

Outlook Integration

Outlook displays error about missing .dll files when loading Outlook integration. Outlook integration is now loaded without errors.
Sage ACT! address book is not listed as an available address book in Outlook for Outlook integration. Issue is now resolved.
When updating the time on a Sage ACT! activity and checking the “send invitation email” box on the activity dialog, the sender will get an updated iCalendar invitation, but the time still shows the original time for the activity.
Workaround: The sender must manually change the activity time and/or date inside the email message. The manually updated message does update the receiver’s existing Outlook Calendar.
Note: Microsoft currently has no plans to refresh the cache more often or provide a mechanism for Sage ACT! to refresh their cache due to performance.
Act.Outlook.Sync.exe errors when logging in with multiple users in Terminal Services. Issue has been resolved.

Preferences

Fixed the issue of not being able to change record creation options from the Web database client.

Opportunities

Custom date ranges on opportunity list filters does not return any results/data. Issue has been fixed.

Lookups/Keyword Search

Sorting on results of contact column after performing keyword search does not sort in any logical order. Issue is now resolved.
Lookup Keyword Search does not find all records, specifically is searching the Current Lookup. Issue has now been resolved.

Mail Merge

When Microsoft Word is set as the word processing editor for Sage ACT! Premium (access via web), if a user opens the mail merge fields dialog to add fields to the mail merge template, the fields are not in alphabetical order. Issue has been resolved.
Mail merge to Microsoft Word and print does not record history. Issue has been resolved.

Firefox™ Web Browser

Unable to perform advanced queries when accessing the web database client via Firefox®. Issue has been resolved.

Login

User logs in and in a varying time from 5 minutes to 20 minutes, the user will start getting a pop up message stating "Continue to stay logged in". The user then receives this same popups every 1,2, or 5 minutes asking them to click to continue. Issue has now been resolved.

Technorati Tags: Sage,Sage ACT!,ACT!,CRM

Can Sage treat ACT! as a global product?

2011-07-27T22:49:00.001+10:00

Those who know me know that I love and support ACT!, but there are some issues with Sage that I believe need work.

There has been a discussion going on in the LinkedIN ACT! Fanatics Group for some time on how to find ACT! Consultants in international regions. The discussion can be seen here: Finding ACCs around the world...

There has been some good comments from Consultants, users and Sage staff. This has helped me to a few thoughts on what the problems are and I thought I would describe them here.

Regionalisation

The first problem is regionalisation (at least the way Sage do it). This causes issues in the product design AND in the support of users and channel. While this does work in the ERP world, that Sage comes from and where every country/region needs different handling, it actually harms the proper selling and supporting of CRM.

ERP users (even in small multi-nationals) don't usually spread usage of their accounting system across country boarders. However, CRM users regularly do and even those based in one country will travel and want access to their data. There are many areas of the product that are designed with North American defaults that don't work as well for others – multi-currency, scheduling for different time zones, phone formatting and country codes to name a few.

From the support point of view (especially the channel support), this is left to the individual Regional Operating Companies ... and they simply don't have the resources or budget to provide this for Sage ACT! at the same level as North America. It is this area that has caused some regions (eg Asia) to drop ACT! altogether.

I offered to help Sage with training and support ACT! resellers in Asia, but was told they weren’t interested.

Sage has a corporate marketing team that directs all the OpCos about the logos, colours, etc ... they need to implement a similar method to ensure that ACT! (and probably other CRM solutions) have a similar global uniformity in dealing with their partners and users.

Responsibility with Authority

The second problem that is endemic across Sage is that those given responsibility for an area or project rarely (if ever) also have the necessary authority to make changes... and those with the authority rarely understand the product.

Over the past years, I have spoken to many staff who agree with many of these issues… but the regional staff tell me it’s corporate and those with global responsibilities tell me that decisions are made by the regions.

Management Communication

The third issue is the lack of public communication on ACT!'s road-map from management since David van Toor left. I highlighted this in this post: Better handling of rapidly updating environment (yet to get a response from Sage). If you haven't added a Kudo to that post, please do.

Even the Press has Noticed

You'll see that I'm not the only one who sees some of these issues ... read this ZDNet article:
ZDNet - Sage Summit 2011: CRM at a Crossroads
This is a mostly positive article, but his conclusion that says corporate needs to "rejigger its thinking" in how they handle their CRM products is spot on.

Moving Forward

Should anyone at Sage Group Inc. or the ACT! team wish to discuss any of these points, I’d be more than happy to talk and help to come up with a way to address them. Like you, my aim is to provide the best experience for users and partners with their investment in Sage ACT!

Technorati Tags: Sage Group,Sage,ACT!,Sage ACT!,CRM

Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 Hotfix 4

2011-05-25T21:03:00.001+10:00

This documentation applies to Hot Fix 4 for Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 for the following versions:

Sage ACT! Pro 2011 SP1 (version 13.1.111.0)
Sage ACT! Premium 2011 SP1 (version 13.1.111.0)
Sage ACT! Premium 2011 (access via web) SP1 (web server version 13.1.111.0)

This hot fix requires that Sage ACT! 2011 Service Pack 1 (SP1) be installed. If you have not yet installed SP1, please do so before applying this hot fix. Instructions for downloading and installing SP1 are in the following Knowledgebase article:

How To Download and Apply Sage ACT! 2011 Service Pack 1 (includes Hot Fix 1)
Answer ID: 27290

Do not apply this hot fix to any other versions or builds of the software. To determine the version of the product you are using, select Help, then About ACT! from the ACT! main menu.

Important: You must apply this hot fix to all machines that share the database – especially when using synchronization. This includes all machines that contain the Main Synchronization Database (Publisher), Main Remote Database (Subscriber), and machines that have the ACT! Network or ACT! Internet Sync Services installed. All machines must have this hotfix applied for synchronization to continue. Check installed version by going to Help and About Act!. Consult with your administrator before applying this in a sync environment.

Sage ACT! 2011 hot fixes are cumulative, so the latest hot fix will include the benefits of all earlier hot fixes for this version. It is not required to install earlier hot fixes prior to installing the latest hot fix.

Hot Fix 4 for Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 is designed to resolve the following issues:

You see that Microsoft® Outlook® takes a long time to load when the Sage ACT! address book has been added and Exchange Cache mode in Outlook has been disabled.
You are using a localized version of Sage ACT! and see that umlauts are stripped from the content of any email that also contains a graphic.
You are using remote database synchronization and see that record information is not being exchanged correctly when changes are entered to the same record at both the parent and the remote sites during a single sync cycle.
You see that attachments with file names exceeding 15 characters are stripped from email messages received using the Sage ACT! Email client.
You notice that Keyword search fails to return all expected records.
Your database contains one or more custom entities that include spillover tables and the following error displays when running a query on one of those tables: “Ambiguous column name ‘EventsID’.
You have edited a template in your Sage ACT! Premium (access via web) database and are unable to save the template to a public directory.
You see that attachments with names that exceed 15 characters are stripped from email messages sent using Sage ACT! email.
You are using a localized version of Sage ACT!, and see that the Maximize button in the Keysearch window is unavailable.
You are using a German version of Sage ACT! 2011, and see that the word ‘location’ is translated incorrectly in the Appointment Activity Send Email invitation.
You are using Sage ACT! with Microsoft® Windows® 7 and Microsoft Office® 2007, and see performance degrade after sending an email through Sage ACT! to a contact and then creating or clearing an activity.
You are using Microsoft Outlook Integration with Sage ACT! and see performance degrade after sending an email to a contact, opening the calendar, and then opening the task list.
You are using Sage ACT! 2011 Service Pack 1 with Microsoft Word 2007 or 2010 and notice that the Quick Print function in Word 2007/2010 is disabled.
You have cleared the Allow history creation for email sent from a user of this database to another user option (Tools>Preferences> Admin), but find that email sent to other users incorrectly adds files to the attachments folder.
You are using Sage ACT! 2011 Service Pack 1 with ACT! Email and see the options to attach a file or a photo are unavailable.
You are using Sage ACT! Premium for Web and, after using Lookup to find a group of records, you see that the Contact Detail page is blank, you are unable to page through the Contacts returned in the lookup, and returning to the Contact List view causes you to be logged out of the database.
You are using Sage ACT! Premium for Web and are unable to change Record Creation options in the Web Client. You are using an English language version of Sage ACT!, but the new Data Chart properties display French options.
You are using Sage ACT! with Outlook Integration over Terminal Server and see an error if more than one Sage ACT! user is logged in.
You are using Sage ACT! Premium 2011 (access via web) with Microsoft® Outlook® integration enabled and notice that Sage ACT! is not listed as an available address book in Outlook.
You are using Sage ACT! Premium 2011 (access via web) and see a distorted view when attempting to customize columns in the Contact List.
You are using Microsoft Office® 2007 with a Dutch language version of Sage ACT! and see, that when you create a quote from a new opportunity, the Excel® portion of the quote fails to populate.
You have applied the SP1 update to Sage ACT! 2011, made a copy of your database via the File > Save Copy option, and see unexpected error messages when attempting to set your duplicate checking options in the copy of the database.
You have applied the SP1 update to Sage ACT! 2011, made a copy of your database via the File > Save Copy option, and see unexpected error messages when attempting to delete a user account in the copy of the database.
You have applied the SP1 update to Sage ACT! 2011, have remote databases, have setup Outlook Contact Synchronization, and are seeing data inconsistency between the Publisher database, Remote databases, and Outlook when synchronizing.
You have applied the SP1 update to Sage ACT! 2011 and are now unable to use the Outlook Add-In for Sage ACT!.

