East Region Microsoft CRM

Update Roll-up 1 is now available for Dynamics CRM 4.0

The headline says it all.  Here's the link:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=57c6267b-3b13-49dd-bfed-3cc83633aea7&displaylang=en&tm

Make sure you back up your databases before applying the update!

eService Accelerator is now available

OK...OK I know everyone has been sitting on the edge of their seats ever since the CRM accelerators were originally announced and one of the more anticipated accelerators was the one for eService.  SO GO NUTS!  IT'S AVAILABLE ON CODEPLEX!!!   WHOOOO-HOOOO!!!   [ahem] sorry about that..I got a little carried away.

http://www.codeplex.com/crmaccelerators/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=19956

And no I don't have any more information on the Analytics Accelerator or Enterprise Search.  But I'm sure they'll be available soon.  I think. 

Calling all Entrepreneurs!!! Calling all Developers!!!

It's no secret that one of the biggest strengths of Dynamics CRM is the robust development platform that underlies the application.  With this in mind and in few of the challenging economic environment, our friends over on the CRM ISV team have put together what looks to be a really cool opportunity.

If you have a great XRM idea that has been keeping you up at night or know of someone who does, this could be the chance of a lifetime.  The 1st CRM Incubation Week is being held at the Reston MTC from December 15th through the 19th.  Check it out over on Sanjay's blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/sanjayjain/archive/2008/11/14/microsoft-dynamics-crm-incubation-week.aspx

Come on all you clever MId-Atlantic CRM jockeys!  Make me proud!

Accelerators for Microsoft Dynamics CRM

I know you have all been waiting (some more patiently than others!) for information on where to access the recorded training sessions and where to download the CRM Accelerators.  A central repository has been established on PartnerSource for the most current information on the CRM Accelerators.

Here is the link on PartnerSource:

Accelerators for Microsoft Dynamics CRM

As those of you who attempted to attend some of the sessions know, there were some audio challenges that have made it necessary to re-record some of the training sessions.  As such, these new recordings, along with easy to consume videos, will be available the week of October 27^th for download.

The Accelerators will also be posted to CodePlex as they are released.  As of this writing, two accelerators are currently available:

1. CRM Notifications
2. Extended Sales Forecasting

Others, along with marketing materials and technical FAQ's will be coming soon so check back often!

The Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2006 adapter for Microsoft Dynamics® CRM 4.0 is now available!!

The Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2006 adapter for Microsoft Dynamics® CRM 4.0 is now available.

This adapter has the same functionality as the previously released 3.0 adapter, with the following updates:

•             Supports both 32-bit and 64-bit deployments of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0

•             Supports form-based authentication

•             Supports multi-tenancy

With this adapter, you can integrate Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 with any other non-Microsoft business application using the BizTalk server mapping capabilities, which allows you to discover and use the schema of any of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM entities.

•             Adapter is available for download

•             Adapter is available at no additional charge

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=ABD3BB9E-A59A-4EB6-8DE8-FB25B77926D7&displaylang=en

V-what? VPAT!! - Voluntary Product Accessibility Template® (VPAT™)

Most of the IT world has at least heard of Section 508, an amendment to the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, but many  are a bit sketchy on what's involved in actual 508 compliance. Here's an excerpt from the www.section508.gov website explaining the purpose of Section 508:

"In 1998, Congress amended the Rehabilitation Act to require Federal agencies to make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. Inaccessible technology interferes with an individual's ability to obtain and use information quickly and easily. Section 508 was enacted to eliminate barriers in information technology, to make available new opportunities for people with disabilities, and to encourage development of technologies that will help achieve these goals. The law applies to all Federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology. Under Section 508 (29 U.S.C. ‘ 794d), agencies must give disabled employees and members of the public access to information that is comparable to the access available to others."

The purpose of the Voluntary Product Accessibility Template, or VPAT, is to assist Federal contracting officials and other buyers in making preliminary assessments regarding the availability of commercial "Electronic and Information Technology" products and services with features that support accessibility. So it is indeed great news that we have released the CRM 4.0 VPAT.

