One of the key considerations to either a windows based system or a cloud based system is in relation to email integration. One of the highest values of the ACT! CRM system is the capability of capturing emails and then filing those emails against the related contact records. For example, users are able to look up a contact record and see a log of all the emails that have been sent to that contact in chronological order and with their attachments.
Historically, this integration has been accomplished with ACT!’s very effective Microsoft Outlook plug-in. This plug-in is very good for Windows based users because it happens automatically. When a user sends an email from an ACT! template or directly from Outlook, ACT! takes a snapshot of that email and automatically associates it with the contact record. ACT! doesn’t even have to be open. This functionality is reliable and is often one of the main reasons clients invest in ACT! However, the ACT! to Microsoft Outlook plug-in doesn’t support iPhones, iPads, Android devices or non-Microsoft Outlook email programs. This lack of support for the other platforms wasn’t a problem for Windows users because many of them were only running Windows, and Windows was the most common platform for email.
However, more and more users are now accessing email from those other platforms, and there is a requirement to capture emails when they’re sent from iPhones, iPads, Android devices, or non-Microsoft Outlook email programs. To address this issue, there is a very good third party program that integrates ACT! to Microsoft Exchange. With this add-on, ACT! users who need to send emails from their smart phones, can have those emails filed against the relevant contact record and logged into the ACT! history module in an efficient and reliable manner. The product we usually recommend is called 123 Synchronizer. Additional information about this product can be found here.