Downloading the Hotfix:

Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 Hot Fix 4 (English)
Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 Hot Fix 4 (French)

More detailed information available from ACT! Knowledgebase KB27440

Technorati Tags: ACT,Sage ACT!,Sage,CRM

ACT! for Notes 9.0 is ready for Shipment!

2011-05-23T16:03:00.001+10:00

ACT! for Notes 9.0 will instantly increase user enthusiasm, user adoption, deliver results and help you get more of what you value most - TIME!

ACT! for Notes 9.0 is Simple Efficient and Easier to Use.
Seeing is believing, so schedule your web demo, request a Free demo and check out our below videos.
Below are only a couple of reasons that ACT! for Notes 9.0 will Help Save you Time and make you more Productive.
Partial List of New Features
Web Search Action Buttons - integrate with endless on-line social media and reference resources, directly from your ACT! for Notes database. ACT! for Notes 9 brings you visibility to relevant contact information residing in Google News™, Weather, LinkedIn®, and Facebook right to your desktop. You can add new or change existing searches on your own! (see AFN 9.0 Preview below)
Contact and Company Forms - Redesigned forms give AFN users a "360-degree view" of ALL RELATED INFORMATION including : Activities, Notes, Sales Opportunities, individual contacts at a company, account billing info, and attachments such as contracts, proposals, and much more. (see AFN 9.0 Preview below)
Enhanced Search Capabilities - A new "Output to Folder" option provides AFN users post query flexibility using broadcast e-mails, mass security, mail merges and much more! (Click the below Play Button)

Context-Sensitive On-line Help - All End User and Administration Help information has been upgraded and placed on-line and available from within ACT! for Notes. New, Context-sensitive help has been designed to give AFN users quick assistance.   AFN users can access Help within AFN by simply clicking F1.
Create an Activity from within the Calendar View - An AFN will user can quickly create a scheduled Activity document directly from the calendar view.
(Click the below Play Button)

Navigation Pane - New, easier to use Accordion style Navigation Pane.
PREVIEW ACT! for Notes 9.0

(click the below Play Button)

Technorati Tags: ACT! for Notes,ACT! for Lotus Notes

SaaS/Cloud software and Regional Internet access

2011-03-14T21:49:00.000+11:00

Regional road trips. No doubt you’ve, “been there, done that before” and experienced what a nightmare it can be to get any internet coverage. No matter what the reasons for our travels out of town may be, one thing is certain: We still need our connection to the big, busy world via our trusty iPhones or Blackberries – or in my case, both!

A short time ago, I had the pleasure of attending a friend’s birthday party on the Gold Coast of Queensland and spent 10 days there to catch up with some old friends.

I was based in Ormeau. For those who don’t know where this is, it is about 1 hour’s drive south of Brisbane (Australia’s third largest city) and is in Australian’s largest growing region.

I had a great time catching up with friends in Brisbane, Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast (North of Brisbane).

And of course, being me, I needed to have constant and regular access to my ACT! contacts, to email, and to various other office and on-line services and forums.

I was carrying an iPhone4 and a Blackberry Pearl (both with Handheld Contact) to give me the remote access I needed and hoped to find Wi-Fi connections where convenient to sync and to access my other information.

I suffered serious regional culture shock

Now don’t get me wrong. Like most people, I love getting out of town and escaping the hustle and bustle, but coming from Sydney, I’m used to the comforts of being connected at anytime of the day or night. I’m used to having a 30Mbit connection and 3G/4G network coverage. That’s not the reality though for my regional friends as I discovered while on my road trip. Here’s what I discovered on my travels:

Mobile access was shocking: I had to wander from street to street, just to get a measly 1-2 bars on either the iPhone4 or Blackberry. As a customer of Telstra - this country’s largest telecommunications provider - it felt way short of my reasonable expectations for adequate coverage. It could have been worse – I could have had no coverage like any other poor person with the other carriers!
Not all regional areas have ADSL coverage: Telstra has only put in enough lines for about half the properties in this new estate so the place where I was staying only got access after a neighbour moved out – the new resident in their neighbour’s place would be out of luck.

As frustrating as it was for me venturing out into this regional area...

...These frustrations are also being experienced in metropolitan areas of Australia!

There is “business park” in Brisbane itself (Australia’s third-largest capital city), that has virtually no broadband access at all …

Read that again if you need to, because the mind boggles. Even in a city like Brisbane, a business park doesn’t necessarily have broadband internet access. You can check out: Brisbane's NBN 'will transform people's lives' to get the lowdown on that story

For now though you might be wondering how this is relevant to this blog dedicated to Sage ACT!, CRM and IT?

Well, much in CRM is about mobility… and recently a lot of the press have jumped on the “trendy” technologies of cloud based computing – both for phone/tablet access and for general access.

For those of us who have been in the computing industry for long enough, we remember that the PC was originally viewed (by IBM) as little more than a slightly more intelligent “dumb terminal” to main-frame applications. Later, as the power of PCs increased, more of the data was stored locally and out of IT control. This lead to a gradual pull-back of control via networking, and then via various remote solutions.

These remote solutions are collectively referred to as “cloud computing”:

ASP – Application Service Provider
On-demand software
SaaS – Software as a Service

To be honest, I’m not sure how to really define the differences of those … other than that they are buzz-words from different decades.

They are usually accessed via one or more of these methods:

Remote Desktop Protocol Connection (Terminal Services or Citrix)
Virtual Desktop (VMware, etc)
Virtual Private Network
Browser based applications

Cloud-based technologies do have some benefits:

The data is live to the remote users
Software integration issues are largely eliminated from the client side
It can be platform independent – although, this can depend on browsers / versions that are supported
Key software systems are kept up to date, available, and managed for performance by experts
Improved reliability, availability, scalability and security of internal IT systems
A provider's service level agreement should guarantee a certain level of service
Access to product and technology experts dedicated to available products
Reduction of internal IT costs to a predictable monthly fee
Redeploying IT staff and tools to focus on strategic technology projects that impact the enterprise's bottom line

But there are also some serious disadvantages:

The client must generally accept the application as provided since vendors only fully customize solutions for the largest clients
The client may rely on the provider to provide a critical business function, thus limiting their control of that function and instead relying on the provider
Changes in the market may result in changes in the type or level of service available to clients
Integration with the client's non-hosted systems may be problematic
Accessing data to convert to another system later maybe costly or not-available
Loss of control of corporate data
Loss of control of corporate image
Insufficient vendor security to counter risks
Lack of internet access (even temporarily) prevents users’ access to their data
What happens when the provider suffers problems? Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, Salesforce and many others have been in the press during the past year for being down for periods of time. Or some, like Google for losing data.

So where does that leave potential CRM users looking for remote access via the cloud?