It  can be found here:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/1/d/7/1d7af6c9-af47-49eb-8f57-5c06b4c0cd39/Microsoft%20Dynamics%20CRM%204%200%20VPAT.doc

CWR Mobility Mobile CRM Client

CWR Mobility has long been the Dynamics CRM client of choice for running on a Windows Mobile device.  Here's a link to their web site:

http://www.cwrmobility.com/

The following excerpt from their web site covers the major features of the mobile application:

As a smart client application for field sales and service people, CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM leverages the power of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 and 4.0 system and the advanced connectivity of the Windows Mobile Platform.

CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM provides your field force with timely, convenient access to customer and corporate data while reducing the time they need to spend developing time-consuming reporting for management. Mobile CRM makes your sales and service teams more effective, and more efficient.

Built for Mobile Professionals

CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM is built specifically for mobile sales and service professionals’ providing them with an unrivaled user experience through an intuitive, graphical user interface based on the familiar Dynamics CRM 3.0 and 4.0 look and feel.

CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM is a cost-effective solution that can be deployed in as little as 15 minutes providing wireless handheld users with immediate and instant access to accurate CRM data in the field – including all standard and custom entities from Dynamics CRM 3.0 and 4.0.

CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM delivers:

• Access to Dynamics CRM 3.0 and 4.0 while out of the office – allowing for up-to-the-minute data changes (from the field and the office) and instant access to current data.
• A user-friendly interface on the Windows Mobile devices for intuitive CRM data access and entry by the mobile professional. Both while the device is connected online to a wireless service provider and offline, such as in an airplane, or deep inside a customer’s warehouse

Using CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM, sales and service teams have instant access to important customer information when and where they need it.

By allowing your sales and service people to quickly and efficiently update their customer information on the fly, your organization gets transparent up-to-the-minute reporting, while your people have more time to do what they are supposed to do: Sell and Service!

Great solution for small and medium-sized enterprises

For small and medium-sized enterprises (SME’s), CWR Mobility's Mobile CRM for Dynamics CRM 3.0 and 4.0 is the perfect solution. The working patterns of SME’s lends itself well to mobile technology as these companies tend to spend disproportionately more time outside of the office. The smaller the firm, the more jobs they combine with owner-managers being the most notorious multi-taskers.

Spending more time out of the office means that access to a range of key applications, including e-mail, CRM and other enterprise applications will make the SME professional more efficient and responsive, and help reduce working hours.

But Mobile CRM is not just for smaller organizations, it can also be deployed by very large organizations that also have a need to make their mobile workers more efficient and effective.

Ten Digits MobileAccess for Dynamics CRM

Ten Digits and Microsoft announced an alliance right before the Worldwide Partner Conference to provide CRM Mobile clients for both Blackberry and Windows Mobile devices.  Full press release below:

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/jul08/07-03MobileBlackberryPR.mspx

Here's the link to the Ten Digits site:

http://www.tendigits.com/

MobileAccess® for Dynamics CRM is the company's latest product line that consists of the MobileAccess Client for BlackBerry and MobileAccess Server for Dynamics CRM. These products enable organizations that have deployed Microsoft Dynamics CRM to increase the productivity of their mobile users by allowing them to use CRM online or offline.

MobileAccess includes numerous technical and product features with patented technology deployed today in many global enterprises. These features can be summarized by the following unique attributes:

• Proven User Experience.  MobileAccess is designed exclusively for wireless users with hundreds of successful deployments worldwide. 

• Always-Available Wireless CRM.  Work anywhere with instant access to your data online and offline with full CRM functionality regardless of your location. 

• Multi-tasking, Graphical User Interface. Navigate instantly between various records, lists, tasks and applications without losing track of a thing. 

• Tight Application Integration.  Dial phone numbers, browse websites and compose emails directly from fields.  Log emails and phone calls from your BlackBerry to account and contact history in CRM.  Use Microsoft MapPoint, MSN/LIVE, and Yahoo! web services to find timely information relevant to your CRM records.

• Secure and Reliable.  Unlike other solutions, our smart-client technology guarantees data delivery and complete transaction integrity. 

• Rapid, Low-cost Implementation.  Automatically inherits your unique CRM customizations – no programming required – speeding deployment time and control cost.  

