Email Autolink Works Sporadically

[Bill Mack]

I find that Email Autolink only works sometimes. I use it to link emails I
receive to difference Business Projects. I try to be careful to check both
the email address in the first tab and the relevant Business Project in the
second tab. On many occasions, however, even after I have done this, I find
that the next email I receive from the same address is not linked to the
Project, as it should be.

I have the feeling (but have not conducted a real study) that if I link the
FIRST email I receive from a new contact to a particular Business Project,
Email Autolink tends to work, but if I try it with later emails, it does not
do so well.

Any thoughts on what I may be doing wrong or have not done right?

 

[Bill Mack]

Let me add some detail to my issue, so that perhaps others will recognze the
problem and suggest a solution.

The e-mail form in Outlook 2007 has a ribbon across its top called
"Message". In that ribbon is a panel called "Business Contact Manager".
That panel contains two buttons, "Link to Record" and "E-Mail Auto-link".
The "Link to Record" button allows you to manually link that particular
e-mail to an Account, a Business Contact, an Opportunity or a Business
Project in BCM. If you use that button only, then each e-mail has to be
manually linked. The "E-mail Auto-link" button seems to offer a partial and
automated alternative to manual linking. It seems to offer the option to
link an e-mail address to a Business Project in BCM, and thus to
automatically link future e-mails from that same address to the selected
Business Project.

Here is how I think it works, or should work. When I receive an email from
say "(e-mail address removed)", I click "Email Auto-Link" at the top of the e-mail. This
opens a box titled "Select Addresses and Business Projects to Link". There
are two tabs in the box; a tab called "E-mail Addresses", which shows the
e-mail address (e-mail address removed) with a check box, and a tab called "Business
Contact Manager Projects", which lists all my Business Projects with check
boxes next to them.

I think what is SUPPOSED to happen is that by checking the box for
(e-mail address removed) on the first tab and the box for a Business Project (say "Smith
v. Jones") on the second, I am linking (e-mail address removed) to the Business Project
Smith v. Jones for the present e-mail and all e-mails I receive in the future
that contain this address.

The benefit of course is avoiding the time needed to manually link every
future e-mail for (e-mail address removed) to Smith v. Jones.

What I find, though, is that this auto-link feature works well sometimes and
not at all in other times. For example, it may be that I used the auto-link
as described above, but the next e-mail from (e-mail address removed) is not linked to
Smith v. Jones when I open it and check it. So I have to manually link it.
Sometimes the auto-linking will work for a while, and then mysteriously stop
working for a particular address. Sometimes the utility goes a little crazy
and links an e-mail address to more than one Business Project, including
Projects to which the address has no relevance and was never auto-linked.

I have spent a lot of time explaining my problem. I hope someone out there
has a good suggestion. Thanks for listening.

 

[Jackie Lampiasi]

Hi Bill

We started using BCM without linking our emails to our projects, and now I
am going through the same process as you.

Instead of linking the records from the email ribbon as you have done, I
link them through the top task bar (File - Edit - View) by clicking on
Business Contact Manager and choosing "Manage Email Auto Linking". I get the
same screen, choose an email, then on the next tab choose the folders, and
they seem to be staying linked. This links all of the PAST emails, but not
the future.

To link the future emails then I open their Business Contact and choose
"Email Auto-Link" on the top ribbon. They do seem to stay linked.

After that I think you would have to link it to the project - not sure.

We are running into several different issues: for instance, one of our
clients changed email addresses. I have to have their old (and obsolete
address) in their contact form in order to link past emails; however if I do
a bulk email now, that old address will be exported.

Also, I'm unsure how to make BCM link several clients to one vendor or
account and have the vendor emails link to the individual clients.

I hope this helps!
Jackie Lampiasi