Using Dynamics CRM to Create and Distribute Mandated Communications to External Stakeholders

Overview

Our client, a utility provider, requested our aid with a project to provide a replacement solution that manages its formal communication management processes with its external partners and customers. This complex communication process needed a detailed level of auditability due to strict state and federal regulations.  The regulations needed managing which contacts are associated to specific roles and when each communication was sent and verifying its receipt.

Prior to this project, these mandated communications were handled through a variety of disconnected spreadsheet, content management and an email-based solution that was being discontinued by the manufacturer. Our client recognized the potential for significant business efficiencies by managing the creation, distribution, and management of these communications within a CRM context, which enabled employees fulfilling several roles the ability to effectively collaborate. The innovative approach also brought technical and compliance-related efficiencies, such as enhanced scheduling and tracking capabilities.

Solution

Our client engaged us to plan and implement a CRM solution that could be supported by the internal IT department but would not need IT to configure or update end-user modifiable options and settings.

Concurrency’s core project team included a CRM business analyst, a CRM technical architect, a developer, and a project manager. A second CRM technical architect also supported the project. The project ran approximately five months. Throughout that time, we worked closely with both business users and IT.

We decommissioned our client’s end-of-life CRM solution and migrated the data to the new Dynamics CRM platform. We then developed some enhancements to the out-of-box contact, account, and communication management functions to manage these scheduled and targeted communications.

These enhancements included:

• Process automations that tracked the sending and recipient receipt/acknowledgement.
• Template enhancements to support the addition of custom fields.
• Creation of scheduled communication functionality to allow for queuing of the communications to be sent weeks or even months in advance of a known matter.
• Quick creation of emergency -related communications—such as disaster recovery updates—to distribute the communications without the distraction of formatting and working across multiple systems in a cumbersome manner.

Looking toward the future, we also ensured our client could readily move other business functions —such as customer service and case management—onto the CRM system.

This project is an excellent example of how the Dynamics CRM platform’s out-of-the-box functionality can be quickly configured and enhanced to meet a wide range of business needs.