Work with a Contact Record

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

• Describe the purpose of the contact record.
• Edit the details of a contact.
• Communicate with the contact from the contact record.
• Review past interactions with the contact.

What Is a Contact Record?

In a Salesforce org, every contact (person) has an individual listing that contains the details about the contact and the associated relationships. Contacts can be associated with accounts (businesses), opportunities (deals in progress), cases, and more. You can complete numerous actions such as editing details, initiating and logging communication (we avoided the obvious contact your contact joke), and reviewing past activity from the contact record.

Edit the Details

1. With a contact record open, find the details about this contact record.
2. Click the pencil icon to the right of the Title field.
3. Enter a new title for this contact.
4. Click Save.
5. Click the Edit button at the top of the contact record.
6. Adjust any of the fields.
7. Click Save.

As you can see, there are multiple ways to edit your contact record. The more accurate the information you can gather in the contact record, the better relationship you can create with this contact.

Communicate with the Contact

1. In the activity section (look for the New Event and Log a Call tabs), select Email.
2. Enter text in the Subject text box. Note that From, To, and Bcc are auto-populated but can still be edited.
3. In the section below the subject, enter the body of your email to this contact.
4. If this contact is associated with another record (account, case, orders, and so forth), select the record in the Related To field at the bottom. Relating this communication logs it as an activity on the related object too.
5. Click the arrow next to the icon to change the object.
6. For testing purposes, avoid clicking Send as this will actually send your contact an email. If you were to send this email, it would automatically be added to the past activity log for this contact record.

Log a Communication

Beyond email, there are times when you need to log an offline communication, so it can be referenced later.

1. Click Log a Call.
2. Enter or select the subject of your communication.
3. Enter the relevant comments, notes, or recap from your communication with this contact.
4. Select the related object, if any.
5. Click Save. Don’t worry, this entry can be deleted later.

Review Past Activity

1. Within the activity section, find the timeline. Your logged communication has now been added to this contact’s timeline.
   Note: Any other user who has permission to access this contact record can see this timeline. If you email this contact from the Email tab, the email activity communication is automatically added to this timeline too.
2. Click the arrow to the left of your logged entry to expand and see the communication details.
3. To delete this logged communication, click the down arrow next to your entry and select Delete.
4. Confirm you want to delete.

As you can see, the contact record is incredibly useful for managing the relationship with a contact. Be sure to keep exploring as there is even more that can be done within the contact record.

Resources

• Salesforce Help: Manage Contacts