Microsoft Dynamics CRM Blog - The Official Blog of Increase CRM

Update Rollup 4 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 has been released

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Fri, 08 May 2009 17:40:00 +0000

Microsoft has released Update Rollup 4 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0.

This Update Rollup contains 5 hotfixes that have been released since Update Rollup 3, and contains a number of resolutions for issues for which no hotfix had previously been released.

We are testing Update Rollup 4 and we will issue a Status Update email to all users advising them to install Update Rollup 4 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook when we are satisfied that our testing is successful.

Issues with Internet Explorer 8 and Hosted CRM 4.0

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 13:41:00 +0000

Over the last couple of weeks, we have been testing IE8 with hosted CRM 4.0 and found a couple of issues.

Specifically, when users have Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook installed and Outlook is running and then attempt to log in through the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 web client, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 becomes temporarily disabled. A message pops up from the CRM icon in the Windows system tray: "Signed Out. You successfully signed out of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. To re-enable the CRM toolbar, the user has to restart Outlook.

Other issues include login screens appearing when trying to use Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with IE8 installed.

Uninstalling IE8 and reverting to IE7 does not appear to resolve this issues.

We have raised the issues with Microsoft Premier Support and expect to have resolutions provided shortly. In the meantime, our advice is not to upgrade to Internet Explorer 8. Users should be careful applying Windows Update as we expect IE8 to be automatically downloaded as part of Windows Update services within the next few weeks.

Update (Tue 28/04/2009): Thanks to Jim Sheehan at PowerObjects, I've discovered that using the shortform URL login (e.g. https://companyname.addictivecrm.com) prevents me be signed out of Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook. Still a few other gremlins though when using lookup features.

Genesis acquires Increase CRM: FAQs

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 07:57:00 +0000

Are there any changes to our agreed terms and conditions?
No, there are no immediate changes to the terms and conditions of any agreements you had with Increase Ltd. Over the next few months, you will be moved across to the Genesis terms and conditions. We will be contacting you shortly.

What’s happening to billing?
You will have received your March invoices from Increase CRM. From April onwards, we will begin to transfer your contracts to Genesis Communications Ltd. Following this, you will receive all future invoices from Genesis.

For April billing, invoices will be dated later than the start of the month as we go through the contract transfer process.

Genesis accept payments by Direct debit. If you currently pay by:

Debit/credit card and direct debit: on transfer of your contract, your payment details will be passed from Increase CRM to Genesis. In the interim, you will continue to see Increase CRM as the organisation on your bank statements.
Bank transfer/ cheque: you will see our bank details on our invoice to you. Please amend your records to update payment details to our bank account.

Going forward, we aim to move all payments on to direct debit, especially if you currently pay by bank transfer and cheque. This will be discussed with you as we transfer the contracts over to Genesis.

Are there any changes to CRM support?
There are no immediate changes to how you receive CRM support. You can still reach the Increase CRM help desk by calling 020 8099 1302 or emailing help@increasecrm.co.uk. CRM cases will be investigated and resolved by the same team of CRM heroes as before. In the next few months, the support numbers will change and we will communicate the new details to you in plenty of time.

How do I find out more about other Genesis products and services such as hosted Microsoft Exchange, hosted SharePoint or mobile solutions?
Genesis customers are managed by regional account managers. Please contact the Increase CRM help desk and we will put you in touch with your local Genesis account manager.

Who has left Increase CRM?
Two of Increase CRM’s directors, George Bliss and Jon Sturgeon, have moved on. Neil Benson and the rest of the Increase CRM team are now part of Genesis.

Have any contact details changed?
The Increase CRM team has now moved to the Genesis London hub. Our new address is: 12-16 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5PQ. You can continue to use all the Increase CRM contact details. Over time, our email addresses and phone numbers will change and we will keep you posted about how you can continue to communicate with CRM support heroes too.

What are the plans for migrating Increase CRM servers to Genesis?
Increase CRM’s servers were hosted by Rackspace. Genesis has its own data centre in Leicester and a secondary facility in Bury. We will be migrating all hosted CRM systems from Rackspace to Genesis during the weekend of 4-5 April. During this migration there will be a period of downtime that we will schedule to minimise disruption to your hosted CRM service.

On this weekend Rackspace were planning to move Increase CRM’s servers to the new Rackspace data centre, which would have involved six hours of downtime. Rather than migrate to a new Rackspace data centre and then later to the Genesis data centre, we are planning to minimise disruption by moving the service directly to Leicester.

Particularly with regards to hosted CRM, what are the future plans of Genesis?
Genesis are making significant investments in mobile and hosted IT services, including:

Improved Infrastructure – to make hosted CRM faster, more resilient and secure
New Products and Services – such as mobile CRM to compliment its mobile phone and mobile email services, and new CRM add-on products
Better Tools and Communications – as well as a fresh new brand to be launched this summer, Genesis will be launching improved customer communication channels such as a customer portal and community for CRM customers

Update Rollup 3 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 21:10:00 +0000

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM team released Update Rollup 3 last week. (Increase CRM is the only hosted CRM partner in Europe to have a Microsoft Dynamics Partner Advantage Plan, so we got a 'heads up' a couple of weeks ago.)

We'd consider Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to be a mature, stable product, so as expected Update Rollup 3 contains fewer hotfixes than previous rollups. Update Rollup 3 contains six previously released hotfixes and resolutions for many minor issues. None of the hotfixes or resolutions are known to affect any of our customers or are considered major.

Our initial internal testing of Update Rollup 3 is going well and we expect to deploy this update on our hosted CRM platform within the next few weeks. Once the server components have been installed, we will be distributing the client component for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook to all our users.

Latest Microsoft CRM Statement of Direction

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 21:40:00 +0000

Microsoft has published an update to the Dynamics CRM Statement of Direction that was released last year.

