SCOTTSDALE, AZ--(Marketwire - August 21, 2007) - Sage Software today announced availability
of the new ACT! by Sage 2008 product family including ACT! by Sage 2008
(10.0), ACT! by Sage Premium 2008 (10.0), and ACT! by Sage Premium for Web
2008 (10.0). New customizable(1) dashboards anchor this year's product
releases, and allow individuals and workgroups to access priority sales
opportunity and activity details in a comprehensive graphical view.
Additional ACT! 2008 enhancements include editable list views(2), multiple
contact assignments per opportunity, and expanded workgroup security, among
others.
Today's ACT! 2008 product announcements coincide with the 20th anniversary
of ACT!. ACT! established the "Contact Management" software category with
its introduction in 1987. Today ACT! is the number-one selling contact and
customer management solution and preferred choice of over 2.7 million
registered users and over 41,000 additional corporate customers to
organize, access and manage their customer information.
"ACT! continues to benefit millions of users, and gain new users, not only
due to its core productivity features, but also because it continuously
evolves to address new business requirements," said Joe Bergera, executive
vice president and global general manager for Sage CRM Solutions. "Our new
dashboards, for example, deliver rich visual analysis capabilities that
were once only found in enterprise CRM systems. Now, with ACT!, they are
available and affordable for small and mid-size business use."
ACT! 2008 Product Family
ACT! delivers powerful contact and customer management capabilities that
support a full range of desktop, laptop, Web browser and handheld device
access methods that can work seamlessly with a centralized database to help
individuals, selling teams and corporate workgroups improve productivity
and increase sales.
ACT! can be customized for specific business environments and offers
turnkey integration with common business applications such as Microsoft®
Office, Lotus Notes®, Peachtree by Sage, Sage MAS 90 ERP, Sage MAS 200
ERP, QuickBooks®, and BlackBerry®(3), Palm OS®, and Pocket PC
handheld devices(4), among others.
ACT! Premium products include all ACT! features and offer sales teams and
workgroups additional functionality in the areas of centralized
administration, team scheduling, enhanced opportunity tracking, and
advanced data security.
New Dashboard Features
ACT! dashboards provide a comprehensive visual overview of key activities
and opportunities on a single screen. Users can set an ACT! dashboard as
their startup view to begin each day with a snapshot of activities that
require attention, and track their progress against company goals and key
performance indicators. The ACT! by Sage dashboard allows users to track
their individual activities and opportunities. The ACT! Premium and ACT!
Premium for Web dashboards allow team members to track their individual
activities and opportunities, while managers can also track group
performance.
Each ACT! dashboard includes six customizable components: Schedule
At-a-Glance, My Activities, My Opportunities, Opportunity Pipeline by
Stage, Top 10 Opportunities, and Closed Opportunities. Users can hover over
charts and graphs to see associated details, or click graphics to take
further action on any activity or opportunity. Users can also create new
calls, meetings, to-dos, or add additional details to existing
opportunities directly from the dashboard. The entire dashboard, or
components, can be copied into any application including Microsoft Office
applications for use in e-mails, reports, etc.
Managers and administrators can add or remove ACT! dashboard components,
change titles or legends, and utilize drag-and-drop functionality with the
Dashboard Designer to easily customize any default dashboard or create new
dashboard components(5).
New & Improved End-User Productivity Features
Users can quickly edit fields within a contact, group, or company list view
without having to open records individually(6). Multiple contact
assignments per opportunity allow more than one contact to be associated
with an opportunity, so all decision makers associated with a sales
opportunity can be tracked. Users can also view all contacts or products
associated with an opportunity from a list view without having to open the
opportunity.
Document shortcuts can be added to activity and history items without
having to attach full documents, to help control database size and allow
any non-ACT! users to edit documents, while also ensuring the most updated
versions are in the database(7).
