A few months ago I had a great lunch with a friend here in town who owns a marketing firm that has a particular emphasis on social media.  One of the things we discussed is the changing face of marketing.   What is also changing is the role of sales and salespeople. My company is really starting to focus on changing how we sell and market based on what I am seeing in the industry.  The whole topic gave me the idea for today's post. I’m going to start it off with

Service Pack 1 for Sage ACT! (Pro and Premium) was released yesterday (January 8, 2013).  This release addresses issues that users have requested in Sage ACT! and focuses on staying current with technology trends. The most significant changes to this release are compatibility updates to fully support the following new platforms: Microsoft Windows 8 Windows Server 2012 Windows SBS 2011 Internet Explorer 10 IOS 6 for iPhone and iPad The Social Updates feature, introduced in the

I just learned something and thought I'd pass it along to people who are interested in Sage ACT dashboards and viewing them on the web. Behind the scenes, there is an XML file located in the Tools folder under Program Files that controls what templates are available for building dashboards in Sage ACT.  You can create your own SQL commands and embed them in this file by following the instructions at the top of the XML file. Ok, so, if you add this SQL statement to the Act.dashboard.

Back in 2009 I wrote a blog article about staying nimble in a bleak economy.  It is sad to note that we are still in that environment.  That made me think it was time to revisit this post and see what had changed.  Interestingly, not much.  I've added a few new items, but here is my take on what we are doing to stay ahead of the grim business reaper. Staying in business is important to my staff and I and we are celebrating our 15th year anniversary in 2013 and I want to make

Today's blog is about using SQL commands directly in Excel.  I am going after data in Sage ACT, but you can use the same technique to go after a wide variety of data sources that are SQL based. First off, open Excel.  I am showing you screen shots from Excel 2010.  You want to click on the data tab and pick "from other data sources". After choosing From other data sources choose From Data Connection wizard which brings up the following dialog box.  Choose Other

Several years ago I wrote this blog article and after working with a client recently I figured it was time to post it again.  We went over exactly what was in the post and I thought that would be great to blog about. And I went, duh, I already did. Here it is. Time to ACT. What does that say to you? Time to do what you need to do? Now’s the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country? You get the idea. It means time to do what needs to be done. Ok, Let’s take it to

I love Sage ACT's eMarketing feature.  It is a plugin that allows me to use the Swiftpage email blast and survey service. I can send out mass emails and ensure that none get delivered to people who have opted out of my emails AND (this is the good part) know that they have indeed received, opened, and clicked on links in my emails. The best part is the data gets written back to my ACT database and I now have information that I can search and act upon. In a previous life I used Constant

When thinking about the right CRM ask the 5 "w's" questions: Where are you going to use it, Why are you using it, When will you use it, What will you write about and Who is your audience. 1. Where - if you are selling GPS equipment to combine owners and you are outstanding in their field (and I don't mean good at what you do, I mean standing in the middle of a corn field), internet connections are probably not available and small devices not an option.   unless.... 2. When - if you