The highlights for the next version of CRM include:

New Levels of User Productivity and Collaboration Capabilities

Improved view of CRM data within Microsoft Outlook
New 'ribbon' user interface
Streamlined user interface with fewer pop-up forms, clicks and keystrokes
Personalisation of views
Greater levels of SharePoint integration
Inline reports for better business intelligence
More options for balancing workloads and prioritising tasks

Continued Enrichment of Core CRM Capabilities

Visualisation of contact and account hierarchies
Team-based collaboration
Call centre and unified communications improvements
Additional revenue recognition, forecasting, revenue management features
New team-selling features in sales opportunities
Further investment in knowledge management
Extended outbound marketing capabilities, particularly email marketing
Ability to schedule future recurring activities

Best-of Breed Business Solution Platform

Ability for developers to build application packages, called "Solutions", that will provide the ability to easily add, update and remove add-ons
Secure code on the server
Integration with Windows Azure cloud services platform
Data auditing
Extended use of Windows Workflow Foundation
Global picklists and hierarchical/cascading picklists
Improved Visual Studio integration
Improved multi-tenanted management for hosting partners (yeah!)
Greater leveraging of Windows Hyper-V for virtualisation, Microsoft SQL Server 2008 for business intelligence and Microsoft BizTalk Server 2006 for integration

The Statement of Direction also includes a summary of the CRM solution accelerators:

Analytics
eService
Event Management
Enterprise Search
Extended Sales Forecasting
RSS Notifications
Sales Methodologies (to be released Q1 2009)
Newsfeed Business Producitivity (released March 2009)

It also covers:

Mobile Express for CRM 4.0
Ten Digits Alliance for mobile CRM on Windows Mobile and BlackBerry devices

Still no scheduled release date though. Our money is on Q1 2010, and a name change - Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2010, or possibly even Microsoft Dynamics xRM 2010 - who knows?

CRM record counter on grids

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 21:22:00 +0000

Ever asked yourself, "how many records are in this view?" and found yourself counting the number of pages of results one-by-one? There are a couple of elegrant third-party add-ons that provide the often-requested record counter and page counter features on CRM grids.

If you're an Increase-hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM customer and interested in either of these record counter add-ons, please let us know. We're currently testing them and hope to release one of them on our on-demand CRM platform soon.

New CRM Business Productivity Accelerator released

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 13:16:00 +0000

Microsoft has released the latest accelerator for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0: the Newsfeed Business Productivity Accelerator.

The Newsfeed Business Productivity accelerator provides a dashboard that shows users all the recent activity within the CRM system, for example: cases created, sales opportunities won (or lost!), marketing campaigns launched, and so on. The goal of the Newsfeed Business Productivity accelerator is to present live CRM data in a way that your users will find appealing and interactive and encouraging user adoption.

CRM administrators will be able to configure the newsfeed dashboard to display notifications about updates to any type of entity, including custom entities.

The screenshot (courtesy of Joel Lindstrom's Customer Effective blog) shows a typical Newsfeed Dashboard showing the day-by-day updates to CRM records, each with the entity icon and a clickable hyperlink to the record itself.

Over the next few weeks, Increase CRM will be testing this new accelerator ready for deployment at no charge to all our hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 customers.

Genesis Communications acquires Increase CRM to create the UK’s leading provider of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM services

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 19:50:00 +0000

Genesis Communications is pleased to announce that it has acquired Increase CRM, for an undisclosed sum, to become the UK’s leading provider of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM solutions.

The acquisition of Increase CRM represents the next step by Genesis to become the UK’s leading provider of mobile and hosted IT solutions to small and medium-sized enterprises. Genesis will combine its considerable investment in its hosting platform with Increase CRM’s leadership and expertise in providing hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM solutions and value added professional services.

Increase CRM’s customers will benefit immediately as their hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM services are migrated to Genesis’ purpose built data centre, located in Leicester. Customers will also be able to benefit immediately from a broader range of high quality and cost saving services such as hosted Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Exchange and Office Communication Server which can be integrated with Microsoft Dynamics CRM for improved collaboration and communication. Genesis will also soon be launching a mobile CRM solution which will allow customers to access their Microsoft Dynamics CRM data on the move using their mobile device.

Piers Linney, director of Genesis, said, “Genesis is absolutely focused on providing the leading suite of mobile and hosted IT solutions for small and medium-sized enterprises in the UK. The acquisition of Increase CRM allows us to become a UK market leader and dramatically extends our ability to support customers and deliver the value added professional services that our customers are demanding as they increasingly embrace the power of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. We look forward to working together to develop this exciting market and our offering.”

Neil Benson, chief addict at Increase CRM added, “The team of passionate CRM addicts at Increase CRM are extremely excited about joining Genesis. We can now offer our customers a wider range of mobile and hosted solutions, combined with the added security of the significant investment that Genesis has made in its infrastructure.”

Microsoft has launched a global Software+Services strategy in response to the demand for hosted IT services. By 2011, analyst firm Gartner predicts that 25% of all software will be delivered as a service.

Martin Walker, Software+Services - UK Lead, Microsoft UK commented, “Both Genesis and Increase CRM are Microsoft Gold Partners focused on leading the development of the Software+Services market. We are excited by the announcement of the acquisition. Microsoft is strategically committed to the Software+Services model across its business products suite and is working closely with its partners to take solutions to market. The acquisition further enhances the capabilities of Genesis, which is a business with the infrastructure, scale and the necessary expertise to offer a compelling Microsoft Dynamics CRM proposition.”

About Increase CRM
Increase CRM is the Microsoft Dynamics CRM hosted services business of Increase Ltd. Founded in 2002, Increase Ltd was among the first Microsoft partners to offer hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM in 2006. Increase CRM was the first Microsoft partner in the world to offer hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 in December 2007 and has established itself as a the UK leader in hosted Microsoft CRM.

About Genesis Communications
Genesis Communications Limited is an independent and leading provider of mobile and hosted IT solutions to UK small and medium-sized enterprises. The company has 250 employees based in Manchester, Leicester and London and generated revenues of c.£33M in 2008.
Genesis provides mobile voice and data solutions to approximately 15,000 customers. The company has invested in a wholly owned state-of-the-art data centre in Leicester with infrastructure to provide managed services and Software-as-a-Service IT solutions, such as Microsoft Hosted Exchange 2007, Microsoft Hosted SharePoint 2007, Microsoft Office Communication Server and Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0.

The company has achieved a total of 7 Microsoft Gold Partner competencies and its objective is to become the leading provider of unified communications and IT solutions to UK small and medium-sized enterprises.

