sage crm | Schulz Consulting

Where Can I Download Sage 100 ERP (fka MAS90 or MAS200) version 2013?

December 14, 2012 by Wayne Schulz

Sage has just turned on their landing page for the new release of Sage 100 ERP 2013.

This release of Sage 100 ERP 2013 is available entirely by download. There are no disks sent by mail. Luckily the process for downloading the 2.29 GB file is very simple (see instructions below) and takes under an hour (depending upon your connection speed).

Once downloaded you will have a single self-extracting EXE file which when clicked creates a folder holding the entire installation disk (including Crystal Reports). Separate downloads are needed if you use Sage CRM or Sage Intelligence reporting.

Once downloaded you can install your upgrade (we strongly recommend consulting your Sage business partner first) from the source files on your server.

Schulz Consulting / DSD Business Systems customers should not worry about downloading the file as we’ve already secured copies and will transfer this file (as well as all other files needed to upgrade) onto your servers via the use of Dropbox which will synchronize the files overnight for you.

This update introduces several enhancements to Sage 100 ERP (fka MAS90 and MAS200)

Visual Process Flows – Menu “maps” make navigating the system easier than ever.
Sage Exchange integration for credit cards now allows for use of credit card swipers (Important: Talk to your partner about the conversion process as it may be more time consuming if you have many years of credit card history. Also please recall that PC Charge is no longer supported on Sage 100 ERP 2013).
Customers and vendors may now be designated as inactive.
Cleared checks from Bank Reconciliation now show up in Account Payable vendor maintenance.
Multiple ERP companies can access a single Sage CRM database.
Sage Advisor notifies you when it’s time to upgrade

The Sage 100 ERP 2013 software may be downloaded from:

CUSTOMERS:

Sage 100 ERP customers on a Business Care plan can download your copy by logging on to the Customer Portal, and then clicking on www.Sage100ERP.com/download2013. Before you download, Sage recommends that you check with your certified solution provider to assist with your upgrade.

PARTNERS:

Sage 100 ERP certified Business Partners can download your copy by logging onto the Partner Portal, and then clicking on www.Sage100ERP.com/download2013.

Detailed Information On What’s New in Sage 100 ERP 2013 fka MAS90 MAS200

For a more in-depth description of new features in this release – please review either of the PDF files

Sage 100 ERP – At-a-Glance Version Enhancements Version 2013 (PDF)

Sage 100 ERP 2013 Detailed Release Guide (PDF)

Need help understanding your upgrade options? Contact Us.

Sage 100 ERP Webcast: SageCRM Integration to Sage 100 ERP Drives Growth

September 8, 2012 by Wayne Schulz

If your business lags in responding to customer needs…if you’re plagued by a lack of visibility into customer buying habits…or if your front- and back-office teams aren’t seeing the same information…help is at hand!

With Sage CRM and Sage 100 ERP (formerly MAS 90 | 200), you can unify the sales and marketing aspects of your business. CRM supports the whole sales process — from your initial marketing campaign, lead and opportunity generation, quotes, to winning the sale, and finally, to fulfilling the order and providing outstanding customer service. Your marketing department will be able to justify the costs of their campaigns just as your salespeople will be able to track their forecasted sales. Plus, sales managers have a full view of their team’s productivity. Your staff will work more effectively because every aspect of your operations will be connected while your limited or expensive resources are optimized.

Sage CRM integration with Sage 100 ERP
Sage CRM integration with MS Outlook
Forecasting within Sage CRM

When: Wed September 12, 2012 – 1pm ET (10am PT)

Where: Online webcast – Register for How integrating Sage CRM with Sage 100 ERP (formerly MAS 90 MAS 200) drives business growth

August 2012 Webinars: Sage CRM, Sage 100 v4.5, BizNet Reporting

July 9, 2012 by Wayne Schulz

Our webinar calendar for 2012 has just been released. Below are the free sessions we will host during the month of August 2012:

Session 1: How Integrating Sage CRM with Sage 100 ERP (formerly MAS 90 | 200) Drives Business Growth

Sage CRM integration with Sage 100 ERP (formerly MAS 90 | 200)
Sage CRM integration with Microsoft Outlook
Forecasting within Sage CRM

