A Contact Management System is a complex solution for managing a database of Contacts, assigning tasks to them, tracking business opportunities and maintaining a history of business transactions. Contacted.com is a powerful online tool designed to manage contacts, store valuable contact details and set automatic reminders for interaction with contacts.

A Contact is a person you have met or been referred to in the course of doing business. Contact records can be created, edited and deleted within the system.

To add a new Contact, choose Contacts > Add New Contact. Next, fill out the requisite fields and click Update – the Contact will be added to the Contact list. To duplicate a Contact, choose Contacts, click on the desired Contact and then click Update&Duplicate..

Custom User Fields allow you to add new fields to the Contact page. By default, a Contact record contains basic information such as Name, Address, Phone, etc. You may want to add Spouse’s Date of Birth or Favorite Pet to the list of information collected for each Contact. This can be done by defining Custom User Fields.

Those with administrative rights may add Custom User Fields to the Contact page. To do so, take the following steps:

• First, you will want to create a custom template; choose Home > User Field Templates > Add New User Field Template. Type the name of your Custom Fields Template and click Update. The Custom Fields Template will be created and displayed in the list.
• To add Data Fields to the Template, choose Edit Fields > Add New User Field Template Item, type the name of the desired Field and click Update. The Field will be added to the Template. Repeat the second step until you have completed adding Custom Fields to the Template. The new fields will now be ready for use. To apply the Custom User Fields to a specific contact, visit the Contact and click on the desired Contact. On the Contact page, choose User Fields > Templates Used and select the desired template. The new Custom User Fields that you defined will now be available for use on the Contact record.

Private Contacts are visible only to the Record Manager who originally entered the Contact into the system and the Administrator. Public Contacts are available to all users.

To send an e-mail to a Contact, choose Contacts, click on the desired Contact and in the Contact window click New E-Mail.

In the Send E-mail window the To: field will be pre-filled with the Contact’s name. If you want to send the e-mail to multiple Contacts, click Select Contacts and opt to search in All Contacts or in the specified Group. The list of available Contacts will be displayed in the Recipient list field. Select the desired Contact and click Add >>. If you wish to add all listed Contacts, click Add All >>, the Contacts will be added to the Selected Contacts field. You can also remove select contacts from the listing as desired.

To facilitate e-mail writing, you may use a template by selecting it from the E-mail Template List.

After filling out Subject, Body and Signature fields, opt between Send Action In the Active Window or In the Background. When sending e-mail to one contact, choose Send Action In the Active Window. The system will instantly send the e-mail and remain available for further work. When sending the e-mail to multiple contacts or sending large attachments, choose Send Action In the Background. This feature will allow you to continue work while distribution occurs to the list “in the background”.

If you want to attach a file to your e-mail, do one of the following:

If the file is already uploaded in one of the system folders, choose the folder the file resides in via the Select Folder field, then choose the file in the Select File field and finally click Attach.

If the file is not yet uploaded, click Upload New File > Browse, select the file on your local system, click Upload and then click Attach. Repeat this step if you wish to upload and attach more files. The attached files will be shown in the Attachment File List. When finished attaching files, click Send.

The system will allow you to track correspondence sent by traditional postal service (“snail mail”) via this feature. This feature’s intent is to help you track both traditional and electronic correspondence with your Contacts. To use this feature check the Save as History box in the Letter Editor Window before printing the letter.

When creating an e-mail message or a letter, you can choose from a number of templates. Within the E-Mail or Letter window pick the required template from the Template list. Click Preview to verify whether any changes need to be made and click Send to send the e-mail or Print to print out the letter.

The Basic Text Box feature supports plain text format only (think “Notepad”), whereas the Rich Text Editor feature allows for formatted text (bold, underlined, etc.), pictures, etc. Messages in Rich Text format are normally larger than those in Basic Text.

To add a mail template, choose Home > Mail Templates > Add New Mail Template. On the Mail Template page, type the template Name, specify whether you want the template to be available to all users (Public) or only to you (Private); define the type of your template (E-mail or Letter). Use Contact Fields to create a template. To include a Contact Field in the Template, set the cursor in the body of the Template where you want the field to be added, select the desired field in the Contact Fields list and click Paste. The Contact Fields data will be replaced with the corresponding data, when creating an e-mail or letter with a specified Contact.

To modify an existing Template, choose Home > Mail Templates, click on the Template you wish to modify, edit the requisite data and click Update to save changes to the Template.

• Choose Home > Mail Templates and click Delete next to the name of the template you wish to delete;
• Choose Home > Mail Templates, click on the name of Template you wish to delete and on the Template page click Delete.

All Contact Management System records, i.e. Contacts, Opportunities, Tasks, Notes, Letters, Groups, Templates, etc., are not permanently deleted from the system when you click Delete. Instead, they are moved to the Recycle Bin. All records in the Recycle Bin can be restored to live status. To restore a record, choose Recycle Bin and check all the deleted items you wish to recover; you may use Select all on the page for convenience, then click Restore selected or Restore all if you wish to restore all records in the Recycle Bin.

If the Recycle Bin is emptied, records within it will permanently be lost. Only the Administrator has permission to empty Recycle Bin.

