Microsoft Dynamics CRM - The Danish blog : Service

Microsoft Dynamics CRM in the Lead - according to Gartner

martinhj@microsoft.com — Mon, 04 May 2009 10:00:00 GMT

Microsoft Dynamics CRM accelerates for Sales, Marketing and Service Management processes, we all know that. Now, with CCF – Customer Care Framework, Gartner acknowledges this by placing Microsoft Dynamics CRM in the "Leader" quadrant on the April 2009 released Gartner Magic Quadrant for Customer Service Contact Centers.

Gartner says this:

The addition of the Microsoft CCF is a boost to Microsoft Dynamics CRM's capabilities.
The user interface is intuitive and appeals to broad audiences familiar with the look-and-feel of Microsoft's applications.
Microsoft is investing in knowledge solutions, Web self-service, business process capabilities and industry versions, adding to its basic customer service functionality.
The concept of xRM, where the customer is given the tools to create its own brand of CRM solution, is useful to reach a broad audience

Valuable resources
Information on Microsoft.com
The Gartner report
CCF Deployment Guide
CCF Development Guide
Download CCF 2009 including SP1 go to 'Servers' and then 'CCF2009'.

Learn more from your Partner-newsletter in Insights and on PartnerSource.

Enjoy! :-)

Martin Houlberg Jensen
CRM Evangelist
Microsoft Dynamics CRM team

Sure Step Service Pack 1 Now Available

martinhj@microsoft.com — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:01:00 GMT

This service pack is providing general improvements to the overall user experience, including:

Platform enhancements:

The Sure Step setup tool has been enhanced to permit the user to select the destination location for Sure Step documents during installation.
In the Documents and Projects views, phases show the number of files within them matching the filtering criteria.
The Reference pages have been updated with our new support information.

Content fixes:

Corrections have been made to content in all language packs including fixes to filtering issues, broken or unavailable links, and minor changes to text.
Some documents did not properly accept a user-supplied logo when the project logo wizard was applied. These documents have been identified and fixed.

Bug fixes:

A number of fixes have been instituted to regularize the experience of navigating the Sure Step client and viewing its content.

If you do not currently have Sure Step installed: Go to the Sure Step download page on PartnerSource.

Accelerate the adoption of Sure Step within your organization!
This 1-hour on-demand webcast introduces a process, tools and tips to help you drive the use of Sure Step. The faster and more thoroughly you adopt the concept, the faster you will reap the benefits of Sure Step: shorter sales cycles, increased wins, managed implementation risks and higher customer satisfaction. The webcast discusses the reasons why you should adopt Sure Step, how you should plan and prepare for the first use of Sure Step, the tools and resources that you can access, and finally how to use Sure Step to the max.

Go to https://training.partner.microsoft.com/plc/details.aspx?publisher=12&delivery=255322 to access the Webcast.

New Videos Featuring Sure Step and Services for Microsoft Dynamics Now Available
With a powerful, growing portfolio of options, Services for Microsoft Dynamics helps you and your customers increase efficiency, productivity, and profitability. In other words, everybody wins with Services for Microsoft Dynamics.

Business Ready Enhancement Plan, Customer Services, CustomerSource, Partner Services, Sure Step and Licensing - with these powerful services, it’s no wonder that Microsoft partners and customers worldwide see Microsoft as a strategic business partner for every stage of expansion and development. And by providing customers with access to the most robust services, partners can help them meet ever-higher business objectives.

So: Serve Up the best services to your customers. Go to Services on PartnerSource to view a series of videos about Services for Microsoft Dynamics, including Sure Step, to learn more about services available.

Enjoy! :-)

Martin Houlberg Jensen
CRM Evangelist
Microsoft Dynamics CRM team

CRM Accelerators - accelerating Dynamics CRM even more

martinhj@microsoft.com — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 16:09:00 GMT

After my last post about the eService Accelerator I have been doing primarily two things in this matter:

Beta-testing and debating eService and the results are great!
Answering questions about this and the other accelerators

So, I felt the need to post the source of more information :-) Go to Partner Source for the "Microsoft Dynamics CRM Statement of Direction" document.

Partner Source: https://mbs.microsoft.com/partnersource/default

Direct link to the Statement of Direction document: https://mbs.microsoft.com/partnersource/marketing/statementofdirection/MD_CRM_SOD.htm

In here you can find descriptions, screen shots, planning, inspiration and Microsoft's window on development - for the accelerators and more.

Enjoy! :-)

Martin Houlberg Jensen
CRM Evangelist
Microsoft Dynamics CRM team

eService Accelerator for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 - Service Management out of the box and the company

martinhj@microsoft.com — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 17:30:00 GMT

With the upcoming enhancement for the service module in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 "eService Accelerator", the Service Management concept gets even more extensive and powerful! In a short while our customers will be able to - out of the box, I might emphasis, web-enable the service module of CRM. Meaning that the service actually goes beyond the borders of the company, the phones, mails, faxes, letters, meetings etc.

Beta program airing right now

I have been walking around the eService Accelerator for a couple of days now and let me give you the short version first: It works and it is GREAT! And now for the slightly longer version...

The intro text states: "The eService accelerator provides businesses the ability to deliver self-service capabilities to their customers while tracking and managing these interactions in Microsoft Dynamics CRM." And it is right, it does just that. Some of the cool features are:

Authentication: An employee at the company using CRM creates the contact as normally, including his or her email address. Then in a drop down list (a new field in the person form) the web-access-level is selected. Now an email is sent to the contact with a link to the company's customer service portal complete with login.

Self-service data: From here (s)he can edit own data (name, phone numbers etc.) and all changes goes back into CRM of course.

Self-service tasks: The contact (customer to the company) can now view service cases and create new ones, schedule service visits etc. What really gave me a kick was that (s)he can comment on cases and these will be seen as additional notes in CRM on the case. Here an employee can comment further - creating effective and documented dialogue with the customer. Now, hold on for this is not all! The employee can also make a note on the case that can NOT be seen from the outside, so you have the tool to have internal dialogues about the case at the same time! And in the same tool! That is great!

Self-service knowledge: The contact can also search the knowledge base articles, email the right one found to another contact or whomever.

The company gets MORE: Now, this is still not all. The usefulness of this goes on. Let me end this post with just another idea; the employees can of course use the same portal or CRM and have the same access to knowledge as the customers, so they can learn to do it themselves. I see a lot of processes in many companies getting smarter and quicker and at the same time the companies customers are getting more service at their own pace and time, when and where they want it. Could it be any better? :-)

A comment on the license:

The eService Accelerator itself is free for all CRM customers. The eService Accelerator requires a "Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 External Connector" license for external users (that don’t have a CAL). Internal users will require a CAL.

Now, get ready to enjoy! :-)

Martin Houlberg Jensen
CRM Evangelist
Microsoft Dynamics CRM team

Citizen Service Platform - help Local and Regional Governments meet the needs of their Citizens

martinhj@microsoft.com — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:02:00 GMT

On CodePlex - Microsoft's open source project hosting web site - you can find many projects of interest, in particular the Citizen Service Platform. This project is designed to hold solutions built upon the Microsoft platform using SharePoint, Dynamics CRM and the Windows Live platform that can be used to help Local and Regional Governments meet the needs of their Citizens. To see an online hosted demonstration of the templates in action, and other Public Sector demonstrations please visit the http://www.microsoftpsdemos.com site.

Enter the CodePlex/CSP site here.

For even more information have a look at http://www.microsoft.com/csp and http://www.citizenserviceplatform.com

Enjoy! :-)

Martin Houlberg Jensen
CRM Evangelist
Microsoft Dynamics CRM team