To use BCM or not? Help!

[turk54]

We are a small company, looking for an easy to use, low cost of
implementation, and low cost of ongoing support CRM package. We have Office
2003 w/BCM throughout our company, and have evaluated BCM 2003 and found it
to be lacking. Now we see BCM 2007, and we think it is still lacking, but
might be more acceptable. We have some issues that we need to resolve before
we can move forward with this.
1. We have a SBS 2003 server at our home office, but most of our employees
work from home offices. They need to access the server data, which we
understand we can accomplish via VPN connections. However, we want to ensure
that no one makes a copy of the entire database on their individual computer.
How can we force the issue of not letting individual users establish offline
capability?
2. We would like to separate individuals from seeing all contacts. In
essence, we want our sales people to see client contacts, and purchasing
people to see purchasing contacts only. We think we understand that, with
BCM, users are all in only, and that we have no security controls over what
contacts that they can see. However, we can have two databases, and grant
the appropriate priveledges so that sales people only have access to the
client contacts, and purchasing people only have access to their contacts.
Is this the only alternative that we have? Is there a different solution?
There are people in our company that need access to both sides of the fence,
and I was curious if I have to flip flop between the two databases or not?
3. If I have to use two databases, how does the auto linking of emails
work? Will the emails that get in from clients go to the client database
contact records and the emails that I receive from the purchasing contacts go
to the appropriate contact in the purchasing database?
4. If we have the full versions of SQL Server, does BCM still use the SQL
Server Express, or can we get it to work with the bigger/better SQL that we
own?
5. In reviewing various postings on this discussion board, it seems like
BCM is somewhat cludged together, and doesn't fully use Exchange or sub
folders (which would have solved our issue with two separate databases I
believe). Is there any hope that this will be addressed, or should we embark
on finding a third party solution better suited to our needs? I have only
seen one person on this board singing the praises of Avidian's Prophet, but I
haven't read any other suggestions from anyone else of any other products
without having to invest $$$$ into MS Dynamics CRM. I should mention that we
evaluated ACT! 2007 Premium for Workgroups and found so many issues with it
in the first week that we shelved it right away. We don't want to waste our
time (don't have enough of it) or money (again - don't have enough of it).
We would appreciate any suggestions.

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[Lon Orenstein]

Turk54:

I'll answer by your numbering below:

1. You could require them to work online all the time, and not make an
offline copy. The ability to backup the database is disabled but I don't
think the File, Export is disabled. That said, I think that someone who
knows what they're doing could get a copy of your data.

2. You're correct -- users are either all in or all out. You could use two
different databases but you can't specify that Bob only sees this part of
one database. You can filter the views so that they only see the contacts
you want them to (based on conditions you create in the filter), but someone
who knows what they're doing can change the filter. If this is for
convenience, it'll work fine. If it's for security, it's not very secure.

3. The email linking might miss a few. You would have to manually tell BCM
to go Search and Link emails at the end of the day, for example, in each
database.

4. You can use SQL Standard instead of SQL Express.

5. Sad about ACT!, I know... MS CRM will do what you want... I know Tim is
very strong on Avidian's Prophet and other consultants I know have good
things to say also. I'd like to HOPE that MS will add BCM to Exchange's
powers which would solve all this quite nicely. Another vote from you will
help! There are other solutions out there that can handle the security you
want, but none at BCM's price point.

HTH,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

 

[mrtimpeterson via OfficeKB.com]

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities that
you are looking for. Check it out at: www.avidian.com

-THP

Turk54:

I'll answer by your numbering below:

1. You could require them to work online all the time, and not make an
offline copy. The ability to backup the database is disabled but I don't
think the File, Export is disabled. That said, I think that someone who
knows what they're doing could get a copy of your data.

2. You're correct -- users are either all in or all out. You could use two
different databases but you can't specify that Bob only sees this part of
one database. You can filter the views so that they only see the contacts
you want them to (based on conditions you create in the filter), but someone
who knows what they're doing can change the filter. If this is for
convenience, it'll work fine. If it's for security, it's not very secure.