An expanded ACT! search capability can perform advanced queries on groups
and companies to find specific information more easily. Advanced queries
can be saved for later searching and re-defining of search criteria.
New & Improved Workgroup Administration And Security Features
Administrators can control data security by limiting a user's or team's
access to any group or company record, determine which users can view
and/or edit group and company information, and limit access to any new
groups and companies created based on pre-set security preferences(8).
Administrators can also temporarily suspend a remote database from
synchronizing to the parent database to protect unwanted data or deletions
from affecting the parent database, among other new administration
features.
Sage Software today also announced 63 ACT! Add-on solutions to further
extend ACT! with additional functionality including marketing, shipping,
mapping and synchronization capabilities. (See today's "Sage Software
Announces Over 60 Add-On Solutions for New ACT! by Sage 2008 (10.0) Product
Family" press release for further details.)
Pricing & Availability
ACT! - Ideal for individuals and small teams of up to ten networked users.
Available at popular software retailers, e-tailers and direct resellers, or
by contacting Sage Software at 866-333-0990 or
www.act.com/estore. ($229.99
MSRP, upgrade $149.95 MSRP)
ACT! Premium - Ideal for small to mid-sized businesses, sales teams, and
corporate workgroups. Available by contacting ACT! Corporate Licensing at
888-855-5222. ($399.99 MSRP, upgrade $259.95 MSRP)
ACT! Premium for Web - Enables remote, traveling and on-premise user access
to centralized ACT! data via a Web browser. Available by contacting ACT!
Corporate Licensing at 888-855-5222. ($399.99 MSRP, upgrade $259.95 MSRP)
ACT! by Sage Premium Dual Access - Enables seamless online/offline access
to centralized customer data for sales teams, small to mid-sized
businesses, and corporate workgroups via a single-user license that
includes both the Windows-based ACT! by Sage Premium and browser-based ACT!
by Sage Premium for Web solutions. Available by contacting ACT! Corporate
Licensing at 888-855-5222. (Volume pricing beginning at $529.99 per
single-licensed user)
ACT! products are also available from more than 700 ACT! Certified
Consultants located at
www.act.com/certifiedconsultants. For more ACT!
information, visit
www.act.com.
About Sage Software
Sage Software supports the needs, challenges and dreams of nearly 2.8
million small and mid-sized business customers in North America through
easy-to-use, scalable and customizable software and services. Our products
support accounting, operations, customer relationship management, human
resources, time tracking, merchant services and the specialized needs of
the construction, distribution, healthcare, manufacturing, nonprofit and
real estate industries. Sage Software is a subsidiary of The Sage Group
plc, a leading international supplier of accounting and business management
software solutions and related products and services for small and
mid-sized businesses. Formed in 1981, Sage was floated on the London Stock
Exchange in 1989 and the Group now has 5.4 million customers and employs
over 13,000 people worldwide. For more information, please visit the Web
site at
www.sagesoftware.com/moreinfo or call (866) 308-2378.
© 2007 Sage Software SB, Inc. All rights reserved. The Sage Software
logo, ACT! and Peachtree are registered trademarks or trademarks of Sage
Software SB, Inc., or its affiliated entities. All other trademarks are the
property of their respective owners.
(1) In ACT! Premium for Web, customizations must be performed on the Web
server.
(2) This feature is not available in ACT! Premium for Web.
(3) Requires additional purchase.
(4) This feature is not available in ACT! Premium for Web.
(5) In order to edit, add, or remove dashboard components, you must have an
ACT! manager or administrator security role.
(6) List edit mode works with ACT! and ACT! Premium only.
(7) Document shortcuts work with ACT! and ACT! Premium only.
(8) Limited access Group and Company names will be viewable from the tree
view, but all associated information will remain inaccessible.
Contact Information: Contact:
Ryan Zuk
Sage Software
480-368-3818
ryan.zuk@sage.com
Shana Keith
Porter Novelli
404-995-4557
shana.keith@porternovelli.com