For More Information
Press information:
Steve Leigh and Helen Taylor, Citypress
Tel: 0161 235 0300 Email: steve@citypress.co.uk Helen.Taylor@citypress.co.uk

Kath Dewar, marketing director, Genesis Communications
Tel: 0161 447 2026 Email: helen.shuttleworth@genesis.co.uk

Neil Benson, chief addict, Increase CRM
Tel: 020 8099 1304 Email: neil.benson@increasecrm.co.uk

UK CRM User Group - 26 March 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:46:00 +0000

The UK CRM User Group is a great way to meet other Microsoft Dynamics CRM customers and find out how they're using CRM. The next meeting is coming up in March, and we'd love to see you there:

Time: 1pm to 5pm

Date: Thursday 26 March 2009

Venue: Chicago Room, Building 3, Microsoft Campus, Thames Valley Park, Reading, RG6 1WG

Cost: FREE

Agenda:

CRM Metrics, Steve Zangari, Zap Technology
Case Study of CRM Implementation at Endsleigh Insurance, Becky Smith
Extending the Marketing Capabilities of Microsoft CRM, Kim Archer, 2b.net
Discussion Session with Microsoft, Jason Nash, Dynamics CRM Product Manager, Microsoft

For more information and to book a place, please visit: http://www.crmusergroup.co.uk.

Finally! Easy document distribution from Microsoft CRM

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 08:18:00 +0000

Distributing invoices from our Microsoft CRM system used to take me two minutes per invoice but, as the number of customers grew, it was taking me a day every month to finish the job of sending all the invoices. Distributing documents from Microsoft CRM can be painfully slow, and there had to be a better way. Unfortunately, even with the improvements in CRM 4.0 workflow, attaching files to workflow emails is still limited.

Recently I tried using Draycir Spindle Professional 2009 SP1. Spindle Pro acts as an intelligent printer driver that will distribute CRM documents by print, e-mail and fax and archive a copy on a file server, in a SharePoint document library and your CRM system. It took me about a day to configure Spindle Pro to email the invoice to each customer as a PDF attachment, save a copy on our file server and archive a copy of the invoice in our CRM system. Now the whole job of sending invoices to our entire customer base each month takes me two minutes. So I’m saving 478 minutes every month!

How to Send Invoices (Before Spindle Pro)
So here was my challenge. Every month we invoice our customers for their hosted Microsoft CRM service. And since we use Microsoft CRM to manage orders and invoices, I use CRM to generate an invoice report then send it to the customer.

Here's my old procedure for sending an invoice from Microsoft CRM:

On the Invoices grid in CRM, highlight the invoice I want to send
Click on the Reports button
Select the Invoice report
Choose The selected records
Click Run Report
Wait for the report to be generated
Select Acrobat (PDF) file as the format
Click Export
Click Open
Click File > Save a Copy
Navigate to our file server and find the folder where we file invoices
Rename the file
Click Save
Close Adobe Acrobat Reader
On the Invoices grid in CRM, double-click to open the invoice I want to send
Select Actions > Add Activity > E-mail
Change the From address to our Billing queue, not my user account
Change the To address to the billing contact, not the customer account
Click Insert template and select the Invoice as the template target and click OK
Select the appropriate e-mail template depending on the customer's payment method, click OK
Save the e-mail
Click Notes, and then click New E-mail Attachment
Click Browse and navigate to the folder where we file invoices and find the right invoice
Click Attach, then click Close
Finally, click Send

This monstrous, awkward procedure involves dozens of clicks and keystrokes and takes me a few minutes for each invoice. But with a bit of mundane practice, I've managed to nail it down to about 2 minutes per invoice. That was OK when we started and we had a few dozen customers, but now the invoicing job can take me an entire day! There had to be a better way.

Then in December 2008 we got a call from Draycir, an ISV based in Leicestershire. They wanted some help testing the latest release of Spindle Professional with partner-hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM with the internet facing deployment (IFD) configuration. So we fired them up a test instance of CRM, and they kindly provided us with a copy of Spindle Pro.

In January I finally got around to testing Spindle Pro to see what it could do. Spindle Pro is a locally installed Windows application that acts as a very intelligent printer driver. In Spindle Pro Tools, you configure various document automation rules that tell Spindle Pro what to do with documents that you send to it. For example, you can combine the document with a letterhead, print the document to any network printer, e-mail the document as a PDF or TIFF attachment to internal or external recipients, archive the document on a file server or in a SharePoint document library, and save a copy of the document in Microsoft CRM.

Configuring Spindle Pro
Here’s how I configured Spindle Pro to handle our invoices:

Print
As you might expect, simply printing the document is really easy. I configured Spindle Pro to print a copy of each invoice to the printer next to our accountant. You simply select the network printer that you want to print to, and Spindle Pro will even allow you to control the printer trays used, and provides options for duplex printing and collation. With a bit of imagination, you could even use ViaPost or iMail to have your documents printed, packed, posted and delivered to your recipient.

E-mail
I configured Spindle Pro to distribute invoices to the billing contact by email and send a copy to our billing mailbox. I used a simple text box with mail merge data such as “Dear ##FirstName##” in the email body. I haven’t tried using the HTML email formatting option or some of the other advanced email management features yet. My CRM invoice report gets merged with a invoice letterhead form and then attached to the email as a PDF with a file name that Spindle Pro allows me to configure, such as “Invoice ##InvoiceNumber## ##CompanyName##”. The emails get sent from Outlook but I’ve configured Spindle to override my email address with billing@increasecrm.co.uk.

Archive
Next, I configured Spindle Pro to save the invoice documents in the invoices folder on our file server with the same file name: “Invoice ##InvoiceNumber## ##CompanyName##”. I haven’t tried using Spindle Pro to archive the invoices to our SharePoint server yet, and it would be interesting to see if I could configure it to save the invoice in the customer’s document library so that it shows up in the CRM account’s Documents tab.

CRM
Finally, I configured Spindle Pro to save a copy of the invoice in a Note on the customer Account record. Personally, I would have preferred to have the invoice e-mail that gets sent to the customer tracked in CRM and set regarding the CRM invoice record. I’ve contacted Draycir with my request and hopefully we’ll see this level of Microsoft CRM integration in a later release.

How Does Spindle Pro Work?
Spindle Pro does processes my document using various commands that I inserted into the CRM invoice report. The commands get interpreted by Spindle Pro, but they don’t get included in the document when it is generated. It’s probably best if I show you can example...

Invoice Report from CRM
Here’s our new Invoice report that we designed in SQL Reporting Services and published in CRM:

Using the handy Spindle Pro user guide, our report designer and I figured out how to use the Spindle Pro commands merged with CRM data to pass information to Spindle Pro about how to handle the document. These commands appear at the top of each invoice in the report, but aren't printed when you send the report to Spindle Pro.

