CRM HOWTO
The guide is created with a respect to a NIL of NGI Netherlands
Accessing the EGI CRM
Login in the EGI CRM
The EGI CRM can be accessed at http://crm.egi.eu by using the EGI credentials (EGI SSO). Who should I contact to get my sso accepted by the CRM? .
The first screen shows a login page like the one shown in the figure.
After loging, the EGI CRM shows the navigation toolbar, which comprises the main options to use the CRM system. It basically has the following options:
- My Home. The user can define his / her own preferences regarding what info should be displayed.
- Data Management. This option enables creating, updating and browsing the information about accounts and contact details, as well as accessing the information about activities.
- Activity Management. This option enables managing project, project tasks, and milestones.
- Support. This option enables the access to support documentation and FAQs.
- Analytics. Through this option the user can access to reports, following predefined templates and dashboards.
- Tools. This option provides with additional tools to the user.
Adding and browsing Contacts and Accounts
The Data Management option enables creating or viewing the details of accounts and contacts. Accounts represent entities which are being or should be contacted and contacts represent specific individuals. For a complete example see CRM Use Case Record ESFRI Data.
The Data Management option provides several buttons to trigger different actions with accounts or contacts as seen in the figure
Adding a new contact
Contacts represent persons from institutions (either NILs' entities or representative persons of actual or potential user groups) who will interact. There are two equivalent ways of adding new Contact: Searching for the institution of the contact and then adding a new contact, or adding a new contact and then linking it to the institution. IMPORTANT: if institution does not exist in CRM, you must add institution at first and only after add a new contact.
Option 1: First find institution and then add contact
To search for an institution, there are again two possibilities: Listing all Institutes in CRM for a specific Country (see example for the Netherlands) or searching by institution name in the CRM for a specific country (see example).
Second step is to add a contact for the institution selected. To do so, you should choose Contacts from the institute profile and then blue button Add Contact, as shown in the figure.
Finally, you should fill in the details for the new contact.
Option 2: Adding a contact and then searching for the institution of the contact to be linked
A contact can be created directly through the Data Management / Contacts option by clicking in the button.
Once all the fields have been completed, the institution can be added by clicking in the button next to the field Account Name. Next two figures show this process. Search for institution and select by pressing "green plus" next to field "*Account Name"
Adding a new institution
Adding new institution
IMPORTANT: if ESFRI Project or National Project in which institution participates is not listed in "Project List" field, you must add ESFRI or National Project at first and only after add a new institution and choose the projects from the Project List field. Also you must choose "Account Type" to be "Research Institute"
"Data Management" -> "Accounts" -> "green plus"
Adding a new project
Adding a new project
IMPORTANT: if you adding ESFRI project, field "Account Type" must be set to "ESFRI Project", if National, then "National Project"
"Data Management" -> "Accounts" -> "green plus"
CRM Calendar
The calendar tool enables the automatization of tasks through reminders and the sharing of events and planned actions that could be of interest for the community. Through the calendar is possible to add tasks (ToDos) or Events (calls or meetings) and associate such activities with contacts and accounts. The calendar view enables programming recurring events, searching events and editing customized calendar settings.
Creating Reports and Analytics
Creating custom reports
1) List of institutes without the contacts
"Analytics" -> "Reports" -> "green plus" -> "Contacts"
New window with a Wizard will be opened. Important steps are:
- Step 2) Related Module (choose "Contacts" or "Accounts" - there is no difference)
- Step 4) Selected Columns (choose the columns you want to see in the report)
IMPORTANT: "Project List" column under Accounts section is definitely what you want to see in the report output, because it will let you identify the projects, institutions participate in
- Step 7) Filters (add conditions)
In our case we are building report "List of Institutes in The Netherlands without the contacts"
- First condition is: "Account Name" field (under Contacts section) equals to a blank field.
- Second condition is: "Assigned To" field (under Accounts section) equals to a value "NGI Netherlands (NL)"
Report output
IMPORTANT: if institute participates in more then one project, the list of projects is split by "|##|"
2) List of institutes with the contacts
The report building how to is the same as previous just first condition above now is opposite: "Account Name" field (under Contacts section) not equals to a blank field.
3) List of contacts i never contacted
Additional Options
CRM_Support_tools
A list of FAQs can be accessed through the option Support / FAQ, which also can be consulted at the wiki page CRM_FAQ. Additional comments or questions can be sent to the egicrm.helpdesk@lip.pt and if they are of global interest, they will be published in this section.
Tools
TBC: Documents