Target to Lead conversion, keep track of source?

[wdroush]

I would like to know how many leads come from certain sources (I'd like to later make graphs of leads by source), I'm currently brainstorming how this should be done.

I could make a new field called "source" in the target module, then create a new source for every company source we track, however we'd drop old sources, so I guess that would either cause issues or cause the old leads to get a null value (that would be fine I think...)

The preferred way would be to track the campaign or the target list it came from, I have no clue how I'd do that though.

Any ideas?

[andopes]

What is a source in your business?
A Marketing Campaign or anything else?

Cheers

[wdroush]

What is a source in your business?
A Marketing Campaign or anything else?

Cheers

It's actually going to be a company that provides us with these targets (contact information we bring up when the lead calls in), I so far have them set up as marketing campaigns (we pay them to put out mailers), they give us an excel document with all of these contacts and I upload them into our target list.

I can make them something else if it would provide better tracking.

[andopes]

So you can consider the lead_source dropdown as a list of companies which provide you leads.
You can create this same field on Prospect module and set a logic_hook before_save to copy this field into Leads when you are going to convert a Prospect into a new Lead.

Let us know if you need clarification over that approach.

Cheers

[wdroush]

So you can consider the lead_source dropdown as a list of companies which provide you leads.
You can create this same field on Prospect module and set a logic_hook before_save to copy this field into Leads when you are going to convert a Prospect into a new Lead.

Let us know if you need clarification over that approach.

Cheers

That sounds excellent, okay so prospects are under the target list, yes?

I'm just getting into logic hooks so hopefully I'll be able to pick this up easily.

[wdroush]

Okay, again I find that SugarCRM supports the functionality I want, I'm just implementing it wrong.

Target lists allow for not only targets to be on them, but also leads, this is exactly what I want. (Later I want to add report functionality as to leads per target list vs. all leads)

However, you must go back into the target list, go under "leads" and select the lead, how can I make it so when you convert a target to a lead that this action is automatically performed by the system? I guess I can use the logic hook before_save to go get the ID of the target list... and somehow add the yet-created lead to it...? On the right track?

Thanks.

[wdroush]

However I've found an issue, after you convert the target to a lead, other people can still convert that target to a lead without error (causing duplicate leads)!

Eek I guess that would also be a logic hook (I guess I can do this both with the same logic hook eh...)? Look for the same name/refcode, and somehow return the user to an error page?

[andopes]

However, you must go back into the target list, go under "leads" and select the lead, how can I make it so when you convert a target to a lead that this action is automatically performed by the system? I guess I can use the logic hook before_save to go get the ID of the target list... and somehow add the yet-created lead to it...? On the right track?

Yes, you are almost there!
But instead of a before_save you need to implement an after_save on Leads.

[wdroush]

Yes, you are almost there!
But instead of a before_save you need to implement an after_save on Leads.

Ok and I'd just write a bunch of SQL queries by hand? Or is there a way to add a lead to a target using Sugar's framework (sorry for a silly question but I have issues finding documentation on functions and classes for Sugar).

Eek but these is an issue, how can I tell the difference between a user that is converting a Prospect to a Lead, and someone just saving a Lead? I want to check if the Lead already exists and not let the user continue to prevent duplicate (or stealing) Prospects to the Lead table, however I'd be doing a lookup on the Lead table to see if they exist, and if so, to stop adding them, but this code will be fired off if you open a lead, change and save it, and will find the lead you're editing and say that it's already created.

Hmm... Basically I need a flag set that "I'm converting a prospect", does this flag exist?

[andopes]

the request variables ($_REQUEST) provide you information which can let you decide it.

Cheers