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Google Apps CRMS - Nutshell Google Integration Evaluation

Nutshell CRM Google Apps Integration Evaluation - Contacts

Since integration with Google Apps is a key driver in my evaluation, this one of the first criteria I am evaluating in detail. 
Overall (2 out of 5)

There is no true "sync" functionality here, so even if you import your contacts, if you change them either in Gmail contacts, or in Nutshell, then data will get out of sync. This is a problem in my experience. A true integration would keep synced contacts synced.  Import functionality didn't work, and was a bit cumbersome. Overall this is a bummer. Was expecting more.

Contacts Importing (1 out of 5)
  • I don't see anyway to import contacts directly from Google apps contacts. This is a bit of a bummer,  and would seem to be a basic part of functionality.
  • Importing a single contact from gmail works nicely.
  •  Importing from csv.
    • Exported from google contacts to csv. But had problem with UTF-8 Chars in export, so thats a bit of a bummer.
    • Tried with the "Google" format for export, this does not work, not parsable by Nutshell, although the UTF-8 problems were solved.
    • There is not field for "Title" in nutshell, pretty commonly used...
    •  There is no way to go back, after trying a mapping, so I have to start over if I see there are problems, not cool.
    • In the end, could not get even a simple list exported from Gmail to import successfully, problably a combination of 
      • UTF8 issues 
      • Bugs in import functionality
    • It didn't create a single account, even thought I mapped some account Fields. 
    •  
 In summary, importing contacts is not functional from Gmail contacts. Significant problem. And since there is no "sync" functionality, not sure how we are going to get our contacts in. I will try exporting from other sources (our existing sugar CRM for example).


Until then the only way to easily get contacts in will be through gmail email.  

Importing Contacts From Gmail (4 out of 5)
This functionality seems to work quite well. A gadget is added into each gmail message, and Nutshell does a pretty good job of finding (by email address) existing contacts in Nutshell so that you can archive those messages to the CRM. 

If a contact doesnt exist (email address not found), then you are given a simple option to create a contact or account.





Clicking on the link gives you a dialog box to enter the name (not sure why they dont take the name portion of the sender as well...)

 

The contact is immediately created, and you see it in the email message....




    Would be nice to be able to add more information here immediately, like phone, etc. Would be nice also to have this more closely linked to gmail contacts, since we do not want to duplicate.
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