3. The email linking might miss a few. You would have to manually tell BCM
to go Search and Link emails at the end of the day, for example, in each
database.

4. You can use SQL Standard instead of SQL Express.

5. Sad about ACT!, I know... MS CRM will do what you want... I know Tim is
very strong on Avidian's Prophet and other consultants I know have good
things to say also. I'd like to HOPE that MS will add BCM to Exchange's
powers which would solve all this quite nicely. Another vote from you will
help! There are other solutions out there that can handle the security you
want, but none at BCM's price point.

HTH,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

We are a small company, looking for an easy to use, low cost of
implementation, and low cost of ongoing support CRM package. We have

[quoted text clipped - 55 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[turk54]

Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing .. so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities that
you are looking for. Check it out at: www.avidian.com

-THP

Turk54:

I'll answer by your numbering below:

1. You could require them to work online all the time, and not make an
offline copy. The ability to backup the database is disabled but I don't
think the File, Export is disabled. That said, I think that someone who
knows what they're doing could get a copy of your data.

2. You're correct -- users are either all in or all out. You could use two
different databases but you can't specify that Bob only sees this part of
one database. You can filter the views so that they only see the contacts
you want them to (based on conditions you create in the filter), but someone
who knows what they're doing can change the filter. If this is for
convenience, it'll work fine. If it's for security, it's not very secure.

3. The email linking might miss a few. You would have to manually tell BCM
to go Search and Link emails at the end of the day, for example, in each
database.

4. You can use SQL Standard instead of SQL Express.

5. Sad about ACT!, I know... MS CRM will do what you want... I know Tim is
very strong on Avidian's Prophet and other consultants I know have good
things to say also. I'd like to HOPE that MS will add BCM to Exchange's
powers which would solve all this quite nicely. Another vote from you will
help! There are other solutions out there that can handle the security you
want, but none at BCM's price point.

HTH,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

We are a small company, looking for an easy to use, low cost of
implementation, and low cost of ongoing support CRM package. We have

[quoted text clipped - 55 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[mrtimpeterson via OfficeKB.com]

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am not sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a document or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing .. so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities that

[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

 

[turk54]

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible mis-understanding
on our part. Someone in our company had been given a demo of it back 6
months ago, and the inability to attach documents without an associated
opportunity was one of the red flags raised in the evaluation report. I will
follow up and call Avidian myself and verify and answer back to this thread.
I appreciate your efforts in voicing other possible solutions to BCM. It
truly is appreciated.

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am not sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a document or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing .. so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities that

[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[Lon Orenstein]

One future thought stream to interject here...

In the old days of ACT! and other contact managers, we all wanted to link
documents, emails, notes, et al to each contact record because that was the
best way of organizing and finding related info. In the new world, SEARCH
is the answer, and I'm seeing a much reduced need to link everything
together. Yes, it's very handy to do that but when you experience what
search tools can do and how fast they do it, it's much more efficient to
type in a few characters and find all the related info anywhere in your
email database or hard drive or company server. I've used X1 for a few
years and can't rave about it enough. Search in Windows Vista "should"
replace this at some point but it's still not optimized...

I've also found over the years that people say they want everything in one
place so they can "review all my notes before a sales call" but in reality,
they rarely do it. So, if your goal is to handle the 20% of the time you do
need it, maybe it's not as important as you thought. It's better to
concentrate on the 80% of the time...

More as time permits...

Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible
mis-understanding
on our part. Someone in our company had been given a demo of it back 6
months ago, and the inability to attach documents without an associated
opportunity was one of the red flags raised in the evaluation report. I
will
follow up and call Avidian myself and verify and answer back to this
thread.
I appreciate your efforts in voicing other possible solutions to BCM. It
truly is appreciated.