I wrote an article a year ago on “Supporting Remote Users with ACT! by Sage”. In selecting the best method for a specific site, there are two questions you need to ask:

Will the master and remote users always have reliable connection when they need access? If not (especially in the case of regional access as per the beginning of this article), then you should look at a sync-solution. The users work off-line and sync the changes with the master
This is especially important for smartphone and tablet users who may want to do work in areas not covered by their phone carrier or Wi-Fi (eg on a plane, some buildings and areas)
Do you have the necessary reliable bandwidth and access to IT skills to self host or do you get it hosted by a third-party for an on-going fee? This is a bit more complex and can depend on:
- How good is your internet connection (for host and remote)?
- How responsive are your support options (in-house or out-sourced) if the server has issues?
- For hosted solutions:
  - How reliable are they?
  - How good is their tech support? Do they provide a service guarantee?
  - How financial are they?
  - What happens to your connection and data if their business or service fails?
- If the third-party host is down for a day, how much will the loss of access cost you? Will it be less if the remote users are using sync to local copies?
- How secure is the connection? At a minimum, must use one or more of SSL, VPN, RDP
- If you want to change application, will the hosted provider allow you to access ALL of the data in a format suitable for importing into other systems?
- How customisable is the application? Can you integrate it with your legacy systems or add functionality that you might require?

In Conclusion:

While SaaS/cloud offering will be suitable for many users, there are some questions that you need to ask to determine if it’s the best solution for you.

I feel certain that SaaS offerings will become more viable as time goes by, but right now I’m reminded of the line that for those on the bleeding edge of technology, that “a pioneer is frequently the guy with an arrow in his back!”

Technorati Tags: ACT,Sage,Sage ACT!,SaaS,Cloud,Remote,Smartphones,CRM,SageACT!

Solutions to some of the SQL issues when installing ACT! 2011

2011-02-16T19:41:00.001+11:00

Re-posted, with permission from Ben Hamilton

This is a set of common issues we have seen when installing SQL 2008 (which is part of Sage ACT! 2011), especially when upgrading a previous version that used SQL 2005

Remove .Net Framework 4.0 before install

The support staff in Sage Business Solutions Melbourne (bless ‘em) gave me a pointer that if “Microsoft .NET Framework 4 Client Profile” is installed it gives troubles. Therefore they suggested uninstalling it prior to commending an SQL 2008 install. I don’t know why or what but this was an important step. Note that just doing this still gave me a failed SQL install. I’d love to know more about the ‘why’ here. I’d also like to have been informed earlier instead of after me jumping up and down and making phone calls. But that’s a topic for another day. For now I’m very happy with their suggestion as it does appear to have contributed to a successful install, which is GOAL NUMBER ONE.

SQL Service Account

During the install you get the option to set which account the SQL Server Database Engine uses, instead of setting to NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM as per Sage KB26994, leave it as the default. After the installation is complete you then go to services.msc and change it to Local System then.

Avoid Special characters in the path

As per Microsoft KB955666 you can’t use a ‘number’ or ‘pound’ (#) sign in the path name. Now I did NOT have a pound sign in the path, but there was a space in one of the folder names and a ‘plus’ sign (+). So taking to heart Microsoft's admonition, I copied the installer to a folder C:\SQL2008ExpR2\*.* and ran it from there.

Various other issues and resolutions

“MsiGetProductInfo failed to retrieve ProductVersion for package with Product Code = ‘{4AB6A079-178B-4144-B21F-4D1AE71666A2}’. Error code: 1608.. ” See here and here.
“Wait on the Database Engine recovery handle failed. Check the SQL Server error log for potential causes.” See here.
“Error: 15209, Severity: 16, State: 1. An error occurred during encryption.” See here.
Attempting to open registry subkey Software\Microsoft\PCHealth\ErrorReporting\DW\Installed
Attempting to get registry value DW0200
Submitted 1 of 1 failures to the Watson data repository
Refer here, here and here.

Hope this helps someone short cut the time to resolve their SQL install.

Please add Comments with any other issues and resolutions you might find when installing SQL 2008 (especially when upgrading from SQL 2005)

Technorati Tags: ACT,Sage,Sage ACT!,SQL 2005,SQL 2008

Finding the hidden functions of ACT! with your Consultant

2011-02-01T20:46:00.001+11:00

Part 4 of The Seven Day Blogging Challenge - Share a photo I took this week and tell you about it.

I have thought about today’s Challenge post for a while and, with this blog being about ACT!, there was not much I could think of to take a picture that would be relevant.

So I’ve taken a screen shot of a menu that describes how proper use of ACT! will benefit you:

If you can’t find these functions in your copy of ACT!, I suggest you speak to your ACT! Certified Consultant. These are the people who do more that the break-fix support you might get from a vendor support contact.

A good ACC will take the time to understand your business and the workflow of your operations. They will then assist you in designing ACT! in the best possible way to achieve your goals using functions within the product or some of the many powerful add-ons that extend it’s use.

The ACC can then assist with planning and implementing your installation roll-out including importing your data, connecting to other systems and training your users and administrators to properly get the maximum benefit from the product.

An investment in a good Certified Consultant will generate a Return many times in better managing your contacts

When looking at the ACT! Certified Consultant list, you may find many in your area. So here is an article on how you should go about picking the right one for you: How to pick the right CRM consultant

Should you have any questions on this, please let me know by posting the comments here.

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT!,Sage,SageACT!,CRM,ACC

Problems with Sage Mobile for ACT! (new ACT! Mobile Live)

2011-01-31T21:44:00.001+11:00

Part 3 of The Seven Day Blogging Challenge - Write a blog post on the same topic as one my most popular posts

Well, the most popular posts previously have been:

So I thought I would do another on mobile CRM with Sage ACT!.

I have always supported ACT! as a mobile product … both with sync to laptops and remote offices and with sync to PDAs and smartphones. Over the years, I have purchased new devices along this path to use, test and support other users:

An HP95LX in 1992 for ACT! for HP95
Apple Newton in 1995 for ACT! for Newton
Handheld PC running Windows CE in 1997 for ACT! for Windows CE
Palm M505 in 2002 for ACT! for Palm OS
Blackberry in 2000 here I used Companion Link
Another Blackberry in 2003 using Handheld Contact
Since then, I have used various devices using Blackberry, iOS (iPhone and iPad) and Windows Mobile operating systems.

I believe in the benefits of being able to access and enter my ACT! data wherever I am and understand the problems that mobile users have.

Since 2003, I have been using Handheld Contact. But I have still tested other products to be satisfied that no other product is better for me to switch to.

Despite ACT! for Palm being the best PDA/smartphone solution for ACT!, the ACT! developers have concentrated on products linking to the native address books and losing much of the functionality that real ACT! users should want. Without this, they may as well be using Outlook for their CRM.

They have had “ACT! Mobile Live” in beta and release for around three years and recently renamed it as “Sage Mobile for ACT!”. It still has many of the bugs and issues I reported in the first beta.

So I thought I’d let you know why I really don’t think users should consider it for their use.

The country code is not supported in phone fields - this means:
- You can't dial international numbers
- You can dial any numbers when travelling overseas
- You can't enter contacts with international numbers
- It causes problems if also using ACT! for dialling/faxing with other services
If sync's with Exchange, Outlook or Google, changes to the outlook profile will either delete records from the ACT! database or duplicate them ... results can be inconsistent
Some activity types are incorrectly handled causing data changes back in ACT!
Some activity time-zones cause activities to move
No formatting of fields
Not a multiuser service... so can't work with web or hosted environments
No tracking of History on calls, emails and sms made from the phone

There are a number of other bugs and functional omissions but as the challenge (as mentioned top of this post) is for a limited number of words, I’ll do a longer post on this later.

Considering Handheld Contact is only $50 more, I think the choice is a no-brainer

Technorati Tags: ACT!,Sage,Sage ACT!,CRM,Blogging,Mobile CRM,Blackberry Vs iPhone,iPhone,Sage Mobile

How Are Product Management Decisions Made?

2011-01-30T15:31:00.001+11:00

Part 2 of The Seven Day Blogging Challenge - Answer one question I think people visiting my blog may have.