##CFG## - identifies this document type so that Spindle knows what to do with it. So you could also use Spindle Pro to distribute quotes, orders, letters or any document that you wanted to from CRM or just about any application that can print.
##EMAIL## - identifies the billing contact’s email address that Spindle Pro uses to distribute the document by email.
##CRMFNAME## - this is the billing contact’s first name and gets used in the email body when we email the invoice to the billing contact.
##CRMCOMPANY## - this is the CRM account name, used for archiving the invoice in Microsoft CRM.
##VAR1## - we used one of Spindle’s custom commands for the invoice number. This gets used in the file name when we create the PDF attachment and archive the file, and in the email subject line and body when we send the email to the customer’s billing contact.
##VAR2##, ##VAR3## and ##VAR4## - a few more custom commands used for the invoice due date, invoice value and account manager that I used in the email body.

Then I print the report to the Spindle Pro printer driver and the rest is completely automated. Here’s what the results look like:

Invoice Emailed to Customer Billing Contact
Spindle Pro sends the invoice as a PDF attachment to the billing contact and sends a copy to our Accounts Receivable mailbox. The email subject and body text use merged data to personalise the email for each customer.

Invoice PDF Attachment
Spindle Pro takes the invoice PDF attachment takes the CRM invoice report and combines it with an invoice letterhead form that I had previously configured using Spindle Pro.

Invoice Archived in CRM
Spindle Pro saves a copy of the invoice in the Notes tab of the customer Account record in our CRM system.

How To Send Invoices (Using Spindle Pro)
Now that I’ve configured Spindle Pro, and shown you how it works, I thought it would be interesting to compare the previous procedure (takes two minutes, has 25+ steps, and involves dozens of keystrokes and mouse clicks) with the new procedure using Spindle Pro:

On the Invoices grid in CRM, highlight the batch of invoices I want to send
Click on the Reports button
Select the Invoice report
Choose The selected records
Click Run Report
Wait for the report to be generated
Click Print
Select Spindle Pro as the printer
Click OK

So now I send out a couple of hundred invoices in less than two minutes with about 10 clicks and zero keystrokes. Yippee!

So, Any Downsides?
As you can probably tell, I’m really impressed with Spindle Pro. It’s saved me hours of repetitive, boring work every month. I can imagine lots of our customers using it, and lots of other Microsoft CRM customers using it too.
However, there are already a couple of things on my wish list for the next release:

Custom CRM workflow action or a CRM plugin to print a report to Spindle. It would be great if I could fully automate document distribution by using a workflow rule or a plugin to interact with Spindle in the background without any user intervention at all.
Improved CRM archiving options. Spindle Pro can attach the document in the Notes tab of the contact or account, but the Notes tab doesn’t really seem like the best place to me for recording customer communications. As I mentioned earlier, I’d like to be able to track the e-mail sent to the customer and set it regarding the invoice so that it shows up in the activity history areas in the invoice, contact and account records.

About Spindle Professional 2009 SP1
Spindle Professional 2009 SP1 was released by Draycir in February 2009 and is the first release to offer integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

Requirements: 1GHz processor, 512MB memory, 500MB free disk space, Windows 2000/XP/Vista or Windows Server 2003 (32-bit or 64-bit).
Supported Systems: Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 & 4.0, NAV and GP; Microsoft Office Word, Excel and Outlook 2000/XP/2003/2007; Microsoft SQL Reporting Services; Microsoft SharePoint, Sage accounting products, Pegasus Opera, Access Accounts, Crystal Reports, lots of fax servers and other email solutions (MAPI, SMTP, Lotus Notes, etc.).
Suggested Retail Price: Spindle Professional 2009 SP1 is available from Draycir’s reseller network. A 10-user bundle costs approximately £1,820 plus £600 per annum for Gold Support which includes support, updates and version upgrades. Generous discounts are offered for volume bundles.

(Full Disclosure: Increase CRM is a Draycir reseller.)

How to install Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 11:13:00 +0000

Increase CRM has successfully installed Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM on all our hosted CRM servers, and customers should now install the client component of Update Rollup 1 on all computers running Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook.

Customers using Microsoft Dynamics CRM web client do not need to take any action.

Procedure for installing Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook

Download CRMv4.0-KB952858-i386-Client-INTL.exe from Microsoft Downloads.
Click Save to save the file to your computer. If you are installing Update Rollup 1 on many computers, we recommend saving the file on a network location.
Before running the Update Rollup 1 installation program, ensure that Outlook is not running and that the CRM host process is not running. (If you can see the Dynamics CRM icon in your system tray, right-click on it and select Exit).
If have saved the installation file to your computer right-click on it and select Run as administrator, then click Next.
Click 'I accept this license agreement' then click Next, the click Install to start the installation.
Once the installation is complete, click Finish to restart your computer.
To validate that Update Rollup 1 has been installed successfully, click Start > Control Panel > Programs and Features (or Add/Remove Programs if you're using Windows XP), click the Show Updates checkbox and verify that Hotfix for Microsoft Dynamics CRM Client (KB952858) appears under the entry for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Microsoft Office Outlook.

Update Rollup 1 now available for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:24:00 +0000

Last night Microsoft released Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0. You can find out more about the 116 hotfixes included in this release here: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=952858.

Increase CRM is currently testing Update Rollup 1 and we expect to install it on all production CRM servers in our hosted infrastructure next week. We will provide you with more information and a maintenance schedule once we have completed our testing.

After the server-side hofixes are installed, we will be advising all users to install:

Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook, or
Update Rollup 1 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access

Users using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM web client will not need to take any action.

Increase CRM signs up for Microsoft Partner Advantage Plan

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 10:05:00 +0000

Increase CRM is delighted to announce that we have adopted a Microsoft Dynamics Partner Advantage Plan. The Partner Advantage Plan is only available to qualified Microsoft Dynamics partners and demonstrates the deep partnership between Microsoft and Increase CRM to deliver the very best on-demand CRM service in Europe.

Increase CRM is the only Microsoft Dynamics CRM hosting partner in the UK with a Microsoft Business Solutions (CRM) competency. To achieve this competency, partners are required to have individuals who have passed three Microsoft Dynamics CRM exams (Applications, Customization, and Installation and Configuration) and have at least three customer references featuring Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

In addition, Increase CRM also is the only Microsoft hosting partner in Europe with a Microsoft Dynamics Partner Advantage Plan. The Partner Advantage Plan is the most comprehensive support plan available to Microsoft Dynamics partners and demonstrates Increase's commitment to providing the highest levels of support to our customers.
The Microsoft Partner Advantage Plan offers the following benefits:

A dedicated Microsoft Technical Services Account Manager who understands our hosted CRM infrastructure and will proactively help manage and escalate issues within Microsoft's global CRM support team
150 support incidents with a 1-hour guaranteed response time to resolve issues reported by Increase CRM and our customers
Access to senior Microsoft CRM support engineers
Technical advisory services to help with product migration, code review, or new program development
Unlimited access to Microsoft e-learning courses for Microsoft Dynamics
Unlimited access to training material for Microsoft Dynamics
A license to customise Microsoft Dynamics training material for our customers
Access to the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step methodology, providing best practice for the successful implementation of Microsoft Dynamics

Jon Butler, Microsoft Dynamics Business Advisor comments, "I’m pleased and excited to welcome Increase CRM to the Dynamics Partner Advantage Plan. Increase is championing Microsoft’s long term strategic focus in the Software+Services market and they are leading the way for hosted Microsoft CRM in the UK.

