Upgrading From Act! to SalesLogix

It's not so difficult to upgrade from Act! to SalesLogix, as a matter of fact, Sage has made upgrading from Act! to SalesLogix rather straightforward for their business partners and their clients as they provide a discount on the SalesLogix licenses when upgrading from ACT! however there are still things that need to be kept in mind when doing so.

Where is the Data that Act! stores?

Act! data can be stored in a variety of places, in older versions of Act! the data store utilizes dBase files accessed via the CodeBase xBase data access engine but not all ACT! data is stored in standard dBase files, and furthermore not all ACT! data which is stored in dBase files is stored using dBase data type standards. For the data not stored in dBase files other flat file formats are used and the ACT! COM based API is needed to retrieve the information from the various data stores which comprise the ACT! “database”. If upgrading from Act! to SalesLogix using a newer Act! version oftentimes this data is stored in a SQL database which helps facilitate the migration of existing Customer and Prospect data.

Each unique ACT! data store will need to be evaluated to determine what modifications have been made to the data store itself. If many individual ACT! databases will be required to be imported into the SalesLogix database and they all have identical data stores the evaluation stage is only required to be performed on the first unique example of the data store and the other stages of the data import process will use the evaluation of the first database for the rest of the databases.

 

The first step in Upgrading from Act! to SalesLogix then would be "The Evaluation Stage"

The Steps we Take in Evaluating the Data to Migrate from ACT! to SalesLogix

The evaluation stage of the data migration process reviews the modifications made to the Act! data store to ensure that the data for the Act Database which is stored is included in the import process.

Each unique ACT! data store will need to be evaluated to determine what modifications have been made to the data store itself unless the decision is made to centralize the Act! data into a single datastore (via synchronization) when upgrading to SalesLogix. If many individual ACT! databases will be required to be imported into the SalesLogix database and they all have identical data stores the evaluation stage is only required to be performed on the first unique example of the data store and the other stages of the data import process will use the evaluation of the first database for the rest of the databases.

During the Evaluation stage items which will be mapped to fields maintained by a SalesLogix Picklist will be identified. If the nomenclature of the two fields does not align either a field will need to be added to the PickList in SalesLogix or the data will have to be converted during (or immediately following) the data transformation service run to match the values chosen to be used in SalesLogix. Also during this stage there may be fields found that are data type incompatible which will need to be changed or fields that are identified as NULL in ACT! which are not allowed to be NULL in SalesLogix. Any of these items that are found will be documented and provided with the Data Mapping document for review and approval. The level of effort required to normalize this data can be extremely variable although usually minor. An estimate to perform the work for the data normalization will be provided with the data mapping if these items are found. During the Evaluation Phase a data import specialist will review the customizations made to the instance of the ACT! data store that has been provided which is to be migrated/upgraded to SalesLogix. When Rocky Mountain CRM receives the database a list of custom fields (if any) that should not be brought over should be provided with database so time and effort is not expended on fields no longer required in the new SalesLogix database.

 

Displaying Data in SalesLogix which was once in Act! – The Field Creation Stage

The effort required in the data mapping and field creation stage depends on the discoveries found during the evaluation stage. During this stage the data to be imported from the ACT! data store must be mapped to the SalesLogix database – most of the standard fields in ACT! 5.0 and ACT! 6.0 will be readily mapped to your SalesLogix database however the custom fields that should be ported to SalesLogix from ACT! Will require special attention if they need to be replicated within the SalesLogix database.

Depending on the type and quantity of the information to be imported the data mapping and data structure creation stage can be rather easy to complete to being quite involved. Considerable familiarity with both the ACT! data store model and your SalesLogix database is required to perform this work.

 

ACT! and SalesLogix data storage methods

Act! and SalesLogix differ substantially in the method in which data is stored in each application. Not only are there the differences between the ContAct vs. Account centric implementation of the two databases and the unique way in which ACT! creates its data store, but there are also schema representational challenges which need to be managed. For example ACT! allows for "N" e-mail addresses while SLX (out of the box) allows for only 3 per contAct (email, secondaryemail, and email3). The data in ACT! therefore in some cases will need to be flattened in order to bring into SalesLogix and placed in a 1:1 table and in others instances one ‘record’ in ACT! will be pivoted into many different records in SalesLogix as the data is normalized. The steps to upgrade Act! to SalesLogix (with regards to the data) are: Data Translation File Creation, Running of the DTS, Cleansing and Validation of the resulting data.

Immediately following the data mapping and approval and once the database structure has been completed the custom fields will be added to our standard Data Transformation Service File. Oftentimes the Account records must be “deduced” from the ACT! ContAct data as formal Account records do not normally exist in the ACT! datastore, if groups are being used to provide the “Account” functionality (which is rarely the case) some additional work will be required to manage this relationship between the contActs and the Groups / Accounts they’re associated with. If your database is not set up in this way then a SalesLogix Account record will be created for each unique ACT! company value found in the data store of all contAct records during the DTS run.

Due to the inherent data structural differences between ACT! and SalesLogix a few items from ACT! cannot be easily imported into SalesLogix. The items that do not come over into SalesLogix from ACT! require special attention and include:

1) Recurring Activities,
2) Lookups,
3) Reports and Word Templates,
4) Customizations and Layouts, and
5) Attachments

Rocky Mountain CRM has conducted many Act! to SalesLogix Upgrades and Migrations. Please contact us if you are planning an upgrade from Act! to SalesLogix so we may help with your planning.

 

References

Documentation

This document was created based on our experience of upgrading many clients from Act! to Sage SalesLogix. Portions of this document were taken from existing SalesLogix documents.

SalesLogix Database Schema Guide and Database Schema Diagram
SalesLogix Implementation Guide
SalesLogix Planning Guide
SalesLogix Advanced Features Guide
SalesLogix Developer's Reference
SalesLogix Workgroup Administration Help
SalesLogix Architect Help
SalesLogix Developers Network Portal
 

For a complete copy of this white paper:

Upgrading ACT! to SalesLogix

Contact Rocky Mountain CRM in Denver Colorado at (303) 290-1793 or in Phoenix Arizona at (866) 298-9341.