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A lead can be defined as the first stage of the sales or sale opportunity process. It represents an individual or organisation who has shown interest in buying a service or a product, but is not yet certain if they wish to continue. Leads can be converted to customers in DEAR. 


At this point in time it is not yet possible to import leads from 3rd party tools to DEAR, however this is under development.


Prerequisites


Table of Contents


Add a new lead

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A lead represents an individual or organisation who has shown interest in buying a product or service. New leads in DEAR can be created by navigating to the CRM → New → Lead page. View existing leads by navigating to CRM → Leads


Enter lead details

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Lead fields marked with an asterisk (*) are mandatory. This information will be inherited by the customer if lead is later converted to a customer. Enter the lead details and Save your changes to add the lead. 


The following lead fields are available:

  • Name*: Enter a name for the lead. 
  • Status*: Define the current status of the lead. Available options are Attempting to Contact, New, Qualified, and Disqualified. You can also add your own custom statuses for leads
  • Currency*: Define the currency used for negotiations and sales with this lead. Your DEAR organisation base currency will be selected by default. 
  • Sales Representative*: Defines the sales representative in charge of the specific lead in terms of following up until the lead is qualified or disqualified.
  • Tax Rule*: Defines the default tax rule for the lead. 
  • Price Tier*: Defines the default price tier that would be applicable for the lead when opportunity is created. 
  • Terms*: Defines the payment terms for the lead. 
  • Amount: The estimated value from a potential customer the organisation would earn upon winning a deal.
  • Chance of Close*: Define the probability of winning a lead as a percentage. 
  • Close by: Defines a target close date for winning a lead or following up a lead. 
  • Comments: Optional comments field. 


Add addresses to a lead

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Once general details have been entered for a lead, addresses can be added. Multiple addresses can be added for the same lead. Each type of address (Business, Shipping, Billing) must be correctly identified for each lead so that this information is correctly displayed on invoices, sale orders or any other DEAR Inventory document. If the lead has multiple addresses of one type, select a default address for that type by checking the Default for Type box. This information will be inherited by the customer if the lead is later converted to a customer. 


Lead addresses can be imported in bulk via CSV file.


Add contacts to a lead

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One or more contacts can be added for a lead. If multiple contacts are added, a default contact must be selected.


Lead contacts can be imported in bulk via CSV file.


Convert a lead to a customer

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When a lead is "converted” it means that the lead becomes a customer in DEAR inventory systems. Leads can be converted manually from a lead's detail screen or from the lead list. Leads of any status can be converted to a customer. Conversion will remove the record from the lead list and create a customer record. This action is irreversible. 


 Tasks of all status for a lead will be inherited by the customer after conversion. 


Create an opportunity for a lead

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An opportunity is defined as a sales prospect, requested service, or product. An opportunity can be a possibility of converting a lead to a possible customer or a winning a new sales opportunity from an existing customer. Create an opportunity for a lead by clicking Opportunity on the lead's details screen. See Opportunities for more information. 


View Leads 

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The Leads dashboard page provides users an overview of created leads in the CRM module. Leads can be viewed in list or Kanban board format. 


Lead listing

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View your leads and customers in list format from the Listing view. Listing view can be filtered by reporting period, lead status and sales rep using the filters in the toolbar, as well as import and export lead details, lead addresses, and lead contacts. Leads list can show leads only, customers only, or leads and customers. 


Click on a lead to open the lead's details screen. In the top-right, click the Refresh icon to load the latest DEAR data and the Settings icon to enable or disable columns in the lead listing table. 


Lead Kanban board

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View your leads in Kanban board format from the Kanban view. Kanban view can be filtered by reporting period and sales rep using the filters in the toolbar. In the top-right, click the Refresh icon to load the latest DEAR data and the Settings icon to change how leads are grouped.


Click on a lead to open the lead's details screen, and drag and drop leads between columns to change their status. The small number represents the count of tasks assigned to users relating to this lead. Clicking the number allows you to change this and show the total lead amount. 


Select Manage Statuses to change which statuses are visible on the Kanban board. Custom lead statuses can be added as Kanban board columns, and default statuses can be removed by checking/unchecking the Show in Kanban box. Drag and drop lead statuses to change the order in which they will appear on the Kanban board. Select + to open the custom lead status display where you can add/remove additional custom lead statuses. When you have finished, click Update to save your changes and update the board.


Attach documents

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Documents up to 10MB  can be dragged and dropped to the Attachments tab for future reference. This tab will become available once a lead has been saved. 


Activity log

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The Activity Log tab shows any changes that users or the system have made to the lead record. This tab will become available once a lead has been saved. 


Define custom statuses for leads

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In addition to the default lead statuses (Attempting to contact, New, Qualified, and Disqualified), you can add your own custom statuses by going to Settings → Reference Books → CRM → Lead Statuses. Custom lead statuses can be added to the Lead Kanban board as columns. 


Add custom lead statuses by clicking + or Add more items, click on an existing custom lead status to edit it, and delete custom lead statuses


Delete leads

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At this time there is no option of deleting leads. Leads can simply have their status changed to disqualified. 


Import lead details

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Lead details can also be imported from a CSV template. This is useful for quickly adding many leads, lead addresses, or lead contacts in bulk. It is important that the column names and order are not changed when editing the CSV template.


Import lead list

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Import large numbers of lead details via CSV file to save time.

  1. Navigate to CRM → Leads.
  2. Click Import → Leads.
  3. Download the lead CSV template.
  4. Populate the template with the lead values, making sure the information matches the column headings. The column headings must not be changed for the import to work.
  5. Save the CSV Template.
  6. Browse your files for the populated CSV file and click Upload.


Import lead addresses

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Import large numbers of lead addresses via CSV file to save time.

  1. Navigate to CRM → Leads.
  2. Click Import → Lead Addresses.
  3. Download the lead addresses CSV template.
  4. Populate the template with the lead address values, making sure the information matches the column headings. The column headings must not be changed for the import to work. Multiple addresses can be added for the same lead by adding new address lines with the same customer name. The Action column can be used to delete a lead address by typing in DELETE.
  5. Save the CSV Template.
  6. Browse your files for the populated CSV file and click Upload.


Import lead contacts

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Import large numbers of customer contacts via CSV file to save time.

  1. Navigate to CRM → Leads.
  2. Click Import → Lead Contacts.
  3. Download the lead contacts CSV template.
  4. Populate the template with the lead contact values, making sure the information matches the column headings. The column headings must not be changed for the import to work. The Action column can be used to delete a lead contact by typing in DELETE.
  5. Save the CSV Template.
  6. Browse your files for the populated CSV file and click Upload.


Edit lead details in bulk

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Aside from the ability to edit lead details individually, lead details can be exported as a CSV file and edited in bulk. This method can be used for leads, lead addresses and lead contacts.

  1. Navigate to CRM → Leads.
  2. Select the appropriate Export option (Export → Leads, Export → Lead Addresses, Export → Lead Contacts).
  3. Save and open the CSV template.
  4. Edit the details that need to be updated. Do not change any of the column headings to prevent any errors during the upload.
  5. Save the CSV Template.
  6. Upload the edited template using Import.

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