“Generally a contact is anyone that we communicate or associate with. In sales automation, the scope gets narrowed down to include just the people who directly affect the salesperson’s business, or have the capability to influence it. Contacts may have needs which at some point, will turn into sales opportunities, and they have to be treated with the importance that they richly deserve. Without the contact, there is no business.” – from “Sales Automation Done Right” by Keith Thompson.

The Contact form is designed to manage Contacts that sales teams interact with.   It is important to keep this information up to date with new Leads, Opportunities (IBOs) and Interactions, to ensure sales effectiveness.  Every Lead and Opportunity belongs to a Contact.

At the top of the left hand-side you see the Contact’s name and Title, if the Contact is being read, not edited.

The rest of the Contact form is divided into the following sections:

1. Contact Summary:  The contact summary shows the number of IBOs, Leads and Interactions associated with the Contact.
2. Linked Accountt: This is this Contact’s parent Account or Sub-Account. This section also shows the whole Account with its Account tree.  Contact’s “parent” is highlighted in grey.
3. Attachments. You can attach files to Contact records.
4. Contact Name: these fields are here if you are editing a Contact.
5. Contact title and type: these fields may be disabled by your Administrator
6. Address: Standard fields and custom address fields. Some of these fields can be inherited from the Contact’s Account as per this post.  You may also see here more fields, if they are configured by your Administrator. In read mode you can click on a red control to see the Contact’s location in google maps.
7. Communication: Email address and Phones etc.
8. Source Campaing and Event: if the Marketing module is enabled. More on Source here.
9. Additional Information: Unsubscribe from Emails. Check this field if this Contact does not wish to subscribe to Emails sent by your Organization.  If your Organization is using a Marketing module, then this field is also relevant in Collection(s).
10. Sections of Custom Fields, if used by your Organization.
11. Leads and IBOs widget:  This shows all Leads and IBOs associated with the Contact.
12. Interactions widget:  Here you can view Sales Interactions ( IBO-focused and Relationship-focused). If you are using a Marketing module, then you can also view Lead-focused and Marketing-focused Interactions.
13. Appointments/Tasks widget:  This tracks all Calendar Entries linked to the Contact.
14. Service Logs widget: If Service module is used, then here you see Install Base and its Service History, where the Contact is listed as a Primary Contact.

You can add Leads, IBOs, Interactions and Calendar entries from the Contact form.  They will automatically appear in a relevant widget.

Creating a Contact

Click Create>Contact from any listview or “Add Contact” from Account or Sub-Account that does not have any other Sub-Accounts at lower levels.

Contacts are linked to Accounts or Sub-Accounts, automatically or manually.

You can click on it in read mode or click x to change in edit mode.

Learn here how to link a Contact  to an Account or Sub-Account.

Deleting, Merging and Moving Contacts

Sometimes your Contacts will move to a different Organization, quit and move to an unknown Organization, or just retire.  You may be tempted to delete the Contact, but deletion removes historical Leads and IBOs and is recommended only to resolve duplicates.

Read more on  Merging Contacts and Moving Contacts, which is more applicable to retaining the Contact’s history.