Contact Management Overview

Purpose of this document

Contact Management provides users with the ability to set up and define parameters related to the Relationship Management – Contact functionality. Contacts can be used by food banks to supplement the available Contact fields on Agency Cards, Vendor Cards, Donor Cards, Bank Account Cards, Parent Agency Cards, or Employee Cards.

Note: If you are hosted by Feeding America, then the email logging functionality may not be supported.

Ceres Object release 6.00.00 is required for the functionality described in this document.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

•  Marketing Setup
  • General FastTab
  • Inheritance FastTab
  • Default FastTab
  • Interactions FastTab
  • Numbering FastTab
  • Duplicates FastTab
  • E-Mail Logging FastTab
• Creating Contacts
  • Manually
  • Automatically from a Card
  • Automatically from the Create Contacts Function
  • Automatically when a new Record is Created
• Accessing Contacts

 Marketing Setup

1. Marketing Setup can be accessed by selecting “Search” from the Dynamics 365 Business Central Banner and entering “Marketing Setup” in “Tell me what you want to do” then selecting “Marketing Setup” from the results in the Go to Pages and Tasks section OR by selecting the “Marketing Setup” menu action (if present) from your Role Center home page.

2. Update the setup parameters on each of the FastTabs.

General FastTab

The fields on the General FastTab define where the Contact data will be stored. 

Attachment Storage Type: Indicates where Ceres stores the attachments you want to use when creating interactions. Attachments can be Microsoft Word documents, for example standard letters, Excel, or PowerPoint files. The options are Embedded or Disk File (External). The only option supported is Ceres is embedded.

Attachment Storage Location: Indicates where the attachments are located when the Attachment Storage Type is External.

Inheritance FastTab

A color toggle in the Inherit fields indicates you want Ceres to copy the details from the Contact Card of a company to the Contact Card for the individual contact person(s) working for that company.

When you enter a new contact person for a company recorded as a contact, Ceres will copy the content of the fields containing the details of the contact's address (for example the Address and Address 2 fields) from the company's contact card to the person's contact card.

Default FastTab

Input a value in each of the fields below that you want Ceres automatically assigns to contacts when they are created.

Interactions FastTab

Mergefield Language ID is not currently available for Ceres.  The Business Relation Codes identifies that a contact is linked to an Agency, Vendor, Bank Account, Donor, Parent Agency, or Employee. If you enter a Code in this field, Ceres will synchronize the Agency Card, Vendor Card, Bank Account Card, Donor Card, Parent Agency Card, or Employee Card and the Contact Card. This means you only have to update information in one place. In addition, it will add a new Contact whenever you create a new Agency, Vendor, Donor, etc. When you create contacts from Agencies, Vendors, Bank Accounts, Donors, Parent Agencies, or Employees, Ceres automatically assigns the business relation code to these new contacts.

Numbering FastTab

The Number fields contain the codes for the Number Series that you want Ceres to use when assigning numbers to Contacts. Toggle on the Assign Same Contact Number field if you want the number to be assigned to the Company or People Contact based on the Agency, Vendor, Donor, Parent Agency, Employee it was created from.

Duplicates FastTab

The Duplicates fields indicate how you would like Ceres to research duplicate Contacts.

Maintain Dupl Search String: Toggle on to indicate that Ceres automatically updates the search strings it uses to search for duplicate records. You can set up the search strings in the Duplicate Search String Setup Table.

Autosearch for Duplicates: Toggle on to indicate you want Ceres to automatically search for duplicates each time a Contact is created or modified. When searching for duplicates, Ceres uses the search strings that you have defined in the Duplicate Search String Setup Table.

Search Hit %: This field contains the level of precision you want the program to apply when searching for duplicates.

E-Mail Logging FastTab

The E-Mail Logging functionality is not supported in Ceres. 

Creating Contacts

There are two different types of contacts (company and person).  Company contacts can be linked to agencies, vendors, donors, bank accounts, parent agencies, or employees.  Person contacts are linked to a company contact.  