Neil Benson, chief addict at Increase CRM added, "With the Microsoft Dynamics Partner Advantage Plan, Increase CRM deepens its partnership with Microsoft and extends our on-demand CRM leadership. We're committed to providing our customers with Beyond Demand Support and look forward to working with Microsoft to deliver it."

6 Tips for Optimising Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 16:37:00 +0000

If you're using Increase Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook, this article has seven tips for improving performance. Please note, this article refers to the online version of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook and not Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook with Offline Access.

1. Refer to our article for optimising Internet Explorer for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 web client
The tips provided in our aticle for optimising Internet Explorer for Microsoft CRM also apply when using Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook, so that's a good place to start.

2. Install the latest cumulative hotfix for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook
We expect Microsoft to release a Rollup Update for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 Outlook in December 2008. In the meantime, the cumulative hotfix KB956720 resolves the following issues:

You should download and install the cumulative hotfix from KB956720 only if you are experiencing one or more of the issues listed above and cannot wait for the CRM 4.0 Update Rollup. Inidividual hotfixes are designed to fix only the specified issue and they don't receive as much regression testing as the Update Rollup, so please don't install the cumulative hotfix unless you need to.

To download cumulative hotfix KB956720:

Download the hotfix package from Microsoft Support.
Review the Agreement for Microsoft Services, and if you're happy, click I Accept.
Select the hotfix for KB956720.
Provide your e-mail address.
Click Submit.
When you receive an email from hotfix@microsoft.com, click on the link to download the hotfix.
Click Save to download the hotfix package to your PC.
On the Save As dialog box, select a location on your PC and click Save.
Once the hotfix has been downloaded, click Run.
In the Microsoft Self-Extractor, select a folder where you want to unzip the hotfix file to and click OK.
To unzip the hotfix package, refer to the email from hotfix@microsoft.com and enter the hotfix password when prompted.

To install cumulative hotfix KB956720:

First, close Outlook if it is running.
If you are using Windows XP, double-click on the file CRMv4.0-KB956720-i386-Client-INTL.exe. If you are using Windows Vista, right-click on the file and select Run as Administrator).
On the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 Update dialog box, click Next.
If you're happy with the licence agreement, select I accept this licence agreement and click Next.
Once the installation has finished, click Finish.
You may need to restart your computer for the changes to take effect.

3. Optimise the synchronisation process
To optimise the synchronisation process for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, configure the synchronisation process so that:

As few records are synchronised as infrequently as possible to meet your requirements.
Duplicate records are not created if key fields match.

To set your synchronisation options for optimal performance:

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, on the CRM menu, click Options.
On the Synhronization tab, in the Synchronize Microsoft Dynamics CRM items with my default folders section, select only the record types that you require to be synchronised. For example, if you don't need CRM Letters to be synchronised as Outlook Tasks, then uncheck My Letters.
In the Schedule automatic synchronisation with Outlook section, increase the interval between each synchronisation. The minimum time interval between synchronisations is 10 minutes, but 15 minutes is the default and you may find that an interval of 30 or 60 minutes will improve performance.
In the Schedule what to do if duplicates are found during synchronization section, select Do not create duplicates to block the creation of records if key fields contain the same data.
Click OK to close the Set Personal Options dialog box and save your settings.

4. Optimise the Outlook address book synchronisation

To make it easier to email CRM accounts, contacts and leads from Outlook, Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook maintains an Outlook address book which is synchronised with records from your CRM system.

To optimise the Outlook address book synchronisation, configure settings so that the Outlook address book:

Matches only against contacts synchronised to Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Retrieves updates as infrequently as possible without compromising business requirements

To set Outlook address book synchronisation for optimal performance:

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, on the CRM menu, click Options.
In the Set Personal Options dialog box, on the Address Book tab, under Select how e-mail recipients are reconciled with Microsoft Dynamics CRM records, to the right of Contacts, verify that Match only against contacts synchronized to Microsoft Dynamics CRM is selected.
To the right of Other record types, ensure that Match only the items I own is selected.
In the Select how often the Outlook Address Book should be updated from Microsoft Dynamics CRM section, ensure Update the Outlook Address Book every x hours field is checked and set the interval to 24 hours.
Click OK to save your settings and close the Set Personal Options dialog box.

4. Improve the startup time for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook

Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook relies on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Application Host system tray application to maintain a connection to Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Configuring Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook so that the Host service runs continuously, rather than only when Microsoft Office Outlook runs, will help to ensure that Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook starts and loads as efficiently as possible.

To ensure that the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Host service runs continuously:

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, on the CRM menu, click Options.
In the Set Personal Options dialog box, on the General tab, under Improve Outlook startup time and Microsoft Dynamics CRM display speed, ensure that Always run the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Application Host process is selected.
Click OK to close the Set Personal Options dialog box.

5. Run the Diagnostics program for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Outlook comes with a useful Diagnostics program. It's a good idea to run the Diagnostics program from time to time, particularly if you are experiencing errors or slow performance.

To run the Diagnostics program for Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook:

Click Start > All Programs > Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 > Diagnostics.
In the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Office Client Diagnostics program, click Run Diagnostics.
Once the diagnostic tests have been completed, which may take several minutes, click Fix next to any settings which the Diagnostics program may be able to automatically fix.
If requested by the Increase help desk, click Save to save the Diagnostic results to your computer and email the MSCRM Diagnostics Report.xml to help@increasecrm.co.uk.

6. Modify your My Contacts local data group to synchronise only the required contacts

By default, Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook will synchronise all the CRM contacts owned by you with your Outlook Contacts folder. If you are the owner of a large number of CRM contacts, then all of these contacts will be synchronising in the background with your Outlook contacts which can cause poor performance. Synchronising more than a few hundred CRM contacts with Outlook can cause performance issues.