To schedule a new task, do one of the following:

• Choose Tasks > Add New Task
• Choose Calendar and click on the cell that corresponds to the desired Task start time.
• Choose Contacts, select the Contact who you want to schedule a task with and on the Contact page click New Task.

In the first two cases, the Scheduled With field is already filled in with the specified Contact’s name, whereas in the third case it is filled automatically with the first Contact’s name in the list. Fill out all requisite fields and click Update to save the task.

Clicking Save as History Item on the Tasks window saves the record related to the Task into History for a specified Contact; this indicates that the task was completed without actually being scheduled.

You can opt between Low, Medium and High Task Priority in the Task window. Each status is marked correspondingly with yellow (low), blue (medium) and red (high) color in the Task list or as flags in the Due Tasks window. Differentiating between each tasks’ priority enables easy filtering and sorting options.

Only Tasks on which the Reminder feature is enabled or Tasks which are overdue are displayed in the Due Tasks window. Lead Time defines when the Task will appear in the Due Tasks window. The Lead Time can be set in days (d), hours (h) and minutes (m).

With Autorefresh enabled, your Due Tasks window is refreshed automatically on the specified interval, whereas with Autorefresh disabled, the window is not refreshed automatically – only when you log in and out of the system. Automatic refresh is useful for those that keep the system open and work in it on a continual basis. Setting a short Automatic refresh interval may slow down system performance, therefore a longer interval is recommended when using this feature (e.g. every 30 minutes as opposed to every 3).

When the Send E-Mail box on the Task window is checked, a reminder e-mail message regarding the task will be sent automatically to the Contact the Task is Scheduled With.

A cleared Task disappears from the Due Tasks window but remains in the Task list and Calendar view. Completed Tasks show with struck through text in order to show progress.

If you want to add a Task to the Calendar view, select Calendar and click on the cell that corresponds to the desired Task start time. Next, fill out all requisite fields and click Update.

Removing a Task from the Calendar view also removes it from the Task list. To remove a Task from the Calendar View, do one of the following:

• Choose Calendar, click the Task you wish to remove and in the Task window click Delete.
• Choose Tasks, click the Task you wish to remove and in the Task window click Delete.
• Only open Tasks can be deleted. Cleared Tasks can be deleted only by Administrator.

You can assign a Task to any registered user in the Contact Management System. To do so, within the Task window, select a desired user in the Scheduled for drop down list. By default this field is filled with your name; be sure to change the name in order to prevent assigning the Task to yourself.

To create an Opportunity with a Contact, do one of the following:

• Choose Opportunities > Add New Opportunity.
• Choose Contacts, select the Contact you wish to create an Opportunity with then click New Opportunity.
• Fill out the requisite fields and click Update to save the opportunity.

To add a new item to a directory, for example, Products on the Opportunity page, do one of the following:

• Click Edit (to the right of the Product field). Type the name of the new item and click Add. With similar Directory fields, i.e. Product Type, Sales Stage, Competitor, Reason, etc. the items are added similarly.
• Choose Home > Directories, select the desired Directory, for example Products, and click Add New Reference Book Item, type the name of the item and click Update.

You can sort Contacts, Tasks, Opportunities or any other list by clicking on the field title. For example, to sort Contacts by Company field, choose Contacts > Company, the list is sorted alphabetically; pressing Company again reverses the order. All other lists can be sorted similarly.

Filtering data in the list makes it easy to view only the desired records. To filter data using Custom Filters specify the filtering parameters and click Go.

A Report is a set of data that is organized and formatted according to specific criteria. Contacted.com users have a number of Reports ready at their disposal. Each Report can be previewed, printed or exported to PDF, Word or Excel. To work with a Report, choose Reports and click on the report that interests you, specify the parameters and click Preview, Print or Export.

Directories are predefined sets of data to be used with Contacts, Tasks or Opportunities. Examples of Directories are lists of Cities, Companies, Products, Competitors, etc. To add new items to an existing Directory, do one of the following:

• Choose Home > Directories, select the desired Directory, click Add New Directory Item, type the name of the item and click Update.
• Click Edit to the right of the desired Directory field, for example to the right of Company on Contact page, type the name of the new item and click Update.

A Group is a set of Contacts that possess a common feature or identity. Groups are user convenience items used to organize a large number of Contacts. To create a new Group, choose Home > Groups > Add New Group. Type the name of the Group, fill out all the requisite data and then click Update to save the Group.

Use the Contact page to refer a Contact to a specific Group. Click Contact Groups and check the desired box, the Contact will be included in the specified Group.

Contact lists can be filtered based on Group criterion.

Only those that are assigned to the Administrator Security Role are empowered to change the skin. When logged in as Administrator, choose Admin > Skins. Check Host if you wish to change the skin for all users or Site if you wish to apply the chosen skin to a specific user only. Select the Skins list and click Apply to apply the selected skin and container.

Only the Administrator Security Role is enabled to change Private Label Area information. When logged in as Administrator, choose Home > My Company. On the My Company Info page fill out the requisite fields and click Update.

You can also upload your company logo in the Report Logo section in order to have that logo displayed on reports. If you work with a skin that supports custom banners, you can upload your company logo in the Site Logo section.