Microsoft Office 2003 All-in-One

Creating business accounts allows you to track individuals that you do business with. Creating accounts in the BCM allows you to take a big-picture approach to managing business information. An account is a company, organization, or other institution that you do business with.

After different company accounts have been entered into the BCM, you can then associate individual business contacts with a particular account. For example, you may have several different employees from a business listed in your business contacts. Associating them with a particular account allows you to better document the interactions that you have with that company and their employees (we discuss associating contacts with an account later in the lesson).

To create an account in the BCM, follow these steps:

1. Select Contacts on the Navigation pane , and then select Accounts in the Business Contact Manager .

2. Place the mouse on an empty spot in the Accounts pane, and double-click. A new Account dialog box will open (see Figure 21.5).

   Figure 21.5. You can create accounts in Business Contact Manager.

3. Provide the account name for the account (such as a company name ).

4. You can type the name of the primary contact, or you can select from your business contact list. To the right of the Primary contact text box, click the ellipse (...) button. A Contacts dialog box will appear showing the business contacts that you have entered in the BCM. Select a contact from the list and then click OK .

5. Enter the address and other information for the account including the Account financial information. You can also add categories to the account.

6. Click the Details tab of the Account dialog box. Enter the type of business, territory, and other information as needed. You can also add notes related to the business on the Details tab.

7. When you have completed entering the account information, click Save and Close .

You can open any of the accounts in the Account pane by double-clicking on the account. As with business contacts, you can also add Account History events such as e- mails and phone calls. Other items such as Word documents, Excel workbooks, and Access databases can also be associated with an account. We discuss linking items such as other Office documents to an account later in the lesson.