Activity Management¶
Overview¶
Record-keeping and planning events or interactions between parties is a crucial aspect of a successful CRM strategy.
The CRM functionality of Mythradon is designed for collaboration, not just for the benefit of individual users.
While providing functionality in a system like Mythradon is one thing, getting users to fully adopt and utilize this functionality is a different challenge altogether. It is essential that users understand the benefits of tracking and measuring activities in Mythradon, such as how it can help them to perform their job more efficiently, form better relationships, win more sales, provide better service, and strategically execute marketing projects.
Many organisations have relied on email systems or tools like Slack or Confluence to share and collaborate with their teams, or have implemented shared inboxes or policies to copy others on important emails. However, there are several compelling reasons to consider tracking activities in Mythradon instead:
- Email systems are personal silos of information - Each person's inbox becomes their personal collection of information. This approach is not effective when teams interact with customers, partners, suppliers, and other parties. When a staff member leaves the organisation, their data and history of interactions may be lost. Sharing this information in Mythradon is much easier to locate and share across the team, and it does not matter when a staff member leaves, as their interactions are recorded for others to view.
- Planning follow-ups - It is easy to let time pass without following up as frequently as necessary. Once people start tracking activities, it is common to realize that "I had no idea it had been that long since I last visited or contacted this customer." One of the most important insights organisations can gain from Mythradon is how long it has been since last contact was made with their customers, partners, suppliers, and other parties. However, if activities are not tracked, Mythradon cannot provide this information.
- Accountability - Many studies have shown that accountability to peers and managers helps to change or maintain behaviour. Just as accountability is used to support personal fitness goals, it is also essential in the business world. Successful individuals welcome accountability for both short-term tasks and long-term goals.
- Memory - When managing relationships with hundreds or thousands of people, it is impossible to remember every conversation. It can be difficult to remember if you left a message earlier in the day or if you just hung up and planned to call back. It can also be difficult to remember if you left a business card on your last visit or if you were able to speak to someone. Additionally, there is the challenge of organizing all the details such as preferences, order history, service expectations, hobbies, and family. Entering activities is how we listen and remember.
- Leading indicators - Most employers only care about meeting sales, customer satisfaction, conversion, or other key performance metrics for the year. However, how will staff and management teams know they are doing the right things on a daily basis to achieve these numbers?
- Creating a foundation - Mythradon offers a range of options to make users more productive, such as preference tracking, future planning, mobility, social integration, and customer portals. Good activity management is a foundational building block for everything else that Mythradon has to offer. If a team cannot master activity management, leadership is unlikely to invest in areas that will add more value. Similarly, if an individual cannot master activity management, they are holding the entire team back.
- Employability - Most employers now require new employees to use a CRM solution, and experienced employees are expected to have CRM experience. Using Mythradon can help to enhance employability and career advancement.
- Collaboration - Mythradon's CRM functionality is designed for collaboration, not just for the benefit of individual users. Sharing activities and information in Mythradon allows teams to work together more effectively and make better decisions.
Overall, tracking activities in Mythradon is essential for improving efficiency.
Connecting with Customers, Partners and Suppliers on a regular basis is critical to the success of your business.
Given the points mentioned above, how can Mythradon help?
By default, Mythradon supports the following types of activities:
- Meetings
- Calls
- Tasks
These types of activities can also be related to the following entities:
- Accounts
- Contacts
- Leads
- Opportunities
- Cases
All of these entities have the Activities panel on their detail view. Custom entities of type Base Plus also have the Activities panel.
Note: System administrators can create custom entities of type 'Event'. Any new 'Event' type entity can be made available in the Mythradon Calendar. More information on this is provided below.
What's the Difference Between the Types of Activities¶
All calendar activity types have the following common fields:
Common Fields
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Name | Name/Subject used to describe the Activity/Event. |
| Status | Status of the activity. Standard options:
|
| Direction | Used to indicate the direction of origin. Standard options:
|
| Start Date/Time | Starting date and time of the Activity/Event. |
| Duration | Duration in minutes of the Activity/Event. |
| End Date/Time | End date and time of the Activity/Event. |
| Parent | The related parent record. This field allows you to select the entity type and then an actual record of that type to be the parent record. |
| Reminders | Controls if the system should send a reminder before the event start date/time. System supports popup dialog or sending a reminder email. |
| Description | General description for the event. |
| All Day | Controls if the activity lasts for the whole day. |
Meetings¶
Use Meetings to schedule meetings between multiple parties. The meeting has a start date and time. You can add multiple attendees of different types (Users, Contacts, or Leads) to a meeting. You can also set up in-app reminders for a meeting, and all attendees will receive a notification to remind them of upcoming meetings.
Calls¶
Calls are similar to Meetings, in that you can add multiple parties as attendees. The main difference is that Calls have shorter duration, with a maximum of 2 hours, while Meetings can last up to 1 day.
Tasks¶
Tasks can be created as an activity related to any supported entity. Tasks do not have attendees, but you can assign a user to a task and add attachments.
In this article:
Meetings & Calls¶
Attendees¶
Three types of attendees are supported: Users, Contacts, and Leads. For each attendee, it is possible to specify an acceptance status: Accepted, Tentative, or Declined.
You can send invitation emails to attendees by clicking the button in the top-right corner. Attendees will be able to set their acceptance status by clicking on a corresponding link in the email. The template for invitation emails can be modified at Administration > Template Manager > Invitation.
Reminders¶
There are two types of reminders: Popup (in-app message) and Email. Reminders will be applied to the Assigned User and users specified in the Users field.
Default duration¶
Default duration can be changed by a system administrator at Administration > Entity Manager > Meetings / Calls > Fields > Duration > Default. It must be specified in seconds.
Tasks¶
The Date Start and Date Due fields are not required. Dates can be specified with or without time parts.
Reminders¶
Reminders field is hidden if Date Due field is empty. It will show up once it's filled in.
Scheduler¶
The Scheduler panel allows you to view free and busy time ranges for attendees (users) when scheduling an event. This feature is available for Meetings, Calls, and custom entities of type Event.
You can add or remove the Scheduler panel at Administration > Layout Manager > select the needed entity type > Bottom Panels.
You can configure which entity types will be taken into account when showing busy time ranges at Administration > Settings > Free/Busy Entity List.
Calendar¶
Calendar displays Meetings, Calls, Tasks. It's also possible to show custom entities of Event type.
Supported views:
- Month
- Week
- Day
- Timeline
Users can add Calendar on their dashboard.
It's possible to view calendar of another user (is you have an access determined by roles). Calendar button is available on the user's detail view.
Refreshing calendar¶
To refresh calendar items you can click on the date range title at the top in the centre.
Shared calendar¶
Users can create custom shared views that will display events of specific teams.
Note: User must have a proper User Permission set in Roles to be able to use shared calendars. Set the permission to
teamorall.
Note: The shared view displays events of users belonging to the selected team. It does not necessarily display events assigned to that team (i.e, an event may be assigned to the team but not to any specific user within that team).
Shared view is also available for Timeline view. It allows to view events of multiple users.
Custom Entities on Calendar¶
System administrators can create custom entities of type 'Event'. At Administration > Settings > Activities, it is possible to set this entity type as an activity and make it available in the Calendar.
See also¶
- Mythradon Basics
- Mythradon Marketing
- Mythradon Sales
- Mythradon Service
- Mythradon System Administration
- Mythradon Tools