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am not
sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a document
or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record
without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual
record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You
might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do
this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for
a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a
decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked
at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future
upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a
huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or
file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to
be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and
then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe
we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public
folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what
MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with
BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to
moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing ..
so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all
the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that
their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities
that
[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[mrtimpeterson via OfficeKB.com]

Though Windows Vista is yet not optimized, the current indexing has been very
impressive for this user. I have "rediscovered" the beauty of apps such as
One Note for easy search. Even if not directly linked, a carefully written
note that references the key words to search on are all that I really need
most of the time.

-THP

One future thought stream to interject here...

In the old days of ACT! and other contact managers, we all wanted to link
documents, emails, notes, et al to each contact record because that was the
best way of organizing and finding related info. In the new world, SEARCH
is the answer, and I'm seeing a much reduced need to link everything
together. Yes, it's very handy to do that but when you experience what
search tools can do and how fast they do it, it's much more efficient to
type in a few characters and find all the related info anywhere in your
email database or hard drive or company server. I've used X1 for a few
years and can't rave about it enough. Search in Windows Vista "should"
replace this at some point but it's still not optimized...

I've also found over the years that people say they want everything in one
place so they can "review all my notes before a sales call" but in reality,
they rarely do it. So, if your goal is to handle the 20% of the time you do
need it, maybe it's not as important as you thought. It's better to
concentrate on the 80% of the time...

More as time permits...

Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible
mis-understanding

[quoted text clipped - 71 lines]

 

[Lon Orenstein]

Tim:

I've been using OneNote and love it. Try this: right click on a BCM
contact and choose Contact Notes with the OneNote icon. You've now got a
linked page in OneNote -- linked! You can click in OneNote and open up the
BCM record from there, plus link tasks and appointments in OneNote. It's
far from complete but it's got fascinating potential.

Take care,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

Though Windows Vista is yet not optimized, the current indexing has been
very
impressive for this user. I have "rediscovered" the beauty of apps such
as
One Note for easy search. Even if not directly linked, a carefully
written
note that references the key words to search on are all that I really need
most of the time.

-THP

One future thought stream to interject here...

In the old days of ACT! and other contact managers, we all wanted to link
documents, emails, notes, et al to each contact record because that was
the
best way of organizing and finding related info. In the new world, SEARCH
is the answer, and I'm seeing a much reduced need to link everything
together. Yes, it's very handy to do that but when you experience what
search tools can do and how fast they do it, it's much more efficient to
type in a few characters and find all the related info anywhere in your
email database or hard drive or company server. I've used X1 for a few
years and can't rave about it enough. Search in Windows Vista "should"
replace this at some point but it's still not optimized...

I've also found over the years that people say they want everything in one
place so they can "review all my notes before a sales call" but in
reality,
they rarely do it. So, if your goal is to handle the 20% of the time you
do
need it, maybe it's not as important as you thought. It's better to
concentrate on the 80% of the time...

More as time permits...

Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible
mis-understanding

[quoted text clipped - 71 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[turk54]

Truer words could not have been said.... We have come to the realization that
we don;t need all of the bells and whistles, and that we can store documents
in Sharepoint and give everyone access and search capabilities. We all use
Windows XP professional, and have recently started messing around with
Windows Desktop Search. I would be appreciate your comparisons with X1.
I believe that in the perfect world, we all want to find a simple, cost
effective, single integrated solution for our CRM needs. The resistance we
all have with piecing together or cobbling together a solution is the
underlying issue. We need to get over the belly aching and just figure it
out and live with it. Thanks again for your insight, it is always
appreciated. Please continue on with your thoughts when you get the time....

One future thought stream to interject here...

In the old days of ACT! and other contact managers, we all wanted to link
documents, emails, notes, et al to each contact record because that was the
best way of organizing and finding related info. In the new world, SEARCH
is the answer, and I'm seeing a much reduced need to link everything
together. Yes, it's very handy to do that but when you experience what
search tools can do and how fast they do it, it's much more efficient to
type in a few characters and find all the related info anywhere in your
email database or hard drive or company server. I've used X1 for a few
years and can't rave about it enough. Search in Windows Vista "should"
replace this at some point but it's still not optimized...