To modify the contacts that synchronise between Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Microsoft Outlook:

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, on the CRM menu, click Modify Local Data Groups.
In the Local Data dialog box, double-click on the My Contacts local data group.
Add additional filter criteria to restrict the number of contacts. For example, to synchronise only contacts related to a customer parent account, filter on Related > Parent Customer (Account) > Type > Equals > Customer.
Once you have finished adding additional filter criteria to the My Contacts data group, click Save and then close the Data Group dialog box.
Click OK to save your settings and close the Local Data dialog box.
In Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook, on the CRM menu, click Synchronize with CRM.

7 Tips for Optimising Internet Explorer for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 Web Client

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 16:10:00 +0000

If you're using Increase Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 web client with Internet Explorer, here are seven tips for improving performance:

1. Check your computer hardware
We recommend at least a 1.0GHz processor and 1GB of memory to use the CRM web client. (You'll need a higher specification computer if you are using the hosted CRM with the Outlook CRM client).

To check your computer's specification:

Right-click on My Computer
Click Properties

2. Check your internet connection latency and bandwidth
Latency and bandwidth are different. Latency is the time it takes for an internet packet to get from your computer to an internet server and back again in milliseconds (ms). Bandwith measures the capacity of the connection to handle a volume of internet packets in a given time, often measured in kilobits, megabits or gigabits per per second (Kbps/Mbps/Gbps).

I don't expect the new lane on the M1 to make any difference to how long it takes me to get from Richmond to Luton. Although the bandwidth of the M1 is increasing, there is still a high latency because of bottlenecks on the A406 North Circular.

One of the main causes of poor CRM performance is the latency of your internet connection. The lower the latency (measured in milliseconds), the better the CRM performance.

To check the latency of your internet connection:

Click Start > Run
Type cmd
Type ping addictivecrm.com

The goal is to have a low latency (round-trip time of 10-30ms) so that CRM views and forms load in 1 to 2 seconds. If your round-trip time is 30-100ms, it will take 3 to 4 seconds for a CRM view or form to load, and if your round-drip time is 100ms+, it could take an extra 5 seconds or more for a CRM view or form to load.

If you experience high latency, you may wish to consider a site-to-site virtual private network connection between your network and our data centre. There is a small additional charge for this service, but the effects can be quite dramatic.

If the latency of your interent connection is low, the bandwidth of your internet connection can become an issue if there are lots of people sharing your internet connection. Other users might be downloading files and sending and receiving emails while you're trying to use hosted CRM (or they might even be using Facebook, or streaming Classic FM or BBC iPlayer instead of working!).

If you are using an ADSL connection, it's likely that you are sharing this connection with other customers nearby. This is called contention and contention rates of 20:1 or even 50:1 are not uncommon, particularly if you are using a residential service. This might affect the performance of your CRM system, but check the latency first.

To check the bandwidth, try using SpeedTest and connecting to the London server. Speedtest will show you the upload and download speeds and the latency. These might be different from the speeds advertised by your ISP, and if so, you shuld have a word with your provider.

At Increase CRM lab in Richmond, we have a 10Mbps leased line connection to the internet and a site-to-site VPN between our firewall and the Rackspace data centre. A leased line means a dedicated line with no contention. Our latency to the hosted CRM platform is 9 to 11ms.

3. Add the CRM web site to your Trusted Sites
We encrypt your CRM communications using SSL (secure socket layer), so you should consider configuring Internet Explorer to recognise your CRM web site as 'trusted site'.

To add your CRM website to your trusted sites in Internet Explorer:

In Internet Explorer, click Tools > Internet Options
On the Security tab, click Trusted Sites
Click on the Sites button
Type https://*.addictivecrm.com/ in the Add this website to this zone field
Click Close
On the Security tab, set the Security level for this zone to Low
Click OK

4. Improve your Internet Explorer cache
The cache in Internet Explorer is where frequently used web content is stored so that your computer displays the content quickly (otherwise the content has to be downloaded again from the web server). You can increase the size of the cache to improve performance.

To increase the size of your Internet Explorer cache:

In Internet Explorer 7, click Tools > Internet Options
On the General tab, in the Browsing history section, click Settings
Set the Disk space to use to 250 and click OK
Click OK

5. Check your desktop security software
Some desktop security software is known to cause performance issues with web-based applications such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

In particular, we found that lots of McAfee anti-virus and firewall software products have a feature called ScriptScan which scans all web pages for malicious JavaScript. Just like the security gates at Heathrow airport, this causes long, frustrating delays.

We recommend you disable the McAfee Script Scan feature or replace the McAfee product with another security product. But please speak to your IT manager before disabling or removing any security software from your computer!

6. Automatically send CRM error messages to Microsoft
Even now and again there are problem loading a script and an error message pops up. Most of the time it's easier if these error messages are automatically sent to Microsoft.

To automatically send error messages to Microsoft:

In the CRM 4.0 web client, select Tools > Options
Click on the Privacy tab
Select Automatically send an error report to Microsoft without asking me for permission
Click OK

7. Use Internet Explorer 7
If you are still using Internet Explorer 6.0, we advise you to upgrade to Internet Explorer 7. (But don't go too far just yet, Internet Explorer 8 is coming soon, but it is still a beta product and there are known issues with IE8.0 beta 2 and Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0.)

So there you have it: seven top tips for improving the performance of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 web client. If you've got any more tips you'd like to add, please let us know and we'll update the article after we've tested them out.

Two Microsoft CRM Accelerators released

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 08:59:00 +0000

Microsoft has released two Solution Accelerators for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0. Two more Solution Accelerators are being released within the next week, and four more within the next month or so.

Here's what's coming:

CRM Notifications (now available) - subscribe to CRM views and updates via RSS feeds in Outlook, Internet Explorer or a Vista Gadget
Advanced Sales Forecasting (now available) - set goals and sub-goals for sales professionals and teams and use new SQL Reporting Services reports to analyse sales vs. goals
eService (coming next week) - accelerate the deployment of a customer service portal with secure customer login, online case management, online service scheduling and customer profile management
Event Management (coming next week) - manage marketing events online with online registration
Analytics (coming soon) - advanced analytical OLAP reports and SQL Reporting Services dashboards
Enterprise Search - Rapidly configure portal views of CRM data within SharePoint (MOSS) and expose this data to MOSS enterprise search
Business Productivity - A collection of time-saving productivity workflows
Sales Methodologies - Practical Guidance for adoption of third-party sales methodologies such as SPI Solution Selling, Target Account Selling (TAS) and Miller Heiman)

Increase CRM will be deploying the Solution Accelerators internally and then making them available to customers as soon as possible. We'll be announcing available in the next few weeks.