Recently I have been trying to explain to users in a couple of forums why the feature they want might not be likely to make it into the product. For a couple of examples of this, see:

So I thought I might try and explain simply how I see the product management decision process. However, please note that I’m not actually privy to the process used by Sage (or any other company other than my own) and am only going by the experiences of what I’ve seen and heard.
Update: Members of the Sage team have confirmed that “this is directionally close” to the process as used

First, all the requests are split into two areas:

Bug Fixes and improvements – defects where the product does not perform as designed or intended as well as compatibility with other new systems and usability
New Features and Enhancements – functional improvements to the actual design of the product

For each of these, a priority must be allocated. The priority would depend on a number of factors:

How many users would be affected by the bug or benefitted from the enhancement
If it’s a bug, it is data damaging or prevents the use of a primary function of the product
Also for bugs, can the issue be replicated in-house to determine the cause
For enhancements, would it just be a nice-to-have for current users or would it sell more product by being part of the decision making points of potential users
Is there a competitive need for the request – are other products in the market doing it
Are there manual workarounds or third-party products that could deal with the request now
How will the request integrate or interfere with current code and user interface design
How they fit into market trends/visions that they want to focus on
Usability and compatibility with adjacent products

Then, for each, a time-frame and cost must be determined. For this, a specification document must be created with much thought being given to looking at all the possible scenarios, data types and values that are considered likely. This is done by consulting users and developers for their input.

Finally they can decide which to approve now, delay for a future version or discard. Obviously, the higher the priority, the higher the allowable cost would be for it to be approved.

So, in order to have the best chance of getting your requests addressed, you should try and put it in terms to answer as many of the points mentioned.

I would write more, but the challenge limits us to 400 words….

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT!,Sage,Sage ACT!,Product Management,Development

The Seven Day Blogging Challenge – Part 1

2011-01-29T19:41:00.001+11:00

Twitter contact, Andrew Emmett, is doing a Seven Day Blogging Challenge. He challenged other bloggers to join him and I have decided to accept.

Here are the 7 topics that Andrew has challenged us to write about.

Starting Saturday I will write one blog post a day, each with 300 to 400 words about:

What the purpose of my website is, who I am and why my blog is unique.
Answer one question I think people visiting my blog may have.
Write a blog post on the same topic as one my most popular posts.
Share a photo I took this week and tell you about it.
Embed a legal YouTube clip that I either found today or created myself. Then tell everyone about the clip and related information.
Create a blog post on a subject I’ve never blogged about here before.
Share hints or details of what I intend to write about in the future.

This experiment promises to be an interesting diversion for the norm and I do hope I can think of some useful and interesting items for you on each of these topics.

One of the opportunities this challenge presents to me is the requirement to write a piece every day and to make it a specific length. As those who read this blog would know, my posts tend to be of a technical nature and I haven’t thought about the length of each article or have a set time that I must post. I write when I think of something deserving of a post and as long as I need to properly explain each topic. I also tend to use the articles as a permanent knowledge base on items I get asked rather than the typical “web log” style of most blogs.

The general aim of this site is to help ACT! users, resellers and consultants get the most from the product. Unlike other ACT! related blogs, I have tried not to simply create content of a marketing or promotional nature. I love ACT! and have have dedicated the past 23 years to the product – but I also experience many of the frustrations that users feel when certain functions don’t operate as well as they should or where the Product Management and development teams have missed the mark and I try to warn users of these also. Hopefully, this “warts and all” approach helps us all use ACT! better and encourages Sage to continue to improve it.

Now that I’ve completed Part 1, I need to think of a question you might have for Part 2.
Any suggestions you might add to the comments area would be most welcome.

Technorati Tags: ACT!,Sage,Sage ACT!,Blogs,Blogging

How should ACT! resellers/VARs deal with Microsoft install issues?

2011-01-27T20:32:00.001+11:00

I'm sure this must be a question concerning every ACT! consultant/reseller ... but, which a number of them have asked my opinion on this, I've not seen any public discussion on it. I'd also be interested in the views of end-users as to what they believe would be fair.

The last time I was shown the figures, around 80% of install support incidents by Sage North America were not due to ACT! code, but were related to Microsoft issues - in the operating system, .Net Framework, SQL Server or Office. Note: If someone at Sage has a more current figure, please let me know

I’m not sure how long ago this happened, but I recently noticed that Sage Australia (and I assume similar in other regions) excludes many areas that fail from their install warranty. While the box says that install issues are covered under a 30-day warranty, it then refers you to the website for Getting Started Support – Free for 30 Days where you can see the majority of install issues that sometimes plague users are specifically exempted.

On one level, this is understandable, because it is sort of unfair that Sage should be responsible for supporting and repairing issues with products and components produced by Microsoft. On the other hand, it could be argued that Sage chose to use those technologies as a basis of the product and that they should provide that support.

The big problem that this raises is how should a Consultant/VAR handle this support? If you are installing a product that costs $300-500 and an OS, SQL or .Net issue requires 4-8 hours of work to resolve, how can you justify charging the user for this time?

If the installer doesn’t charge, then they lose money to sell the product
To charge may make a user feel less than happy at having to pay 4x the cost of the product
Telling a non-technical user to deal with Microsoft, may also not be the best for customer satisfaction

Is a notice to users, in advance, that such a charge may be necessary the right choice? Would this tend to scare off some potential users?

Obviously this would be different for larger user sites where they would be more aware of the complexities of commercial software as well as being able to spread the cost over a larger number of seats.

As I’ve said, I’d really like the thoughts of users, resellers and even Sage staff on this topic. Please post any thoughts you might have to the comments as I think the sharing of ideas is likely to help everyone come to an amicable solution to this problem.

Technorati Tags: ACT!,Sage,Sage ACT!,CRM,Support,SQL,.Net

GL Computing wins @ExpertsExchange Titan award – 3rd time!

2011-01-05T15:20:00.001+11:00

For the 3rd consecutive year, GL computing has earned a spot as a Top Expert in the 7th Annual Expert Awards.

From a competitive field of over 30,000 qualified experts worldwide, GL Computing has been awarded the:

Titan Award - 2010

From Experts-Exchange: “Thank you for sharing your unparalleled, inconceivable, and brilliant knowledge with the members of Experts Exchange, without you Experts Exchange would not be the #1 IT resource in the web.”

GL Computing has won the Titan Award in 2008, 2009 and is the only Experts-Exchange Certified ACT! Sage

It is truly gratifying to have received this award, along with those others I’ve been honoured with recently.

Sadly, I still get no acknowledgement from Sage for the effort I put in to support users - including over 9,400 posts to their own ACT! Community Site and hosting the ACT! Fanatics Group.

Technorati Tags: ACT!,Sage ACT!,CRM,Experts-Exchange

Wishing you all a very festive season from GL Computing

2010-12-23T20:16:00.001+11:00

I would like to thank all the readers of this blog and hope you have enjoyed the information I have shared during 2010 and found it useful.

I’d especially like to thank:

Rich Bohn of SellMoreNow who honoured me with a Willy 2010 award for being a CRM Unsung Hero:
Tony Holowitz of GetMyACT! Together for this very nice post titled: I Like Mike

These wonderful tributes encourage me to keep assisting users and resellers of ACT!

I thought I'd let you know that I won't be taking a break over this time, so feel free to post a comment here on the blog, to the ACT! Fanatics Group or the GL Computing Facebook Page should you have any questions I can help you with.

Please also feel free to post any suggestions for the types of content you’d like to see from me in the new year - your opinions are important to me.

I'd like to wish all of you and your families a safe, wonderful and successful new year.

Kindest Regards,
Mike Lazarus
ACT! Evangelist

My LinkedIN Profile
ACT! Fanatics Group
GL Computing Facebook Page

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACTbySage,SageACT,CRM,Rich,Bohn,Unsung,Hero,Tony,Holowitz,GetMyACT,Together,Mike,tributes,users,Fanatics,Facebook,Lazarus,Evangelist,LinkedIN

ACT! 2011 - The string was not recognized as a valid datetime

2010-10-29T13:13:00.001+11:00

Last week, I was asked to look into a problem by an ACT! Consultant in Australia. They have a client in New Zealand who is experiencing the following problem.

On starting ACT!, they get the following error:

The string was not recognized as a valid datetime. There is a unknown word starting at index 5

That’s not too bad, as after clicking OK, everything seemed ok. However when they try to schedule an activity, they got this error:

Resolution of the dependancy failed, type = "ACT.ULAvailControl" name = "Exception message is: The current build operation (build key Build Key{Act.UL.AvailControl, null}; failed. The string was not recognised as a valid Date Time. There is a unknown word starting at index 5. (Strategy type BuildPlanStratefgy, index 3)

They contacted Sage Australia tech support and were told:

Please be advised that it is a Locale, Data/Time specific issue and has been identified as a known issue with the software version for New Zealand and Mexico and is under investigation. We should get a fix for it in Service Pack 1 which may be couple of months away. In the mean time, you can follow the below step to work around the issue –
Close and open database [File > Close] without closing ACT completely.
You will be able to access the date/time related features without any problem. If you have any questions, please feel free to reply to this email or call Support

Obviously, as this problem only happens in those countries, there is a problem with those who didn’t beta test it prior to release.

