Planned

Outlook/Google Calendar integration to Automatically create a CTA

Votes
dan_ahrens
Rank
Userlevel 7
Badge +1
Hi - an idea that was shared with my by one of my customers was related to creating CTAs automatically through Outlook/Google calendar integration. The use case is as follows:
  • CSM creates a calendar meeting request to their customer to schedule a meeting. While in the calendaring app, they have an option to click a button that will sync that meeting to a CTA in Gainsight.
  • The CTA will be created using relevant content from the meeting request (some details will have to be worked out as to how the correct customer is selected and how other mandatory fields are populated)
  • CTA is now ready to be actioned upon once the meeting is held and the notes are added to the CTA or chatter feed for that customer. 
This would allow for reduction of an extra manual step and will especially assist in cases where customers do not have standing recurring meetings, but instead meet in an ad-hoc basis.

22 replies

heather_bennis
Rank
Agree 100%.  An overall integration with Outlook would be really handy to sync contacts, emails, calendar events, and tasks. 
nicole_mendonca_6a33dc
Rank
Userlevel 3
I also got this feedback from my CSMs! They dislike the extra clicks / steps to manage a CTA and also manage their calendar, which is essentially doing the same thing "Schedule Admin call", "Lock in EBR" etc etc. 
darkknight
Rank
Userlevel 7
Badge +2
I'm thinking it could prove difficult to initiate this from the Outlook or Google Calendar since Gainsight doesn't own/manage those interfaces.  

It seems more likely that while creating a CTA in Gainsight there could be a button to say "Add to Calendar" with the option to pull in contacts to include in the calendar entry and a prompt to send an invite.   

There appears to be requests already for calendar integration https://community.gainsight.com/gainsight/topics/add-cockpit-integration-for-google-calendar-or-simi...  but been a while since there has been an update.
Jeffrey Kirkpatrick
grace_boyle
Rank
With other CS platforms I've used there's been a simple integration with Gmail and Outlook, that includes all emails, etc. automatically syncing (no matter who is emailing that customer as long as they've setup the sync and the contact is in said tool or in our case, SFDC). 

Right now we're using BCC for Me a Chrome app that syncs in their BCC SFDC email and pulling in a custom object  of all "Activity" to c360 but it doesn't look pretty and is hard to view. 

I think displaying customer communication in one place and what's happening with the customer, is key. Would love to see this too!
allastair_meffen
Rank
If this could be done through the Salesforce plugin for Outlook that would be ideal.  That plugin already grabs the account information so if it now could use that information to work with Gainsight that would be great.
darkknight
Rank
Userlevel 7
Badge +2
This item shows "Planned" - has there been any progress made on getting this onto the roadmap?
Jeffrey Kirkpatrick
nitisha_rathi
Rank
Userlevel 7
Hi Jeff,

This is not planned for fall release. I will update the ETA once we start scoping for the winter release.

Thanks,
Nitisha
johnpaul_dicks
Rank
Userlevel 2
Hi Nitisha, thanks for this! Any updates on this with regards to the winter release?
nitisha_rathi
Rank
Userlevel 7
Hi JohnPaul,  

This will not be available in winter release. I will post updates here once I have a tentative ETA.

Thanks,
Nitisha
miles_beckstead
Rank
Would love this and seems like an obvious move for gainsight.  We use a tool called Calendly that integrates with salesforce, but it's suboptimal for our use case.  
candacemarie_mitcham
Rank
Userlevel 1
Agreed!  We have like asks from our CSMs.
Candace-Marie Mitcham - Escalations Manager, Client Sales - 8x8
C
Rank
Userlevel 7

Hello All,
This post of multiple request, let me update what is available right now and what is planned.

Currently available:

  • Chrome plugin & Outlook add-in for Gmail & Outlook email respectively, which allows users to consume email templates in Gmail and log emails to timeline from Gmail.
  • Syncing the CTA’s to user calendar, Gcal and Outlool calendar.

Planned:

  • Chrome plugin and Outlook add-in for Gcal and Outlook calendar to log the events from calendars to timeline. Here is the glimpse of how it will look in Gcal.

     

 

katie_b
Rank
Userlevel 6
Badge +1

@chethana What is the status of the calendar plugin to log meetings to timeline? Will this be a separate extension, or just an upgrade to the existing Gainsight Assist extension?

Katie Baker
C
Rank
Userlevel 7

Hello @katie_b 
We are yet to start working on this, plan is to start this starting coming quarter. I will keep you posted about updates.

A
Rank

Hi @chethana You mention that you plan to start work on this in the coming quarter - do you mean Q3 2021? Is this piece of work likely to be delivered before the end of Q3 then?

C
Rank
Userlevel 7

Hello @Andy_Lewis 
Yes, we are planning to start in Q3 2021.

L
Rank
Userlevel 1

Will this be available in Gainsight SFDC, or just Gainsight NXT?  If just NXT, when do you plan to support these features in SFDC?

C
Rank
Userlevel 7

Hello @LoLock 

This will be available for both editions.

L
Rank
Userlevel 1

Hi @chethana Thank you for the follow-up.  FYI - I’m in SFDC edition.  I want to get clarity on your response.

 

6 months ago (See in this thread) you mentioned that CTA sync to GCAL is already available, but I don’t see any documentation for how I can do this within SFDC.  Is this available to us?  Or is it only available for NXT?  If it is not available for SFDC, when will it be?

Additionally, it looks like the upcoming release will allow us to log our GCAL events to timeline activity in a similar fashion to how we log our gmail emails?   Am I reading this correctly?

C
Rank
Userlevel 7

Hello @LoLock 

Creating CTA in Gcal is available for only NXT. i was referring to the ability mentioned above where logging meeting to timeline directly from Gcal, this will be avaialble in both SFDC and NXT.

R
Rank

This would be nice, as I have many upcoming client appointments in Outlook , and existing appointments that could be added to GS.

Z
Rank

I agree, this would be handy to set up and link from the calendar directly

Has work on this been started or a potential ETA?

Reply