← Back to Listing

Assigning Contacts in VanillaSoft

Overview

Customer Journey managers are responsible for setting up a campaign ("Team") in VanillaSoft, which is the list of the contacts that are available to be called on for the campaign. The manager is also responsible for assigning these contacts to BDTM.

VanillaSoft Team Setup

The process for setting up a campaign team in VanillaSoft is shown in this video.

 

Contact Assignment

Contacts are assigned when: 

  • A new campaign begins
  • Contacts are being reassigned from one BDTM to another 
  • New contact data is received
  • Remaining contacts from the list are assigned to continue campaign
  • The PM needs to take contacts out of rotation or wants to handle those calls (in which case the PM assigns contacts to themselves)

Contacts are usually assigned alphabetically through the data list. Contact volume assigned to each BDTM is determined based on number of contacts. As a guide:

  • For every 8 hours of work a BDTM is assigned to a campaign, they should have 100 contacts.
  • For every 16+ hours of work a BDTM is assigned to a campaign, they should have minimum of 200 contacts.

 

How to Assign Contacts in VanillaSoft

  1. Log in to your VanillaSoft account. 
  2. Click on the project in which your campaign is located. 
  3. Click "Contact Management" on the left side navigation menu. 
  4. Locate the "Assign Contacts Query".
  5. Click "Select this Query".
  6. Click "Edit this Query".
  7. Under the "Team" field, open the drop-down menu under "Value" and click the campaign name.
  8. Next to the "Contact Owner" field select the person for which the contacts are assigned under "Value". [Refer to point two in the overview section above for assigning  contacts].
    1. If this is a new data upload and you are the project manager, select your email address. [This will make it easier to delegate contacts to other BDTMs and ensures control over the contact list].
    2. If this is an existing data set and you are adding contacts to another BDTM, you can either reassign the contacts to yourself (PM) and then delegate them to the BDTM. 
  9. Next to the "Flagged" field, set the "Filter" to "equal to" then open the drop-down menu under "Value" and select "True".
  10. Next to the "Closed Flagged" field, set the "Filter" to "equal to" then open the drop-down menu under "Value" and select "False".
  11. Next to the "Lead Status" field, set the "Filter" to "not equal to".
  12. Open the drop-down menu under "Value" and select "Opportunity".
  13. Click "Run Query". Do not click "Save as New" or "Update Query".
  14. Click the blue column header "Company" once to sort in alphabetical order.
  15. Scroll to the right side of the page and next to "Show", click the drop down menu and select "1000" to include more results on one page.
  16. Scroll down on the page until you get to contact number 200 (or whichever volume you need to assign).
  17. Locate the company name of the 200th contact (or whichever volume you need to assign). Highlight it, right click, then click "Copy". 
  18. Scroll up to the top of the page and click the "Edit Query" button.
  19. Next to the "Company" field, open the drop-down menu under "Filter" and select "equal to or less than".
  20. Click in the drop-down menu under "Value" and use CTRL + V to paste the company name you previously copied.
  21. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the "Run Query" button.
  22. Results will show contacts that are flagged. Sometimes results will include a little bit more or less than what you thought you were going to get and this is OK.
  23. Click the "Perform Task" button and select "Update Contacts".
  24. Check the "BDS Name" field and select the email address of the person you want to assign the contacts to.
  25. Check the "Contact Owner" field and select the first and last name of the person you want to assign the contacts to.
  26. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the "Update" button. 
  27. Click the "OK" button on the pop-up window.
  28. Because you searched for the contacts that were assigned to "X contact owner" and you just switched to the contact owner, when the page loads it should show that there are no contacts in the query. This means the contacts were successfully updated/assigned. Continue on to Step #9 to continue assigning out contacts.
  29. Click the "Edit Query" button
  30. Next to the "Company" field, open the drop-down menu under "Filter" and select "--".
  31. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the "Run Query" button.
  32. Repeat Steps 9-27 for the next group of 200. Ensure you keep the "Contact Owner" value in your query so that every time you assign out a new group of contacts, the results won't include ones previously assigned.

 

Team Name Updates

We use an asterisk symbol ( * ) in the VanillaSoft Team name to designate which campaigns are active. This includes active teams in an automated report every Thursday morning at 7:30am, which includes how many active contacts we have for each list. That report enables us to finalize BDTM schedules that are appropriate for the volume of contacts we have per campaign.

All lists must start with an asterisk. Once a list is completed the asterisk must be removed. List status/scenarios:

  • When the campaign is first set up, and when it is active and hours are scheduled or calling will continue: Include *
  • If they are campaigns with no hours assigned and they only exist by orphan: Do not include *
  • If the related campaign no longer has hours assigned but are still finishing out PCC: Remove *
  • If it is a plug-in list: Remove *
  • When the campaign closes, all associated lists for that campaign: Remove *