Using business contact mgr for conference registration

[Guest]

I am evaluating Outlook 2007 with BCM for a client. I'm assessing its
capabilities against what they need to track in their customer relations.
They are primarily a service organization.

Looking for advice/suggestions/insights:

I want to gather a list of business contacts who have registered for a
conference. Then I need to track and consolidate specific information like:
what workshops are they attending? special dietary requirements? have they
paid? that sort of thing. I'll want to be able to do things like produce a
list of attendees by workshop, to give to workshop facilitators.

I've had a look at the project management and marketing campaign features in
BCM, and I can see it should be fairly straightforward to flag people who are
registered (perhaps with a user-defined field), but I can't see a good way to
track detailed information for each attendee. It would be workable to create
the list of attendees in BCM, then export it to an Excel spreadsheet which
can be annotated with additional info; but then how do I update the
spreadsheet as new registrations come in?

Any ideas on the best way to use BCM (perhaps in conjunction with other
Office apps) to make this work?

 

[Mukesh Agarwal [MSFT]]

Nick,

BCM 2007 allows you to add new fields and edit the drop down lists. You can
create new fields for your specific requirements. These fileds can be added
to Outlook views and will show up in BCM reports. You can also customize BCM
reports. I would recommend reading a recent post on our blog that explains
customization with BCM.

 

[Guest]

Hi Mukesh, thanks for responding so quickly. I know I can create my own
fields. However, I'm looking for general advice on how best to use BCM. I
don't want to put transitory information about an event in the contact
records themselves--so what's the best way to record and manage data about
people who are coming to a conference

I saw an earlier post that recommended using Opportunities as a way to track
detailed business transactions with a customer, so I had a look at that and I
think it might work.

The ideal would be to have a "conference registration form" designed
specifically to collect the information I need about people attending a
conference--but I assume I would need to step up to Microsoft Dynamics to get
that kind of functionality.

Any other advice?

Nick,

BCM 2007 allows you to add new fields and edit the drop down lists. You can
create new fields for your specific requirements. These fileds can be added
to Outlook views and will show up in BCM reports. You can also customize BCM
reports. I would recommend reading a recent post on our blog that explains
customization with BCM.


--
Mukesh Agarwal [MSFT]
Visit team blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/bcm

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

I am evaluating Outlook 2007 with BCM for a client. I'm assessing its
capabilities against what they need to track in their customer relations.
They are primarily a service organization.

Looking for advice/suggestions/insights:

I want to gather a list of business contacts who have registered for a
conference. Then I need to track and consolidate specific information
like:
what workshops are they attending? special dietary requirements? have they
paid? that sort of thing. I'll want to be able to do things like produce a
list of attendees by workshop, to give to workshop facilitators.

I've had a look at the project management and marketing campaign features
in
BCM, and I can see it should be fairly straightforward to flag people who
are
registered (perhaps with a user-defined field), but I can't see a good way
to
track detailed information for each attendee. It would be workable to
create
the list of attendees in BCM, then export it to an Excel spreadsheet which
can be annotated with additional info; but then how do I update the
spreadsheet as new registrations come in?

Any ideas on the best way to use BCM (perhaps in conjunction with other
Office apps) to make this work?

 

[Mukesh Agarwal [MSFT]]

Current version of BCM doesn't allow creating new entities or renaming
existing entities. You will need to repurpose existing entity for your
purpose. Based upon what you want, Opportunity is probably the best fit.

--
Mukesh Agarwal [MSFT]
Visit team blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/bcm

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

Hi Mukesh, thanks for responding so quickly. I know I can create my own
fields. However, I'm looking for general advice on how best to use BCM. I
don't want to put transitory information about an event in the contact
records themselves--so what's the best way to record and manage data about
people who are coming to a conference

I saw an earlier post that recommended using Opportunities as a way to
track
detailed business transactions with a customer, so I had a look at that
and I
think it might work.

The ideal would be to have a "conference registration form" designed
specifically to collect the information I need about people attending a
conference--but I assume I would need to step up to Microsoft Dynamics to
get
that kind of functionality.

Any other advice?

Nick,

BCM 2007 allows you to add new fields and edit the drop down lists. You
can
create new fields for your specific requirements. These fileds can be
added
to Outlook views and will show up in BCM reports. You can also customize
BCM
reports. I would recommend reading a recent post on our blog that
explains
customization with BCM.


--
Mukesh Agarwal [MSFT]
Visit team blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/bcm

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
rights

I am evaluating Outlook 2007 with BCM for a client. I'm assessing its
capabilities against what they need to track in their customer
relations.
They are primarily a service organization.

Looking for advice/suggestions/insights:

I want to gather a list of business contacts who have registered for a
conference. Then I need to track and consolidate specific information
like:
what workshops are they attending? special dietary requirements? have
they
paid? that sort of thing. I'll want to be able to do things like
produce a
list of attendees by workshop, to give to workshop facilitators.

I've had a look at the project management and marketing campaign
features
in
BCM, and I can see it should be fairly straightforward to flag people
who
are
registered (perhaps with a user-defined field), but I can't see a good
way
to
track detailed information for each attendee. It would be workable to
create
the list of attendees in BCM, then export it to an Excel spreadsheet
which
can be annotated with additional info; but then how do I update the
spreadsheet as new registrations come in?

Any ideas on the best way to use BCM (perhaps in conjunction with other
Office apps) to make this work?