I wondered who might have seen this, so I posted a message about it to the ACT! Community Forums and the LinkedIN ACT! Fanatics Group … the answer came on the LinkedIN group from José Roberto dos Santos from Brazil. He said:

Change the Regional Settings in Windows Control Panel from "am" and "pm" to "AM" and "PM".

I am glad to report that this simple fix worked perfectly and I thought I’d post it here for others in those regions who have this error.

Technorati Tags: Sage,ACT,Sage ACT!,ACT! 2011,New Zealand,Latin America

What’s New in Sage ACT! 2011 #SageACT

2010-09-15T05:18:00.001+10:00

Normally I try to get this out during the beta period. But, for various reasons, I’ve only been able to get to this now.

Sage ACT! 2011 has added a whole swag of new functions, improvements in usability and fixes to issues. I’m going to try and cover the ones that I have found to be most useful. Unfortunately, a couple are only useful to those within North America… but such is the lack of ability of the regional offices to test the functions and respond.

For the full, public list, please refer to these ACT! Knowledgebase Articles:

Obviously, before you upgrade you should ensure your system, and any add-ons or plugins, support the new version or if they need an update as I suggested in the article: Upgrading ACT!, especially when you are using add-ons

One change worth noting first is the product name changes:

ACT! by Sage is now Sage ACT! Pro
ACT! by Sage Premium is now Sage ACT! Premium (access via Windows)
ACT! by Sage Premium for Web is now Sage ACT! Premium (access via web)

Other than ongoing improvements in stability and speed, the biggest new items are:

Smart Tasks

Smart Tasks allow you to schedule a series of common and connected steps. You can use the Smart Task templates that Sage ACT! provides* or create your own using the Smart Tasks Manager. Smart Tasks can be run manually or scheduled to run automatically.

Note: I think this feature is the one that should easily justify the upgrade for most users.

You should have a look at the ACT! 2011 Smart Tasks video on YouTube

Outlook Contacts and Calendar Integration

Outlook Integration allows you to synchronize your activities and contacts between Sage ACT! Premium and Outlook. You can set synchronization options to determine what information is synchronized. Synchronization can be scheduled to run automatically or manually run at any time.

Note: I strongly suggest users be careful with using these options as I’ve found some odd behaviour. While some of the bugs have now been fixed with Hotfix 1 for Sage ACT! 2011, others are still problems. For example, the fact that it doesn’t sync the country code with phone numbers makes it useless for anyone who wants to call internationally or to use the numbers when travelling – this is the same as one of the bugs I identified in ACT! Mobile Live.

Sage Business Info Services for ACT!

Sage Business Info Services for ACT!* (provided by Hoover's™) provides tools to access critical business information for your contacts and companies. With Sage Business Info Services for ACT!, you can:

Build a list of companies and people and then import these lists directly into your database. Access links from the contact and company Web Info tab. These links provide key information about your contacts' and companies' profile, financial details, company contacts, industry information, and company news. Subscribe to alerts to notify you when key changes occur for the contact or company.*Requires additional subscription.

Note: This service provides very limited benefit to those of us outside North America or United Kingdom as you can see from the Hoovers' Companies By Geography list

Sage E-marketing for ACT!*

Sage E-marketing for ACT! is replacing the name for the connected E-marketing service, formerly ACT! E-marketing. There is a new icon for the contact toolbar as well. *Requires additional subscription.
Sage E-marketing for ACT! is integrated “out of the box” with Sage ACT! 2011 Smart Tasks (3 Smart Task templates require a subscription to Sage E-marketing for ACT!).
Email templates can now be launched as landing pages (web pages hosted by Swiftpage™).
The service now has an Advanced Template Editor that can be used to edit imported templates.
The template manager has been redesigned to help users manage, edit, publish/distribute, and launch landing pages easier.
Swiftpage has added support for Microsoft® PowerPoint®, Microsoft Excel®, and text files as documents that can be linked from an email template.
Documents and images can be managed in a library format instead of uploaded individually for each template. The document library can store up to 100 documents, and the image library can store up to 500 images.

Security, Administration and Other Improvements

Increased Security for Attachments and Notes/History Editing Within Your Database
Company Security
Import Data Changes: New Express Method, Ability to Create New Fields On-the-Fly During Import, and Synonym Mapping
Installation and upgrading seems much more reliable
Installation without MS SQL on workstations
Now uses MS SQL 2008 Express by default
Full support for MS Office 2010 - in 32bit mode only as per Office 2010 support with ACT! by Sage
Parallels (for Mac users) now officially supported as well as VMWare, Sun Virtual Box and Citrix
Web version now supports native Firefox 3.5 and 3.6 … I’ve also found it seems to run ok in a brief test with Firefox 4.0b6 and Google Chrome, but these aren’t “officially” supported

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT!,Sage ACT!,ACT! 2011,Hoovers,Outlook,Smart Tags

Office 2010 support with ACT! by Sage #SageACT

2010-08-28T15:25:00.001+10:00

For some months, people have been asking about support for Office 2010 in ACT! by Sage with no information or direction from Sage itself.

Up until this point I had assumed that, like with many earlier versions, Sage would provide a patch for the currently available version of ACT!, but that it would be significantly improved with the next major release. Well, this was not the case.

Sage management had left everyone guessing till finally an announcement from Larry Ritter. In brief:

There won’t be a patch to provide full Office 2010 support in ACT! by Sage 2010
There is a workaround to provide limited support for Outlook 2010 by downloading a preference file from ACT!’s knowledgebase article 26713 - ACT! by Sage Compatibility with Microsoft® Office 2010
Sage ACT! 2011 will support Office 2010, but only if installed in 32bit mode

Let me address each of these points in turn:

No patch for ACT! 2010 for full support

There are two possible reasons for Sage’s decision not to provide a patch for users of ACT! 2010.

Either there were significant changes in the new Office version that produced major challenges to incorporate in the current code base, or Sage completely underestimated the faster uptake to Office 2010 compared with Office 2007 and didn’t foresee it would be an issue for enough of its user base.

Whatever the reason, Sage decided it was better value for their R&D dollars to concentrate on ACT! 2011

But why has it taken so long to provide this necessary information?

Limited support via a replacement preferences206.xml file

While I do applaud Sage for at least providing this bandaid fix, there are a few issues I have:

It’s important to read the knowledge base article linked above to see that, while it provides limited support for Outlook, it provides no support for Word or Excel integration.
Back in June, a user posted to this Sage’s Community site article that he had received XML files for this fix. I contacted several people within Sage to see if I could get some information on the custom XML files, but did not receive a single reply. Seeing as they knew about this fix in June, why did it take so long to post it to a knowledge base article or even make it available to other users in need?
When Sage did post the knowledge base article, it only included a fix for the US version of ACT! 2010. Within a couple of hours of being informed how the XML was made, I had provided an AU version to Greig Hollister to update the knowledge base. I see that a Sage Australia Tech Support staff member also took the effort to provide one – their name has removed from this blog at their request not to be associated with any form of communications … but you can see who on Larry’s blog. I found the request to remove their name particularly telling as the problem here is the lack of public communication from Sage as this is what they objected to.
But so far those are still the only versions posted. Sage needs to realise that this product is used world-wide and either produce the localised versions from their North American office or request each of the regions to provide them in a timely manner. I have also been told that the US version will work for Canadians as long as you rename it to CApreferences206.xml
For any users or resellers in the other regions who want to create their own:
- On a clean OS, install Office 2007 and then ACT! 2010 12.1
- Open ACT! and set up the Office integration
- Go to the folder appropriate to your operating system:
  - Windows® XP: C:\Documents and Settings\{User_Name}\Application Data\ACT\ACT for Windows 12)\Preferences
  - Windows Vista® & Windows® 7: C:\Users\{User_Name}\AppData\Roaming\ACT\ACT for Windows 12\Preferences
- Copy the file XXpreferences206.xml (where XX refers to your country version)
- This file can then be used as per the knowledge base article linked above with Office 2010

Support for Office 2010 in Sage ACT! 2011

On a 64bit operating system, Office 2010 can be installed in either 32bit or 64bit, but ACT! 2011 will only support Office 2010 in 32bit mode.

