Purpose: Microsoft Outlook Integration allows you to exchange information between Outlook and the CRM application of your SAP Business ByDesign system. You can synchronize your contacts, e-mails, appointments, and tasks. This information is then available to you even offline.
There are additional functions for creating service requests in the system from incoming e-mails; and for associating e-mails, tasks and appointments with SAP Business ByDesign accounts, campaigns, and opportunities. Associated activities are treated as follow-up documents to these accounts and business transactions.
Business Configuration Activities: Before you can install and use the Microsoft Outlook Integration functions, you must be granted authorization to the Account Management work center where all data relevant to Microsoft Outlook Integration is maintained.
Ensure that an administrator makes the following settings in Business Configuration:
Go to Business Configuration WoC --> select Implementation Project --> select Edit Project Scope --> Scoping --> Communication and Information Exchange --> Office and Desktop Integration --> select the Outlook Integration checkbox.
Answer the related scoping questions for synchronizing accounts and contacts to and from Outlook. Two-way synchronization is proposed as default. The settings here are valid for all Microsoft Outlook Integration users.
Answer the related scoping questions under E-Mail Integration with Service Request Management and Automatic Creation of Service Requests.
A. Optional Activity — If you want to assign accounts without using or changing normal Employee Responsible determination, go to fine-tuning for Sales --> Party Role Definition --> Create a new party role with responsibility role, ensuring that the description indicates that it is specifically for Microsoft Outlook Integration users.
B. Required Activity — There are two ways to assign an account.
a. Create a Responsibility Rule (recommended)
Go to the Task Distribution view (Application and User Management work center). In Employee Work Distribution, mark the Account Responsibility by Party Role line and click Edit. Add a rule for each responsibility role relevant to Microsoft Outlook Integration.
b. Edit the responsibility directly in the account
Go to Account Management work center --> Accounts view --> Edit --> select Contacts --> On the Relationships and Responsibilities tab, add a new row in the Responsibilities section. Select a responsibility type, enter the user ID of the user for whom this account should appear in My Accounts, and set the Direct Responsible checkbox.
Finally, you must maintain a business e-mail address in the Home work center ( Home --> Self Service --> Edit My Contact Data ).
Now, Install and Log On to the SAP Business ByDesign Add-In for Microsoft Outlook Integration
Note- When you are working offline and cannot log on to the system, any changes to relevant e-mails, appointments, and tasks, or new items for synchronization to the SAP Business ByDesign system are kept in a pool in Outlook. The actual synchronization of these items occurs automatically as soon as you log on to the SAP Business ByDesign system via the add-in.
Caution- If you are logged on to the SAP Business ByDesign system via the add-in for many hours without any action, you may receive an authorization error when trying to use a Microsoft Outlook Integration function. In this case, your user cookies may have expired. Simply log off and log on again.
Here, the add-in automatically creates the folders used for synchronization, including the:
To change any of these folders, click on the folder link, choose a new folder, and click OK.
Hereafter, accounts and their contacts in your direct responsibility are synchronized automatically to Outlook when added or changed.
Caution- Downloading contacts may not work when there is a high load of contacts and accounts in the system due to memory constraint issues. We recommend you synchronize only those contacts that are needed in Outlook, for example by ensuring that proper responsibilities are assigned.
Tip- Right-click on the SAP Business ByDesign Add-In icon in the Microsoft toolbar. Here, you can display synchronization errors and notifications directly, access the error and conflict folders, open the activities list, and send meeting requests.
In this blog, I have shown only the Configuration Part. I will post one more blog continuing this in which I will show how to use all the Functionalities.
There are additional functions for creating service requests in the system from incoming e-mails; and for associating e-mails, tasks and appointments with SAP Business ByDesign accounts, campaigns, and opportunities. Associated activities are treated as follow-up documents to these accounts and business transactions.
Business Configuration Activities: Before you can install and use the Microsoft Outlook Integration functions, you must be granted authorization to the Account Management work center where all data relevant to Microsoft Outlook Integration is maintained.
Ensure that an administrator makes the following settings in Business Configuration:
- Activate Microsoft Outlook Integration: In the standard system, Microsoft Outlook Integration is not in scope. Activate this function as:
Go to Business Configuration WoC --> select Implementation Project --> select Edit Project Scope --> Scoping --> Communication and Information Exchange --> Office and Desktop Integration --> select the Outlook Integration checkbox.
Answer the related scoping questions for synchronizing accounts and contacts to and from Outlook. Two-way synchronization is proposed as default. The settings here are valid for all Microsoft Outlook Integration users.
