Contact manager

A contact manager is a software program that enables users to easily store and find contact information, such as names, addresses and telephone numbers. They are contact-centric databases that provide a fully integrated approach to tracking of all information and communication activities linked to contacts. Sophisticated contact managers provide calendar sharing features and allow several people in a company to access the same database.

History

The original contact management system (CMS) was ACT! 1.0 for DOS in 1987, some beta copies were out prior to this.^[1]

Benefits

A contact management system (CMS) may be chosen because it is thought to provide the following advantages:^[2]

• Centralized repository of contact information
• Ready to use database with searching
• Sales tracking
• Email integration
• Scheduling of appointments and meetings
• Document management
• Notes and conversation management
• Customizable fields
• Drip marketing
• Import/export utility

Differences from customer relationship management

A contact manager is usually used for instances where the sales interaction model of the organization is a one-to-many interaction model, in which a single sales representative is responsible for multiple roles within a company. Alternatively, a company with a many-to-many interaction model, in which many sales representatives are targeting a single job role, a customer relationship management (CRM) system is preferred.:^[2]

See also

References