Using Secondary Contacts in Act!

Question: How do I use Secondary Contacts in Act!
 
Product Details: 
Product Family:  Act!
Product:  Act! Pro, Act! Premium, Act! Premium (access via web)
Version: 2005 and later
 

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Answer: 
 
What are Secondary Contacts?
 
Secondary Contacts are a segment of the Contacts section within Act!. Secondary contacts allow you to store basic contact information about people who are associated with a contact in your database, without actually creating a contact record for the person associated with your contact. This can be useful if your contact has a secretary, personal assistant, or even a family member that you occasionally talk to, but you don’t necessarily need to track your interaction history with this person because they are more of an alternative way to reach the contact associated with them than an actual main point of contact.
 
Secondary Contacts will not be found in the Act! address book, nor will you be able to Mail Merge to them, add them to a Group, create Activities with them, Import/Export them to Microsoft Excel or CSV, or any other functions that require a Primary Contact record. However, after creating a secondary contact, if you find the need for them to be a Primary Contact, they can be promoted to their very own Primary Contact record.
 
 
Using Secondary Contacts
 
 
Creating a Secondary Contact

1. Navigate to the Detail View of the Primary Contact that you would like to add a Secondary Contact to
2. Click the Secondary Contacts tab, then click New Secondary Contact
3. Fill out the necessary information in the form that appears
4. If you wish for the Secondary Contact to be private, enable the checkbox for Private
   
   Note: If you are not the Record Manager for the Primary Contact and you check the option to make the Secondary Contact Private you will not be able to see that Secondary Contact, regardless of what your database security role is.
    
5. When finished, click OK to save the Secondary Contact details to the Secondary Contacts tab for the chosen Primary Contact

 
 
E-mailing a secondary Contact

1. Double-click the Secondary Contact you wish to send an e-mail to
2. Click the e-mail address field to open a new message with the Secondary Contact’s email address in the To field
3. Compose message and send as usual
   
   Note: E-mail history will not be recorded for e-mail messages sent to Secondary Contacts.
   
   

 
 
Printing Secondary Contacts (Act! for Windows only)

1. Navigate to the appropriate Primary Contact
2. Click the Secondary Contacts tab
3. Right-click any of the Secondary Contacts in the list, then choose Print Secondary Contacts
4. Set desired print options, then click OK

 
 
 
Promoting Secondary Contacts to Primary Contact
 
Note: Only users who have the Administrator or Manager security role can promote any Secondary Contact that isn’t marked as private. Standard users can edit or promote Secondary Contacts where they are the record manager of the Primary Contact only.
 

1. Select the Secondary Contact you wish to Promote, then click the Promote button
2. When promoted, choose one of the following:
   
   
   • Duplicate data from main contact’s primary fields
     
   • Do not duplicate data from primary fields
     
   
   Note: Choosing to duplicate data from main contact’s primary fields will overwrite existing data already entered into the Secondary Contact’s record. For information about Primary Fields, refer to the following knowledgebase article:
   
   What are Primary Fields in Act!?
   
    
3. Click OK to finish Promoting the Secondary Contact to a Primary Contact