Blog/Training

You may import new Leads and Clients into the MSICRM database. The data file needs to be in a CSV format. The template is below.

Please note that the NAME field is not needed in Leads imports but is required for Clients imports. The NAME field references Account Name. An Account Name is generally an umbrella account over multiple clients such as a household (husband and wife) or a company.
Some formats of the NAME field:
Smith, Joe (if individual)
Smith Joe and Susie (if married)
Joe Smith Co (if company)

IMPORTANT: Once you get to STEP 4 of the import process you MUST choose EMAIL ADDRESS in Available Fields on the right side and drag it over to the Fields to Check on the left side before proceeding with the Import Now button. Otherwise you will get numerous errors on the screen and only a partial import of records.

If your role allows you to export data, you have access to download lists of Leads, Clients and Application data for backup and/or external needs.

Click on any of the lists from the Sales menu and functionality works the same.

Bring up the lists for Leads, Clients or Applications.

Click the button that shows an image of a checkbox. It’s at the top of the first column of data.

Select your quanity – typically it is all of the records…

Click the Bulk Action button immediately to the right and then click on Export.

It then generates a CSV file for you to use.

In Chrome, it adds the file to the bottom bar of the browser screen.
In Firefox, it adds the file to the download button typically in the row up top in the address bar. Or bring up your File Explorer and find it in Downloads.

We do not recommend sending bulk email out of the MSICRM system. This is due to the potential of being blacklisted by sending out bulk email when you are not a true email provider. We recommend using the integrated service such as, Mailchimp.com (and as of Summer 2021, SendGrid). SendGrid (from what we’ve been told has a stronger privacy policy than MailChimp – although MailChimp is very user friendly – so you need to balance your wants and needs with the two similar yet different companies and their products.

Mainly this is due to technical issues in email spam specifications in the email server world.

Bottom line is the digital powers that be will blacklist servers that send out bulk emails unless they are dedicated email servers. Mailchimp has all the functionality you would want to create email campaigns and has a generous free level (up to 2000 contacts) and paid levels. MSICRM has the integration functionality built-in to send newly created leads to Mailchimp. This includes First Name, Last Name, Email Address and Date of Birth (for sending birthday greeting automatically).

We need an API key from Mailchimp to enable this connection.

Create a Mailchimp account at https://mailchimp.com. Once in the account, go to this link to create the API key:
admin.mailchimp.com/account/api

Copy the API key and send it us and we will get it installed.

While you are waiting on our install of the API key, you need to also build the BIRTH_DATE field in Mailchimp.

Click on the Audience button in the left side Index.

Then click on the All Contacts button.

On the next page, click “Settings” and then “Audience Fields and *|MERGE|* tags”.

Click “Add A Field” at the bottom of the screen.

Select “Birthday” and click “Save Changes”.

It will create the following entry. The marked fields MUST be edited.

Change the “Untitled” birthday field to “Birthday” and change the “MMERGE#” filed to read “BIRTH_DATE”.

Save it and that’s it. Once we plug in the API key, test the connection by creating a lead in MSICRM and verify by checking your Audience list in Mailchimp.