FAQs

Companies List

The company name is a link to the main record. The Edit button is a direct link to the Edit page and the Expand Arrow brings up the Quickview. (Quickview displays a summary of the company information without changing the page).

The Quickview also provides links to Opportunities associated with this company.

Add New Company

The Add button goes to the Add New Company page. Fill in the details you want to keep and Save will take you to Company View where you can add people. The address details entered for company are the default for people. There’s no need to enter phone and address twice, unless you want to.

Enter Tags for the company in the Industry Tags box. Tags need to be single character strings e.g. real_estate and separated by spaces.

Please Note – DO NOT include commas in the company name or address fields. These throw out the order of data listed in the Export function and limit the uses of .csv files explorted.

Company View

Click the company name to go to the Company View. Here we show the address details, all the people we’ve associated with this company, and all actions, correspondence and attachments related to it. Actions, correspondence and attachments all happen in Dashboard and Opportunities. We include them in the Company View so that when the CEO calls you can have everything on one page.

Add Person to this Company

Takes you to the Add People page. There’s no need to add address and phone if all you want is the company default.

The email address for people is important. Webrequest works on email addresses for people, not companies. Tags are equally important. Webrequest lets us use Tags to populate Invite lists. For maximum flexibility include email addresses and Tags in the People record.

New People records can also be created in the Add Correspondence function. When adding notes about calls, meetings or email the “With” drop down box offers a list of people associated with the company. It also offers “Create New Contact”. New people records created this way do not have any address data associted with them. This data needs to be added in the Edit People function.

People

In the Sidebar we have links to Companies, People, Import Contacts and Download Templates. Clicking People opens the People list.

Edit and Quickview work just the same as for companies.

When adding a new person in this panel we “look up” the company in Companies. Entering a name in Company which doesn’t already exist in the database will create a new company record.

Please note address details created in the People panel DO NOT default through to the new company.

Tags

For a detailed description of Tags in Front Office Box check FAQ Tags Masterclass

Import Contacts

The Sidebar offers the Import Contacts utility. This function works with the templates also offered in the Sidebar.

We’ve used this Import to build address books with 2,500 records. It works, but of course the data needs to be complete, accurate and in the correct format. Hence the templates.

Download the templates to your desktop. Use Copy/Past to populate the data from .csv exports made by Outlook etc. or from .xls files of lists. Mac users don’t have a .csv exporter for their Address Book but they can get one here [1]

Click Import Contacts, browse to find the template on your desktop, then click Import.

There are two templates 1) Companies and 2) People. Importing Companies and then People will add people to the companies, provided the company name is exactly the same. When using the import template for people Front Office Box will “look up” the company name. If it already exists the person will be associated with the company. If the company doesn’t exist a new company will be created, but there won’t be any address information.

Download Contact Templates

Click on the Download Templates links – they’ll download to your desktop.

