Newest KB Articles in COOLSite CRM

Unassigned Leads from General Site Registration

Fri, 30 Nov 2012 21:57:36 GMT

There are essentially two ways in which a visitor can register for an account on your website. They can register through an IDX Listings page or the General Site Registration page.

By default, whenever a new visitor registers for an account on your website through the General Site Registration page (ie: by clicking on the "Register Now" link on any non IDX Listings page that is enabled for Registration Required access), they are entered into CRM as an "Unassigned" lead (ie: Unassigned Contact Group and Staff) and you will not receive an e-mail notification informing you of this new lead. However, you can setup your CRM to better route such leads, by assigning them to an actual Contact Group and Staff, and therefore resulting in getting an e-mail notification. Please see the instructions below on how to do so.

1) Click on "CRM" from the menu on the left in your COOLSite Admin.

2) Click on "Contact Groups" from the menu at the top of the page.

3) Click on the "Add New Contact Group" button at the bottom of the page.

4) Enter a "Group Name" (Example: Unassigned Leads or Unassigned Leads from General Site Registration).

5) Click on the "Rules" tab above and do the following.

Check the "Auto Assign" box

Select "* NO SOURCE *" under "Source Page"

6) Click on the "Staff Assignment" tab above and select the Staff Members that you would like to assign these types of leads to, by moving them over from the "Available Staff" list to the "Assigned Staff" list.

7) Click on the "Save" button below.

8) Double-click on this Contact Group to re-edit it and click on the "Auto Lead Weighting" tab above, and enter the Lead Weight Setting that you would like to use for each Staff Member listed. Please see the very bottom of the following Knowledge Base article - http://support.colony1.net/KB/a317/contact-groups.aspx, for more information on Auto Lead Weighting.

Contacts List

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 20:25:39 GMT

Overview

Within this section of CRM, you will be able to view and manage your leads. When you pull up a lead, you will be able to add notes, send them an e-mail, view their Saved Searches, and more.

Breakdown

Search Filters

You can use these Search Filters to view a specific subset of leads and can also send a Mailblast to this particular subset of leads if you would like to do so.

Search Results

When you use the Search Filters above to view a specific subset of leads, the results will show up in this grid.

Below this grid, you will see a few buttons.

Add Contact - Clicking on this button will allow you to manually add a new lead to your CRM
Select | De-Select ALL - Clicking on this button will allow you to select or de-select all leads shown in the grid currently
Delete Checked Contacts - Clicking on this button will allow you to delete all of the leads that you have selected in the grid currently
Mailblast - Clicking on this button will allow you to send an e-mail to all of the leads that are shown in the grid currently
Transfer Leads - Clicking on this button will allow you to transfer all leads from one Staff Member to another. This is useful when a Staff Member leaves your company and you need to re-assign all of their leads to another Staff Member.
Export Results - Clicking on this button will allow you to export the data for all leads that are currently being displayed in the Search Results grid, to an Excel spreadsheet.

You can double-click on any lead in the grid to view and/or edit their contact information, send them an e-mail, view their Saved Searches, etc... See below for more information on each tab.

Contact Info - On this tab, you will see the leads contact information as well as some other important information, such as the Staff Member and Contact Group in which they are assigned to, etc...

Drips - On this tab, you will see all Mail Drips that have been queued for your lead. You will also see the status of each Mail Drip in the queue, along with any possible actions that can be taken (if applicable). Please see below for a breakdown of all possible Status scenario's.

Scenario # 1

Drip Row has a “Status” of Active and a “Next Send” date sometime in the future. This is an active drip that is scheduled to be sent in the future.
Available Action: You can turn off the drip for the contact by clicking on the ”Disable” button under the “Action” column, before the “Next Send” date.

Scenario # 2

Drip Row has a “Status” of Done. This is a one-time drip that has already been sent out to the contact or a recurring drip that has reached its Quantity limit as defined in the Drip Settings, and has been de-activated.
Available Action: There is no action that can be taken here, as the drip cannot be resumed.