If you're interested in using of the Solution Accelerators in your Increase Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 system, please let your account manager know.

Back to School!

noreply@blogger.com (George Bliss) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 10:51:00 +0000

It's time to go back to school! The Microsoft Partner Certification team are launching a 'new generation' of exams for the following Microsoft competencies:

Advanced Infrastructure
Networking Infrastructure
Security Solutions
Microsoft Business Solutions
Information Worker
and SOA and Business Process.

So it's time to hit the books - all MCP's are required to meet the new requirements (i.e. sit the new exams) before October 2009 or risk loosing the status and competency.

IDOX goes live with Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM from Increase

noreply@blogger.com (George Bliss) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:48:00 +0000

London, UK - IDOX plc (LON:IDOX) the specialist information and knowledge management company, has chosen Increase CRM, to implement and host a Microsoft Dynamics CRM solution.

In the first phase of the project, CRM experts Increase will provide IDOX with Microsoft SureStep® implementation services and a Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 platform to streamline sales order processing and improve sales forecasting accuracy.

“We needed a central CRM system to help improve our reporting capabilities over our four Regional sales teams” comments John Bell, Project Manager at IDOX. “We currently rely on a Saleslogix system in order to provide sales forecast data to the IDOX Board. The system will also help us speed up the integration of our recent acquisitions: CAPS and Plantech as well as providing us with a superb platform for our critical commercial data.” he said.

As the leading provider of document management software and services to UK local authorities, with a large market share, the IDOX sales team are focused on the highest quality account management via hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Additionally, Increase's expertise will assist IDOX to more effectively track these relationships through a series of feature rich desktop, web or mobile device clients.

“We’re extremely excited to work with such a successful and innovative technologist” said George Bliss, Marketing Director at Increase CRM. “A CRM strategy is all too often thought of as a means for boosting monthly sales revenue, but often the advantages of CRM for account management can be overlooked. This approach can increase the value of existing accounts which is key in the current economic climate, when budgets are being constantly squeezed and new spend is often deferred.

“Hosted Microsoft CRM, implemented with the Microsoft SureStep® methodology will mean a rapid, low risk and successful implementation of CRM for IDOX. At Increase we use Microsoft Dynamics CRM every day, so our Beyond Demand™ service ensures customers become addicted to our solutions and see hosted CRM as an integral part of their business.”

About Increase CRM

Increase, based in Richmond, London is passionate about making CRM software ridiculously easy, addictive and affordable. Increase's customers include small and medium-sized businesses in all sorts of market sectors. The thing they all have in common is an ambition to grow, improve their efficiency, and provide their people with the tools to serve their customers better.

About IDOX plc

IDOX plc is a specialist information and knowledge management company, focusing on the development and delivery of software products and content for information and knowledge sharing, recruitment and training of information professionals at all levels, and consultancy services.

For more information please contact:

George Bliss, Marketing Director, Increase CRM

020 8099 1303 george.bliss@increasecrm.com

We're Rackspace's Partner of the Month!

noreply@blogger.com (George Bliss) — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 17:33:00 +0000

Increase CRM, Europe’s leading provider of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM has been named Rackspace Hosting’s Partner of the Month for September 2008. The announcement follows Increase’s recent participation as a finalist in the Rackspace Fanati™ awards.

Increase and Rackspace have enjoyed the benefits of this strategic relationship for many years, having first worked together in 2002.

“Rackspace and Increase are very similar organisations culturally and we’ve always enjoyed the Fantatical Support™ experience. We’re delighted to have been awarded this recognition; as one of Rackspace’s top-tier partners we’re constantly looking to nurture an environment of innovation and creativity when it comes to complicated and intricate technical requirements” comments Neil Benson, Increase CRM’s Managing Director.

Neil continues, “We chose Rackspace Hosting primarily because of their commitment to high availability and infrastructure support for our complex hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform. It means we can offer our customers a level of service that scares the competition. Our businesses are closely aligned to Microsoft’s Software+Services (S+S) theme so we’re proud to be associated with Rackspace, as a leading pioneer in this area.”

“Rackspace is proud of our Partnership with Increase CRM” comments Brian Garvey, Head of Strategic Alliances at Rackspace Hosting. “The Microsoft SaaS solutions they provide suit businesses both large and small. Recognition by Rackspace as our ‘Partner of the Month’ is well deserved”.

Microsoft "CRM 5.0" - what's planned?

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 07:58:00 +0000

Microsoft Dynamics CRM program manager, Reuben Krippner, has recently announced a Statement of Direction for the next version of Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

We met with Reuben a couple of weeks ago at Microsoft Worldwide Partner. He and other Microsoft CRM program managers were keeping tight-lipped about what they were planning for the next version of CRM. So we're delighted to see that they are finally able to let us sneak a peek at what they are planning.

The next version of CRM is planned for release late 2009/early 2010, and it's so early in the release planning cycle that Microsoft hasn't even invented a decent codename to the project yet. We've head CRM 5.0 and the Statement of Direction mentions CRM V.Next, but hopefully a snappier codename will emerge soon. (Our bet is that the final product name will be Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2009 - following the recent change in naming convention of AX and NAV releases).

Here's what's planned for CRM 5.0:

Better Office integration – particularly Outlook and Office 14
Ribbon UI – easy to find features
Streamlined UI – less pop-ups and clicks to complete common tasks
Improved personalisation – including views
SharePoint integration for document management
Improved BI – simple data visualisation for everyone
Workload management – for users
Contact/Account management – hierarchy and relationship visualisation
Team-based collaboration – including team selling
Call centre and unified communications enhancements
Improved knowledge management
Extended outbound marketing – including attachments on email templates
Recurring activities
Data auditing
Extended use of Windows Workflow Foundation
Reusable and dynamic picklists
Streamlined management of multi-tenanted environments
Improved virtualisaiton with Server 2008
Improved data management and BI with SQL 2008
Updated BizTalk adapter

With the exception of email attachments on marketing emails (which we think has the potential to bring all CRM and Exchange platforms to a griding halt), we're very excited about the new features. Please bear in mind though, this is an early statement of intent and features may be dropped, changed or added.