Date: Tuesday August 14, 2012 – 10 am PT / 1 pm ET – 60 Minutes – REGISTER HERE

Session 2: What’s New in Sage 100 ERP Version 4.5 (formerly MAS 90 | MAS 200)

Sage 100 ERP version 4.5 (formerly MAS 90 and 200) is here, and everything you’ve heard about the new features and benefits are all true and ready for you when you upgrade. In fact, there is so much for everyone that one hour isn’t enough time to cover all of the tremendous enhancements and inclusions, so we will be taking a broad look at the main points that everyone should know about, such as National Accounts for Account Receivable, integrated Customer Relationship Management, and the Reporting Tree capability for financial reports. We’ll also discuss the option to migrate to Sage 100 Premium ERP (SQL server).

Date: Wednesday August 8, 2012 – 10 am PT / 1 pm ET – REGISTER HERE

Session 3: Meet the next generation excel-based, financial reporting solution for Sage 100, 300, 500 ERP.

BizNet’s award winning Excel® Business Information Suite is the most innovative and intuitive reporting solution on the market. It is a business reporting and analytics platform that provides real-time access to your business data from Microsoft Office Excel®. It delivers simple, yet powerful capabilities to anyone who uses spreadsheets to gather and analyze business information. With over 200 Partners, over 9 ISV’s, and Customers in over 14 different countries, BizNet has been selected as a top reporting solution by industry analysts.

Contact Jeff Keirns at 800-627-9032 x123 to book a demo

Our Upcoming Sage Webinars: Trade-Ins, Sage CRM, MAS v4.5, BizNet

March 12, 2012 by Wayne Schulz

Here are the current list of upcoming Sage webinars for the period March 20 through April 12, 2012:

Learn how to take advantage of the Sage Cash for Clunkers Promo and trade in your old Sage MAS 90/200 for the NEW Sage 100 ERP v4.5 and get up to 50% Off!*

FINAL DAYS – expires 3/31/2102 – no extensions!

Sage ERP MAS 90 and 200 version 4.5 is here, and everything you’ve heard about the new features and benefits are all true and ready for you when you upgrade. In fact, there is so much for everyone that one hour isn’t enough time to cover all of the tremendous enhancements and inclusions, so we will be taking a broad look at the main points that everyone should know about, such as National Accounts for Account Receivable, integrated Customer Relationship Management, and the Reporting Tree capability for financial reports. We’ll also discuss the option to migrate to Sage ERP MAS 200 SQL.

Length: 60 minutes
Instructor: Leanne Lowe

Days/Times:

Tuesday March 20, 2012 – 10am PT / 1pm ET – register

Wednesday March 28, 2012 – 10am PT / 1pm ET – register

How Integrating Sage CRM with Sage ERP Drives Business Growth

With Sage MAS 90 | 200 and Sage CRM, you can unify the sales and marketing aspects of your business. CRM supports the whole sales process — from your initial marketing campaign, lead and opportunity generation, quotes, to winning the sale, and finally, to fulfilling the order and providing outstanding customer service. Your marketing department will be able to justify the costs of their campaigns just as your salespeople will be able to track their forecasted sales. Plus, sales managers have a full view of their team’s productivity. Your staff will work more effectively because every aspect of your operations will be connected while your limited or expensive resources are optimized.

Sage CRM integration with Sage MAS 90 | 200
Sage CRM integration with Microsoft Outlook
Forecasting with Sage CRM

Length: 60 heart pounding minutes
Instructor: Leanne Lowe

Tuesday April 3, 2012 – 10am PT / 1pm ET – register

What Is New in Sage MAS 90 | 200 Version 4.5?

Length: 60 minutes
Instructor: Leanne Lowe

Wednesday April 4, 2012 – 10am PT / 1pm ET – register

BizNet Excel-Based Financial Reporting for Sage ERP

Are you looking to enhance your reporting and analytics capabilities for Sage MAS 90 | 200, Sage MAS 500, or Sage Accpac?

Meet the next generation excel-based reporting solution.

Length: 60 minutes
Instructor: Denise Hutchison

Thursday April 12, 2012 – 10am PT / 1pm ET – register

Sage Act! moves from being a strategic CRM product to a value product

December 16, 2008 by Wayne Schulz

UPDATE May 2009: There has been a re-organization of roles within Sage which may result in the Sage Act! product line moving out of the Value Business division.

