June 20, 2013 10:00 – 11:00 am CDT

Maybe you’re already using Microsoft Dynamics CRM for marketing. Maybe you use it mainly for salesforce automation, but you’re curious as to how it can improve your marketing efforts. Or maybe using Dynamics CRM for marketing has never really even crossed your mind.

In this webinar, we’ll will give you a chance to not only learn about the marketing capabilities in Dynamics CRM, but see some real-world applications of how to make it work for you. Join Jeff Wedren, Marketing Manager at PowerObjects, and Cecilie Svensgaard, PowerPack Pro at PowerObjects, to discuss why someone may want to utilize Microsoft Dynamics CRM for marketing and see some examples of how PowerObjects uses it for marketing on a daily basis.

Learn more and register

The post Upcoming Webinar: Dynamics CRM & Marketing appeared first on PowerObjects.

If you want to create a Dynamics CRM 2011 form pop and automatically populate fields in the form, one of the best ways to get the job done is to use query string values. CRM 2011 supports the option to populate fields using query strings.

By populating the fields with a query string in CRM 2011, we avoid some JavaScript rules. You might use a screen pop if you have a custom portal that redirects you to CRM, if you are sending a link to a CRM form, or if you are creating a screen pop such as in a phone integration.

To do this, you’ll need to add a string to the extraqs value in the query string:

https://<yourorg>/main.aspx?etc=1&pagetype=entityrecord&extraqs=<values>

You can populate the following field types with this method:

• Option sets
• Boolean fields
• Strings
• Dates
• Lookups (Custom Lookup, Customer Lookup , Owner Lookup, PartyList Lookup)

Populating the Option Set

Let’s say you want to auto-populate the Address Type in the account form. To do this, add address1_addresstype%3D1. The query string will look something like this:

/main.aspx?etc=1&pagetype=entityrecord&extraqs=address1_addresstypecode%3D1

Populating Boolean Fields

Populating Boolean fields will be similar to how you populate the options set. Set the field value and an integer value of 0 or 1.

Populating String Field

For the field name, add the following string after the field’s name:

/main.aspx?etc=1&pagetype=entityrecord&extraqs=name%3DPower Objects CRM

Populating the Date Field

Populating the Date field will be a little more complicated because the string will need to be coded. For example, if you want to display 07/04/2013, you will need a string of 07%2F04%2F13.

Populating Lookup Field

Populating a lookup field for a simple lookup will be the entity’s guid and the string. For example, let’s say our Primary Contact is Joe CRM. It would look like this:

primarycontactid%3D%7b132525B5-75BD-E211-8F5E-000C298A36A7%7d%26primarycontactidname%3DJoe%20CRM

If you use Customer or Owner, you will need to add the type of the lookup. For example, the owner system user will be:

ownerid%3D%7b132525B5-75BD-E211-8F5E-000C298A36A7%7d%26owneridname%3DJoe%20CRM%26owneridtype%3Dsystemuser

Tips:

1. If you get an error screen, you might have entered something incorrect in the query string or missed something this screen. This is what the error will look like:

2. You can combine several fields together. For example, if you want to populate two lookups and option sets, you will need to add the & sign.

3. Make sure that the guid that you are providing in the look up is the correct one.

Hope this helps! If you want to add more JavaScript to your forms on load, these blogs might come in handy:

• Populate a CRM 2011 Lookup or PartyList Field Using JavaScript
• CRM 2011 Useful JavaScript Tidbits

Happy CRM’ing!

The post Populating Field Values in a Form Using a Query String in CRM 2011 appeared first on PowerObjects.

In today’s blog we’ll take a peek at an extremely powerful tool in Dynamics CRM 2011: workflows. In particular, let’s look at a scenario: Alpha Company would like to use CRM to automatically sort their lead records for their sales team. To accomplish this, they’ve decided to use a workflow to assign a territory to a lead.

We’ll assume that Alpha Company has read up on adding a State/Province field as a drop-down or look-up, and that they’ve created a global option-set called State containing 50 US states and a custom look-up to the Territory entity, containing their desired territories. The state and territory fields will be located on the lead form.

After the State and Territory fields are created and implemented, a new workflow will be created under the Lead entity. This workflow will run when a record is created, and the Scope will be set to Organization.

The workflow will begin with a Check Condition and an Update step that looks like this:

If Lead:State equals (desired states for desired territory), then:

Update: Lead (set properties) > (Choose desired territory from Territory look-up)

The Check Condition and Update step work to check what state the lead record is in, and update the Territory field accordingly.

For example: A lead record is created, and located in Wisconsin (WI). The workflow would check for WI, and if found, it would update that same lead record’s Territory field to read Midwest. This is useful in that it will automatically sort incoming leads to appropriate territories, unlocking a bevy of further automation possibilities!

