Tech Tip: Matching Incoming Email with Contact Records
 
If you're a KnowledgeSync Business Partner who does NOT work with the SalesLogix CRM application, you might not be aware just how useful KnowledgeSync can be when it comes to matching up incoming email messages with contact records in an underlying database.

This function -- which we call "Email Contact Matching" -- can be implemented for use with ANY application database that stores contact records, whether a CRM application, an accounting system, or any other kind of database.

Here's how it's done:

1. Create a first query that monitors incoming email. The table you will want to monitor is "ks_inbox.mdb" (located in the KnowledgeSync "Data" folder). Among the columns you choose for this query should be the field called "from_root" -- this contains the email address of the sender. This query  should have only a single filter -- checking to make sure that the "inbox.received_dt" is greater than or equal to the "{%Last Date/Time Event Checked%}".
    
2. Create a second query that monitors your contact database. Among the columns you choose for this query should be the field that contains a contact's email address. This query will also have a single filter -- comparing the value of the contact email address field against "{from_root}" (without the quotation marks).
    
3. Create an event with the preceding two queries -- first query #1 and then query #2. When a new mail message comes in, KnowledgeSync will pick it up, retrieve the sender's email address, and then try to match that value against the email addresses in your contact database.

When a match is located, you can configure an outgoing alert message (such as an email) to contain details from both the incoming email message as well as from your contact database. (This would, for example, allow you to configure the event to forward the email to the correct account manager.)

Also -- when a match is found, the KnowledgeSync event can be configured to execute Workflow Actions, such as taking the content from the incoming message and adding it to the contact's history, or using the content from the incoming email to create a follow-up activity and assign that activity to the appropriate account manager.

If you'd like to see an example of how such an event would work, Vineyardsoft has created an EventPak that illustrates this using the SalesLogix CRM application as the contact database. Note that you do not have to own SalesLogix in order to receive this EventPak or to see how it works. Just send mail to Don Farber at farber@vineyardsoft.com and request the "Email Contact Matching" EventPak.