How To Run Marketing Campaigns With Dynamics 365 Sales

How to Use Dynamics 365 Sales to create marketing campaigns without buying Dynamics 365 Marketing

Microsoft recently released Dynamics 365 Marketing which is a fantastic, fully featured marketing system. However, for some businesses, Dynamics 365 Marketing is too expensive or cumbersome, so there is another option…

Marketing Using Dynamics 365 Sales

You’ll find these features in a little used section of Dynamics 365 Sales (if you can’t find this, make sure you’re using the Sales Hub app)

Planning your marketing campaign – before you start

• Do you know which group of people you’d like to contact?
• Do you know how you want to contact them?
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Post
  • Or a combination
• Sketch out your campaign first, then think about Dynamics

How to create Marketing Lists in Dynamics 365 Sales

The first step is to identify who you want to contact? Decide on your criteria. Which people would you like to receive this marketing?

You can make a marketing list from these record types

• Leads
• Contacts
• Accounts

Each marketing list can only contain one type of record

Choose whether you want to pick recipients manually – a static list or whether you want the list to populate automatically – a dynamic list

Dynamic lists
Are based on search criteria – for example ‘all contacts in the UK’  would create a dynamic marketing list which contains all your contacts in the UK.
Whenever a new UK contact is created, they are automatically added to the list.

Static lists
These lists don’t change members automatically, but you can add and remove them manually as you like. Great for a newsletter list for example.

Create a new marketing list

Open Marketing Lists and select New

• Give the list a name
• Make it descriptive and we suggest including a reference number, as you’ll find you’ll soon have many lists and management can get difficult
• Choose a list type of static or dynamic

Add members to a marketing list

In a static marketing list, you add members by:

• Lookup – Click Manage Members > Add using Lookup. Type a name and select Add
• Advanced find – Click Manage Members > Add using Advanced Find. Here you can build a criteria to add a one-off group of members into the list

In a Dynamic Marketing List, you add members by clicking Manage Members and editing or creating a view criteria. More details on Microsoft’s website

Once you’ve selected who to contact, now choose how to contact them…

How to set up a marketing campaign in Dynamics 365 Sales

Choose which type of campaign

There are two type of campaigns  – a Campaign and a Quick Campaign.

• Use Quick Campaigns for a one-off, simple activity like a bulk email, or a phone call.
• Use Campaigns for longer-term multi-activities with reporting.

Create a campaign in Dynamics 365 Sales

• Click Campaigns > New
• Choose a descriptive name and add a code number to make cross referencing easier
• Choose a type and add start dates
• Save the record
• In the Marketing Lists section click add Add Existing Marketing List
• Choose the lists you want to receive this campaign’s activities

Sending emails or scheduling activities from a campaign

Activities are the things you want to happen as part of a campaign, they include

• Planning activities (useful if you record your time spent against campaigns)
• Emails
• Phone calls

Select New Campaign Activity from the Campaign Activities area

1. Add a descriptive name for the activity
2. Choose a channel for this activity
3. Choose start / end dates (for your records, these do not affect when activities are scheduled)
4. In the Anti-Spam Settings section, enter the minimum number of days you like this contact to wait after receiving a previous activity
5. Save the campaign activity. Add this point, no activities have been created

To send emails

• Open the email Campaign Activity you created
• Click Distribute Campaign Activity in the command bar
• The New Email pop up will open

• Either use an existing Email Template or compose the email directly in this window
  • You can add merge fields (dynamics text) to the template – see how here
• Select an activity due date (this does NOT schedule the email. Emails are sent immediately)
• Choose a subject and a user to send the email from
• Use the unsubscribe button to add an unsubscribe link

• Click Distribute and choose who will own the activities.
• The email will be sent immediately

To schedule other campaign activities

• Open the email Campaign Activity you created
• Click Distribute Campaign Activity in the command bar
• Choose a due date, a subject and a description for the activity
• Select Distribute
• Choose who should own these activities
• Select Distribute, and the activities will be created.
• Remember, there is no automation here. Dynamics users will see these activities and will have to manually contact the recipients to fulfil and close the activity

NOTE: Activities won’t be created for recipients who have opted out

• If Bulk Email = Do Not Allow, no emails will be sent
• If Phone = Do Not Allow, no phone call activities will be created
• If Direct Mail = Do Not Allow, no mail activities will be created

The Email Allow / Do Not Allow field controls whether emails can be sent to the recipient via Dynamics

View Campaign Activities

Each campaign has a timeline where you can see all the campaign’s activities

Also, each activity will show on the recipient’s timeline

If you want to see more about reporting on emails, look at our advanced guide to campaigns

Using Quick Campaigns to send a bulk email in Dynamics 365 Sales

For a one off campaign, it’s easier to use a quick campaign

• Open the Marketing List you’d like to send the campaign to
• From the Quick Campaigns area, choose New Quick Campaign
• Choose an activity type and owners for the activity
• For emails
• Select a template or compose an email
• Select Next and Create
• For other activities
• Choose a due date, subject and description
• Select create

You can also create a quick campaign from a list of contacts. Just select the contacts from the list and choose Quick Campaign (possibly in the hidden menu) > For Selected Records

What marketing can Dynamics 365 Sales do?

Comparing Dynamics 365 Sales and Dynamics 365 Marketing

FAQs

What is the difference between Dynamics 365 Marketing and Dynamics 365 Sales?

Briefly, Dynamics 365 Marketing is a fully featured marketing platform which competes with other commercial platforms. Dynamics 365 Sales has some marketing features, but lacks a lot of the flexibility and automation. See the table above

What are campaigns in Dynamics 365?

Campaigns in Dynamics 365 contain collections of marketing activities and information about budgeting and time spent. They’re useful for reporting on RoI (return on Investment)

What is the difference between Quick Campaigns and Campaigns in Dynamics?

Quick Campaigns are used to create one-off activities which aren’t part of a wider marketing campaign. Quick campaign lack a lot of the reporting features of Campaigns