New company contacts can be created manually or automatically as outlined below.   Generally, person contacts are created manually.

1. Manually by selecting New from the Contact List or the Contact Card.
2. Automatically from the Agency Card, Vendor Card, Donor Card, Bank Account Card, or Employee Card by selecting Related à  Agency, Vendor, Donor, Bank Account, Employee à Contact.  From the   Parent Agency Card by selecting Parent Agency à  Contact.
3. Automatically by running the  Create Conts. from… function for agencies, vendors, donors, or bank accounts.
4. Automatically when a new agency, vendor, donor, bank account, parent agency, or employee is created.

Manually

The following steps outline how to create a contact manually.

1. Contacts can be accessed by selecting “Search” from the Dynamics 365 Business Central Banner and entering “Contacts” in “Tell me what you want to do” then selecting “Contacts” from the results in the Go to Pages and Tasks section OR by selecting the “Contacts” menu action (if present) from your Role Center home page.

2. Select New to create a new contact. Contacts may be edited by highlighting a contact in the List, and then selecting Manage à  Edit.

3. The Contact Card will display. Fill in the fields on the General FastTab as needed.

No.: This is the main identifier for the contact, which can be entered as any combination of text and numbers. BC can be setup to automatically number each customer for you, or you can enter the number manually.

Name: This field provides the main name of the company or the person depending on the type of contact that is being setup.  Up to 100 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers. Therefore, enter the name as you want it to appear on any documents.

Name 2: This field is an extension of the Name field. This field can be used for names longer than 100 characters. This field is 50 characters in length.

Type: Select company or person as the type of contact.

Company No: Select the company that this contact is associated with. For company contacts, the Contact No. and the Company No. will be the same. For person contacts, the Contact No. will be the unique identifier and the Company No will be the company contact the person contact is associated with.

Company Name: This field automatically populates based on the Company No.  field.  For company contacts, the Name. and the Company Name. will be the same. For person contacts, the Name. will be the name of a person and the Company Name will be the name of the company contact the person contact is associated with.

In the below example, person contact RMCON-0192, Jane Does is associated with company contact AG-00020, agency American Red Cross. 

Business Relation:  The business relationship displays in this field if the company contact is linked to an agency, vendor,  donor, bank account, employee, or parent agency.

Search Name:  Enter an alternative name that this contact can be searched by.  When a new contact is created, this field defaults to the Name field.

Job Title:  If this is a person contact, enter the job title of the person.

Responsible Person: Select the person who is responsible for this contact.

Salutation Code:  Select a salutation code for this contact when correspondence that is created from BC is sent to the contact.

Contact Type:   Select the contact type from the drop down list.  

Organizational Level Code:  Select the organizational level of the person contact.

Last Date Time Modified:  System maintained field that displays the last date and time this contact was updated.

Date of Last Interaction:  System maintained fields that displays the date of the last interaction for this contact.

Date Last Attempted:  System maintained field that displays the last date this contact was contacted.

Next Task Date:  System maintained field that displays the date of the next task related to this contact.

Exclude from Segment:  Toggle this field to exclude this contact from Segments.

Privacy Blocked:  Specifies whether to limit access to data for the data subject during daily operations. This is useful, for example, when protecting data from changes while it is under privacy review.

Minor: Toggle this field to designate that the age of the person contact is below the definition of adulthood as recognized by law.

Parental Consent Received:  Toggle this field to indicate that parental consent was received for this person contact and that they can use order products/services provided by the company.

4. The History FastTab displays the interaction associated with this contact.

5. Move to the Communication FastTab and update the fields as needed.

Address: This field would typically be the street number and street name of the contact. Up to 100 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers. The contents of the Address field are often used when you print something, so enter it as you want it to appear.

Address 2: An extension of the contact’s address, such as a suite number or building number. Up to 50 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers.