Scenario # 3

Drip Row has a “Status” of Paused. The drip was de-activated at some point due to one of the following changes to this contact’s record:
- Marked for Bounced Mail
- Email Opt-Out status set to Yes
- Assigned to a new Staff, Group, or Status.

When the “Bounced Mail” box is unchecked for this contact or their “Email Opt-Out” status is set to No, the system will not automatically send any drips that have a “Next Send” date and time more than 3 days old. This will ensure that the contact does not receive several drips at once.

When changes are made to the Staff Assignment, Group Assignment, or Status Assignment, the system will determine new drip eligibility. In doing so, the system will not automatically send any new non-listings drips that have a “Next Send” date and time more than 3 days old (Note, this only applies to drips that were setup / scheduled based on “Date Created”). This will ensure that the contact does not receive several drips at once.

Available Action: You can choose to manually re-activate the drip by clicking on the “Resume” button. The drip will then continue with its normal schedule as defined in the Drip Settings.

Scenario # 4

Drip Row has a “Status” of OptOut. This is a non-listings drip that was de-activated at some point due to the contact opting out of this particular drip.
Available Action: You can choose to opt the contact back into this drip by clicking on the “Reset” button.

Scenario # 5

Drip Row has a “Status” of OFF. This is either of the following.
- This is a non-listings drip that was de-activated at some point due to the contact opting out of ALL non-listings drips. However, the contact continues to receive “Listings Only” drips.
  - Available Action: There is no action that can be taken here and the Action column will indicate “[ListingsOnly]”.
- The drip was de-activated at some point due to this contact being marked for Bounced Mail or their Email Opt-Out status was set to Yes.
  - Available Action: There is no action that can be taken here and the Action column will indicate “[Bounced / Opt Out]”. The drip cannot be resumed.
Note: The Status and Available Action for this drip will change accordingly if/when the contact is no longer marked for Bounced Mail and/or their Email Opt-Out status is set to No.

Notes - On this tab, you will see all notes related to your lead. These notes will include automatic system generated notes as well as notes that you have manually entered for your lead. You can also add additional notes to your lead using the "ADD NOTE" link under this tab.

Email - On this tab, you will be able to send an e-mail directly to your lead. You can also use predefined Tokens to automatically populate content in your e-mail, such as the first and last name of the lead. This will allow your e-mail to be personalized and will also save you the time of having to type out full information.

Reminder - On this tab, you will be able to setup various reminders for your lead. For example, you can setup a reminder for the next time that you need to follow-up with your lead. You will receive an e-mail notification an hour before the scheduled reminder time.

History - On this tab, you will see information such as when your lead was created in CRM, the last time in which they logged into their account on your website, etc... In addition, you will be able to view their searches and any particular listings that they may have saved, as well as the e-mails that have been sent to them via CRM.

Mail My Listings - On this tab, you will be able to select your personal listings or those from your Brokerage, and e-mail these selected listings to your lead.

Reports

Wed, 31 Oct 2012 17:06:39 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will be able to run reports to review statistics surrounding when leads were created in the system. There are two reports provided that you can utilize.

The Summary Report provides lead assignment information in aggregate. The data shows the number of total leads by date created.

The Detail Report provides lead assignment information at a detailed level. The data shows the number of total leads, organized by contact group and staff member, based on date created.

* Above is a screenshot of the Summary Report Filters.

Running a Report

1. Click "Reports" from the menu at the top.

2. Click on the "Summary Report" or "Detail Report" link.

3. Enter a Start Date and End Date.

4. Select the appropriate criteria for which you would like to run a report on.

5. Click the "Show Report" button below.

* Above is a screenshot of the Summary Report Results.

Import Contacts

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 16:12:04 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will be able to import your existing contacts / leads into CRM.

Setup

1) Click “Import Contacts” from the menu at the top.

2) Click the red "[Click Here]" link shown in Step # 1 on this page and you will be prompted to open or save the following file - "contacts_import_template.xls". You can choose to do either. However, if you save the file, you will need to open it once it has been downloaded to your computer.

3) Input the data for the contacts / leads that you will be importing into CRM, into this Excel spreadsheet, and be sure to follow the guidelines / requirements shown (ie: Field, Required, Type, Length, and Notes) at the bottom of the "Import Contacts" page when doing so.

