How do I configure the Retention Centre?

Summary

This article will explain how to configure the Retention Centres and actions within these.

More Information

The Retention Centre is a hub to simplify regular actions required to maintain good relations with customers and foster the best possible business relationship with them. The purpose of this software is to help you to retain customers and thus maximise your business by staying in touch with customers in various ways and reminding them of significant events.

Configure Retention Action Times

Each Action within the Retention Centre can be configured to run within a time frame of the event. To configure a Retention action within the Workshop :

Go to " Reports & Settings Maintenance Options System Administrator Module Settings Workshop Retention Centre Settings".

• Select the Action you wish to edit and press <F2> or click [Details].
• In the "From" and "To" you can enter the range of number of days leading up to an event you want the Retention Centre to report on.
  • For example if you want to send out service reminders between 30 and 15 days before the service is due you would enter '30' in "From" and '15' in "To".
  • This will output the service reminder for the unit as long as the retention centre is processed between 30 and 15 days before the service is due.
• If you do not want a retention action to be performed then enter '0' in the "From" and "To" fields.
• Each action can also be prevented from repeating for a customer or unit within a minimum number of days.
• This can be set using the "Block days" prompt, the default value for this is '120'.

Configure Retention Media Preference

Each Action within the Retention Centre can be configured to output a letter, an E-Mail or a text message. You can further assign the order of preference for each output type.

Go to " Reports & Settings Maintenance Options System Administrator Module Settings Workshop Retention Centre Settings".

• Select the Action you wish to edit and press <F2> or click [Details].
• Under "Media Preference" you have the options for "Mail", "SMS" and "E-Mail", each with a drop down for priority.
• For each Media type set the priority for each method

'0' will indicate not to output the media type and '3' will be the most preferred.

For example if you set "SMS" to '3', "E-Mail" to '2' and "Mail" to '0' this will send out a Text Message as the preferred method, followed by E-Mail and never output a Letter.

• The priorities on here will also take account of customer preferences. For more information on this see here.
• For the "Mail" output the system can also produce an address label for each letter by setting the "Labels" option to 'Yes'.

Configure Retention Media Output

Each Action within the Retention Centre can be configured to output a letter, an E-Mail or a text message. You can further assign the output type.

Go to " Reports & Settings Maintenance Options System Administrator Module Settings Unit Sales Retention Centre Settings".

• Select the Action you wish to edit and press <F2> or click [Details].
• Select the Media output type at the bottom and press <F2> to open the Action Output Settings.
• In the "Report code" field enter the code of your report or press <Ctrl+F1> to open the Report Search window and search for the report you wish to use.
• Click [Close] to save the change.
  • If you have a suitable report you can have the Retention Centre output the details to a file for you to process manually instead of creating the letters and messages from within Platinum.
• If you have a standard message you wish to use instead of a report change the "Output type" option to 'Message'.
• In the "Message" field press <Ctrl+F1> to open the Message Search window and select the message you wish to use.
• Click [Close] to save the change.

• In the Workshop Retention Centre you will see that some of the actions output Service, MOT and Combination reminders within one action. If you want to output only one of these types, e.g. Service reminders only, then this can be achieved by the following :

Go to " Reports & Settings Maintenance Options System Administrator Module Settings Workshop Retention Centre Settings".

• Select the Action you wish to edit and press <F2> or click [Details].
• Select the "Mail - MOT" Media and press <F2>.
• In the "Report code" field, delete the code entered and click [Close].
• Select the "Mail - Combination" Media and press <F2>.
• In the "Report code" field, enter the report code used for the "Mail - Service" Media. The default for this is '~S1'.
• Click [Close] to save the changes.
  • This will ensure that any customers that have a service due in the same date range as their MOT will also get included.
• Repeat this for the "SMS - MOT", "SMS - Combination", "E-Mail - MOT", "E-Mail - Combination" Media outputs.

Configure Follow up Actions

Each Action within the Retention Centre can be configured to create a follow up task either in Sales Prospecting or Personnel Planning.

Go to " Reports & Settings Maintenance Options System Administrator Module Settings Workshop Retention Centre Settings".

• Select the Action you wish to edit and press <F2> or click [Details].
• Either:
  • To create a Sales Prospecting follow up, in the "Salesman to pursue" field, enter the code of the salesman for whom to create the follow up task.
  • In the "Follow days", enter the number of days after the output is created that it should be followed up. This sets the "Follow up" date in the Sales Prospecting contact.
• Or:
  • To create a Personnel Planning follow up, in the "Employee task" field, enter the code of the employee for whom to create a Personnel Planning task.

See also

• Getting started - Retention Centre
• What print records do I need for the Retention Centre?
• How do I filter out customers I don't want to contact?
• How do I stop PDI's from appearing in the Retention Centre?
• How do I Get my Logo onto Printed Documents?
• How do I create a custom Retention Centre action?
• How do I add advisories to a workshop job?

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