City: Enter the city of the contact. Up to 30 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers. Enter it as you want it to appear in printed documents.

State: Enter the state of the n. Up to 30 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers. Enter it as you want it to appear in printed documents.

Zip Code: Enter the zip code of the contact.

Note: If you fill in the zip code field with a zip code that is linked to a single city in the zip code table, this will fill in the city field automatically. If there is more than one city linked to the zip code, a list of the relevant cities for you to choose from will display.  If the zip code is not setup in the zip code table, you must enter the city manually.

Country/Region Code: Select the Country Code from the lookup list, primarily used to determine the address formatting on documents applicable for the selected Country. In addition, this field can be sorted on or filtered in various lists to view or select contact for a specific Country.

Phone No.: Enter the primary phone number for the contact. The field is 30 characters in length and cannot contain any alpha characters.   You should use a consistent format when entering the number, such as 123-456-7890.

Mobile Phone No.: Enter the mobile phone number for the contact. The field is 30 characters in length and cannot contain any alpha characters.  You should use a consistent format when entering the number, such as 123-456-7890.

E-Mail: Enter the e-mail address for this contact. Up to 80 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers, in a standard e-mail address format.

Fax No.: Enter the fax number for this contact. The field is 30 characters in length and cannot contain any alpha characters.  You should use a consistent format when entering the number, such as, 123-456-7890.

Home Page: Enter the Internet home page for this customer. Up to 80 characters can be added here, using any type of text or numbers.

Correspondence Type: Select the preferred correspondence type for this contact.   The options are: blank, Hard Copy, Email, or Fax.

Language Code.:  Enter or select the language code that will be used when translating specified text on documents to foreign business partners.

6. The Information FastTab displays some of the same fields that are on various FastTabs of the Agency Card.

7. The Profile Questionnaire FastTab displays the questions and answers of the profiles (surveys).

Automatically from a Card

1. Company contacts can be created automatically from an Agency Card, Vendor Card, Donor Card, Bank Account Card, or Employee Card by selecting Related  à Agency, Vendor, Donor, Bank Account, or Employee.

2. If a contact does not already exist for the record, a message of “Do you wish to create a contact for…..” will display.  Select Yes to create the contact and no to cancel the request.

3. If you select Yes, a company contact will be created automatically and copy the Name, Address, Phone No. etc. from the agency, vendor, donor, bank account, or employee to the contact. 

4. To create a contact automatically from the Parent Agency Card, select Parent Agency  à Contact.

Automatically from the Create Contacts Function

1. Company contacts can also be created automatically from agencies, vendors, donors, or bank accounts by running the Create Contacts function.   Generally, you would run the Create Contact from function if you decided to use the contact functionality after your agencies, vendors, donors, etc. had been created.

2. The Create Contacts from function can be accessed by selecting “Search” from the Dynamics 365 Business Central Banner and entering “Create Contac” in “Tell me what you want to do” then selecting “Create Contacts from…” from the results in the Go to Pages and Tasks section OR by selecting the “Create Contacts from….” menu action (if present) from your Role Center

3. Select the Create Contact function you want to run.

4. From the Create Conts. from… page, set filters based on which records you want to create contacts for.  In the below example, if the filter fields are left blank, a company contact will be created for each Agency if one does not already exist.

5. Click OK to run the function.

6. Once the contact has been created, it will be linked automatically to the record it was created from.  In the below example, company contact AG-00022 was automatically created and linked in the Contact Code field to agency AG-00022.

Automatically when a new Record is Created

If Business Relationship Code was setup for Agencies, Vendors, Donors, Bank Accounts, Employees, or Parent Agencies on the Interactions FastTab in the Marketing Setup then a company contact will be created automatically when a new agency, vendor, donor, bank account, employee, or parent agency is created.

Accessing Contacts

Once a contact has been created it can be accessed   from the 

1. Contact List

2. Contact Code field on the Address & Contact FastTab of the record it was created from or is linked to.