With over 4.4 million users working at 40,000 companies, Microsoft Dynamics CRM has long been used in a variety of sales, marketing and operational functions. For some, Dynamics CRM serves as an out-of-the-box tool to simplify operations, while others use the software to track client feedback, manage schedules and projects, and collect purchase information.

This series of blog posts will profile different customers’ unique approach to using Dynamics CRM and provide real-life examples of how the software is used to help improve business processes.

The first is a company that specializes in managing a loyalty card program and partnering with different retailers to offer students discounts and deals utilizes Dynamics CRM’s Inventory Management. This feature allows the company to use the newly released Rollup fields to create a running total for each product offering that has been sold.

Using the Business Management feature gives the company the ability to populate, change, show or hide a field based on the value of another field. Business Rules enabled the company to dynamically update Quantity on Hand for a product when a replenishment value is entered, while creating a workflow prompts members of the sales team of a reduced Quantity on Hand when a product is sold.

Dynamics CRM continues to benefit the company by giving the sales team a full view of their inventory and manage products on hand.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a fast, flexible and reliable CRM solution that helps manage customer information across different functions such as Marketing, Sales and Service. Here are the top 5 ways Microsoft Dynamics CRM can benefit your business:

1.Integration with Microsoft Office and Office Outlook

Microsoft Dynamics CRM easily integrates with tools like Microsoft Word, Excel and Office Outlook. With the system’s familiar and user-friendly interface, employees can efficiently pull information and gain quick access to the data they need.

2. Adaptable Dashboards

The dashboards feature adapts to job functions and each user’s preferences providing a real-time, overall view of business areas from lead generation, pre-sale to customer service. Users can also customize dashboards depending on the functionality that is most needed. 

MS Dynamics 365 for Sales vs Salesforce | Learn more about Dynamics 365 for Sales features

Continuing from our previous blog post, we’ll further discuss the process of capturing leads and how to develop them into potential customers. Now that you’ve established your workflow and have found some promising leads, the next step towards gaining new customers is to build on your relationship with your leads and to nurture them.

What is lead nurturing?

Lead nurturing refers to the development of a series of planned actions and communication strategies for the purposes of eliciting certain behaviours from potential clients. The idea of lead nurturing is to guide consumers down their purchasing journey, sending them specific and relevant content which can help convince clients that you both understand their needs and assuring them that you have the solution to their problems.

How does lead nurturing work?

Part 2 is a continuation of the series of blog posts that will profile different customer’s unique approach to using Dynamics CRM and provide real-life examples of how the software is used to help improve business processes.

An engineering, construction, service and maintenance company that provides services for infrastructure companies approached WebSan to implement Dynamics CRM and maximize the Dashboards feature of the software.

Using the Workload Reporting of Dashboards allowed the company to do the following:

• Break down by user the current status of Open Projects
• Access the number of projects that have been created in a specific timeframe by Users and the status of those projects
• Create a list view that depicts total number of created, cancelled and completed projects by user
• Create a pie chart to show the number of open projects and order them by status

To add, an active activities Dashboard breaks down the many activities (tasks, emails, appointments, etc.) that are being tackled “this month” by all users.

Dashboards in Dynamics CRM act as a tool to provide a fast and easy way to view and communicate business data. It also acts as your homepage upon logging into your environment. Serving as a one stop shop to quickly get a peek at your data, Dashboards allow you to spot trends and monitor valuable metrics, while dynamically updating based on new data that is being derived.  

One of the powerful marketing tools on Microsoft Dynamics CRM is an Email Template which will allow your sales team to mass email groups of contacts.

To create Email Templated within CRM, navigate to the Settings Tab, then Templates under the Business section. Select the Email Template button.

Note: The Outlook Client & Web Client will both look slightly different. However, both have the same options, so users should be comfortable using both.

CRM will then ask the user for a Template Type.  This will restrict the template to certain groupings of data from within CRM.  For example, if one selects a Template Type of ‘Contact’, CRM will restrict the template data to CRM contacts.

Looking beyond the dozens of features that various CRM Systems have to offer, there are specific features which your CRM system must adequately provide to ensure your business is able to attract and retain customers successfully.  Here are 5 CRM Features your company needs and should look out for:

Remote Access

Your CRM System should give your employees access to customer information remotely from any location and device. Remote access is critical to obtain real-time information as well as provide your employees a way to update your CRM system with vital information on clients and partners.

Security

If you are a company where there is an overlap between departments in terms of roles and responsibilities, it would be easy for the wrong person to gain access to confidential information from your CRM system. It's important to put in measures which monitor what information is accessed through your CRM system. Additionally, encrypted access and a secure server is important if you're remotely accessing your company's real-time information from your CRM system.

If you use Microsoft Dynamics CRM, chances are you are also using the Outlook Integration that allows you to access and update CRM data directly from Microsoft Outlook. Have you now noticed that the CRM tab in Outlook has disappeared?

The most common cause of this is that the CRM add-in has been disabled in Outlook (unfortunately, why the add-in got disabled is difficult to determine). This has been known to happen in Outlook with several add-ins, but particularly CRM.

To get your CRM integration back, use the following steps:

1. In Outlook, go to File > Options
2. Select the Add-ins tab from the left side
3. Under the “Manage” dropdown at the bottom of the window, change the selection to “Disabled Items” and select the “Go…” button
4. Highlight the CRM add-in and select the “Enable” button
5. Hit OK to close the Outlook Options window

You may have to close out Outlook and restart it for the changes to take effect, but that should be all you need to get your CRM functionality back in business.

Rahim Jiwani is an Implementation Lead at WebSan Solutions Inc, a Microsoft Dynamics GP Silver Partner & 2012 Microsoft Impact Awards Finalist. Rahim can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 416-499-1235 ext 217.