4) Save this file as a "Text (Tab Delimited) (*.txt)" file type. You can do this by clicking on the "File" menu at the top and then clicking "Save As". You will then need to browse and select a folder on your computer to save this file to, and then enter a File Name and select "Text (Tab Delimited) (*.txt)" from the "Save as type" drop-down selection box. Finally, click on the "Save" button.

5) Click on the "Browse" button under the "Upload Contacts" section on the "Import Contacts" page and browse to / select the file that you saved in step 4 above, and click "Open".

6) Click on the "Start Upload" button.

7) Once your upload is complete, you will be able to view the contacts / leads that were imported into CRM, by clicking on "Contacts List" from the menu at the top.

Staff List

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 18:32:12 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will need to setup your Staff List. Your Staff List is essentially a list of all agents working in your office, who will need to access CRM to work on the leads that are assigned to them. Please note that this is only applicable if you have the multi-user version of CRM. If you have the single-user version of CRM, this is not applicable / needed.

Setup

1. Click "Staff List" from the menu at the top.

2. Click the "Add New Staff" button.

3. Complete the information under each tab (see below for more information).

4. Click the "Save" button at the bottom of any tab.

Staff Details:

Enter the information for the particular Staff / agent which you are setting up. Please note that the following fields (see below) are required / are the most critical fields that need to be completed. In addition, you must check off the "SiteLogin Active" and "CRM Active" boxes in order to enable CRM access for this Staff / agent.

First Name
Last Name
Email 1
User Level
Username
Password
Signature

Reminders:

If reminders are currently setup for leads that are assigned to this Staff / agent, you can click on the "Delete All Reminders On All Of Your Contacts" button if you wish to delete all reminders on all leads / contacts that are assigned to this Staff / agent. In the case where you are setting up a Staff / agent for the first time, this will not be applicable since there would not be any leads / contacts currently assigned to this Staff / agent.

Notes:

Here you can enter any notes regarding the particular Staff / agent which you are setting up.

Status Setup

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 17:37:19 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will need to setup various statuses for your leads. These statuses are used to properly mark or identify how far along a particular lead is, towards being considered completed / closed.

Examples of statuses are:

Cold - Leads that are at the beginning of the process and not quite ready.
Warm - Leads that are already in the process / midway through.
Hot - Leads that are very close to completion.

Setup

1. Click "Status Setup" from the menu at the top

2. Click the "Add New Status" button

3. Enter a "Status Name" (ie: Warm) and "Status Description" (ie: Leads that are already in the process / midway through).

4. Select a "Group Rank" for this Status. This should be based on the progress level of your statuses (ie: Cold = 1, Warm = 2, and Hot = 3). Please note that the Status you rank as 1 will indicate that this is the default Status that all new leads will be assigned to.

5. Click the "Submit" button at the bottom.

Contact Groups

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 16:59:13 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will need to setup various groups for your leads. These groups are used to categorize your leads, based on the type of property they are interested in, etc...

Examples of groups are:

Foreclosures - Leads that are looking for Foreclosure homes.
Short Sales - Leads that are looking for Short Sale homes.
Rentals - Leads that are looking for Rental homes.
Buyer Existing Lead - A lead who has purchased from you in the past.
Buyer New Lead - A new lead who just contacted you about purchasing a home.
Seller Existing Lead - A lead whose home you sold in the past.
Seller New Lead - A new lead who just contacted you about selling their home.

Setup

1. Click "Contact Groups" from the menu at the top.

2. Click the "Add New Contact Group" button.

3. Complete the information under each tab (see below for more information).

*Please see the note below pertaining to the "Staff Assignment" tab.

4. Click the "Save" button at the bottom of any tab.

Group Details:

Group Name: The name of your group (ie: Foreclosures).

Group Description: Defines what the group represents (ie: Leads that are looking for Foreclosure homes).

Rules:

Auto Assign: Check this box if you want your leads to be assigned automatically to this group.

Group Rank: Allows you to set the preference of this particular group amongst your other groups. The lower the number, the higher the preference.

