Best Way To Share a Global Outlook Profile?

[Joe]

Hello All:

We have the following environment.

Exchange 2000 running on SBS 2000 Server.
Clients Running XP Pro SP2, Office XP and Outlook 2003.

We want to have a central database of contacts that represent our customers
and we want the end users to have their own seperate personal contacts that
do not necessarily represent customers as well. So we are basically talking
about users having a personal contact database and a shared Customer contact
database. We want to set permissions on the global customer contact database
to allow various levels of capabilities regarding access to the cutomers and
their related emails, Documents, Notes, Tasks, etc... .

We would like to be able to identify the customers that employee "X" would
have access to to be te ones haveing his/her employee ID in the REP (custom)
field in the Customer contact record.

As a note is linked to a Contact, or a task is related to a contact for
follow up, etc... we would want all users having access to that particular
contact to have access to this.

What is the best way to accomplish this basic Customer Relationship
configuration given our current software??

Public Folders????

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

The best way to do this is to get a purpose-built CRM tool that works well with Outlook+Exchange and/or SQL Server. See http://www.slipstick.com/addins/contact_management.htm. It would take a lot of custom programming to make Exchange public folders work as you describe.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

 

[Joe]

Thank You for your quick reply Sue. Thats what I Thought. By the way, do
you recommend one over any other.

The programmer taking on the project has been learning as he goes and its
not going well. To allow each user access to a subset of records he has
created secondary contact folders using the method I have seen you descibe
for sharing contacts in a peer to peer environment using a distributed PST
containing shared contacts that are added to a users prpofile. The
propgrammer populates each contact folder on each users desktop each evening
with any new "Business System" customers that have been added in customer
order entry, that would be considered "Their" customers. He has then
written custom forms that he is trying to prpopogate to these machines into
the shared Contacts profile as he makes modifications, but he has been having
a nightmare of a time with his propogation methodology and not all contact
updates are occurring nor are all custom form updates occurring on each
desktop. I see nothing wrong with his custom forms work, but his peer to
peer method of distributing the contacts, and related activities and custom
forms is where the system is braeking down For example I spoke with 3 users
today and none of them can ADD new contacts to their Company Contacts List.
They must be added via the update the prpogrammer is doing from the ERP
package and this is not the only time they shoudl be added (i.e. prospects).
The custom forms on one persons pc are not as current as the custom forms on
another... etc. My theory was that to simplify deployment he could simply
create a public folder for each Contact list associated with each rep and
keep them updated with new customers each night with an upload from our ERP
system. Also his Custom Forms, which as I indicated seem to work well would
inherently be the same for all users. My question is if I have a cutom
Folder containing contacts and I look at Activities... How dows it Link
Emails, and Tasks to that Contact?

Thanks,

Joe

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

My experience is that while every company thinks their CRM needs are "just like everyone else's," they are in fact all unique when it comes to the information they want to collect and the way they want to organize it. Thus, it's impossible to know which would be the best fit without some detailed analysis, even if I were up on the current offerings, which I'm not.

secondary contact folders using the method I have seen you descibe
for sharing contacts in a peer to peer environment using a distributed PST
containing shared contacts that are added to a users prpofile

That's not a method I personally would recommend, certainly not if you already have Exchange.

his peer to
peer method of distributing the contacts, and related activities and custom
forms is where the system is braeking down

Not surprising. THe only way to make that work is to run code on every machine to get the latest data updates. Very inefficient.

My question is if I have a cutom
Folder containing contacts and I look at Activities... How dows it Link
Emails, and Tasks to that Contact?

Through email addresses on messages and meetings and explict links in the Contacts field on other items. Each Activities group for a public folder, however, can show only one folder.


--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

 

[Jullaja]

Try this Project Management tool - it will allow you to hold all
contacts together (classified by "prijects) - and also it is good
alternative for Public Folders - IMHO
I like how it is organized...

http://outlook.4team.biz/?pcode=607180190pwkkd3

Also check server and this projects web acess possibility

Hope it will help!