I’m not sure of the reasons for this, but it is important to note that many products from Microsoft, Google and others are also limited in their Office 2010 support to 32bit.

I don’t see this as too much of a problem because the only real advantage of operating Office as a 64bit application is if you need to operate on huge (multi-gb) Excel or Word documents.

However, it is something that will be important for Sage and resellers to make users aware of, especially as I would think most pre-installed versions of Office on new systems would have been pre-installed as 64bit.

In Conclusion

While it would have been nice for Sage to have patched ACT! 2010 for full support, there are obviously technical and/or business reasons for their decision not to do this. Certainly it gives justification for users to purchase the maintenance package each year.

What I fail to understand is why it took so long for Sage to inform the user-base of their decision and, more so, to provide the work-around to users caught out by this when they knew about it so long ago.

ACT! is a business tool and its users need timely communication from Sage in order to plan their own business projects. It seems that, since the days under David van Toor and Sam Hunter, ACT!’s management have been communicating in absentia.

What do you think?

Technorati Tags: ACT!,SageACT!,Sage,CRM,MS Office,Office 2010

ACT! by Sage Whitepapers

2010-05-29T23:56:00.001+10:00

A collection of ACT! by Sage Whitepapers from ACT! Knowledgebase article 25908

ACT! 2010 and Microsoft Office Integration
This Whitepaper details ACT! integration with core Microsoft Office applications, including Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel®, Microsoft Outlook®, as well as Internet Explorer®. It explores how ACT! users can leverage the power of both ACT! and Microsoft Office when integrated together. The integration capabilities addressed in this Whitepaper pertain to the 2010 versions of ACT! by Sage, ACT! by Sage Premium, and ACT! by Sage Premium for Web.

ACT! by Sage and Social CRM - Part 1
This whitepaper is Part 2 of our ACT! and Social Media series and will explore the benefits of using social media to engage with your customers, and demonstrate how ACT! 2010 can make it easier to find new prospects, learn about their needs, and grow those relationships. For more information about getting started with social media, please refer to Part 1 of our whitepaper series, Connecting with Your Customers: A Guide to Social Media, which provides a general overview and description of social media and step by step guidelines for how to get started.

ACT! by Sage and Social CRM - Part 2
This whitepaper is Part 2 of our ACT! and Social Media series and will explore the benefits of using social media to engage with your customers, and demonstrate how ACT! 2010 can make it easier to find new prospects, learn about their needs, and grow those relationships. For more information about getting started with social media, please refer to Part 1 of our whitepaper series, Connecting with Your Customers: A Guide to Social Media, which provides a general overview and description of social media and step by step guidelines for how to get started.

ACT! by Sage 2010: Delivering on Usability and Productivity
This whitepaper discusses how in the past year, Sage Global CRM Solutions has increased efforts related to usability, and therefore, implemented a progressive program of customer research involving hundreds of customers and partners. To determine the quality of the ACT! 2010 design compared to the competition, Sage conducted a Keystroke Level Modelling (KLM) study of ACT! and five competitors. The results of the KLM study presented in this paper show that ACT! was rated number one in user productivity, while Microsoft® and Salesforce.com finished 5th and 6th respectively. Overall, ACT! was rated as most efficient with on average 17% higher productivity than competitors. Notably, the same tasks take 25% longer to complete in Microsoft Dynamics® CRM and 37% longer using Salesforce.com.

ACT! Reporting and Data Access Methods
This whitepaper discusses the technical aspects of the ACT! reporting and data access methods. For example, the ACT! architecture provides four additional data access methods that can be used for querying, reporting and data extraction: ACT! OLE DB Reporting Provider, ACT! Reader Utility and account (ACT! Premium only), ACT! Password Utility (ACT! Premium only), ACT! SDK (Software Developers Kit).

Using ACT! Premium in Microsoft® Terminal Server or Citrix Presentation Server Environments™
The whitepaper explores the benefits of deploying ACT! Premium through Terminal Services, outlines deployment requirements and recommendations, and provides installation and performance tips. It is intended for IT Administrators who are considering deployment of ACT! using Microsoft Terminal Services, with or without Citrix.

Factors That Affect ACT! Performance for Individual Users
This whitepaper examines the factors that affect ACT! application performance for the individual user. It includes results of testing performed by an independent benchmark testing company using ACT! by Sage 2006 (8.0), as well as testing performed by Sage on subsequent ACT! versions.

Scalability Results for ACT! Premium Solutions
This whitepaper provides performance and scalability test results and hardware recommendations to deliver a cost effective and positive end-user experience.

ACT! Architecture, Customization, and Integration
This whitepaper discusses the ACT! product family architecture, deployment methods, customization, and integration capabilities with other products and is intended for IT managers or system administrators who want to better understand the underlying platform and capabilities.

Keys to a Successful ACT! by Sage Deployment
This whitepaper explores various deployment scenarios possible with ACT! solutions, based on the organization’s needs, whether users require online access, offline access, handheld mobile access, or a combination of access types.

ACT! Security Model
This white paper discusses the ACT! security model, which was developed to support stand-alone and workgroup implementations and provide consistency and flexibility to managers and IT personnel charged with protecting contact information.

ACT! Synchronization Architecture
This whitepaper provides an overview of the ACT! sync model, including a description of the key features, abilities, and concepts. It is directed at current users and potential customers seeking to perform a functional and technical evaluation of the product. Diagrams and examples are provided where appropriate, as well as greater detail on Internet synchronization, focusing on setup and configuration.

Managing Customer Relationships: The Choice Between What's Cheap and What Works
Authored by Aberdeen, this research document will examine the benefits of free and paid CM solutions for small-to-medium sized businesses. Organizations in need of a sales automation solution to manage account, contact, and company information will be advised on how to select a CM tool that can satisfy short-term needs and meet long-term goal.

CRM: A Business Imperative for Companies During the Global Economic Downturn
This whitepaper examines how Sage is working with small and medium sized businesses today to help them protect and grow their revenues during the economic downturn through the use of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software.

Automating Success: The Choice Between Contact Management and Customer Relationship Management
Authored by Aberdeen, this whitepaper will enable users to determine which solution best fits their business type, as well as the organizational capabilities necessary to ensure the successful adoption of a Contact Management or Customer Relationship Management solution.

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT! by Sage,CRM

Getting ACT! on your phone

2010-05-20T22:23:00.001+10:00

A comparison of various PDA links for ACT! by Sage

This is an excerpt of the PDF: Getting ACT! on your phone

Mobility has been one of the great driving forces behind the use of ACT!. From the ability to sync to laptops (originally supported with ACT! 2.0 for DOS) to PDAs (since the HP95LX version in 1992) and even Web versions, people have found the need to provide access to remote users and to staff on the road to be an essential aspect to their management of customer relationships and of their staff.

I previously described many of the options for remote access of ACT! by Sage in the post:
Supporting Remote Users with ACT! by Sage

With the high uptake of "smart phones", there are now a wide variety of options available depending on your needs and I thought it would be useful to take a look at these and compare them.

The contents of this document are the result of over 60 separate installs in various configurations over a two month period.

Disclosure: I have been using Handheld Contact (on both Blackberry and iPhone) since switching from CompanionLink nearly ten years ago. I also support Handheld Contact resellers and users in Asia Pacific. However, I shall endeavour to provide an accurate an un-biased analysis of all the products.