Source: Allows you to select the type of pages you would like to see in the "Source Page" select list below. Note, if you select "External" or "Real Estate Registration", you can specify additional rules as needed on the right side of the screen (ie: Rules For Real Estate Registration / Rules For External).

Source Page: Allows you to select the page(s) on your COOLSite, in which a lead will need to register on in order to be put into this particular group.

Staff Assignment:

Here you will see a list of your staff (if using a multi-user setup) under "Available Staff". You can assign one or more Staff to handle leads from this particular group, by selecting the Staff from the "Available Staff" select list and then clicking the ">>" button to move them over to the "Assigned Staff" section.

NOTE: When done moving over your Staff to the "Assigned Staff" section, you will need to click on the "Save" button at the bottom of this tab, before completing the information under the "Auto Lead Weighting" tab. Once you click on the "Save" button, you will need to edit this Contact Group again by double-clicking on it and then you can proceed with completing the information under the "Auto Lead Weighting" tab.

Auto Lead Weighting:

Here you determine how many leads get assigned to your Staff (ie: The Staff that you moved over to the "Assigned Staff" section under the "Staff Assignment" tab) during a given round. You can prioritize who gets the majority of the leads that come into this particular group, by entering a number under the "Lead Weight Setting" column for each Staff.

Lead Weight Setting: This is the total number of leads an agent can receive during a given round. The higher the number, the more leads the Staff will receive. You can weigh each Staff evenly so that they each get a fair share of leads, by entering the same number for each Staff listed here.

Lead Count Down: As leads are assigned based on the Lead Weight Setting defined for each Staff, this number will automatically decrease by one, until it reaches 0. Once the Lead Count Down reaches 0 for all Staff associated with this group, this will complete the round and this number will automatically reset to the original Lead Weight Setting number defined for each Staff.

Note: During the initial setup of this group, you will notice that the "Lead Count Down" defaults to 1 for each Staff, which is normal / by design. If you make changes to the "Lead Weight Setting" for any Staff, it will not take effect until the next upcoming round.

Drips:

Here you will see a list of all Mail Drips that are currently setup in your CRM. Setting up your Mail Drips is covered in step # 7 of the CRM Setup Knowledge Base article (http://support.colony1.net/KB/a314/crm-setup.aspx).

Mail Drips

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 14:56:51 GMT

Overview

Within this section in CRM, you will need to setup various scheduled Mail Drips that will go out to your leads. These Mail Drips will be sent automatically from your CRM to the applicable leads, based on their Contact Group, Staff, and Status assignments.

Examples of Mail Drips are:

Welcome Email - This can be used as the initial e-mail that a lead would get upon being entered into your CRM.
Touching Base - This can be used as a follow-up e-mail to your leads, to check in and see how they are doing / if they need help with anything.
Listing Updates - This can be used to send new listings to your leads, that match the criteria of the types of homes they are looking for.

Setup

1. Click "Mail Drips" from the menu at the top.

2. Click the "Add New Mail Drip" button.

3. Complete the information under each tab (see below for more information).

4. Click the "Save" button at the bottom of any tab.

Mail Drip Details:

Active: You will need to check this box in order to enable your Mail Drip, so that it can go out to the applicable leads / contacts in your CRM.

Type: Allows you to specify the type of Mail Drip in which you are setting up. You will need to select the "Listings" option if your Mail Drip uses the {initialPropList} or {homeScoutPropList} Tokens. For all other Mail Drips that are text based only and do not contain listing data, you will need to select the "Other" option.

Schedule Based On: Allows you to define the scheduling of this Mail Drip. You will need to select the "Date Created" option if you would like this Mail Drip to be sent to applicable leads / contacts in your CRM, based on the date in which they were initially entered into your CRM. You can also select the "Date Group Assigned" option instead if you would like this Mail Drip to be sent to applicable leads / contacts in your CRM, based on the date in which they were assigned to a specific Contact Group in your CRM. Please note that for new leads, the "Date Created" and "Date Group Assigned" dates will be the same initially. Also, the "Date Created" date will never change for any of your leads / contacts, whereas the "Date Group Assigned" date can change over time if any leads / contacts are moved to other Contact Groups within your CRM.

