Scribe Software Blog

Write ERP Errors Message Back to CRM

Let me share a story about Bob, a frustrated order processor in need of a tightly integrated system... Bob is processing an order in Dynamics CRM. He pushes the “Submit Order Button” confidently knowing that the order is whizzing around servers, surfing thru the clouds, and eventually landing in the appropriate ERP system. While all of this integration goodness happens his customer waits patiently on the phone. They both await for the all-important Confirmation Number. This number shows up in CRM once the order is accepted in the ERP system, it is the indicator of Order Success.  Pressing the F5 key to refreshe the screen he waits. No Confirmation Number appears. 

“The computers must be a little slow today,” he says with nervousness in his voice. “How is the weather in your city? We just had several inches of rain.” He adds, “...Well, you don’t need to wait any longer. When this Confirmation Number comes back I will give you a ring back. Have a great day, and thanks again for your order.”

Needless to say, Bob is a bit frustrated that he is unable to get a confirmation that the order had made its way into their ERP system. He quickly dials the phone and calls his IT help desk. “Where is my order number? What is going on back there? I had a customer on the phone and…”

The fact is that a CRM to ERP integration can fail for myriad reasons. The customer may be on Credit Hold, or the product that is being ordered is not in stock, or is discontinued. This is a major challenge of “loose integrations”, that is, where the business logic is not replicated in both systems. So if a failure happens in one system the other system needs to be notified of the failure.

What can be done to address the issue specifically with end users? 

In Insight version 7 we introduced a new feature called “Multi Target”. This feature allows one to build a .dts that writes to multiple objects, including the source object. In this article I will show you how to capture the error message and send it back to CRM so the user can see the status of the order, almost immediately. 

Step 1 – Create a Field for the Error Message

First in Dynamics CRM you will want to create, or reuse a field on the Order to send the message into. In my example here, I am creating a field and placing it on the top of the form. However you could use many mechanisms for this. You could create an activity and send an e-mail to the Order Owner, or add a Note to the Order, or create and entry in the Activity feed if that was being used. In this example I am just going to put the error into the Description field. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Step 2 Add a Connection to Source CRM system

In this example I am going to use a sample .dts, from one of our templates, whose source is XML and whose target is an ERP system. This XML comes to the .dts from the CRM Publisher; so we need a connection to the Dynamics CRM adapter that we can use as another target.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Step 3 – Add Step to Update CRM Order as the Last Step

From the configure steps window, add an update step Sales Orders. Don’t forget to define the lookup link on the SalesOrderId.

Step 4 – Push all the Failed Steps to the Order Update Step You Just Added

All the steps need to have their Fail option set to goto the Update CRM Order steps.

 

 

 

 

Step 5 – Edit Step 5 to Copy the Error Message Into the Field You Designated in Step 1.

You can prefix the message with some text or just put the data straight in. The formula that copies the error message is GETROWERROR().This function will return any error information that occurred while processing a row.

  

 

 

 

Step 6 – Run the .dts and ERP Error Shows On the CRM Order Screen

When the .dts encounters an error, two things occur. First the DTS will record an error in the event log allowing for any notification settings in the console to notify the appropriate individuals of the error.  Second, and most importantly, the ERP error will show up on the screen in CRM.

Make your data work for you!

In my role here at Scribe Software, I have the opportunity to present the Scribe ‘Insight’ application solution to many companies ranging from the mom-n-pop shops up to global enterprise organizations.  And what I have found most intriguing across this business landscape is not only how similar their data integration requirements are, but also their need for application extensibility to support business process agility.  This need is a direct result of current business demands and competitiveness within their ever changing marketplaces.  It is my hope within this post to show you how the Scribe Insight ‘platform’ supports this broad business spectrum; enabling a true high, wide, and deep approach in helping companies deliver to their many business needs. 

I'm sure that you would agree in today’s competitive business environment “doing more with less” is considered the norm.  I am not singling out employee productivity here, but rather application productivity.   How can we squeeze more out of our existing applications and how can we better consolidate our newer applications so as to provide a 360° view of our data? 

This is the vision and direction of our prospects and customers.  Companies have recognized that a ‘blinder’ approach to data sharing (point-to-point solution) is just not cutting it.  As company’s disparate business systems become many, the need to integrate becomes more obvious and vital.  Their data is the lifeblood of the organization and the efficient and effective sharing of this data, whether internal and/or external, is one of many critical components that come together in driving businesses forward.