- Select Service Request Management: This step is optional. You can enable manual or automatic creation of service requests from incoming e-mails by going to Scoping --> Service --> Customer Care --> select Service Request Management.
Answer the related scoping questions under E-Mail Integration with Service Request Management and Automatic Creation of Service Requests.
- Assign accounts to Microsoft Outlook Integration users: In order to synchronize an account or associate activities to that account, the user must be the Employee Responsible. For this step, there is an optional fine-tuning activity as well as a required activity for assigning accounts to users.
A. Optional Activity — If you want to assign accounts without using or changing normal Employee Responsible determination, go to fine-tuning for Sales --> Party Role Definition --> Create a new party role with responsibility role, ensuring that the description indicates that it is specifically for Microsoft Outlook Integration users.
B. Required Activity — There are two ways to assign an account.
a. Create a Responsibility Rule (recommended)
Go to the Task Distribution view (Application and User Management work center). In Employee Work Distribution, mark the Account Responsibility by Party Role line and click Edit. Add a rule for each responsibility role relevant to Microsoft Outlook Integration.
b. Edit the responsibility directly in the account
Go to Account Management work center --> Accounts view --> Edit --> select Contacts --> On the Relationships and Responsibilities tab, add a new row in the Responsibilities section. Select a responsibility type, enter the user ID of the user for whom this account should appear in My Accounts, and set the Direct Responsible checkbox.
Finally, you must maintain a business e-mail address in the Home work center ( Home --> Self Service --> Edit My Contact Data ).
Now, Install and Log On to the SAP Business ByDesign Add-In for Microsoft Outlook Integration
- Install the add-in - Go to Home --> Self Services. Under My Computer, you can check your computer settings to ensure you have the minimum requirements, and install the add-in.
- Restart Outlook - Restart Outlook to activate the add-in. When you restart Outlook, the SAP Business ByDesign toolbar is added to your Outlook screen. This toolbar contains buttons for logging in and out of the Business ByDesign system, adding activities, creating service requests, and for accessing the SAP Business ByDesign Help Center.
- Log on to the SAP Business ByDesign system - From Outlook, log on to the SAP Business ByDesign system by clicking Log on in the SAP toolbar.
Note- When you are working offline and cannot log on to the system, any changes to relevant e-mails, appointments, and tasks, or new items for synchronization to the SAP Business ByDesign system are kept in a pool in Outlook. The actual synchronization of these items occurs automatically as soon as you log on to the SAP Business ByDesign system via the add-in.
Caution- If you are logged on to the SAP Business ByDesign system via the add-in for many hours without any action, you may receive an authorization error when trying to use a Microsoft Outlook Integration function. In this case, your user cookies may have expired. Simply log off and log on again.
- Check the SAP Business ByDesign folder locations - From the Outlook menu, choose Tools > SAP Business ByDesign Settings in Outlook 2007, or click on the Add-Ins ribbon then SAP Business ByDesign Settings in Outlook 2010.
Here, the add-in automatically creates the folders used for synchronization, including the:
- Default folder: This is the main SAP Business ByDesign folder, where error and conflict information is stored.
- Accounts folder: This folder contains the accounts downloaded from the SAP Business ByDesign system.
- Contacts folder: This folder contains the contacts downloaded from the SAP Business ByDesign system.
To change any of these folders, click on the folder link, choose a new folder, and click OK.
- In the Advanced Settings section, set the following:
- Flag display Synchronization Notifications checkbox if you want the system to display synchronization related notifications in a message pop-up in the Microsoft Windows taskbar.
- Flag display Synchronization Errors checkbox if you want the system to display synchronization related errors in a message pop-up in the Microsoft Windows taskbar.
- Flag the Enable automatic account filtering for Emails checkbox if you want the system to display only those active accounts which are associated with email addresses of the sender and recipients of an email.
- Click Download Contacts to perform an initial synchronizationThe system synchronizes only accounts in your direct responsibility, so you must ensure that, for the contacts you wish to synchronize, the relevant accounts are listed in My Accounts in the Accounts view (Account Management work center).
Hereafter, accounts and their contacts in your direct responsibility are synchronized automatically to Outlook when added or changed.
Caution- Downloading contacts may not work when there is a high load of contacts and accounts in the system due to memory constraint issues. We recommend you synchronize only those contacts that are needed in Outlook, for example by ensuring that proper responsibilities are assigned.
Tip- Right-click on the SAP Business ByDesign Add-In icon in the Microsoft toolbar. Here, you can display synchronization errors and notifications directly, access the error and conflict folders, open the activities list, and send meeting requests.
In this blog, I have shown only the Configuration Part. I will post one more blog continuing this in which I will show how to use all the Functionalities.
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