The products included in this evaluation:

Testing environment:

Windows XP Professional SP3 (with all updates) on domain
Office 2007 SP2 (with all updates)
Exchange 2003 6.5 SP2 (with all updates)
Blackberry Pearl 8100 with OS 4.5.0.102 via BES
iPhone 3GS 32GB with OS 3.1.3 via Exchange OWA
HTC Touch Duel with Windows Mobile 6 Professional via ActiveSync 4.5
All regional settings set to Australia, Sydney

Areas included in evaluation:

Supported ACT! versions
- Method of sync
- USB
- Wireless via sync server
- Via other software such as Outlook, Exchange, Google Apps
What ACT! data is supported
- Contact fields
  - number of fields
  - data types and formatting
  - pull downs
  - field level security
- Activities
  - linking to correct contacts (or multiple contacts)
  - clearing activities
  - viewing and scheduling for other users
  - custom activities
- Notes / Histories
  - viewing
  - creating on the road (including from emails, phone calls and SMS)
  - linking to multiple contacts
- Sales Opportunities - viewing and creating
- International issues - date and phone number formats
Other functions
Administration
- Ease of setup and implementation
- Ability to control what each user has access to
- Data reliability
- Security
Support issues

Conclusions

After doing far more testing that I had planned for this document, my recommendation for the best product is Handheld Contact Professional for the following reasons:

It is by far the easiest and fastest product to setup and implement and it's just as easy for a single user setup on a local PC as for a 100+ user setup on a network using a computer dedicated to Handheld Contact
It is the easiest product to administer and maintain without technical skills
It provides the most "ACT!-like" experience on the phones it supports
It is a fully integrated application with Contacts, Activities and Notes/Histories in the one interface
Using its own application means that recording of emails, sms and call history can be automatically tracked and synced back to ACT!
It is one of only three products I couldn't cause to duplicate data in the ACT! database - the others being Handheld Contact Basic and 123 Synchronizer
It is one of only two products that operate using a Windows service, which I think is important for network security. The other being ACT! Mobile Live

* A useful point to note for the future: Handheld Contact is working to incorporate the full Sales Opportunity tables as well as those of Accounts Master! towards the end of this year. That will mean Handheld Contact Professional users will be able to view the sales history with their customers, but also to be able to create invoices from the road. Accounts Master! will integrate many accounting/ERP systems into ACT! and Handheld Contact.

It's only negatives are that it's limited to specific devices (Blackberry, iPhone, Windows Mobile Professional) and that the amount of data it requires means that on Blackberry there is a lower contact limit... although this limit is about to be significantly raised in an expected upgrade

My 2nd choice was, to be honest, a surprise to me. I hadn't played with 123 Synchronizer before and was surprised how solid it appeared. If you are using devices that are not supported by Handheld Contact Professional or if your business wants their ACT! data to synchronise with Outlook/Exchange, then this is the way to go.

It is the only product other than Handheld Contact where I didn't manage to cause to duplicate data in the ACT! database
While it didn't run as a service, it does have the option to be called from a command line and run without requiring a user account to be logged into Windows.

The only negatives I found are that it can be quite complex to set up in some configurations - I recommend using an ACT! Consultant - but check that they have done implementations of this product first. Also that it relies on Outlook/Exchange and possibly another product if you want wireless - while this would suit most users, you should check this before selecting it.

If you are running ACT! versions prior to Sage or using a device not supported by Handheld Contact and also not using Outlook, then Companionlink is the choice. But be careful to keep good backups in case of duplication issues. Doublelook really needs to have the option to run as a service to be really considered as an “Enterprise” product.

The free links should really be treated as a one-way option (from ACT! to the phone). The ability to cause problems in ACT! going both ways makes this a poor choice

Regarding ACT! Mobile Live, having supported ACT! since 1987, it really pains me to say I would not advise users to consider this as a realistic option under any circumstances. It has been 20 months since Sage first publically announced the beta of this product. They would be doing a favour to their users and VARs if they either started from scratch or dropped it and purchased one of the other products.

For full details, please see:

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT! by Sage,CRM,PDA,iPhone,Blackberry,Pocket PC,Android,CompanionLink,Doublelook,ACT! Mobile Live,123 Synchronizer

ACT! – Configuring Your Way to Success

2010-04-23T13:02:00.000+10:00

Sage’s Brian Mowka recently published this useful post on editing the ACT! Configuration XML file that can improve the startup speed for some users: ACT! – Configuring Your Way to Success

I hope he will publish some more posts on tweaking the XML files in ACT! to improve it's use for various users.

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT! by Sage,XML

Social Media and CRM – thoughts on how they should connect

2010-04-01T20:02:00.001+11:00

I have done a few articles in my blog on how I'd like to see Social Media integrated to CRM (especially ACT!). The two most relevant are ACT! by Sage and Social Media – Social CRM and Thoughts on ACT! 2010 beta (#ACT2010) - The good, the bad and the ugly

But, since those, I have seen the social media sites expand their capabilities and have seen many more people using them for the business connections as well as their social ones.

From a business point of view, this is introducing many issues with maintaining and managing those relationships and the methods you use to communicate with them. So I thought I would expand my view of some of the ways they should integrate. Obviously, as my focus is ACT!, some of the items might be specific to that CRM environment.

Contact importing/sending and syncing

Social Media has meant that people are making connecting with people in a wide variety of social networking sites like LinkedIN, Facebook, Plaxo, Twitter, Google Buzz and others.

But good CRM strategy means that you should be able to centralise all the points of contact. Basically, I think this should just be one way (from Social Media to CRM) – although, some social media platforms also allow you to load your contacts into them to search and see if they exist, then link them. This would be a good option for those platforms that provide this facility.

Import all (or a lookup) of social contacts/friends from the social media platform
- Check to see if Contact already exists by email (all email fields) or Contact Name
- For each Social Media site, there should be a dedicated field to fill in the key that links the CRM contact to their profile
- As many people use different email addresses for social media sites, when adding the email, it should check if the email address exists. If not, add it to an additional email field
- Ability to define if the imported contacts are Public (all CRM users), Limited Access (some CRM users) or Private
Should also import picture field (if available)
Ability to send a lookup of CRM contacts to the social media network and request to connect or invite the contact if not found
Ability to sync changes made by contacts on social site to CRM - including a picture field. This can be turned on for all or some social sites. An easy way to keep your data up-to-date

Events/Activities

Many social media platforms (like LinkedIN and Facebook) provide the ability to add “events”. These should be imported as activities in the CRM – with the option to link to a specific contact or to the user’s own record in the database.

Social Media Display

This is to display the contact's social media profile in a tab when you are working with them.

For each social media platform this requires two URLs and a dedicated key field
When looking at the contact and displaying their SCRM tab
- If key field is empty, use first URL for search. Try email first (all email fields). Then, if that fails, try Company+Contact or just Contact
- Allow user to select a contact (if only one contact auto select - most likely for email match) and link to the Contact in the CRM by adding the necessary data to the key field
- When contact selected, and the direct key added to the special field and use this with 2nd URL for future views of the contact directly
- Add a check to see if user is connected to the contact. If not, add a button to add them - this will usually display more data and can also change the link field

Blog/Micro blog

From the Social Media Display (above)
- These might be URL with dedicate field from above (Twitter, Facebook, etc) or a web field separate from the web site field in ACT! (for Blog)
- Should also have the ability to "favourite" an individual post - record it in History
- For additional power add for Facebook/LinkedIN (Comment, Reply Privately), Twitter (Reply, Retweet, Direct) - so it's like an off-line client
- Comments, Replies, Retweets, Directs should have option to automatically generate a history
Email
- Maybe add ability to read/send emails via Facebook, LinkedIN, etc
- If Send, also write these to History
Collection of data for accounts
- Ability to combine updates on Groups/Companies like is done now for Notes, Histories, Activities, Sales Ops – this allows a Company wide view of their social media
- Also ability to create Dynamic Groups based on Twitter or Facebook lists and LinkedIN groups

Security

I haven't really thought through the implications of this... but if all of the above is done, some additional security might be necessary - eg you might be a LinkedIN Contact, Facebook Friend, etc with a contact that others in your company are not and not wish them to see
What other items might need to be controlled?

As you can see, my view is that CRM (specifically ACT!) should be the centre of all knowledge and communication and this level of integration and functionality makes that a reality for social media

I'd be more than happy to hear any thoughts/comments any of you might have on this

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT! by Sage,CRM,SCRM,Social Media

ACT! Fanatics LinkedIN Group 1000th member prize

2010-03-10T07:38:00.001+11:00

The LinkedIN ACT! Fanatics Group was created as a place where ACT! users, resellers, add-on vendors and Sage staff from around the world could communicate and share their knowledge of using ACT! by Sage

The success of this is proven by the huge volume of valuable information that has been shared and now we are rapidly approaching 1000 members.