Microsoft announces eight new CRM 4.0 Solution Accelerators

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 14:26:00 +0000

At a Dynamics CRM seminar at WPC on Tuesday, CRM product managers Barry Givens and Reuben Krippner lifted the lid on a range of new CRM solution accelerators for CRM 4.0. And we're excited that Increase CRM has been asked to be the beta test hosting partner for the accelerators.

Here they are

Analytics Foundation: includes marketing, sales and service dashboards, user adoption dashboard and a range of scorecards from PerformancePoint
Business Productivity: a range of configuration options commonly requested by customers such as auditing, sales processes and common workflow patterns such as incident management
Enterprise Search: integration with SharePoint business data catalog to make it easier to search for customer data stored in a CRM database from within your SharePoint portal.
Notifications: a range of options for sending notifications and alerts to users via email, Vista gadgets and unified communications
Sales Methodologies: built-in support for popular sales methodologies from the TAS Group (Target Account Selling), Sales Performance International (Solution Selling) and Miller Heiman (Strategic Selling)
Sales Forecasting: improved features for sales professionals to be able to provide forecasts and for sales managers to get insight into forecast trends and patterns
Event Management: extension of campaign management functionality to your website to allow marketing professionals to publish an events calendar online and manage online registrations
eService: a customer support portal to allow customers to submit and review cases, search the knowledgebase and more

The great news is that the Solution Accelerators will be released over the next few months and FREE (although there may some fees for the sales methodologies). There's likely to be some configuration or customisation involved to get the accelerators working perfectly in your system, but it's great that Microsoft are working on so many simultaneous improvements to CRM 4.0.

Some news of "CRM 5.0" to come soon...

Increase running the show at WPC

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 15:27:00 +0000

Increase CRM has been asked by Microsoft to run the Dynamics CRM - Partner Hosted Solutions stand at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2008 (WPC). We'll be at the stand on Wednesday 9th July. Look out for booth DY28 near the cafe tables.

We're not sure of the timings yet - but Neil Benson or George Bliss should be there most of the day. Make sure you get a demo of hosted Microsoft CRM and one of our partner brochures.

Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 08:36:00 +0000

This year's Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference is in Houston Texas from Tue 8 to Thu 10 July. Increase will be there again. This year we've been asked to host CRM visitors at the Microsoft Hosting Community stand, so look out for George or me there on Wed 9 July.

If you're going to Houston, we'd love to meet CRM independent software vendors, UK CRM consulting partners and anyone who'd like to share their experience of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Just drop us a line...

Who's Who of Hosted CRM?

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Mon, 12 May 2008 16:47:00 +0000

Hosted CRM was pioneered in the late 90s by application service providers who provided outsourced CRM systems. Companies such as Pandesic, Corio, Interliant, USInternetworking blazed the trail but struggled with a business model that was too far ahead of the technological capability and market demand.

A few years later, some innovative software vendors had resolved the technology issues with multi-tenancy hosting and automated billing systems. These Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) providers are generating plenty of buzz and are experiencing rapidly-growing demand due to their lower cost models compared to traditional on-premise software vendors.

Gartner predicts that by 2010 up to 30% of CRM software will be delivered via the hosted model, up from 10% in 2007.

So, who are the SaaS CRM providers? Well, some popular hosted CRM systems available to UK small and medium sized businesses include:

Salesforce.com. An early entrant in hosted CRM, salesforce.com boasts an impressive list of marketing, sales force automation, customer service and support, and analytics features with many add-on products available from AppExchange.
Microsoft Dynamics CRM. An established on-premise CRM vendor with robust marketing, sales and service/support features, Microsoft offers its own hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online (only in North America) and partner-hosted CRM through its network of partners like Increase CRM in the UK.
NetSuite. An early entrant in hosted accounting software, NetSuite now includes a robust range of CRM and ecommerce functionality.
Oracle CRM On Demand. Having acquired Siebel Systems in 2006, Oracle now offers a complete range of CRM functionality with an emphasis on call centre automation and analytics.
SageCRM.com. UK-based Sage offers its Sage CRM product as an hosted service with an integrated suite of marketing, salesforce automation and customer service functionality.
Rightnow Technologies. For many years Rightnow Technologies has been best known for their customer service software. Having made a transition to an on-demand business model, Rightnow still lead this niche despite their acquisition of Salesnet.
Sugar CRM. Sugar CRM is best known as the leading open source CRM software vendor. Sugar offers free CRM software source code, but also offers paid-for professional, enterprise and hosted versions for fans of the LAMP stack.

The hosted CRM market also has plenty of new and niche vendors too. But I get the feeling that with rampant industry consolidation, most CRM buyers (hosted or on-premise) are increasingly looking for vendors with a financial stability and a published product roadmap that they can rely on.

What is CRM?

noreply@blogger.com (Neil Benson) — Mon, 12 May 2008 13:01:00 +0000

At Increase CRM, our misson is to help our customers become addictive. We host their Microsoft Dynamics CRM system so that they can get on with generating leads, closing opportunities, providing great service, managing their business and looking after their customers (not their CRM system).

Hard as it is to believe, not everyone we talk to even seems to have heard about CRM. Or if they have heard about CRM, they have a certain preconception. So for the benefit of CRM newbies, here's our definition of CRM:

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) describes the processes and systems that an organisation uses to attract and retain profitable customers.

So What is a CRM System?

While we're at it, here's our definition of a CRM system:

A CRM system is a central customer database with features for marketing, sales and service users to help them generate better leads, manage customer accounts and opportunities, solve customer requests and boost customer loyalty. A real-time system also provides managers with the insight they need to make decisions and direct resources to the right places.

Most CRM systems include the following features:

Marketing - provides marketing users with features for importing customer data, customer and prospect segmentation, planning and executing marketing campaigns, managing direct mail and email communications and qualifying leads. Combined with analysis features – such as campaign performance analysis and lead source reporting – marketing managers can manage campaign budgets and improve lead quality while reducing the cost per lead.
Sales force automation (SFA) - provides sales people with features for managing contacts and accounts, leads and opportunities, as well as orders and invoices. Combined with management features – such as forecasting and quota mangement, territory management, and pipeline reporting – sales managers can coach the sales team and improve overall performance.
Service and Support - provides service and support staff with features for managing customer cases and requsts and scheduling services. Combined with management features – such such as knowledgebase management and case origin analysis – customer service and support manager can allocate appropriate resources, resolve customer requests quickly and ensure customer satisfaction.
Analytics - provides key users and managers with features for running ad-hoc queries, developing reports and building real-time dashboards so that they can make more informed business decisions, and gain strategic insights about customer data and staff performance.