I've also found over the years that people say they want everything in one
place so they can "review all my notes before a sales call" but in reality,
they rarely do it. So, if your goal is to handle the 20% of the time you do
need it, maybe it's not as important as you thought. It's better to
concentrate on the 80% of the time...

More as time permits...

Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible
mis-understanding
on our part. Someone in our company had been given a demo of it back 6
months ago, and the inability to attach documents without an associated
opportunity was one of the red flags raised in the evaluation report. I
will
follow up and call Avidian myself and verify and answer back to this
thread.
I appreciate your efforts in voicing other possible solutions to BCM. It
truly is appreciated.

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am not
sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a document
or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record
without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual
record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You
might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do
this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

turk54 wrote:
Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for
a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a
decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked
at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future
upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a
huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or
file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to
be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and
then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe
we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public
folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what
MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with
BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to
moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing ..
so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all
the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that
their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities
that
[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[turk54]

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am not sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a document or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is for a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have looked at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again, a huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document or file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem to be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that, and then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution. Maybe we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with what MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths with BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem to moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing .. so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security capabilities that

[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

Tim -

I wanted to get back to you on our impression that one can't attach
documents to a contact record without an associated opportunity record with
Avidian's Prophet. It appears that we are both correct. I called Avidian
for clarification and they said that one can attach documents/notes to a
contact record, but that was a basic function of Outlook. Only after one
attaches an opportunity record to a contact (that is escalate a contact from
a mere prospect to potential client) does Prophet start storing attachments
in its databse. Our impression from the demo we received 6 months ago was
that Prophet is very opportunity centric, which is great for most businesses
but not for all. You might have more/differing info on Prophet's
capabilities, and we would welocme the input. Prophet remains a possible
solution for our company.

 

[Lon Orenstein]

The best thing about X1 is the viewer capability. In Windows Desktop
Search, if you search for a phrase of text, you'll see the documents that
contain it but not inside the documents. X1 has viewers for hundreds of
files and you can click on the result and see inside the doc to make sure
it's the one you're searching for before you open it. Saves a lot of time.
It also has better options for when to index. Complaints about Windows
Desktop Search center around the fact that it's always indexing and it slows
down your PC. X1 gives you the option to schedule it all in the middle of
the night. You don't get real time indexing but that's not a big deal for
me...

HTH,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

Truer words could not have been said.... We have come to the realization
that
we don;t need all of the bells and whistles, and that we can store
documents
in Sharepoint and give everyone access and search capabilities. We all
use
Windows XP professional, and have recently started messing around with
Windows Desktop Search. I would be appreciate your comparisons with X1.
I believe that in the perfect world, we all want to find a simple, cost
effective, single integrated solution for our CRM needs. The resistance
we
all have with piecing together or cobbling together a solution is the
underlying issue. We need to get over the belly aching and just figure it
out and live with it. Thanks again for your insight, it is always
appreciated. Please continue on with your thoughts when you get the
time....

One future thought stream to interject here...

In the old days of ACT! and other contact managers, we all wanted to link
documents, emails, notes, et al to each contact record because that was
the
best way of organizing and finding related info. In the new world,
SEARCH
is the answer, and I'm seeing a much reduced need to link everything
together. Yes, it's very handy to do that but when you experience what
search tools can do and how fast they do it, it's much more efficient to
type in a few characters and find all the related info anywhere in your
email database or hard drive or company server. I've used X1 for a few
years and can't rave about it enough. Search in Windows Vista "should"
replace this at some point but it's still not optimized...

I've also found over the years that people say they want everything in
one
place so they can "review all my notes before a sales call" but in
reality,
they rarely do it. So, if your goal is to handle the 20% of the time you
do
need it, maybe it's not as important as you thought. It's better to
concentrate on the 80% of the time...

More as time permits...

Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

I appreciate the input on Avidian's Prophet, and a possible
mis-understanding
on our part. Someone in our company had been given a demo of it back 6
months ago, and the inability to attach documents without an associated
opportunity was one of the red flags raised in the evaluation report.
I
will
follow up and call Avidian myself and verify and answer back to this
thread.
I appreciate your efforts in voicing other possible solutions to BCM.
It
truly is appreciated.