Send To: Allows you to specify which applicable leads / contacts should receive this Mail Drip. You will need to select the "All Contacts" option if you would like this Mail Drip to be sent to all applicable leads / contacts, regardless of the date in which they were initially entered into your CRM. Otherwise, you can select the "New Contacts" option and specify a "New Create Date", if you would like this Mail Drip to only be sent to all applicable leads / contacts entered in your CRM, as of the "New Create Date" that you specified.

Drip Name: The name of your Mail Drip (ie: Welcome Email).

Campaign Name: The name of the Campaign in which this Mail Drip is associated with (ie: Buyers, Sellers, etc...).

Drip Desc: Defines what the Mail Drip represents (ie: The initial e-mail that a lead gets upon being entered into CRM).

Email Details:

From: Allows you to specify the e-mail address in which this Mail Drip will come from, when it is sent to the applicable leads / contacts in your CRM.

Subject: Allows you to specify the subject line to use for this Mail Drip.

Content: You can use the editor box provided to type the content / actual message to be used for this Mail Drip. Please note that you can include any of the available Tokens shown at the bottom, into your actual message, which will then be replaced with the corresponding data for each applicable lead / contact that receives this Mail Drip. For example, your message may start of with "Hello {contactfirst}" which will then be replaced with the actual first name of each applicable lead / contact that receives this Mail Drip (ie: Hello John or Hello Maria).

Drip Settings:

Group Assignment: Allows you to specify which Contact Groups a lead / contact would have to be assigned to, in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip. The "Available" select box will list all of the Contact Groups that you have setup in your CRM, and for any of these that you would like a lead / contact to be assigned to in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip, you will need to select them and click on the ">>" button to move them over to the "Assigned" box.

Assigned Staff: Allows you to specify which Staff / agents a lead / contact would have to be assigned to, in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip. The "Available" select box will list all of the Staff / agents that you have setup in your CRM, and for any of them that you would like a lead / contact to be assigned to in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip, you will need to select them and click on the ">>" button to move them over to the "Assigned" box.

Assigned Status: Allows you to specify which Statuses a lead / contact would have to be assigned to, in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip. The "Available" select box will list all of the Statuses that you have setup in your CRM, and for any of them that you would like a lead / contact to be assigned to in order to be eligible to receive this Mail Drip, you will need to select them and click on the ">>" button to move them over to the "Assigned" box.

NOTE: In order for leads / contacts to be eligible for this Mail Drip, all criteria above must be met (ie: they must be assigned to a specific Contact Group, Staff / agent, and Status listed above under the "Assigned" box).

Span: Allows you to define the frequency in which this Mail Drip will be sent to the applicable leads / contacts in your CRM.

Quantity: Allows you to specify the maximum number of e-mails that this Mail Drip will ever send out.

Initial: Allows you to specify how soon this Mail Drip will go out to the applicable leads / contacts in your CRM, once they have been entered into your CRM.

Recurring: If this will be a recurring Mail Drip, you will be able to specify its recurring frequency here.

CRM Settings

Tue, 23 Oct 2012 16:59:22 GMT

Overview

Within this section of CRM, you will be able to set various settings / controls based on your personal preferences.

Breakdown

Please see below for more information on each setting / control.

Auto Contact Assignment - If set to ON, this will allow CRM to automatically assign leads to your Staff Members based on the Lead Weight Settings defined for your Contact Groups (Auto Lead Weighting tab).

Single Messaging Active - If set to ON, this will allow you to send e-mails to your leads directly through CRM, via the "Email" tab when viewing a lead's information. The "Mail Blasts Active" setting also needs to be set to ON for Single Messaging to work, as it is a form of a Mail Blast.

Mail Blasts Active - If set to ON, this will allow you to send e-mails to a specific subset of leads that match a particular search criteria. You can run a search within the "Contacts List" section in CRM and then use the "Mailblast" button at the bottom of the page to send an e-mail to all of the leads that match your search criteria. This setting needs to be set to ON for Single Messaging to work, as it is a form of a Mail Blast.