CRM 4.0 Mobile News

As much as I depend on my laptop to get my work done, I think I value my Windows Mobile device even more.  I can keep abreast of the most critical email and text messaging traffic and convert what would often be wasted time into productive time.  I have all my contacts, appointments, to-do's and even a select group of Microsoft Office documents of various formats available in an always-on, easily portable device.  Heck, it even makes phone calls!

I get calls and emails on a regular basis about how to extend CRM to mobile devices so instead of just publishing another list of links, I thought I'd try to go into a little more depth.

So next week I'm going to put out a series of posts about our most popular CRM 4.0 Mobile ISV offerings and wrap up with a how-to about the future of CRM Mobile Express .

Stay tuned!

It just keeps getting better and better...

I am more and more impressed with the tremendous amount of talent we have on the CRM Product Team.  I had the chance to meet with some of them over the past month or so and talk about where we are going with the product and what we need to help our partners compete effectively.  There is so much good stuff coming out of that team it's mind-boggling.  Clearly they have been listening closely to what our partners and the field team have been asking for and they are responding.

Here's a glimpse from the CRM Team blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/crm/archive/2008/07/28/crm-statement-of-direction-and-crm-accelerators.aspx

Microsoft CRM 4.0 User Guides

I loved the 3.0 one we did for Small Business Edition that you were able to modify to work with a client's installation.

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 User’s Guide includes all of the basic end-user information available in Help, including documentation on sales, marketing, and customer service features, as well as step-by-step instructions on working with Advanced Find and workflow in an easily printable format.

To make it easy to customize the document, a version is available in Microsoft Office Word 2007 (.docx) format along with the entire document in PDF format.

Enjoy!

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0DB4D487-1BAA-4619-9BC5-074D73C3997D&displaylang=en

Creating a Dashboard using MOSS, Excel Web Services, Excel 2007 and Microsoft CRM

There is a new CRM Partner blog with some great data on it around Dashboards. Thanks to the team over at I.B.I.S. for publishing some of their consulting knowledge for the rest of us.  Enjoy this quick read.

Creating a Dashboard using MOSS, Excel Web Services, Excel 2007 and Microsoft CRM | I.B.I.S. CRM Blog

Armored Car Company Chooses Microsoft Dynamics CRM

One of our local customers got featured by Microsoft in a press release. Pretty cool. Thanks to Scott from Ascentium and Seth at Dunbar for working through this process.

If you have a customer that would want a press release like this, shoot me an email and I will make the connection to the right folks. (UIS Partners only!)

“One of the main reasons for choosing the Microsoft solution was its integration into and synchronization with Microsoft Outlook, as well as the ability to customize the application,” McElroy said. “We had migrated all of our sales team members to Outlook for e-mail and appointments 18 months ago, so adding a system that’s similar in look and feel will speed adoption.”

Armored Car Company Chooses Microsoft Dynamics CRM to Secure Increased Sales Effectiveness: From an integrated database, Dunbar will provide its locations nationwide with access to all customer and prospect information.

VPC 2007 SP1

I am in the process of switching my demo laptop over to Hyper-V to see if I can't get some better performance from Virtual Machines than we currently get with Virtual PC. In the mean time the Virtual PC team has released Service Pack 1 for VPC 2007. It is available in 64 and 32 bit versions. If you are running VPC, this is worth your time.

Download details: VPC 2007 SP1

CRM Plug-in Registration Tool

So I spent most of the weekend working on my TechEd Session. The Plug-in registration tool included as part of the SDK killed me with the XML file and I not getting along. Shawn and Melissa for support called me about some survey partners with CRM and I managed to rope them into helping me.  And Melissa pointed me to a new Registration tool on the MSDN Code Gallery, which is AWESOME. 

In about 30 seconds I was able to accomplish more than I was in 4 hours of playing with the XML files. :-)

Here is the description from that website:

Are you facing problems in registering plug-ins? Are you wondering if you could get a tool to generate the Xml and deploy plug-ins via Import / Export just like the way customizations are deployed? Are you confused with the various tools that shipped with SDK and how to use the registration API? If the answer is yes, then it is worth downloading the released project.

CRM Plugin Registration Tool - Home