Tags Masterclass

The Technology “Tags” is a standard Internet technology used for associating web pages with others in ways which make sense to the user. Tags in Front Office Box Typical (aka Microsoft based) applications provide user definable fields so the user can way categorize records in ways programmer hadn’t thought of. We really don’t like this idea; a) there always has to be a fixed number of fields b) once they’re fixed they stay that way, making accurate implementation critical and c) they make maintaining the software a nightmare. User defined fields = expensive maintenance, problematic version control, rigid implementations and, worst of all they’re just not Web 2.0. They’re, well, Microsoft! So we use Tags to the same job, without any of the limitations of user defined fields. Most internet software shows Tags as plain text. This works just fine but we want to make the presentation more intuitive – hence the label graphic. Tags really is simple as putting a label on something. The number of tags per record and the text in the Tag is up to the user. Our users can decide on their own Tags, assign as many different Tags as they want to individual records, SEARCH on tags or DISPLAY lists by Tag. The coolest use of Tags is populating Webrequest Invitation lists by drag/drop Tag. (Just try it and we’ll guarantee you laugh, or at least smile.) In the sidebar of every page we offer lists of Tags used in the particular Front Office Box. The Full List shows the Tag with the number of times it’s used in a vertical list. The Compact List leaves out the numbers and presents the tags horizontally. The display also offers a choice of just top 10 or all Tags and ordered alphabetically or by popularity. The type of display can be changed at any time to suit the circumstances. Clicking a Tag in the sidebar brings up a list of all companies and people assigned that Tag. In the list, clicking the expand (arrow on the right) shows the individual record with all of its Tags, each of which offers a new Tag list. (except in Webrequest where we only use Tags for invitations). Example Applications So how are people using Tags? The possibilities are endless but here’s some examples: Geographic Groups We don’t search on State. One of users travels extensively in the USA. If he’s flying to Texas he wants to know all the contacts he might call on while he’s there. He uses Tx as a Tag. Contact Categories Another manages marketing campaigns for a trade association. Existing members get one message whilst prospective members get a different one. She uses Member as one Tag and Prospect as another. Prospecting messages are sent out in quarterly cycles so some prospects are assigned Cycle1 and others Cycle2, 3 and 4. Sales Territories Somebody else organizes her customers and prospects by sales territory – customer north and prospect north. Another organizes his customers using the names of the account rep responsible – John, Sarah, Janice, Ignacio. Networks We even have somebody who gets really clever and organizes by type, territory, rep, social group, state, which looks like Prospect West John Golf NY. This manager can get at contact information in whichever dimension is appropriate in the present circumstances. Limitations There are some limitations we need to confess to. We plan on addressing these in due course but haven’t fixed them yet :-( Typeahead We offer this really cool Typeahead function where, when the user starts to type a Tag Front Office Box looks at all the Tags in use and offers a list to select from. Sometimes the Typeahead doesn’t offer anything. This happens when another account has used this Tag. The reason gets complicated, but it’s all to do with the way we keep data separate from other Front Office Boxes. For example, if one account has used Tx as a Tag and then another account uses Tx as a Tag, the Tag function works fine in both accounts and the data is kept entirely separate. The Typeahead only looks at the unique Tags created by the individual account. It won’t present a Tag previously created by another user. Contacts We only assign Tags to companies and people, not opportunities – see below. Single Tag Search Each search can only be based on a single Tag – see below. Edit Tags Tag fields allow multiple Tags. Each Tag must be separated by a space. Every character in the Tag is part of the Tag. Multi word Tags need to be joined by an underscore. For example Real Estate will be stored as two Tags – Real and Estate. If this is supposed to be one Tag it needs to be entered as Real_Estate. Customer and Customer, will be stored as two different Tags – the comma in the second example is part of the Tag. Futures At some point we’ll be addressing these issues, when we’ve been able to figure out which is the optimal solutions for all users. However we do have plans in place for two changes which we think will really add value: Opportunities and Actions – Tags on these will help multi user accounts quickly see the extent of the individual’s responsibilities for the business. For example a Laura Tag might bring up a list of companies she is responsible for, people she is connected with, opportunities she’s managing and actions assigned to her, all on one page. Nested Searches – will allow the user to list by Tag within the results of an existing Tag list. For example this will enable listing of prospects who play golf within a particular state.

Opportunity Management

consists of:

• Company – who we plan to do it for, or with.
• Opportunity – the objective.
• Actions – tasks we need to complete in order to achieve the objective.
• Assigned to – people we’ve asked to complete the task.
• Correspondence – emails, and notes about discussions with the target company.
• Attachments – documents related to the Action – the “case file”.

New Opportunity

Clicking the Opportunities Tab takes you to the Opportunities list. The opportunity name is a link to the main record whereas Quickview (the expand arrow) offers summary data, the list of actions and link to Add Action.

The Add button at the top goes to the Create New Opportunity panel. Select a company from the dropdown list.

If the company isn’t already in the Address Book it will need to be added there.

Complete Name, Description, Value (if appropriate – this is just a note, we don’t do anything with this value – yet).

Select a category from the dropdown list and Save will go to the Opportunity View where you can add actions.

Category

There are four categories for opportunities:

• Sales
• Customer Service
• Projects
• Closed

Lists of opportunities in categories are available from links in the Sidebar

For the moment, these categories are just a way of keeping separate lists – we don’t treat the opportunities differently in any way.

At some point in the future (?) we’ll be adding functionality to measure “quality”. In terms of sales this will be Pipeline Management. In terms of Customer Service this will be Service Level Management and in terms of Projects this will be Project Management. The Closed category will be used for archiving records so they don’t show in the regular views but will be accessible for history.