Lead – This is the qualifier for a sales opportunity. Perhaps someone you met at a trade show that might not be a qualified lead, but you want to keep in touch with them.

Opportunity – Once you qualify your leads, you would convert them to an opportunity. For example, a lead that you have spoken to whom has shown interest in your product.

Account – Once you have closed business with that person, you would 'win' the opportunity and convert the person / company to an account.

Adam MacIntosh is the Manager of Client Services with WebSan Solutions Inc, a Microsoft Dynamics Partner firm.

Is your company considering upgrading to CRM 2015 as part of its New Year's resolution? Worried that time and training would not be worth the transition from your existing CRM? Well, your company will be happy to know that with the upcoming release of CRM 2015, many users will find key UPDATES made to CRM 2013 rather than face an entirely new system! Consider the benefits!

CRM 2015 delivers powerful updates to its sales tools! As the following features demonstrate, your company will benefit from the system’s capabilities of producing faster and higher profits!

Sales Hierarchies

Running a well-oiled support desk is not for the faint of heart. There are so many moving parts…Does the customer have a support agreement? Does the contacting party have authority to open a support ticket against the agreement? What is the issue? Is the issue covered under the support agreement? What is the expected turn-around time? How does this relate to its priority in the queue? Which support resource should be assigned the ticket? Is the support resource staying on top of the ticket? 

Did you know there is a whole area inside your Dynamics CRM environment that is fitted with tools to manage your support operations? It is neatly tucked away in Settings under Service Management and contains a slew of menu items to manage the many facets of the support process. 

Through the combined forces of Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and Entitlements you are armed with a pairing which allows for a flexible support model. SLAs offer variable levels of support, with varied turnaround times and price points, while Entitlements allow you to define the variable by which support is measured (time vs count), who can open support tickets against the agreement, the products/services covered under the agreement, and the channels by which a support ticket can be submitted.

Depending on how support tickets are received, Automatic Case Creation & Update Rules may prove to be a mighty ally. This feature automates the process of creating/updating records based upon predefined settings and conditions. One such condition is whether an Entitlement exists for the submitting customer. Take your automatically created cases, and make use of Routing Rule Sets, which read the properties of the Case and route the records to your various Support Queues to be picked up by your Support Resources to be worked on. It is worth noting that Routing Rule Sets can also be applied manually if your support tickets reside in a “bucket” for assignment.

For in depth details about Service Management, tune into this webinar.

Being part of the help desk support team affords me the opportunity to learn about little idiosyncrasies in Dynamics CRM. And I like to pass along these sweet nuggets to our loyal blog readers in case you find yourself in a similar pinch.

Have you ever wanted to add ‘Company’ to an existing Lead view, and the field is nowhere to be found?

In order to see the field, you need to perform a bit of trickery…

ü  Choose any other entity from the ‘Record Type’ dropdown,

ü  Then switch back to the Lead entity

MS Dynamics 365 for Sales vs Salesforce | Learn more about Dynamics 365 for Sales features

It's a big misunderstanding that if you just buy and implement a CRM system, it will immediately boost your revenue. Getting a CRM system on board, is just the tip of an iceberg. Below are three tips on how to get the most benefits from your CRM system:

Accurate Data is a Key

You may have the fanciest features in your CRM system, but they won't get you any useful insights, once your data isn't accurate. Make sure that the process of data input is easy, quick and clear, so your employees will be motivated to provide your CRM system with accurate information.  

Customize it

The tremendous success of our Dynamics GP Interactive Demo has shown that users are looking for a way to evaluate systems on their own,  utilizing an expert’s guidance of course.

This is the reason why WebSan Solutions has decided to develop in addition to it a new Microsoft Dynamics CRM Interactive Demo and offer it to users for free. This is basically a Free Forever Trial that will allow users to input information on their own, get familiar with the system’s main functional areas, such as Sales and Service as well as experience the Dynamics CRM system from different roles.

The Dynamics CRM Interactive Demo will give you a 360 overview of the various system capabilities without the hassle of setting up complicated trials. All you have to do is download the demo and start experimenting with it!

After completing the demo, WebSan Solutions offers Microsoft Dynamics CRM licenses starting as low as $12/ user/ month and the ability to purchase them easily online.

Download our Microsoft Dynamics CRM Free Interactive Demo now!

MS Dynamics 365 for Sales vs Salesforce | Learn more about Dynamics 365 for Sales features

With Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales and the implementation of marketing automation, managing and nurturing leads has never been easier. With automation software, potential leads can be tracked and nurtured accordingly based on their level of interaction they have with your company’s content. However, establishing a lead nurturing workflow is not a one size fits all process, and requires some initial setup and customization before you can begin to start bringing in new clients. Consider the following three steps before you decide on implementing any CRM software:

1. Understand Your Customers

Before you can begin setting up any sort of automation, you need to understand how your customers interact with your content. Who is your ideal target segment? Is the information and content relevant to their needs? Knowing how consumers are engaging with your company (i.e. social media, blog posts, etc.) will influence the type of content you post and how you choose to interact with them based on where they are at in their customer journey.

2. Plan Out The Steps To Your Workflow

If you are using Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement (CE) in the cloud, then read on...

Microsoft announced that the legacy web client for Dynamics 365 CE won't be available after December 1, 2020. It is recommended that subscribers begin to transition now with the intent to start using the Unified Interface by October 1, 2020. This ensures that any wrinkles are ironed out ahead of time.

To ease a major concern you may have, this transition will not impact the data in your system. Think of it more as a major update.

To prepare our clients we have developed transition documentation to take you through the end to end process.

Click here to check out the transition plan!