I have been searching for CTI solutions for Dynamics CRM 2011 and found Flexor CTI is a good choice which provides most of common CTI features, such as click-to-dial, screen popping, on-screen call control, journal and log calls direct to customer records in Dynamics CRM, and also management reporting. This add-on is very easy to install and configure, and it supports a wide range of telephony devices. You could find the list of supported devices here.
This blog post goes through the steps to integrate Flexor CTI Add-on with an on-premier Dynamics CRM 2011 through Asterisk PBX.
- Download and install Flexor CTI for Dynamics CRM add-on.
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After the add-on is installed, a configuration dialogue is poped up. you need firstly login the Flexor CTI manager with your account. If you have not gotten a account, you can register as a trial user with 14 days trial period.
- Looking for telephony devices in your organisation.
As the telephony devices used in this example are based on Asterisk PBX. We need set the asterisk server details and AMI (Asterisk Manager Interface) user credentials. Flexor CTI communicates with Asterisk server through AMI, so we need edit the manager.conf in Asterisk server to enable AMI and also create a user credential for connecting to the AMI. You could find more details for configuring Asterisk Server here.
After the Flexor CTI manager connects to Asterisk server, you could scan the server and get all the available telephony devices in your organisation. Then you could select and add the telephony device you want to connect to the current PC.
Now, the Flexor CTI manager is installed and configured.
- Deploy Flexor CTI customisation solution on Dynamics CRM. Firstly, locate the “CamrivoxFlexorDynamicsCTI_managed.zip” file in the Flexor CTI program folder (in Program Files folder). Then log on Dynamics CRM and navigate to Solutions page, import the “CamrivoxFlexorDynamicsCTI_managed.zip” solution to the Dynamics CRM instance.
Don’t forget to publish the solution after it is imported.
- Repeat step 1 – 3 to install Flexor CTI add-on on all client PCs in your organisation.
Now, the Flexor CTI is integrated with Dynamincs CRM system. As the snapshot below shows, you can directly make a phone call to your contacts through the Dynamics CRM UI.
Once there is a phone call coming in, an inbound call panel pops up. You could hang off, hold, forward the phone call through the panel.
In addition, you could add the caller into Dynamics CRM as a Lead, Contact, or Account. Also, you could create a customer service Case record from the phone call.
More importantly, you can edit subject and journal entry on the call panel. Once the phone call is completed, the phone call activity will be logged in Dynamics CRM.
