When is new BCM version coming out?

[gwennibar]

Does Microsoft have an ETA on a new version? One that incorporates the often
mentioned suggestion of making mail mergers more intuitive. 2 of my 4 sales
reps have uninstalled the program and gone back to ACT because of the
multi-step mail merge function. The company president is considering going
back to ACT for the entire company unless MS comes out with a new version -
incorporating this option - in the forseeable future.
It would be nice to just be able to select (via ctrl) multiple recipients
and then use a right click option to mail merge rather than having to filter
the entire database. Sometimes that can take up to 20 minutes just to get 3
specific recipients because of the filter options.
Anyone have ANY reliable info as to when this might be?

 

[William Stacey [C# MVP]]

It has select via ctrl already.

1) Select contacts, right-click and Create/Marketing Campaign.
2) select contacts and click Tools/Mail Merge. This method attaches data in
another static data file.
3) Do other way round. Start from Word. Select list from Outlook contacts.
Insert your fields. Print or mail merge as needed. Use the Doc over and
over. Can also change the list as needed. IMO, this is probably the most
straight forward method.

....

 

[joesmith]

I prefer to do the mail merge from Outlook. Select your business contacts,
then (in outlook 2007) click Tools, Mail Merge. This method gives you access
to ALL the fields in the database, not just the BCM fields. I found it was
the only was to access the 'mailing' address.

 

[William Stacey [C# MVP]]

One thing that may be confusing at first using that method is the data is
not "live". The data is cooked into a csv in another file that Word links
to in the document. So if you open the document again, you only see the
static data from before. You can, however, re-select Recipients from a new
list but then you are back to a parcial list of fields (i.e. Mail_Address
will not be there) so you can get some errors on fields. This whole process
does need some work and be cleaned up a bit and fields added.

Myself, I want to see Defined "View" queries on the left side under
accounts. These would be just sql (or linq) queries under the hood, but
could be exposed in other ways with UI. Now I have my Views, I can "hang"
document or email templates below each view. So I can change the Where
predicates in all views as needed, but not the fields (as that could break
all your templates). You could create a new view as easy as selecting
contacts and having a context menu for "Create View...". Search folders are
close, but not exactly same thing or same location.

 

[RGrenader]

I just installed the Aladdin comm add in and believe it did solve the one
pain in the you know what issue with converting from Act to BCM, the ability
to open a template and populate fields from the contact record immediately.

gwennibar,

This is really an Outlook limitation but there is a happy answer. Check out
this com add-in from Software Solutions:
http://www.software-solutions.co.nz/ I use the Office Documents module
everyday and it works even better that ACT with only 2 clicks required to
instantly knock off a merged document.

Best wishes,

-THP

It has select via ctrl already.

1) Select contacts, right-click and Create/Marketing Campaign.
2) select contacts and click Tools/Mail Merge. This method attaches data in
another static data file.
3) Do other way round. Start from Word. Select list from Outlook contacts.
Insert your fields. Print or mail merge as needed. Use the Doc over and
over. Can also change the list as needed. IMO, this is probably the most
straight forward method.

...

It would be nice to just be able to select (via ctrl) multiple recipients
and then use a right click option to mail merge rather than having to

[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]

specific recipients because of the filter options.
Anyone have ANY reliable info as to when this might be?