Whether the need is for replication, synchronization, or the process integration of data, Scribe Insight delivers to that and more.  A true ‘platform’ architected solution that removes those ‘blinders’ and is strategic in bridging the gap between cloud based and on-premise disparate islands of information; now and into the future.  In today’s competitive business climate, sharing data from one business system to another is absolutely mandatory across the enterprise; however making that data work for you outside of their respective applications (i.e. business monitors, sales data views) is where an extensible architected solution adds tremendous business value. 

For example, the ability to automatically monitor sales orders entered into your CRM system to provide real-time custom based notifications (i.e. emails, text messages) proactively informing the District Sales Manager of the current order volume vs. expected results?  

 Or graphically generating a 3D visual illustrating product cross-selling type, quantity, and customer? 

These are just a few samples of many possibilities that Scribe Insight can bring to the table allowing your otherwise static data to take on a new life, regardless of its location, allowing team analysis and validation of strategic business decisions and direction.  

Scribe Insight has been architected, since its beginning, as a ‘platform’ solution that is not only configurable, adaptable, and scalable, but also extensible.   The functionality to non-programmatically create either Scribe monitors and/or data views are inherent features within the product delivering to the needs of our prospects and customer today. 

“A clear sight of the end goal should not cloud one’s peripheral vision.”

Make your data better with Amazon's Mechanical Turk

Need to improve your CRM data but too busy to do it yourself? Here's a trick that is cheap and easy. Amazon has a service called the Amazon Mechanical Turk marketplace. I'll refer to it as AMT for short. It is defined as a marketplace for work that requires human intelligence. More specifically, it is a simple way to deal with small tasks that are tedious and time consuming. When you have simple tasks that require human involvement you upload your tasks/HITs (Human Intelligence Tasks) to the Turk and someone, somewhere will do them for an amount that you agree to pay per hit. In my real world example that I am doing as I write this I am using the AMT to classify my CRM account records by industry. It took me about a half hour to set this up and is costing me $.10 per record. Pretty cheap, right? Here are the steps I had to take to make this happen:

• Create an account with Amazon Mechanical Turk (this can use your existing Amazon.com account)

• Design the web form that the person doing your HITs will use to do them (see below)

  • Note that my form gives very detailed instructions on what the person needs to do. In this example, I am showing the person a company name and a web URL and am asking the person to go to the URL, read about the company, write a description (in their own words) of what the company does and then select an industry from a list of industries which I coded into the form using basic HTML. Note that I asked them to write the description in their own words because this ensures that they actually spend time on each task and make sure they get it right. Plus, it makes spot checking the results easier for me.

• Export the CRM data from the CRM system. In my example I had to export company name, URL and account ID. I need account ID so that I will be able to update the records back into my CRM when the work is done

• Import that CRM data into the Amazon Mechanical Turk

  • Note on the form screen shot that the ${AccountName} is a variable that will be replaced by my actual data. The worker will see the same form for each HIT but with a different Company Name and URL for each record from my CRM system
• Set a bid amount for each HIT

• Publish the HITs and watch live on screen while people do them. Below is a screen shot of the job progress. It updates real time if I want to watch it but, of course, I don't need to. I can simply come back later and see how much has been done. From here I can review and export the completed HIT for re-import back into my CRM

As of right now my job of 1,614 records is 23% complete and I am paying the equivalent of $1.46 per hour based on how long it has taken so far. I set my job up so that multiple people can work on it at the same time and I bid $.10 per record so my total was 1,614 x .10 plus a ~$16 fee for Amazon. In total I paid $178.80 to get industries assigned to these 1,614 accounts. In reviewing the results including the descriptions I asked the worker(s) to write and the classifications they have chosen I can tell that I am getting very good work. Below you can see an example of a record where the worker correctly identified that the Dobla BV is a producer of chocolate and, thus, belonged in the Manufacturing – Food and Beverage industry category.

What is fascinating is that I do not know, or care, if my worker(s) is/are housewives in Houston or college students in Calcutta. And, at the end of my job, I can spot check the results and accept or reject individual results.

Try it sometime and see what you think. I've done it three times now for various tasks and it has worked well each time. I have learned to include very detailed instructions (with an example) on my forms and I believe that is important.