In a blog post dated December 9, 2008, David Van Toor, General Manager for Sage CRM North America announced that he handed over the supervision and management of the Act! product line to Sam Hunter, GM Value Business.

Van Toor presently has North American management responsibility for the Sage North America CRM line which until now have included: Saleslogix, SageCRM and Act!.

The responsibility for the Act! product line will now be transitioned to Sam Hunter as per this announcement which was posted on David Van Toor’s blog at the Sage Community Forum for Act!.

From his blog post:
The past 18 months have been a highlight of my career as I’ve lead the North American operations for the ACT! product line.

I’m proud of my team’s accomplishments in that time, including the creation of this vibrant on-line community, and increasing the value of being an ACT! customer through the ACT! Platinum Care subscription offering.We’ve also seen support hold times reduce, and service levels increase. The global product delivery team delivered ACT! version 11, which many of you have told me is simply “the best ACT! version ever!” ).

As some of you know, I also managed our mid-market solutions of SalesLogix and SageCRM. When we took a look at the level of attention both groups of products could benefit from, we decided I could not do justice to both.

Consequently, effective immediately, I’ll be focused on the North American operations of SalesLogix and SageCRM.

The North American leadership for ACT! will shift to Sam Hunter. Sam is a trusted colleague, and he and I share many management philosophies. I look forward to the benefits his leadership will bring to our staff, and to you, our customers.

This then will be my last post to this community site. This community has become so strategic to Sage that we’ve created a new position to focus exclusively on its development, and I know Sam’s new team will be continuing communications in this forum in an appropriate manner.

Such a transition carries mixed emotions for me. I’m sad to formerly leave a community of customers with whom I have formed strong relationships with, and whom have taught me much about delivering excellent customer experiences. I’ve enjoyed my interactions with you, and these have shaped my view of what it means to present a professional and caring business. I’m also excited to be able to focus my energies on SalesLogix and SageCRM, and drive their growth in today’s uncertain economy.

Should you wish to continue to read blogs by me, I welcome you to www.davidvantoor.com, and to the new blog I’ll be establishing on the soon to be launched SalesLogix customer community.

To all ACT! customers, a sincere thank you for your passion and loyalty.To all of you who’ve I’ve spoken with through this community, a special thank you for you willingness to engage directly in this new, Web 2.0 business world.Should your CRM needs change, I’d love the opportunity to work with you again.

Dave van Toor.

What Does Sage Act! As A Value Product Mean?

On the surface this may appear to be only an offloading of responsibilities from one busy general manager to another. However Sam Hunter is the GM who supervises the Value Business line at Sage North America.

The Value Business line is widely understood to include those products that are not strategic to Sage North America and therefore would not typically be first in line for research and development or marketing resources.

We don’t think this signals that Act! is being downplayed by Sage in any way. It almost certainly will continue to be funded and developed. Rather what is more likely is that instead of receiving further development efforts to integrate Act! to existing Sage ERP systems it will continue as a standalone CRM product sold primarily through resellers and retail.

This transition of Act! from the CRM division to the Value Business may signal a different positioning for the Act! product line and we’ll have to see if there is any official word (other than the blog posting) issued by Sage,

UPDATE: According to Sage – “ACT! is a strategic product for us. Sam Hunter is now responsible for both the Value Business Unit and the ACT! Business Unit.”

UPDATE: Several Act! consultants have pointed out that Sage’s CRM 2010 prominently features the ACT! product line aside Salelogix and SageCRM.They question whether this movement of Act! outside the traditional CRM group points to a change in the integration plans for the three Sage CRM products announced 9 months ago.

As part of this plan (documented in this March 2008 document titled Sage CRM Solutions 2010 Strategy):
A key part of the CRM 2010 technology strategy is to evolve all Sage CRM Solutions products to support integration with other applications using a common CRM integration contract approach. This approach is Web services-based and is independent of any particular implementation. Any service provider or service consumer can implement the contract. This leads to flexible, lightweight, loosely-coupled integrations.

The initial use of the contract integration is for application to application integration — this could be ACT! to Sage 50 Accounts for example. Each application can choose to publish information, as well as consume information. This same system is then used to generate feeds of information from the CRM application so that customers can view information through a standard Web browser or feed reader.

Link: Passing the torch – David Van Toor blog entry on Act! Community site