Castell Computers

November 23, 2005

Conditionally Include Text Files in GoldMine E-Mail Templates

by @ 4:26 pm. Filed under CRM, GoldMine

The ability to conditionally include text files in html e-mail templates can be quite valuable when building templates to be used for mass mailings or even one-off e-mails.

The option in the template composition menu to include a text file is clear enough — you put some externally-generated HTML into a .TXT file and create an e-mail template in GoldMine with nothing but a reference to the .TXT file. When you merge the template, the HTML in the .TXT file will become the contents of your e-mail. The option to conditionally include a TXT file has always been a mystery.

Let’s assume a mail-order sporting goods shop has a web import form that asks customers if they would like to be alerted to product specials in a monthly news letter. The customers can pick from a broad range of interests. Their choices populate a series of user-defined fields in GoldMine with a yes or no value. Beyond providing excellent demographic information about your customers for future targeted campaigns, this information could drive a more general e-mail template-based newsletter. A series of conditional .TXT file insertions could tailor your HTML newsletter to your customers’ specific interest(s) instead of barraging them with a long list of products, most of which they have probably no interest in.

In constructing your e-mail, you would want to put together the basic body of your nicely-formed HTML document with your logo, web-site links, etc. and then break it into two .TXT files. These would be your header and footer, essentially. The rest of the .TXT files would be the various interest-driven specials that are included based on the customer-stated preferences you gathered via web-import (or sales call).

Use the conditionally include a .TXT file option to craft a series of macros like these:

<<file:(contact2->uski)=”Yes”?j:\goldmine\templates\sportsletter\ski.txt>>
<<file:(contact2->ufootb)=”Yes”?j:\goldmine\templates\sportsletter\football.txt>>
<<file:(contact2->ucamp)=”Yes”?j:\goldmine\templates\sportsletter\camp.txt>>
<<file:(contact2->uhunt)=”Yes”?j:\goldmine\templates\sportsletter\hunt.txt>>

When you mass-merge the resulting e-mail template, your customers will only get the ads they have expressed interest in.

November 13, 2005

Free OpenOffice Training Videos Online

by @ 9:40 am. Filed under General, Technology

Want to try OpenOffice 2.0 but afraid you won’t be able to do the basic tasks you do so easily in your traditional office productivity product(s)? There are a number of absolutely FREE training videos available On this page. No, it’s not a scam. As the NewsForge site explains:

As a public service for Commonwealth of Massachusetts employees (and everyone else), NewsForge is presenting — absolutely free of charge — 11 OpenOffice.org training videos as part of this article. They’re excerpts from the video CD that comes with NewsForge Editor-in-Chief Robin ‘Roblimo’ Miller’s upcoming book, Point & Click OpenOffice.org!, which will be available in December from all major booksellers. But we wanted you to have access to these videos now instead of waiting until the book is available, so here they are.

November 10, 2005

GoldMine Help Refuses to Help!

by @ 12:15 pm. Filed under CRM, GoldMine, Technology

So you thought you’d refer to the help files before going to someone else with your problem and when you open the GoldMine help file, it says the page can’t be displayed! What gives?

A Microsoft windows update security fix is what. Depending on your operating system, a number of fixes could be hindering your access to the HTML help in GoldMine and in many other applications.

Microsoft details various fixes (and some work-arounds) for the problem here and here.

Of course, these patches have also made your machine more secure, so you should consider that before you decide to implement any of the ‘fixes’…

If you’ve thought about it and have decided to skip the security and get your help files working again, copy the following text into notepad and save the file as anything.REG. Once you’ve save the file, double-click on it and windows should ask if you’d realy like to import the information into your registry. Say yes. A reboot may be required before the fix takes effect — but probably not.

anything.REG:

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\HTMLHelp]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\HTMLHelp\1.x\HHRestrictions]
“MaxAllowedZone”=dword:00000001
“EnableFrameNavigationInSafeMode”=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\HTMLHelp\1.x\ItssRestrictions]
“MaxAllowedZone”=dword:00000001

November 7, 2005

Microsoft Releases FREE Development Tools

by @ 1:51 pm. Filed under General, Technology

  1. SQL Server 2005
  2. Visual C#
  3. Visual Basic 2005
  4. Visual C++
  5. Visual J#
  6. Visual Web Developer

If this list of products has you calculating a mental invoice of thousands of dollars, think again. Microsoft has released a bevy of free ‘express’ development tools. Being the corporate giant they are, there is, of course, the stipulation that the packages are free for one year. More information on these powerful developer tools is available here.

Kudos to Microsoft!

November 4, 2005

FrontRange to be Sold

by @ 12:48 pm. Filed under CRM, GoldMine

Numerous news sites are reporting that FrontRange has been sold to investment firm, Francisco Partners. Check out the stories here.

A Businesswire article seems to feel that it might be a good thing for customers reasoning that the aquisition represents an influx of money which could fund further development of the product line(s) and explosive growth.

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