Here is a tip to help you deal with the large volume of "non-deliverable email" one gets back as a result of doing a broadcast email with GoldMine. Rather than dealing with the returned (failed) email messages in your email center inbox, create an email rule that automatically files these emails into a special folder to be handled when you see fit.

Simply create a new rule for incoming messages that identifies emails with a subject that contains the various possible scenarios for undeliverable email. (There's quite a few, and new ones are continually being added.) As the rule's action, have it file the email to a special folder you've created beforehand for undeliverable mail. Remember to activate your rule just before doing a broadcast.

Also, don't forget to deactivate it a day or two after your broadcast. When you've got the time to clean up all those bad email addresses, go into the folder containing all your undeliverable email. To find the corresponding records in GoldMine, just lookup based on "details" for "email address" and type in the email address contained in returned message.

Bonus Benefit - Doing broadcast emails and going through your non-deliverables is a great way to learn about changes in prospect and customer records. With such a large percentage of turnovers in companies, keeping up with non-deliverable email is an effective tactic for alerting you of personnel changes so you can keep your database up-to-date.

At First Direct Corp. we discuss CRM needs with literally thousands of individuals and organizations. Some prospects and customers are very unsure of their sales processes, while others have done a better job of defining things. The customer who is the subject of this issue’s “Golden Nugget” impressed me from the very beginning with their clear vision for how their sales qualifying process needs to be tracked.

Terry Chapman, President of Business Electronics Corp. (BEC), has broken his organization’s sales qualifying processes down into very specific steps which represent milestones. The reps know what is required at each stage so they can concentrate on achieving success. For example, obtaining the expiration date of an equipment lease or the contact information on the right decision maker is essential in order to time and direct future follow-up, so to move from one stage in their sales processes to the next, this information needs to be captured..

First Direct worked with Terry to map BEC’s methodology into his GoldMine CRM system. Important information is tracked, and by using GoldMine’s auto-update feature, the system automatically captures the dates each sales milestone is achieved. Terry can analyze the results of his marketing & sales efforts more accurately, and knows where prospects and opportunities stand. Now, BEC is able to trigger automated communications and scheduled follow-up actions based on the qualifying information.

GoldMine is a great tool; however, to truly achieve desired results with any CRM solution, the people who implement it must have a clear vision for how it is to be used. It helps you to achieve success if you can define it in very specific ways with milestones and “begin with the end in mind!”

Business Electronics Corp. has been serving BirminghamAlabama businesses since 1988 through a dedicated team of service professionals that know how to address the document reproduction and management needs of businesses. Visit BEC online at http://www.businesselectronics.com

Imagine being able to see detailed and vivid analysis of your GoldMine data or data pulled from an external database in the form of professional looking charts, graphs, and reports right within your GoldMine screen, even within the GoldMine Contact Record. 

What’s more, how nice would it be to have immediate access to this information from anywhere over the Internet through a web browser?  Or even, to automatically distribute reports on a timely basis to the right people?  It’s all possible with the new Microsoft SQL 2005, improved SQL Reporting Services, and the features in GoldMine!

As far as reporting solutions go, Microsoft is a relative late comer to the scene. But within the past two years Microsoft released Reporting Services as a free add-on to SQL Server 2000. With its ability to deploy web-based reports, connect to any ODBC data source, and various display export and print options, SQL Reporting Services became a serious contender on the reporting circuit.  Now with the recent release of SQL Server 2005, Microsoft has made significant improvements to SQL Reporting Services (2005). Included with this recent version is Report Builder which allows a user to design an ad hoc report in an easy-to-use interface.

Possibly the most exciting aspect of SQL Reporting Services is its web-based report deployment. All reports are viewed in a web browser such as Internet Explorer.  In other words, users can launch reports from anyplace from a web address/URL … GoldMine users can launch reports from their “Task Bar.

Reporting Services automatically creates a web-based report management tool that allows users to run reports either on-demand or on a scheduled subscription basis deliverable via Email. Reports can be printed or exported to a variety of file formats including Adobe PDF, Excel, HTML, and XML.

Since SQL RS is web-based, it lends itself perfectly to many of GoldMine’s frequently under utilized features. SQL Reporting Services is a perfect match for GoldMine’s GM+ Views, GM+ Browser, and MyGoldMine. At their core, all three of these tools are really web browsers and can be setup to display information from your GoldMine database or even an external database system with a tool such as SQL Reporting Services.

Consider a few possibilities:  You could be on a GoldMine Contact Record and the GM+ View tab showing monthly sales orders and product information relevant to that company/contact. Or envision using the GM+ Browser, introduced in GoldMine CE 7.x to look at a company-wide pipeline report without having to leave your GoldMine screen. Or use MyGoldMine for what it is really meant for, a dashboard interface that shows you at a glance exactly what you need to know when you need to know it. Pie charts, bar graphs, data from multiple sources, and all of it web-based. SQL Reporting Services is such a good fit for GoldMine, it looks and feels like a natural part of GoldMine … truly seamless integration.

Another great thing about SQL Reporting Services is that it is a 100% server side solution. Client machines do not have to be installed, no need to worry about creating DSN connections or loading DLL files on the client machines. And GoldMine Corporate Edition v7.0 has built-in tools to allow users to subscribe and schedule reports from right within your GoldMine menus. Microsoft SQL Reporting Services has already made a big impact on the reporting scene since its recent release, and we can be sure to see its popularity grow!

Want to see a demo or start using MS SQL Reporting Services … contact First Direct.