Drip Campaigns Active - If set to ON, this will allow CRM to automatically send out your scheduled active Mail Drips, as setup within the "Mail Drips" section in CRM. You can turn this setting OFF to temporarily disable all of your scheduled active Mail Drips from sending out to your leads.

Contact Opened Notification - If set to ON, an e-mail will be sent to the site administrator listing newly assigned leads that have not been viewed within a 24 hour period.

Send Email to Unconfirmed - If set to YES, e-mail will be sent to leads that have not clicked on the confirmation link provided in the registration e-mail they received from CRM, upon their initial registration. Please note that unless you have signed up for a Dedicated Mail Server, all e-mail sent to unconfirmed leads will be sent through our Unconfirmed Mail Server. This is a shared server which we do not provide support for, in the event that an e-mail is not delivered to the recipient.

Having a Dedicated Mail Server will allow you to use an unshared and fully customizable Mail Server to send e-mails generated specifically by your CRM only. This will also allow you to build your own reputation and will dramatically increase the success rate of delivery for all e-mails sent. In addition, you will be able to:

Setup SPF, SenderID, DomainKeys and DKIM so an ISP can validate your identity as a sender, to help build trust with the ISP.
Auto identify/disable bad contacts through bounces and feed back loops into suppression lists.
Run reports of domain specific successful/failed delivery.
Set Domain Recipient Specific Smart Delivery Rules with:
- Max Concurrent Connections
- Priority (Deliver to certain domains first)
- Throttle (max messages per hour)
- Custom SMTP Relay mail routing
- and more

If you are interested in this service, please contact us for more detail at Support@Colony1.Net.

Note: Email sent to leads that have clicked on the confirmation link provided in the registration e-mail they received from CRM, upon their initial registration, will be sent through our Confirmed Mail Server. The delivery rate will be far superior to that of the IP used for our Unconfirmed Mail Server.

Welcome Email Type - This determines the type of e-mail a lead will receive when they are initially entered manually in CRM.

Send User/Pass and a Confirmation Link - This will send the lead an e-mail with their Username and Password, and will also include a Confirmation link for them to click on to confirm their registration.
Send Confirmation Link Only - This will send the lead an e-mail with a Confirmation link only, but will not include their Username and Password.
Send Nothing - This will not send the lead an e-mail at all.

BCC Drip - If an e-mail address is entered here, it will be blind copied on all Mail Drips that are sent through CRM.

BCC Blast - If an e-mail address is entered here, it will be blind copied on all Mail Blasts that are sent through CRM.

BCC Lead Assignment - If an e-mail address is entered here, it will be blind copied on the e-mails that go out to Staff Members when a new lead has been assigned to them.

Send Bounced Mail to Staff - If this box is checked, an e-mail will be sent to the assigned Staff Member of any lead that did not receive an e-mail that was sent through CRM, due to a bad e-mail address.

CC Bounced Mail - If an e-mail address is entered here, it will be copied on all Bounced Mail notification e-mails that are sent to Staff Members (see "Send Bounced Mail to Staff" above).

Saved Listing Notify ADMIN - If this box is checked, an e-mail will also be sent to the Site Admin whenever a lead saves a listing, in addition to the Staff Member assigned to the lead. If this box is unchecked, the Staff Member assigned to the lead will still receive this e-mail.

Mail Sent Current Month - This shows you the number of e-mails that have already been sent through CRM for the current month, and includes all e-mail types (Mail Drips, Mail Blasts, and Single Messaging).

Mailing Limit per Month - You can limit the number of e-mails that are sent through CRM per month, by specifying the number of e-mails in this field. Once this limit is met, CRM will automatically stop sending e-mails for the remainder of the current month and the Site Admin will be notified via e-mail. However, CRM will resume sending e-mails again at the beginning of the following month, as the "Mail Sent Current Month" counter is reset back to 0 at the beginning of each month. Please note that once CRM resumes sending e-mails again, it will try to send out all e-mails that were queued to be sent in the prior month, before the mailing limit was reached. Also of note, while you are able to increase the number of e-mails in this field, please be aware that your account is already provisioned with a CRM Email Allowance per month. If you increase the number of e-mails in this field to more than your provisioned CRM Email Allowance, you will automatically be billed for all Overage Emails - (Overage Emails = Mail Sent Current Month - Your Provisioned CRM Email Allowance). If you would like to verify the CRM Email Allowance per month that is provisioned for your account, or to increase your provisioned CRM Email Allowance, please contact us at Support@Colony1.Net or 954-341-7031.

