Managing Relationship Roles

Relationship Roles

Not to be confused with entity relationships Metadata configurations that allow for related records to have lookup fields, which let users link the related records to other records. Any related records can appear in a list that is visible from the record that they have been related to., relationship roles are definitions of how specific account A company that might do business with your organization., opportunity A potential revenue-generating event or sale to an account that needs to be tracked through a sales process to completion., and contact A person who represents a customer or potential customer, or an individual related to an account. For example, an individual who purchases products or services for their own use, or an employee of an account. A contact may also be a person involved in a business transaction, such as a supplier or a colleague. records can be related to one another in Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

• Using Relationship Roles
• Types of Relationships
• Managing Relationship Roles

Using Relationship Roles

Relationship roles are more flexible than those defined in an entity relationship, but they are limited to account, contact, and opportunity records.

Relationships defined using relationship roles can be easily viewed within records, but they can also be used with Advanced Find A tool used to search for specific records and activities. to identify groups of records that share a common relationship role. Relationship information can also be presented in reports, such as the Account Overview report.

There can be any number of relationships that may not be appropriate for your organization to track using an entity relationship. These may include:

• Family relationships (father, sister, brother, spouse/partner, cousin)
• Social relationships (tennis partner, golf partner, club member, friend)
• Sales relationships (champion, influencer, stakeholder, referrer, gatekeeper)
• Business relationships (supplier, partner, consultant, contractor, competitor, former employer)

Types of Relationships

Users can create two types of relationships:

• Customer Relationships
  • Customer records can be related to other customer The account or contact with which a business unit conducts a business transaction. records.
  • Customer relationships allow for a label for each of the two parties in the relationship.
  • Customer relationships are reciprocal. The relationship defined for one record is also available in the other customer record.
  • Opportunity relationships cannot be created from customer records.
• Opportunity Relationships
  • Opportunities can be related to customer records.
  • Opportunities cannot be related to other opportunities.

Managing Relationship Roles

After users choose the records for the relationship, they can select from available labels in the respective relationship form. Only valid labels for those entity types are displayed.

Managing Relationship roles is choosing those labels that will be valid when users define these types of relationships. When you define the labels, you also define which combination of account, contact, or opportunity records will be valid for the label. These relationship roles can be used in reports or Advanced Find queries, so consistency of roles helps ensure consistency of data.

Users are not required to choose labels when they set relationships. They can just enter a description in the relationship.