It is important to have sales acceleration tools that work inside Infor CRM to guide the sales conversations, apply consistency so nothing is forgotten and to auto record the notes for historical reference.

Sales Pilot is an extension of InboxGuru and adds a true sales engagement tool to the system for your sales team.  The solution helps your sales team by allowing them to create and/or manage highly personalized lead and prospect communications.  

Sales pilot sales pallet view helps your sales team set and execute on a series of phone and email communications for large or small sales teams.  It helps the managers plan out a cadence of communications with prospects for the sales team. It helps the sales professional organize and prioritize their day. More on sales acceleration....

Using Sales pilot and call down list

A priority "Call Down" list, close up view:

Each Infor CRM user can enhance their use of Microsoft Outlook Address book contacts when linking to the Infor CRM contacts.  This article covers using the Address book, scheduling an appointment and some recent enhancements.  For more visit, What's new with Infor CRM, mobile and Xbar in 2017.

Using Infor CRM Address Book in Outlook

One of the capabilities of the Infor Xbar implementation is the use of the Infor CRM address book.  This is configured by clicking on Options gear icon under the Infor CRM Connector options panel from the Outlook menu bar.

Then from the Address tab the user can determine how to show contact names- either by first name or last name order.  Next select what do you want to show when the Address book is accessed in Outlook.  In the following example, it is set to show the Infor CRM Groups as separate folders and Show Accounts as Distribution lists.  

For a salesperson, you'd  want to show Leads and maybe show opportunities as distribution lists.  For a CSR in customer support the "Show Tickets" would be helpful.  Optionally you can have the address book also display the CRM users.

One of the helpful capabilities of Inbox Guru is that the results of campaigns and web page visits becomes part of a contact's record in Infor CRM as a history record.  Therefore, you can use history records for analysis and decision making. Use this data to get instant feedback on who is reading your emails and web site content. Because of the flexibility of Infor CRM you can create a 'main view' of historical records, have various history groups and apply filters.  

Here we show the history group "Latest InboxGuru" created records.  The view shows the date of the activity, company account name, contact information, campaign name and so forth.

With the flexibility of Infor CRM web architecture, filters can be created to easily show less and less records for various conditions. In the group above of Inbox Guru history records we can filter to only show a specific category such as email campaign versus web site activity.

The main Infor CRM software product has new updates every two months and here are the latest updates for 2017 as of March with Update 06. Also released where updates to the Infor mobile client and the Microsoft Outlook Integration and Infor Xbar panel.

View "What's new and useful in version 8.3" here

View "What has changes in version 8.2"

Highlights include performance improvements such as the new Favorites for groups and in exporting lists of records. There are updates to Xbar with Outlook Integration, including drag and drop functionality for all browsers and not just Microsoft IE. Finally, with every release Infor corrects open issues and defects from prior versions.

Maps and Driving Directions

Let's say you are a field sales professional that is out of the office visiting a prospect.  You find that you have some time on your hands while visiting the Chicagoland area.  It would be very helpful to use your mobile phone or tablet to check options from your Infor CRM system

The following is an image from Infor Mobile client and it is using a current location with option to show a type of account like Customer with a listing of those near by.  Once an account type is chosen the list of accounts nearest you are shown.  In this case from 1.5 miles out to about 15 miles away.

So you want faster performance?

This latest version became available April 2016 and can be obtained from your account on the Infor CRM Xtreme portal. Also contact your Infor CRM partner before installing.  Review the Client Guides and Installation Guide PDFs shown in the right middle panel.

Most useful for all users:

Previously we covered  how to setup the various user defaults  so that your work can be performed consistently and you are more efficient in looking up information using Infor CRM.

Today we are covering the next key areas that can improve you effectiveness in using CRM - groups.

Groups- segmenting all types of information into intelligent bit-size, digestible pieces of information.

What are Groups:

Groups are collections of records which can help manage your workflow in more manageable ways. You can use groups to work with a subset of records, select data to print on reports, and to send mailing, e-mails and faxes using Mail Merge feature. A record can be in more than one group.  Additionally you can export group records to Excel and share your groups with other users.

Microsoft Outlook remains as one of the most heavily used tools in business today. It successfully manages Inbox, Calendar & Contacts for millions each day.

So you may ask yourself how can I say, Infor CRM has a deep and rich Outlook integration and then claim it causes users to underachieve at CRM?

It’s easy, because for many, it’s true. Let’s explore how and why.

People:  An Opportunity, Not a Roadblock 

Previously we talked about CRM Implementation being a team effort and to think of the people involved as an opportunity and not a roadblock, read more here.

A CRM system can make or break a growing company. The right one can boost your business development efforts, helping you grow revenue from existing customers while cost-effectively identifying and winning new "ideal" customers.  The wrong one? Well, we'd rather not go there … 

Having an optimal CRM system in place — one that addresses your business needs, serves your customers well and pleases your employees — is a high-stakes proposition. Unless you have dedicated staff to handle everything from choosing and customizing a solution to implementing the software and training users, you're going to need a qualified partner to do much of the heavy lifting.

Helpful resource in evaluating CRM solutions that meet your needs

As an Infor CRM channel partner we are very excited with the news that Infor CRM has been placed #1 on the SelectHub Leaderboard, a representation of leading CRM software vendors.