If that was a little confusing, don’t worry. Below you will find an easy-to-follow, step-by-step guide aimed at creating a workflow to solve Alpha Company’s issue.

1. Click settings

a. Click processes

i. Click New

2. Enter “Assign Territory to Lead” in Process Name

a. Choose Entity: Lead

b. Choose Category: Workflow

3. Choose Scope: Organization

a. Choose Start when: Record is created

b. Click Add Step

c. From the Add Step menu, choose Check Condition (not shown in screen-shot)

d. Click <condition> (click to configure)

4. Choose Primary Entity Lead

a. Choose State

b. Choose Equals

c. Choose desired States for Midwest Territory.

d. Click Save and Close

e. Select row and click Add Step (see 10b), in the Add Step menu, choose Update Record

f. Click Set Properties

g. Click Territory look-up.

h. Choose desired (in this case, Midewest) Territory.

i. Click OK.

j. Click Save and Close

5. Click on the word If of the Check Condition you created in steps 10 & 11.

a. Click Add Step

b. From the Add Step menu, choose Conditional Branch (not show in screen-shot)

c. Click on <condition> (click to configure)

d. Repeat steps 11a – 11h, for as many territories as you desire.

6. Repeat steps 12a – 12d until you’ve finished all of your territories.

7. Once you’ve finished all of your territories, click Save.

a. Click Activate

8. You made it! Test it out by creating a lead and assigning the lead a state from the drop-down. Wait 20-30 seconds and refresh the page, and you’ll have your territory automatically assigned!

Want to learn more about workflows? Here are some more posts delving into a wonderful, wonderful world of automation:

• Creating Recursive or Scheduled Workflows in Dynamics CRM 2011
• Time and Condition Based Workflows in Dynamics CRM 2011

Happy CRM’ing!

The post How to Assign a Territory to a Lead in Dynamics CRM appeared first on PowerObjects.

One of the important tasks for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 administrators is ensuring users have appropriate access to the system. One of the challenges of doing an efficient user audit is easily seeing a list of all the security roles each user belongs to. No worries! There is a report that allows you to conquer this challenge.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 has about 25 out-of-the-box reports. Most of the reports analyze your CRM data. However, there is one report for administrators: the Dynamics CRM User Summary report.

Let’s take a look.

1. In CRM, click on Workplace.
2. Click on Reports.
3. Double click on User Summary.
4. The next screen allows you to filter the user list.
5. Once you’ve set your filter criteria (you aren’t required to filter your report), click on Run Report.
6. The resulting report will display:
   1. Information about each User
   2. Users grouped by Business Unit
   3. A listing of all the security roles to which each User belongs

Not only does the User Summary report give you a list of users, it allows you to see which security roles each user belongs to. The only other way to see if a user belongs to a specific security role is by accessing their user record. This can be time consuming especially for larger organizations. Another benefit is that you can access the User record directly from the report, making it easy to alter access levels. And it’s just a great way to audit user access.

NOTE: This report does NOT show roles assigned to Teams.

That’s all it takes!

Want to know more about security roles in Dynamics CRM? Take a look at this recent blog if you’d like to learn how to restrict how information can be taken out of your CRM system.

Happy CRM’ing!

The post Out of the Box Report: Dynamics CRM User Summary appeared first on PowerObjects.

Over the last several years, a new dimension has been added to reporting in Dynamics CRM: visualization. PowerObjects has taken visualization a step further by introducing maps into XRM solutions. It’s a little thing we call PowerMap—another inexpensive and great add-on by PowerObjects that installs in a few clicks and does magic when it comes to data visualization.

PowerMap takes addresses from your CRM and plots them on a map in the form of pins. With it, you can look at all your leads, accounts and contacts on a map. You can use PowerMap to create business plans based on lead/account/contact locations, for reporting (just click on a pin to get more details), to see what clients are located nearby when you travel for a conference, to make your CRM look cool…the opportunities are endless. And because we are constantly improving our products, future versions of PowerMap will have even more functionality, such as different colored pins for different types of customers, heat maps, routing, and directions.

As an example of how PowerMap can be used, let’s take a look at a recent project where PowerObjects helped a county in rural Minnesota integrate their GIS (Geographic Information System) with Dynamics CRM 2011. (We even got a nice little write-up about the project in MS Dynamics World.)

The permits in this customer’s CRM system require a geographic location, and entering that geographic location information in the form plots a dot on a map. This data is sent to their GIS system in nightly batches. Essentially, they use CRM to update information in two systems: CRM and GIS. One of the many uses of this information is to determine which addresses are in a floodplain, shore land, a bluff, and so on. They also use this new system to track photos and associate them with a geographic location. This information is available in both GIS and CRM.

