All Forum Posts by: Scott Costello

@Austin Mudd

You can connect the items in each app by a relationship field.  I'd put the relationship field in the direct mail app and then select the lead in which the DM record is related too.  You can have relationship field hooked up to multiple different apps.

Automate the importing of records from excel is not supported directly from Podio.  You'd either have to find a third party tool or pay to have one built.  I've always just manually imported them.  As I think about it, you might be able to use Zapier to do this, but I'm not sure.

Definitely true about needing to learn by doing.  But nothing wrong with taking some advice right?  All I'm saying is take the time to think through what you want.  That early planning will greatly increase the quality of the system.  Even if you just write out what you want to do it will help.

Haven't you ever had a problem that you couldn't figure out.  Went to a discussion forum (or even just wrote an email) outlining your problem, and by the time you finished asking your question you figured out the answer?  Same thing I'm talking about here.  I'm not saying you should plan every detail before starting, just to think it out before hand.  It saves time.

That anyone can do, development experience or not.

@Austin Mudd

In my database and development experience it's always best to properly prepare the data before migrating it into the new system.  Otherwise you will just create a huge mess in the new system which you'll spend even longer trying to fix or create work arounds for.

Take the time to figure out how you want your Podio system setup, then take the time to prepare the data to be imported.  Don't be in a rush to get started.

I would create an app for each lead type if you are going to collect different information for each type.  Plus you have to think about the long term.  There will be a time when you want to handle a lead type differently (say probate).  If you have separate apps, then you can easily make the change to the Probate App.  However, if you have all your types in one app, then you could be forced to make work arounds again. At the very least you'll have many unused fields because they only pertain to certain lead types.  

I've got 15 years of developing database apps so I have some idea what I'm talking about.  

Hope that helps you out some.

@Account Closed While the prebuilt packs are great for getting started, I would spend a day or so messing around with creating your own apps.  It is easy once you get the knack.  

You WILL eventually hear about Globiflow and how great it is.  Globiflow is a 3rd party solution that you can use to create work flows that you can setup to automate certain things.  Some examples would be to create Tasks every time a new lead gets entered, or send out an email to your buyers list with a click of a button.  Globiflow used to be cheap ($9/mo as recently as last January for the basic package) but Podio bought the rights to be the sole reseller of it and hiked the price up to $120/mo.  Granted that price is equivalent to the Max Globiflow Package, but there are no longer any cheap packages.

I just wanted to throw that out there to you as an FYI. 

I respectfully disagree with this part of your statement.  Podio is not somewhat hard to setup, it's actually very easy and well designed to be easy.  Just drag and drop field types (text, phone, email, map, number, etc..) into an app template, give them a name and there you go.  You now have a fully customized way of tracking what ever you want.

Sure Podio allows you to get complicated with relationship fields, but they are not necessary to get going.  The great part about Podio is you can start simple and then add on as you get more comfortable.

Also the Free Podio account is all most people will need.  You only have to start paying if you want to add more then 5 users to your team or want to include automations (which are awesome and worth it). 

Thanks for the shout out of my blog (StrugglingInvestor.com).  You are very correct that GlobiFlow is almost a must have if you are a Podio user.  The only issue now is that Globiflow can only be had through Podio, and it'll cost you $125/mo to get.  You have to have the Podio Premium 5+ user license to gain access to Podio.  There is no other way right now.  Perhaps that will change in the future but who knows.

@Account Closed  FYI - To get GlobiFlow you'll need to get the Premium Podio 5+ user package.  That makes the cost $125/mo ($25 per month per user) now.  It is insane!  That's why I mention FusionMint, while not as powerful as GF, it may do what you need.

@Account Closed

What you are looking to do is pretty simple if you have access to Globiflow.  Globiflow is a add on service to Podio that allows you to create Automation processes (Flows).  In your situation you would want to create an automation that creates a new item in your "Flip" or "Rental" App based off of the information in your Leads app.  

Now to kick off that Automation Process, you would simply need to create a Category field in your Leads app with a category that says something like "Add to Rental App" or "Add to Flip App".  Globiflow will detect when you select one of those category items and run the process that adds your new item to the other app.

If you don't have globiflow and can't afford it you may be able to do something similar with FusionMint.

Additionally a 3rd option is just have a relationship field in your Flip/Rental App that points to your lead app.  Basically how that would work is when one of your leads turns into a flip/rental, you create a new item in your Flip/Rental App and then in the relationship field you select the Lead App item that belongs to the new Flip/Rental Item.  This won't bring over the information, but you will be able to simply click on the related item to view all the Lead Info when you want to see it.  Advantage of this method is that you won't have duplicate data in your different apps.

Hope that helps!

I've never done this, but what I would do is this...

1. In your lead (for voicemails) app have a relationship field that points to itself. Call this "All Voicemails" or something like that.  You'll use this to reference any duplicate phone numbers.
2. Add a category field to keep track of a call being the "original" or "duplicate" call.
3. Add a multilined text field as a Log.  Record new calls in the log with time and date.
4. When a new call comes in that is not a duplicate number add the lead to the App, mark it as "originated" and Log it in the text field.
5. When a call comes in that is a duplicate, add it to the lead app mark it as "Duplicate".  Reference this duplicate call in the "Originals" reference field and also log it in the "Originals" log.

Now you'll be able to create a custom view on the app the removes the duplicates from the grid. But you'll be able to look at a call and see all the "duplicates" in the reference field.  Plus if you look at the log, you'll see when the other calls came in and any other info you choose to put in the log.

Just an idea above that I just came up with now.  Might need some tweeking, but I hope it helps guide you.

@Chris Hoffman  Thanks for your offer to help.  I will be selling the Apps + Workflows when I'm all done.  It'll be a monthly subscription because I have to store and run the workflows off of my webservers.  

I will be looking for beta testers once development is complete, however you will have to pay into the beta program.  In the past I've tried just giving away software in trade for beta testers but it NEVER worked out well and I would barely get a response.  Beta Testers will get a big discount though.

What sort of development have you done?  do you know PHP and usage of third party APIs over REST?