About the time I got ACT!, Symantec's contact manager, installed and working on my notebook, a friend told me about a new, Internet-enabled product optimized for remote and office use. That was the beginning of my wonderful relationship with GoldMine, the contact manager I use every day.

Since I work for a successful Internet Service Provider (Wing.Net), I was looking for more in a sales force automation tool than a sticker proclaiming "Internet Ready." My sales force needs contact management software that works both on- and off-line. It turns out this is just where GoldMine shines: in a networked environment. The interface is straightforward but fully functional; there are literally hundreds of customizable options.

One criticism I have is that GoldMine can be a little slow over a Wide Area Network (WAN). I suspect this is due, at least in part, to the the program's size. GoldMine uses 9190 KB of space on your hard drive, which puts it in the midrange of software bloat. Rest assured that given what it can do, though, it's space well used.

Knowledge retention

As a sales manager I worry about sales reps coming in and building up contact and activity databases on their notebooks, which they take with them when they leave. So one of the first things I look for in a contact management package is the ability to construct a master database on a server that everyone can update to and access daily. Then, when someone leaves, their acquired knowledge is retained. GoldMine offers this crucial but easily overlooked feature.

GoldMine's database is proprietary, but given the number of ODBC drivers available, connectivity has never been an issue. Nor has creating web pages on the fly with requested information, so long as it is done through a browser. In today's cross-platform environment, and with the advent of Informix engines being bundled with Netcape's Suite Spot servers it seemed the way to go.

A feature that will benefit any company with remote offices is the ability to access GoldMine's database via web browser. GoldMine goes well beyond 'Web ready' or 'Web compatible.' One can fully integrate this program into an Intranet and run calendars or capture new information from the web browser, which connects to records stored in the GoldMine database. The product's excellent web integration can be traced to its ODBC connectivity. Here at Wing.Net, for instance, we talk to the GoldMine server using ODBC drivers, then display results on a web page. Any salesperson with a web browser is fully enabled.

Files export easily out of GoldMine. We have pulled records out and put them in an Excel spreadsheet, for example, to share as a mailing list with a client who was not running GoldMine. It worked like a charm -- even the user defined fields!

The way you like it

GoldMine adds value out of the box, but you can tailor it to match your organization's needs. User groups can be set up for major accounts, new trade show leads, divisional/departmental accounts, and the like so that the contacts can be divided into useful groupings. There are varying levels of security so one can keep a separate database or merge several together to make a master database for everyone to work from. There are performance testing capabilities, great import/export wizards, email, phone dialers, document linking, and the list goes on.

I find GoldMine's reporting tools especially valuable for seeing the sales activities and sales forecasts of individuals or groups at any time. One can call up a contact, schedule activities, dial the phone, and forecast a sale all by clicking the right or left mouse button and the forecasts can be graphed for those less number oriented than the sales manger. There is also an option for user-defined fields. How many contact managers have you used that won't let you customize fields? In many cases, I don't need to know a SIC code, but would really like to store an E-mail address since communication is increasingly electronic. No problem. With the user define fields, I substitute one for the other.

Price and value

GoldMine 3.2 for Windows 95 retails for $295 for a single user or $895 for each five-user network license. (Hint: If you currently use ACT! or another competing product, contact the company before you buy to see whether competitive upgrade pricing applies.)

To sum up GoldMine in a sentence: it's a very friendly, very networkable, productivity-boosting contact manager. I give it my highest recommendation.

About the Vendor

At the time of this writing Mark Mac Auley was a Sales Manager at Wing.Net, a provider of full-service Internet and intranet solutions in New England.