Before the integration with mapping visualization, our clients did a lot of research to implement an off-the-shelf product that would integrate both the systems. They found out that most of the generic products available out there are first of all, fairly expensive, and second of all, have many functionalities that they did not require. That’s when PowerObjects came into the picture and built a custom solution that only had the functionalities that they required—no more, no less.

PowerObjects is not new to XRM integration with GIS systems/mapping components. However, many businesses have keen interest in visualizing vital data. Where are  leads/contacts/accounts located? You want to see the distribution of your leads based on their ranking/score–where are the hot/warm/cold leads? Which region of the country brings you the most revenue? How do you identify your “VIP” accounts in the country so you could send them an invite to the annual fundraiser?

These are some of the questions that can be answered by PowerMap.

If you’re interested in PowerMap’s capabilities, or integrating mapping visualizations with your CRM/XRM, we’d be happy to discuss with you your requirements and implement a robust integration. Meanwhile, give PowerMap a shot. You can download and try it free for 30 days, like all of our add-ons.

Happy CRM’ing!

The post Dynamics CRM / XRM Integration with GIS and PowerMap appeared first on PowerObjects.

Webinar: Extending PowerMailChimp to See What Contacts and Leads are Interested in on Your Website

May 31, 2013, 10:00 – 10:30 am CDT

The PowerMailChimp add-on for Dynamics CRM lets you build and send bulk email campaigns from within your CRM. With it, you can track the sends, opens, clicks, bounces and unsubscribes back to CRM leads and contacts. All your bulk email statistics are right there in your CRM records, along with the other activities.

But what if you wanted to extend PowerMailChimp to learn even more about your contacts and leads? One simple way to go the extra mile with the PowerMailChimp is to connect it to PowerWebTraffic.

Learn more and register

Webinar: Best Practices for Using Leads

June 4, 2013, 2:00 – 3:00 pm CDT

Deciding how to best enter leads in Microsoft Dynamics CRM is not always easy. You want to lay out a clear process for users so that everyone is entering leads the same way and the data is consistent. After the lead is entered, you want to ensure everyone is following the same process and entering data the same way; otherwise your metrics are meaningless. And how do you do all this without making things too complicated?

After attending this webinar, you will have many ideas for what your organization should be doing to make your leads process clear.

Learn more and register

2-Day User Adoption Workshop

July 30 – July 31, 2013, 8:00 am – 5:00 pm CDT

You want CRM success? Take some time away from your daily demands to focus on how your organization can achieve user adoption. The truth is, there are a number of ‘ingredients’ in the recipe for CRM success. In this workshop, you will build a plan for your organization that ensures all of these ingredients are present.

Hearing from other participants as well as the course materials, you will take away hundreds of ideas for promoting a healthy CRM system in your organization.

Learn more and register

As always, you can keep up on the latest Dynamics CRM events here.

The post Upcoming Dynamics CRM Workshops & Webinars appeared first on PowerObjects.

The Track in CRM feature with the Outlook client is one of the most used features in Microsoft Dynamics CRM. PowerObjects has numerous blogs already published on various tips and tricks on CRM and Outlook integration, but today we’ll focus on a tip to figure out the actual date or timestamp of an email activity record and how that relates to tracking in CRM.

As soon as an email is sent or received, it is up to you to track it in CRM. Typically, the timestamp is recorded when you perform this action—in other words, when you click on an email. However, if an email was sent last week and you Track that email in CRM today, CRM will timestamp it to your current date and time.

Essentially, CRM thinks of the Created On date as the date the record was created in CRM, NOT the day the user created the record. Hence, if you want to know the date when the email was sent, you’ll need to look at the Actual End field. The Created On field is populated by CRM when the email is created or tracked in CRM. This will always reflect the time when the email record was actually created in CRM—the moment the email was tracked in CRM.

If you have these columns configured on your email activities view, you’ll see the difference, shown below:

Was this helpful? You might want to check out our other blogs:

• CRM 2011 Campaign Activities – How to Distribute Emails via Mail Merge
• Sending Emails via On-demand Workflows in Dynamics CRM
• Mail Merge in CRM 2011
• Personalize Bulk Email with CRM 2011 Information

As always, stay tuned for more tips and tricks from Dynamics CRM world. Happy CRM’ing!

The post How to Find the Date of an Email Activity Tracked in CRM appeared first on PowerObjects.

Data migrations can be complex. Whether you are migrating from Salesforce.com to Microsoft Dynamics CRM or from another contact management solution, you will come across challenges with data.

This blog will highlight 11 Dynamics CRM data migration tips that migration package developers might find helpful.

1. Know the size of the database, and chose appropriate tool.
   

   Scribe is best known for shorter development cycle as it provides the point and click features. SSIS development takes time, but SSIS packages perform well in terms of speed.