As a special present, some of the add-on vendors who are members of this group have offered to put together two packs of ACT! add-ons:

One for the 1000th member to the group
One for a random member of the group at the end of the week that the 1000th member joins
To be eligible for this prize, you must post a reply to the News article referring to this offer in the LinkedIN group stating why you would like to use any of the add-on products in this promotion.
The decision on the winner will be made by me in conjunction with the add-on vendors taking part

Both packs can be used by the winners or, if won by a reseller, Sage staff member or a user unable to use them, they can be sold at their retail values.*

The following products are included in both packs:

Handheld Contact – Professional Edition (1 yr)	Handheld Contact wirelessly syncs and manages your ACT! Contacts, Activities and Notes/Histories from your BlackBerry, Pocket PC, or Treo Smartphone - it's like having ACT! with you anywhere, anytime! *iPhone version now in beta and due soon
itDial – Advanced	Enhanced calling interface from ACT! via TAPI phone systems and/or Skype VoIP. itDial for ACT! makes keeping track of telephone calls easier than ever. Using itDial, ACT! users can dial and answer calls, update contact information, add new contacts, create history, and schedule activities for incoming and outgoing calls with just the click of a mouse.
Company Wizard	Mass update and build company records based on a Lookup of Contact and create the contact links
Duplicate Contact Wizard - Expert	Powerful De-duplicating Contacts and Companies in your ACT! database while retaining the extended data (Notes, Histories, Activities, Attachments, etc).
ACT! E-marketing (6 months)	ACT! E-marketing helps you reach out to your contacts, grow your database, qualify new leads and automate your business processes. The offer will be 6 months of: Pro service level Silver Drip Marketing 1 user on the account 1,000 email per day send limit
Stonefield Query (6 months)	Stonefield Query for ACT!® is a user-friendly database report writing, query, and data mining tool designed specifically for ACT! putting Business Intelligence reporting in the hands of the end-user where it belongs. Stonefield Query has been customized specifically for ACT! giving you an intuitive, easy-to-use BI reporting solution that you will love!

* Option to resell does not apply to ACT! E-marketing or Stonefield Query

Technorati Tags: ACT,ACT! by Sage,CRM,Handheld Contact,Blackberry,iPhoney,PocketPC,LinkedIN

ACT! 2010 Service Pack 1 is available!

2010-03-06T03:22:00.001+11:00

For ACT! 2010 users, Sage has just released Service Pack 1.

It adds a number of fixes and enhancements and I recommend it for all users.

Note: Apply this update to all machines that are involved in database synchronization to avoid issues surrounding renaming layouts, queries, and reports. This includes all machines that contain the Main Synchronization Database, Main Remote Database, and machines that have the ACT! Network or ACT! Internet Sync Services applied.

You might find the following knowledge base articles helpful:

Technorati Tags: ACT! by Sage,ACT2010,ACT,CRM

What I learned from my last blog post… and what would you like me to blog about?

2010-02-12T13:45:00.001+11:00

Let me start by saying that, while I do like speaking, I don’t consider myself to be a good writer. This is the reason that my posts are largely bullet points or PowerPoint posts and tend to be mostly of a technical nature. Fortunately, blogs in the technical arena gain readerships according to the market they target.

As my blogs are targeted in a small niche of ACT! users who want to improve their technical understanding of the product, I don’t chase the volume hits of more professional bloggers. To put this in perspective, I have been typically achieving about 2000 hits per month on this blog (about the same as I get on the main GL Computing web site.

I try to post at least a couple of times a month and my posts do have a fair degree of text contact, which the search engines love to index.

I do promote my posts via Social Media:

Twitterfeed automatically sends a Tweet on Twitter very soon after an update
New posts are automatically added to the News section in the LinkedIN ACT! Fanatics Group
Networkblogs automatically posts them to the GL Computing Facebook page and to the streams of those who follow either the blog page or are fans of the GL page.
I also find other similar blog posts and, where applicable, add a comment referencing my post
Additionally, I use links to the posts when answering forum questions where I have covered the topic in a post.

Currently, about 50% of hits to the blog are from referring sites (mainly forums I post to and the social media links) and only 35% from search engines.

However, last week, I posted about Why I prefer Blackberry over iPhone for Businesses. This was picked up by a couple of journalists and professional bloggers like Neerav Bhatt on his blog: Introduction to RIM Blackberry Mobile Phones: Pros and Cons

Not only did this article receive a lot of nice comments, but it was highly re-tweeted and has so far received about 1000 hits in less than 2 weeks (500 in the first day).

This raises some questions that I’d like to pose to you:

What would you like to see me blog about?
While I intend to keep targeting the ACT! user base, should I keep the focus on product technical posts? Or would you like to see more posts on other topics that might be of interest, such as: mobile computing, social media, general CRM, general sales/marketing or general IT?
Would it detract from the site if I added some Google Ads or sponsorships?
As I provide the content of this blog for free, do you think it would be a problem to go down this path? Previously, I had not considered the hit rate to be high enough to make this worth-while and also reasoned that the technical people who read the site wouldn’t be interested in this.

To add one more thing – While I don’t sell to end-users, if anyone wishes to utilise my services for any work related to ACT! or IT, you just need to have your reseller contact me to book some time. I can be available remotely for work at any time of the day as we support (via our resellers) in all time-zones.

Please let me know via a comment to this article, a comment in the ACT! Fanatics Group or privately via our Web Site Contact Page if you have any thoughts on what you’d like to see articles on or if there’s anything I can assist you with.

Technorati Tags: ACT!,ACT! by Sage,Blogs,CRM,SCRM,Social Media,support

Life and Times with Sage ACT!

Certified ACT! Genius @ExpertsExchange #SageACT

Is #SageACT! getting too complicated?

Priorities are not easy to determine

Not all the reasons are good ones

Some examples

It doesn’t need to be like this

So, what does Sage need do?

What's New in #SageACT! 2012 – released Sept 1st

New Features and Functionality

Sage ACT! Scratchpad

Universal Search

Services Discoverability/Connections View

Installation/Getting Started

Database Administration

Import

Outlook Integration

Web Administration (Sage ACT! Premium web client)

Fixed Issues for Sage ACT! Pro and Sage ACT! Premium

Synchronization – Remote Databases

Outlook Integration

Contacts/Companies

Import/Export

Security

Lookups

Copy Database/Save As/New

Reports

Smart Tasks

Activities/Notes/Histories

Restore

Sage ACT! Email Client

Other

Fixed Issues for Sage ACT! Premium (access via web)

Installation/Uninstall

Contacts/Companies

Activities

Outlook Integration

Preferences

Opportunities

Lookups/Keyword Search

Mail Merge

Firefox™ Web Browser

Login

Can Sage treat ACT! as a global product?

Regionalisation

Responsibility with Authority

Management Communication

Even the Press has Noticed

Moving Forward

Sage ACT! 2011 SP1 Hotfix 4

ACT! for Notes 9.0 is ready for Shipment!

SaaS/Cloud software and Regional Internet access

I suffered serious regional culture shock

For now though you might be wondering how this is relevant to this blog dedicated to Sage ACT!, CRM and IT?

These remote solutions are collectively referred to as “cloud computing”:

Cloud-based technologies do have some benefits:

But there are also some serious disadvantages:

So where does that leave potential CRM users looking for remote access via the cloud?

In Conclusion:

Solutions to some of the SQL issues when installing ACT! 2011

Remove .Net Framework 4.0 before install

SQL Service Account

Avoid Special characters in the path

Various other issues and resolutions

Finding the hidden functions of ACT! with your Consultant

Problems with Sage Mobile for ACT! (new ACT! Mobile Live)

How Are Product Management Decisions Made?

The Seven Day Blogging Challenge – Part 1

How should ACT! resellers/VARs deal with Microsoft install issues?

GL Computing wins @ExpertsExchange Titan award – 3rd time!

Wishing you all a very festive season from GL Computing

Rich Bohn of SellMoreNow who honoured me with a Willy 2010 award for being a CRM Unsung Hero:

ACT! 2011 - The string was not recognized as a valid datetime

What’s New in Sage ACT! 2011 #SageACT

Smart Tasks

Outlook Contacts and Calendar Integration

Sage Business Info Services for ACT!

Sage E-marketing for ACT!*

Security, Administration and Other Improvements

Office 2010 support with ACT! by Sage #SageACT