GoldMine can track an unlimited number of uniquely named counters. The counter values are stored in the LOOKUP table. For example inserting ~COUNTER("ID",1) into the lookup pick list for a field provides a unique number starting at 0 that increments by 1 each time it is selected by the user.

High on the list of important topics in any sales methodology or training program is the need to “sell to the people most likely to buy.”  And, it ought to be in every CRM system!  Is it in yours?

Every salesperson, worth their salt, knows they need to qualify a lead.  There are hot buyers, lookers who may buy, and others who pass your way.  Leads come in all ways – off web forms, on cold call lists, from referrals, through networking, etc.  Either way, the first order of business with leads is to weed through them to separate the wheat from the chaff by qualifying them. 

Qualifying can take the form of questions, knowing the source of the leads, researching them online, or even by floating attractive direct response offers past them with the requirement for certain information. 

Like other vital information on contacts, qualifying details should be databased.  Otherwise, marketing can’t target future marketing communications, and management can’t report and analyze the effectiveness of its efforts. 

Salespeople have a tendency to capture such findings in “notes” rather than in fields.  Part of the reason is that it may seem easier to type this information right along with all the notes about a conversation; and not to bother to update pertinent fields accordingly.  The other reason is sometimes the CRM system lacks the necessary fields and lookups for the data to go into.  This second reason is an oversight that can be easily fixed.  The first is a more challenging issue – changing people’s behavior!

There are several features in GoldMine that your organization can leverage to make it easier to capture qualifying information:

1. Web Import – capture facts from web forms directly into the corresponding fields in GoldMine.
2. Auto-data Entry – trigger the population of one field based on values from other fields.  For example, drive the entry of territory and/or sales rep base on “state.” Or, automatically populate a date in a field when a milestone value is entered into another field.
3. Scripts – a lesser known feature in GoldMine that enables you to design a series of questions with select responses or manual entries that automatically populate the right fields.  Branching logic is a feature of GoldMine scripts, so a particular response can direct the person asking the questions to the appropriate follow-up.
4. Field Lookups – default choices in fields that can control the values that are entered into fields, thereby ensuring data consistency and integrity, and making it faster and more intuitive for users to fill information in.  (Don’t forget to check off “Auto Fill” in the Lookup Set-up to save users time when entering common choices.)

Changing people’s behavior is easier said than done.  Giving salespeople tools like I’ve listed above will help. Training and reinforcement is a must as well.  But chances are the best reason for them to want to change is if the salespeople see the value in it for them by seeing how the information they capture is used successfully.

Once you’ve incorporated the features in GoldMine into your sales qualifying process, it just makes a whole lot of sense to explore ways marketing and management, let alone sales people, can use this information to sell more, by targeting time, effort, and resources in the direction of the people who are most likely to buy.  If you do, you’re going to increase sales and your ROI!

“News,” most any “news” has its own intrinsic appeal.  Humans are conditioned, probably evolved, to being attracted to things which come across as “news.” The appeal of news is hard-wired into our psyche, and it is our nature to be drawn to news.  

In ancient times, news could be a matter of life or death, so news always drew attention.  Good news or bad, the proclamation of “news” is powerfully effective, which is why it is often incorporated into headlines.  It’s even morphed into just the idea of “news” – because something “new” or an “announcement” can trigger the same effect.

Today we’re hit with more news than we can handle, so our brains will filter the majority of it out on a subconscious level.  We tune in figuratively and literally to news which is relevant and useful.  Otherwise, we’d spend our whole day listening, watching, and reading the news. 

Relevant or useful news is still likely to catch our senses and give us cause to focus.  One way to leverage the value of “news,” in a way that helps your organization to build prospect and customer relationships, is with a quality newsletter. 

To build perceived value over time, a newsletter must be an honest effort to inform your public – to provide your readers with material that helps them one way or another.  If it’s just another advertisement with some news about your firm thrown in that readers could probably care less about, it will only be another reason for your audience to “opt out.”

A good newsletter can build your reputation, establish credibility, and invite your prospects and customers to see the potential for your products and services.  The more effort you put into helping your readers, the higher the likelihood that they will want to reciprocate by doing business with you. 

With the low cost of producing an HTML email, the cost of producing and distributing a newsletter is generally less than the cost of print production.  However, don’t rule out a print version for more lasting impact, which will not get blocked by SPAM filters!  Either way, your newsletter can be integrated with your website, to provide easy access to support materials and links to integrated direct response offers.  Newsletters are a super way to build repeat traffic to your website, draw in registrations, download requests, and more! 

For more ideas on producing newsletters I’ve posted an article on the “Resources Page” of the First Direct web site – click here for a link to the section on “Free Sales & Marketing Tips” and then select the article entitled, “Newsletters – To Print or Not to Print.”

GoldMine Success© is an example of a newsletter that truly strives to provide value to its readership.  I love to receive communications back from recipients thanking us for ideas and information!  I also like getting topic requests.  As the publisher, we put in considerable effort to give our customers material they can use to help them market better, sell more, and manage smarter! (Please give us your feedback.)

How many times in a month do you get one of those vanity phone numbers i.e.1-800-BeefLog and have to sit by the phone converting the letters into numbers? Did you know GoldMine could convert those numbers for you? Here is how it works. Just type in the 10-character string into any phone number field. Note you can only use 10 characters, so when you use something like 800-mattress and they say “skip the last s for savings” you have to not put in that last s.
Once you tab out of the field your text string will be converted to numbers.