:

turk54:

Since this is a BCM forum I don't want to belabor the point but I am
not
sure
how you came to the conclusion about not being able to attach a
document
or
file to a contact using Avidian's Prophet. You can compile a complete
history of attached documents to either a contact or company record
without
there being an associated opportunity. When you open each individual
record
there is an "Attachments" tab that enables the linking to occur. You
might
call up Avidian to discuss and review your understanding of how to do
this.
Best wishes with what ever you decide to do.

-THP

turk54 wrote:
Thanks for the feedback/answers. I can attest how frustrating it is
for
a
business like ours to find a working solution to our CRM needs at a
decent
price point. We have been going around and around looking at various
possible solutions, and have come across issues with all we have
looked
at.
We continue to be disappoited with BCM 2007, especially if future
upgrades
will require wholesale uprades to new Office revisions. Once again,
a
huge
financial undertaking for a small comany like ours.
We have also looked at Avidian's Prophet, and we ran into a potential
problem with that product as well in that one can't attch a document
or
file
to a contact without an assoicated opportunity. There doesn't seem
to
be a
work around for this, and both our sales and purchasing people need
the
capability of attaching files, etc. to contacts without a specific
opportunity. Maybe someone out there knows how to get around that,
and
then
Avidian's product may be a solution for us.
In the interim, we continue to search for a reasonable solution.
Maybe
we
shouldn't pursue this any more, and just use Outlook 2003 with public
folders
and forget about tracking emails, etc. We are also confused with
what
MS
will do down the road since there appears to be conflicting paths
with
BCM,
CRM, Office Live, and now a planned CRM Live product which all seem
to
moving
in different directions, and not the direction we want. So confusing
..
so
confusing ... Once again, we are open to suggestions and welcome all
the
free advice we can get.

Avidian's Prophet is very Exchange server friendly. I believe that
their
Enterprise Edition also has the user permissions security
capabilities
that
[quoted text clipped - 48 lines]

Thanks in advance for anyones help....

 

[Ed Marmon]

Lon, does x1 6 beta index bcm? ( i think i know that 5.5 does not )

( i saw your post there in 2005 that you're looking into that... that's
been quite some time..)

 

[Lon Orenstein]

Not sure, Ed. I didn't know they had a beta. I'm knee deep in betas now
between our own software and Microsoft's...

Are you doing X1's beta? I'd love to know...

Thanks,
Lon

___________________________________________________________
Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
(e-mail address removed)
Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
800.238.0560 x6104 Toll Free (U.S. only) +1 214.905.0401 x6104
www.pinpointtools.com

 

[mrtimpeterson via OfficeKB.com]

My main plug for Prophet is that you don't have to stray off the reservation
and manage separate contact databases like you do with BCM. Prophet's SQL
automatically maintains this match between your Outlook pst contact folder
and the Prophet db. This is very gracefully designed and results in zero
synch issues with WM devices, etc. I also like the extremely versatile
customization of the various parts. The reporting wizard can be modified for
almost any kind of data configuration you can come up with. You are correct
that it is very Opportunity-Centric which is essentially what CRM Sales Force
Automation (SFA) is all about!

-THP

turk54:

[quoted text clipped - 37 lines]
Tim -

I wanted to get back to you on our impression that one can't attach
documents to a contact record without an associated opportunity record with
Avidian's Prophet. It appears that we are both correct. I called Avidian
for clarification and they said that one can attach documents/notes to a
contact record, but that was a basic function of Outlook. Only after one
attaches an opportunity record to a contact (that is escalate a contact from
a mere prospect to potential client) does Prophet start storing attachments
in its databse. Our impression from the demo we received 6 months ago was
that Prophet is very opportunity centric, which is great for most businesses
but not for all. You might have more/differing info on Prophet's
capabilities, and we would welocme the input. Prophet remains a possible
solution for our company.