Web Service Username - The Username entered in this field is used to access the CRM Web Service, when capturing leads from a non-COOLSite website, and must be at least 6 characters in length.

Web Service Password - The Password entered in this field is used to access the CRM Web Service, when capturing leads from a non-COOLSite website, and must be at least 6 characters in length.

Default Listings Control - Clicking on the "Default Listings Control" button allows you to define search criteria to be used for Initial Listing Emails, when a search that was done by a lead produces no results.

The Source section at the bottom of this page shows your Internal and External Sources. Your Internal Sources (External = No) are all "NEW IDX Listings" pages on your website that you currently have setup for Registration Access, or "My Form" pages that you currently have set to "Create CRM account". You can also add External Sources, which are used to identify where your leads are coming from, if not from one of your "NEW IDX Listings" pages that you currently have setup for Registration Access, or "My Form" pages that you currently have set to "Create CRM account" (ie: from a non-COOLSite website, etc...). You can add an External Source by entering a name into the box provided and then clicking on the “Add Source” button.

A Guide to Using CRM

Tue, 23 Oct 2012 14:37:03 GMT

This article applies to customers who have CRM added to their account. If you do not already have CRM and would like to learn more about our powerful Customer Relationship Management system, please Click Here.

Following are the essential steps needed to setup your CRM.

1. Collect Leads on IDX pages

This will allow you to capture visitors who are searching properties on your website, as a lead in CRM.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a240/lead-collection-new-idx-listings-page-types.aspx.

2. Collect Leads on My Form pages

This will allow you to capture visitors who have completed and submitted any of the forms on your website (ie: your Contact Me page, etc...) as a lead in CRM.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a202/lead-collection-my-form-page-types.aspx.

3. Contact Login page

This page is needed in order to login on your website as any of your leads, directly via CRM. For example, you may want to login as a lead to create a new Saved Search for them.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a203/login-as-contact.aspx.

4. Contact Groups

These groups are used to categorize your leads, based on the type of property they are interested in. For example, if a lead is interested in Foreclosure homes, they will be under the Foreclosure Homes group. Whereas, if a lead is interested in Rental properties, they will be under the Rentals group.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a317/contact-groups.aspx.

5. Contact Statuses

These statuses are used to properly mark or identify how far along a particular lead is, towards being considered completed / closed. For example, leads can have statuses such as Cold (beginning of the process, not quite ready, etc...), Warm (already in the process, midway through), or Hot (very close to completion).
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a318/status-setup.aspx.

6. Staff List

Only required for the multi-user version of CRM.
A staff list is essentially a list of all agents working in your office, who will need to access CRM to work on the leads that are assigned to them.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a319/staff-list.aspx.

7. Mail Drips

These are the automated e-mails that you would like to schedule ahead of time to be sent automatically by the system, to your leads. These e-mails are based off your leads Contact Group, Staff, and Contact Status assignment.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a316/mail-drips.aspx.

8. Customize CRM Settings

This allows you to tweak the overall settings of your CRM, based on your personal preferences.
http://support.colony1.net/kb/a315/crm-settings

9. Importing Leads

If applicable, you can import your existing contacts / leads into CRM at this point.
http://support.colony1.net/KB/a320/import-contacts.aspx.

Following are some additional CRM resources.

Now that you have successfully setup your CRM, you can review the following additional resources at your convenience.

1. Overview of how Bounces are handled: http://support.colony1.net/KB/a298/bounces-in-crm.aspx.

2. View and Manage your Leads: http://support.colony1.net/KB/a322/contacts-list.aspx.

3. Reports: http://support.colony1.net/KB/a321/reports.aspx.

4. Unassigned Leads from General Site Registration: http://support.colony1.net/KB/a323/unassigned-leads-from-general-site-registration.aspx.