BCM, Exchange, OTA Sync for Handheld

[Mike P]

Pretty sure I know the answers but want to be sure:
1. BCM and Outlook/Exchange contacts are seperate.
2. Therefore BCM contacts cannot be maintained on an Exchange Server.
3. Therefore BCM OTA Sync for handhelds is not possible.
4. There is no way to sync contacts between Outlook and BCM

Can someone from MSFT please confirm.

For MS: It is more and more common for small business to use a hosted
exchange solution. Big company capabilities for a small price. Not realistic
for a small business to install a CRM system. Sure would be great if there
was a hosted BCM/Outlook solution that could provide OTA sync for handhelds.

 

[mrtimpeterson via OfficeKB.com]

Mike,

I am not with MS. I am a small business like yourself and I feel your pain.
The lack of remote access to a centralized source of data (other than offline
laptop re-syncing) is needlessly frustrating. I am about to investigate the
Office Live offering from MS because it "appears" to offer a web based server
that will synch with BCM data. Thus far, all I can get are a bunch of
splashy marketing pages with limited information about exactly how this
really works. If you can crack the code and find out yourself post back here
with your findings.

-THP

 

[Lon Orenstein]

Gentlemen:

MS had a fabulous opportunity with Office Live and BCM synchronizing
together and they blew it. I was a beta tester for Office Live and during
that period the SDK said that you could synch BCM Contacts to OL Contacts.
They even renamed Office Live contacts to Business Contact Manager in
anticipation of them working together. About a month before OL went "live",
they backed off and said it would be "awhile" before they could make it
work...

Mike: one solution for OTA synch is Companionlink. They've got a synch for
Outlook but I don't believe they've gotten the BCM contacts hooked up yet.
Another option is Goodlink, but you'd have to manually overwrite the Outlook
contacts from BCM daily. For a small database with not much editing, this
could be a decent solution.

HTH,
Lon

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Lon Orenstein
pinpointtools, llc
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Author of Outlook 2007 Business Contact Manager For Dummies
Author of the eBook: Moving from ACT! to Business Contact Manager
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