Support for Custom Views in iFreeTools

iFreeTools CRM just got an update with the new Custom Views feature.

Note : Ability to create Custom Views has also be enabled in iFreeTools Creator, our online database app builder for Google Apps. If you do not see this option when viewing the records for your custom entity, kindly verify if you have selected the Allow Custom Views option for that entity.

Clicking on the Add Custom View link available under each module of CRM, will bring up a form wherein one can provide the view name, description and the criteria to be used for filtering.

For example, to view all leads who have not been contacted yet, one can create a "Not Contacted" view as shown below..




Once the view is created, it will be listed along with the predefined views in the module..


One can also provide multiple values for the criteria.

For example, to view all Open Leads by specific owners (say, for users "Gold" and "Diamond"), one can create a view as shown below (notice multiple values in OR for Lead Owner and Lead Status)..


The resulting view will use all values in the criteria to provide the results..


Such Custom Views will be available for use by all users within the application instance, while admin users alone can create/modify/delete Custom Views.

Currently properties with choices and reference properties alone can be used in providing the filter criteria. For other filtering one can use the search within the Advanced Views, for now. We will be coming up with more options for filtering at a later upgrade.

Check out the new feature and feel free to send us your feedback.

Related Blog Posts : 

• Custom Views now support Template Criteria for User References and Date/DateTime fields

Instant Search now available in iFreeTools CRM

We told you search was "Coming soon.." when we introduced Advanced Views late last week and now, it has arrived in iFreeTools CRM.

This comes a day after Instant Details and Customizable Columns were added to Advanced Views.

Advanced Views now have a "search as you type" feature, shown in action below..

The search string is matched against values from all the columns in table view. If you want to include a property for the search, just add it as a column of the table and proceed to search.

Advanced Views is Javascript powered and works best in modern browsers like Chrome and Firefox - which we use extensively for our testing. While it does work in IE (it can be a bit slow), we recommend better browsers.

There is also an option to disable "Search while typing", which makes search operations to begin only after clicking on the Search button. This can be useful when using browsers like IE.

Keep sending in your feedback on Google App Engine powered iFreeTools CRM. We listen, and more importantly we act and we deliver - fast.

Instant Details and Customizable Columns now available in Advanced Views

Another upgrade and iFreeTools CRM now has support for Instant Details and Customizable Columns in the Advanced Views. This comes soon after the initial support for Sorting and Faster Paging (Next/Previous), added late last week.

With today's upgrade, Advanced View has been made the default list view. If required, one can always switch back to Simple View and the browser will remember your preference the next time list views are loaded.

Within the Advanced View, one can now view the details of the records instantly by clicking on the row in the table.

When the view loads, you will see something like..


Now click on any row in the table to load the details..


Notice how the visible columns are marked with a star image. You could click on the star (or the property name) to toggle the visibility of the property in the table view.

For example, when you want to remove the Salutation and First Name and instead add Lead Source and Lead Industry, click on the relevant property names in the details view and see the changes getting reflected in the table view..


Once the property becomes a column in the table, it can then be used for sorting. Options to save the view settings either for self or as default settings to all users will be available soon.

The usual details view is still available, where you can also view the lists of related records.

We would be glad to hear from you on what you would like to see in our Google App Engine powered iFreeTools CRM. Check out the features and feel free to send in your feedback.

Sorting and Faster Paging (Next/Previous) with Advanced Views

Not being able to sort the data, was one of the pain points expressed by some of our users. So we got working on a quick feature to support sorting of data in the views, while also enabling faster paging.

These features are now available as "Advanced Views" in the Google App Engine powered iFreeTools CRM.



It is recommended to use Chrome or Firefox (with firebug disabled), to experience this feature.

Currently "Advanced Views" is not the default view, as it is still a work in progress. Other upcoming features in the Advanced Views include selectable columns and search.

So, what is your pain point ? What would you like to see soon in iFreeTools CRM ?

Let us know - you can use the feedback form in the application or send a mail to raj@sahasvat.com. We listen, and more importantly, we act and we deliver.

Sales Opportunities Pipeline (Funnel Chart) is now available in iFreeTools CRM

Sales Opportunities Pipeline (Funnel Chart) which was in the works, is now available as part of iFreeTools CRM.



This comes after our initial support for charts added in the Leads module.

As an additional option, we have also included a horizontal-bar-chart in all chart views.

Apart from the Sales Opportunities Pipeline, two more chart views have also been introduced in the Opportunities module, which are Open Opportunities By Source and Open Opportunities By Owner. These charts show the opportunity amount (or potential) aggregated based on source/owner, displayable in Horizontal/Vertical Bar charts or in Pie charts.

We would love to hear your feedback on the application.

Support for charts was actually taken up earlier than planned, after users got in touch with us requesting for the same. Go ahead and check out the CRM built for Google App Engine / Google Apps and let us know what you would like to see soon in this application. You can use the feedback form in the application or send a mail to raj@sahasvat.com.

Google And Its Effects on CRM - You have seen nothing, yet !!

We Blog CRM has post on Google And Its Effects on CRM (a couple of months old).

The blog post points out how applications like Google Docs and Calendar can be good CRM tools and goes on to describe how the current players like Salesforce and Zoho CRM are integrating with Google applications.

Another aspect of Google's effect on CRM has not been given specific mention and rightfully so, because, though there is a potential in that angle, there were no concrete examples to talk about - at least at the time of that post.

That angle is : The effect of Google enabling more low-cost CRM vendors to come into picture due via the App Engine platform. Google App Engine has evolved a lot since its debut in April 2008. Now the platform has a lot more features and JVM support (which enables Java and other JVM based languages)

One such app to take advantage of the platform is our very own http://crm.ifreetools.com, which came out with the Alpha version less than a month ago and seems to be the only application working to be a full-fledged CRM app, based on those listed in App Engine's Application Gallery.

We at iFreeTools believe this will not remain so. There will be a lot more players dropping into the CRM / business software scene, which is now becoming more of a commodity. I had mentioned this in a comment on Zoho's blog titled "Why we compete with Google" - at that time I was still an employee of Zoho (then called, AdventNet).

Deploying such App Engine applications on Google Apps domains is as easy as "Add a Service" from the dashboard and then adding a CNAME (DNS entry) to map a sub-domain.


But, how far can such apps go ?
Will they be able to at least match the core features of the current breed of SaaS applications ?
How feature rich can such applications be, given the restrictions inherent in the App Engine platform ?
Will Google Wave have a bigger role to play ?

All this, we will have to wait and see. All I can say now is, watch out for more of Google's effects on CRM.

What's Cooking : Sales Opportunities Funnel Chart

Yes, that is what's cooking at CRM for App Engine - iFreeTools CRM.

The Opportunities Pipeline Chart (aka Sales Potentials Funnel chart) is a standard chart in almost all CRM application. iFreeTools is now working towards providing the same as part of the next upgrade.

Not sure, if this is going to be a simulated funnel shape (which underneath, uses a normal bar chart)...


or if it going to be a simple bar chart (with not exactly the typical funnel shape)...


The problem with adding a dummy column is, that space is click-able and can confuse users about the actual value..


Let me see what I can do. Until then, have a nice weekend !!

And, as always, feel free to send in your suggestions to me, on what you want to see added soon, in iFreeTools CRM.

Related :
Sales Opportunities Pipeline (Funnel Chart) is now available in iFreeTools CRM