For example, an e-mail received from a customer reporting a problem with an order can be converted to a case.
Once an activity is closed or sent, the activity record is displayed in the History area of the related record, such as a case or the related customer record, allowing you easy access to past interactions. You can also view all of completed activities in the Closed Activities view in the Activities list.
Announcements are used to show the latest news and new items can be easily added (by users with the appropriate permissions) using the settings-administration-announcements form.
Create the lead manually. Convert a campaign response into a lead.Import leads into CRM from an external file.
The following diagram illustrates the ways that you can create an opportunity and close it when the potential customer decides whether to move forward with the sale.
Revenue If pricing is automated for your company, select System Calculated. If not, select User Provided.Est. Revenue Opportunities with products added to them have their estimated revenue value calculated based on the base price, volume discounts, manual discounts, taxes, and other pricing modifications. When opportunities are saved, Microsoft Dynamics CRM recalculates the estimated revenue value based on any changes to the products or product quantities associated with the opportunity. This appears on the main opportunities page.
The following diagram shows you where account information can come from and how you can use it.
Adding the account records to a quick campaign or campaign, or to a marketing list that gets used in marketing efforts, gets your message to your customers and can open new sales opportunities.
The following diagram shows you where contact information can come from and how you can use it.
Ticker SymbolIf you enter a ticker symbol (An identification code used to identify a publicly traded corporation on a particular stock market.) for a market outside the United States, you must prefix it with the country code, for example US:MSFT (country code:ticker symbol). This information is available only for markets that are currently listed on the MSN Money Web site. In addition to the United States (US), MSN Money also provides information for markets in Australia (AU), Belgium (BE), Canada (CA), France (FR), Germany (DE), Italy (IT), Japan (JP), Netherlands (NL), Spain (ES), Sweden (SE), and the United Kingdom (UK). For more information, go to the MSN Money Web site.
Because of how the parts of the product catalog depend on each other, set up the components in this order: Create discount lists (Optional). If you want to be able to apply volume discounts to product orders, create discount lists first.Create unit groups and units. The units measure item quantities. Unit groups define the different measurement availability for your products, such as gallons, liters, or cases.Create empty price lists. A price list specifies the price for each unit. You add products to your price lists in a later step. Create product. Each product your organization sells needs a product record. Then, link each product record to a unit group and a default unit.Add price list items to the price lists. Add each new product to one or more price lists as price list items. Optionally, associate a discount list to a price list. A price list can have only one discount list. However, a discount list may be associated with more than one price list. Set the default price list. Select one of the price lists to which you added the product as the default price list for the product. Microsoft Dynamics CRM uses the default price list for calculations when the associated price list in the opportunity or order for the product does not contain a price definition of the product.
Most sales transactions include a standard process of sharing information between your organization and your customer. The first step in this process is to create a quote. Here is the typical process from generating a quote to completing a sale:Create quote. Create a quote from an opportunity to track all associated quotes, orders, and invoices for any related account or contact. Quotes can have revisions, so you can track the negotiations with your customer. Add pricing and discounts to the quote. Reflect the product, service, or price options. Send the quote to the customer. Revise the terms of the quote, when you and the customer agree on the terms of the quote.Create order. Convert the quote to an order when you and the customer agree upon the terms. Add product order information. Add pricing and shipping information. Send the order to the customer.
Create invoice. Convert a quote to an invoice when the order is partially or totally fulfilled. Prepare using the terms of the order. Send the invoice to the customer.
Close invoice. Close an invoice when one of the following happens: The customer has paid for the order and the product has been delivered. The customer cancels the order.
The following diagram illustrates the ways that you can add leads, accounts, and contacts to marketing lists, and how you can add marketing lists to campaigns and quick campaigns.
Marketing lists can include any one type of customer record (leads, accounts, and contacts). You can create marketing lists and add customer records to them in several ways:Transfer a list of records from an external source, such as Microsoft Office Excel. Create an empty marketing list and add one or more records that you've selected individually. Filter records through an Advanced Find query and add them to a new or existing marketing list.After you've created a marketing list, you can then add it to a marketing campaign or include it in a quick campaign. When you include marketing lists in campaigns and quick campaigns, you can create activities such as e-mail blasts or individual follow-up phone calls for the leads, accounts, or contacts in the lists. You can also bulk-qualify leads if they are part of a marketing list.
The following diagram illustrates how to use a campaign in Microsoft Dynamics CRM to track your marketing efforts.When you are ready to plan a new marketing campaign, your first steps are often gathering information and determining your audience. From there, you can create your team and your budget for the campaign and get ready for launch. All this information, as well as data about the campaign tasks, can be stored in a campaign record, allowing you easy access to the details of a particular campaign. You can also run reports on the campaigns and see what marketing works best for your organization.
For example, using advertisements and direct mail to increase market share, introduce new products, or retain customers.).
When you create a service, select which resources or resource groups go with it. These include personnel, teams, facilities or equipment, and sites. When a customer service representative creates a service activity based on the service you create, the representative assigns the particular resources that should be assigned to the activity. After the representative saves it, the service activity is scheduled and appears in the calendars for all the selected resources.
The following diagram illustrates the life cycle of a case, from the initiating activity to case resolution.When a customer initiates contact with your organization, it is saved as a communication activity (An action to be performed, such as a task, or a communication item that is sent or received, for example, e-mail, phone calls, and appointments. The status of activities is tracked and the activity history is stored in the system, so users can view the open and closed activities.), such as an e-mail message, phone call, or letter. These activities are either created automatically, such as an incoming e-mail message, or manually, such as a letter received. The activity is then sent to a queue (A holding container for activities that need to be completed. There are queues that contain cases and activities in the Workplace, and queues of articles in the knowledge base.) to wait for someone to take ownership of the activity.The new owner converts the activity to a case (A customer service issue or problem reported by a customer and the activities that customer service representatives use to resolve it.) and starts working on the customer's issue. The customer service representative (CSR) can look up the customer's information in an account or contact, and then link it to the case. If there is a contract (An agreement to provide support during specified coverage dates or for a specified number of cases or length of time.When customers contact customer service, the level of support they receive is determined by their contract.), the case can be linked to a specific contract line (A line item in a contract that describes the service support to be provided. A contract line often includes pricing information and how support will be allotted.) that allows the allotment to be added to the billable total time. As the CSR researches the issue, the CSR can link to a relevant article.Further contact with the customer and activities performed to close the case are also saved.When the case is closed, it is removed from the queue automatically. The closed activities, including the case resolution, can be viewed in the history of the account or contact.
For example, use articles to maintain step-by-step resolutions to common customer issues, or for policies and procedures that your organization uses internally.
A customer service contract in Microsoft Dynamics CRM defines what support and services (the lines) a customer is entitled to receive, the total allotment of support and service over the life of the contract, and the remaining allotments available to the customer.