For a description of our plans goto Pipeline Management

Collaboration

Watch this space but you can find out about our plans at Collaboration Design

Actions

Actions are tasks we plan completing in order to achieve objectives – Opportunities. They are shown in the Opportunity View – our plan, Company View – our Customer/Supplier/Partner history, and Dashboard – our schedule.

Clicking Add Action opens a new panel where we can describe the task, add a due date, and assign it to one of the people listed in our company.

Actions can have correspondence notes and attachments associated with them. Each of these is displayed in both the Opportunity View and Company View.

Checking the box in any of the Views marks the task as completed. Completed tasks are shown in the Opportunity and Company Views as “greyed out” and “scored through. This enables us to see what we’ve achieved so far, as well as tasks outstanding.

Webrequest – Introduction and User Guide

Webrequest is our adaption of a proven Internet technology.

We’ve taken the web survey idea, of which there are several successful examples, and built it into a generic, day to day business tool.

It’s very simple for the user, and the people responding, with answers submitted on web pages.

Best of all, cost of collecting the information is zero, from anywhere in the world.

In fact it’s so good Google copied it :-). Ok maybe that’s overstating the case (I withdraw the statement) but two years after we first used Webrequest Google released (as usual without a fanfare) its version, called forms . With a bit of digging you can find it in Google spreadsheets. Invitees get asked questions in an email and the responses get logged in a spreadsheet. Like everything that company does, its good and bad in parts.
With Webrequest, users can ask for information from anybody in the address book, and have the replies filed in their Front Office Box.

Replies can be viewed by individual address, or in lists, and even compared by score i.e. how closely they match the preferred response.

Users can personalize the response form with their company logo or photograph.

Anybody using email to request information can benefit from Webrequest, especially where currently they need to transfer individual responses into lists.

Real life examples of Webrequest in action are:

• Requests for Information or Proposals – comparing offers from potential vendors
• Sales Qualification – does this prospect meet criteria for justifying a proposal
• Job Applications – ask the candidate to submit information the way you want it
• Customer Satisfaction surveys – what does the customer really think of your service
• Invitations to events – which is the preferred venue, how many will attend, special requirements
• Lost business surveys – which competitor did the prospect choose, how was that offer more appropriate than yours, how can you win next time

but these are only ones we’ve come across. There are many more.

How it works

• Anywhere in Front Office Box select the Webrequest Tab and ADD will open the create page.

• Give it a name and, in the description box, add the message you want to send to the invitee. This will be the text in both the email and the response form.

• Add some questions. The default shows three questions, one of each type – Open, Multi Choice, Multi Choice with Scoring. There’s no fixed number of questions – delete or add as appropriate.

• Question type is selectable from the dropdown box. Where the selection is Multiple Choice there’s no fixed number of alternate answers. These can be deleted or added to suit the purpose. The same applies to Multiple Choice with Scoring. With these questions the category – Preferred, Acceptable, No Value – is selected from the dropdown box.

• Saving the questions page creates the Webrequest and takes the user to the Invites page. Here the invites list is populated by individual address – start typing the email address in the box and select from the type ahead list, or by Tag – drag and drop the Tag into the box. Every email address in the address book assigned that Tag will be added to the invites list.

• Please note the invitee must already exist as a person record, with email address, in the address book. Webrequest Invites are related to Person, not company, because of the email address.

• The invites list offers the options to remove or send individual invites or send all invites.

• The invitee receives an email from the users company name. This email includes the description text and a link to the response page. Submitting a response couldn’t be more simple, entering text for open questions or selecting from dropdown boxes, then submitting the response.

• Respondees receive a confirmation email.

• View results offers a filter allowing results to be displayed by Person, Question, Score or Comments and a further filer allowing results to be displayed for an individual person, or an individual question.

• To have your company logo, or a photo displayed on the response page goto Manage My Account and select Company from the Sidebar. This brings up the Edit page for your company and offers an option to Upload Logo.

Anti Spam Guidance

Webrequests must only be sent to people who are regular contacts or who’ve published an address they can be contacted at. The Webrequest text must include the name, address and phone of the company sending the message and offer an option to not receive messages in the future.