Summary

This chapter went into detail on the Sales Force Automation Functionality of Microsoft CRM. I stuck to the Web client because there is a lot to cover, and we'll be looking at the Outlook client in the next chapter.

Lead records in Microsoft CRM provide a great way to keep your prospect data separate from the rest of your data. This keeps service people from having to wade through a lot of information that is irrelevant to them. After a Lead has shown promise, it can be converted to a Contact, Account, and/or Opportunity and put in with the rest of your data.

Microsoft CRM enables you to divide your sales team into Sales Territories. This gives you flexibility when reporting and enables you to assign specific Accounts to territories if this makes sense in your business model.

Sales Opportunity records in Microsoft CRM give you the flexibility of tracking all touch points related to your potential revenue generating events. From Sales Opportunity records you can create Quotes, Orders, and Invoices. You can also automate sales processes through workflow so that Activities are automatically generated and attached to the Opportunity. Sales Opportunities can be associated with Competitor records to show who your competition is on any given Opportunity. Additionally, these Competitor records enable you to track and analyze your competition.

Although Version 1.0 of Microsoft CRM is said to have “lite” marketing functionality, there is a lot you can do with it to improve your marketing efforts. Marketing capabilities in Version 1.0 include Lead Management, List Management, User Data Import, Direct Email, Mail Merge, and Marketing Encyclopedia.