2. Know the age of your database.

   In addition to the obvious question—do we need all this data?—consider the age of the database when looking at the format. Were data formats changed during past upgrades? Was the data stored differently in previous years? It’s particularly common to see changes in the way email is stored. When this is the case, your test run might look fine, but a full run reveals numerous problems.

3. Do some data analysis.

   Run some aggregates on columns to know the type of data you have using queries or a tool like SQL analyzer. For example:

   1. How many distinct values do you have? You expect 2, but find 6.
   2. How many nulls are there? You expect zero but find a bunch in records older than 2003.
   3. How many empty strings? You expect zero but might find a bunch.
   4. Max length expected is 255? You find some with 1080.
4. 
   Use staging database/tables if applicable.
   

   Staging tables become handy when the source data needs to be cleaned or transformed before moving it to CRM. Typical examples of data cleaning include:

   • Parsing a comma separated values
   • Removing special characters from the data
   • Translating values to fit into a multi-select field
5. Resolve any lookups and references in the source query rather than in the package script.
   

   SQL queries are faster than web-service calls. So if a lookup needs to be resolved, it is good to perform the lookup in the source query itself. This saves the time of a web service call.

6. Setup the migration packages with error handling.

   Store the error rows in a table or implement a mechanism to flag the source records that are processed. The server running the migration can go down any time for maintenance. Coming to work on Monday morning and starting the whole migration from scratch is a disaster nobody wants to have.

7. Perform a trial run before actual migration.

   Ideally perform a trial run with the entire source dataset. This gives an estimate of time it takes to complete the actual migration and also helps identify roadblocks if any.

8. Run the migration under a special migration user.

   Since Microsoft Dynamics CRM has named users, consider running the migration as a service account or a domain user. This will ensure that no records are assigned to the developer once the migration is done.

9. Disable indexes, workflows, and plugins.
   

   Before starting migration, disable database index, deactivate workflow processes in CRM, and unregister plugins that should not be running during migration. AND remember to turn them back on once done!

10. Involve the users who use the data in testing data.

    In addition to you checking the data and matching counts of the source and target data, have users review and test the data. The users know the data. It’s important to have testing scripts identified for data testing rather than “eyeballing” the data and assuming it looks right.

11. Run the packages in parallel.

    Divide the data into buckets. Run multiple instances of the packages in parallel. This speeds up performance drastically.

Lastly, and probably most importantly, if you need assistance, call PowerObjects! Experts at data migration from C2CRM, Salesforce.com, or whether you are just trying to migrate to Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, let us help!

Happy CRM’ing!

The post 11 Dynamics CRM Data Migration Tips appeared first on PowerObjects.

If you have SharePoint integrated with Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, you may have noticed a recent service update where you now experience the following:

• You cannot open a PowerPoint file by clicking its link in a document list. Instead, you must download it, and then open it.
• When you search from a document list, the search results page never stops trying to load.

To resolve this issue, you’ll need to install the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM List Component for SharePoint Server 2013. You can download the list component from the Microsoft Download Center.

Important:   Only use the new List component after the SharePoint Online service update is complete. To learn when the SharePoint Online service update is scheduled for you, refer to the Office 365 service alert email that you were sent. You can also go to the Microsoft Service Health Dashboard.

Happy CRM’ing!

The post Update to Sharepoint & Issues with List Component in Dynamics CRM appeared first on PowerObjects.

Using Dynamics CRM 2011 on a daily basis, we all have our own ways of navigating the system to get our work done. I like to encourage less clicks and more kicks in CRM, so here are five tips you can use on a daily basis.

1. Use Refresh!

It may be small, but it’s useful! Whether you are waiting to see the results of a workflow or monitoring incoming records, use the refresh button to see the most up-to-date information available.

2. Use Filters!

Filters are a great way to get the on-demand perks of an Advanced Find without making so many selections. You can drill down to exactly what you’re looking for in no time flat.

3. Use Export/Import!

This feature is hard to beat when you have loads of updates or adds to make.

1. First, Export your list to Excel – remembering to flag the box that allows for reimport .
2. Next, make your changes in Excel.
3. Finally, import the data from your saved file. Updates should appear within seconds!

   

4. Use Edit!

Don’t just use Edit to make changes to one record—use Edit to make changes to many records – at once! Though not all values can be changed with this functionality, it’s so fast that it’s worth a try.

5. Use Arrows!

Use the arrows in a record to navigate through the underlying list. It’s a fast and easy way to move through records.

Whether you’re a Power Objects’ Boot Camp graduate or just starting a CRM implementation, hopefully these tips can make your CRM life easier. Sometimes it’s the little things that make all the difference!

Happy CRM’ing!

The post Five Tips for Daily Work in Dynamics CRM appeared first on PowerObjects.