Dynamics CRM provides a rich set of processes related to the execution of marketing activities. Campaigns are the centerpiece of Dynamics CRM Marketing module. Let's see how a campaign is created and executed:

1. Creating a new Campaign: Navigate to Marketing | Campaigns and click on the New Campaign button:

Let's see the second part of the same screenshot:

Let's see the third part of the same screenshot:

The following are some of the important details on the Campaign form:

• • Basic information: This consists of the campaign name, campaign code, currency, campaign type, and the expected response percentage. An out-of-the-box campaign box can have values such as Advertisement, Direct Marketing, Event, Co-branding, and Other.
  • Schedules: These consist of dates related to the launch of the campaign.
  • Activities: This grid consists of all the activities related to the campaign, such as out-of-box Phone Call, Appointment, Task, and Email.
  • Marketing lists: This grid consists of all the marketing lists, which are to be targeted by the Campaign.
  • Leads: This grid consists of the individual leads that are to be targeted in the campaign.
  • Campaign activities: This grid defines the list of activities that will be executed in the campaign.
  • Financial details: This section consists of fields related to the execution of the campaign.
  • Response: The grid consists of all the responses that the customers have given to various campaign activities.

2. Adding a marketing list to the campaign: On the campaign form, a user can add the marketing lists, which will be targeted by the Campaign:

The members count indicate the number of records present in the marketing list.

3. Adding individual leads to the campaign: On the Campaign form, a user can add the individual lead records that are to be targeted in the campaign:

4. Adding Campaign Activities to the Campaign: On the Campaign form, you can click on the Add button to create New Campaign Activity. This will launch a new form for Campaign Activity:

Mentioned below is some of the important information that needs to be filled in the Campaign Activity:

• • Channel: This defines the mode of Campaign Activity execution. Possible values are Email, Task, Phone Call, Appointment, Fax, and Letter.
  • Scheduled Start: This is the start time of execution of the Campaign Activity.
  • Scheduled End: This is the end time of execution of the Campaign Activity.
  • Allocated Budget: This is the budget that has been allocated for the execution of the Campaign Activity.
  • Actual Cost: This is the total amount actually spend in execution of Campaign Activity.
  • MARKETING LIST: The marketing lists will be copied across from the associated Campaign.

Check out the following screenshot:

5. Approving the campaign: To start the campaign execution, you must firstly approve the campaign. You need to change the status of the campaign to Launched. This will launch the campaign:

6. Distributing the Campaign Activities: After the campaign is launched, you need to distribute the predefined campaign activities. This needs to be done on the Campaign Activity form:

On clicking the button, appropriate activities will be generated for each member present in the marketing list. As the channel of Campaign Activity is Phone Call, the click action will open a form for entering the basic details about the phone call activity. Some of the fields, such as To, will be read-only, as they are to be generated automatically by the system:

Click on the Distribute button after entering all the required information. The system will prompt you the user to enter the owner of the generated activities:

As illustrated in the following screenshot, activities for the members mentioned in the marketing lists will be automatically generated:

7. Capturing Campaign Response: As this is an outgoing phone call activity, you need to manually convert the associated phone call activity to a campaign response:

On clicking the button, a Campaign Response form will open:

The following are some of the important fields related to Campaign Response:

• Customer: This is the contact, lead, or account to which the call is made.
• Response Code: This is the response that the customer gave. Its possible values are Interested, Not interested, Do not Send Marketing Material, and Error.
• Received On: This is the date of response receipt.

Once you click and save the form, Campaign Response will be updated on the Campaign form: