In modern sales, you use more than one piece of technology to complete your day-to-day tasks. But hopping between multiple platforms and searching for the information you need is a waste of time. SalesLoft’s Connect feature solves the problem between your technology stack by letting you access and perform SalesLoft functions directly from the applications you use the most.
SalesLoft Connect for Outlook provides modern sales organizations the ability to seamlessly integrate the powerful functionality of SalesLoft into the Outlook platform. You can Loft emails, view and insert templates, create reminders, and view a Person's SalesLoft information while engaging with your prospects directly inside of your Outlook environment.
In this article, you will learn all of the features available with SalesLoft Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online version, including:
- Supported Versions of Outlook
- Install Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
- Pin the Connect Side Panel - Office 365 Online
- Send SalesLoft Emails in Outlook - Office 365 Online
- CRM Record Selection - Office 365 Online
- Reminders in Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
- The Person Panel in Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
- Add a Person to a Cadence in Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
- Disconnect the Add-in - Office 365 Online
- Troubleshooting Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
If you are using Outlook in Windows or a Mac, learn how to use Connect for Outlook - Windows/ Mac, here.
Supported Versions of Outlook
Currently, the SalesLoft Connect feature is supported by certain applications and versions of Outlook. We’ve compiled a list of the approved versions of Outlook. To learn more information on whether your Outlook client supports add-ins, and would be able to support SalesLoft Connect, check out the link here.
Connect for Outlook is supported by the following Exchange and Office 365 applications:
Your Outlook may need to upgrade to a newer version to avoid functionality disruption. If you’re not sure how to check your client version, check out these instructions. These are the approved versions of Outlook:
- Exchange 2013: You must be running version #CU_15.
- Outlook for Windows 13: You must be running version #15.0.4605.1003 or higher.
- Outlook for Mac 16: You must be running version # 15.35 (170509) or higher.
Install Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
Before you Loft emails, keep on top of reminders, and view SalesLoft People from your Outlook, you need to install the SalesLoft Connect for Outlook add-in.
To install the add-in for Office 365, follow these steps:
1. Open Outlook Settings, then navigate to Manage add-ins.
2. Search for SalesLoft in the search window to bring up the SalesLoft Connect listing.
3. Turn the toggle on to activate the SalesLoft add-in.
Pin the Connect Side Panel - Office 365 Online
There are two options to keep the Connect Side Panel and the Person Profile up-to-date.
First, you can click the "Open SalesLoft" button each time you open a message within your inbox. This refreshes the side panel to view the current Person's information.
Second, you can pin the SalesLoft Connect side panel in Outlook. By pinning the side panel, you ensure it always stays opened in your inbox, saving you the steps of re-opening the panel, and you can easily access important data.
Things to Note:
- You can only pin the side panel in Read mode.
- You cannot pin the side panel when composing a new email.
- This update is only available for Office 365 subscribers using Outlook 2016 or later on Windows, Outlook 2016 or later on Mac, or Outlook on the web.
To pin the side panel, open the SalesLoft Connect side panel and click the pin icon in the upper right corner.
Send SalesLoft Emails in Outlook - Office 365 Online
Installing Connect for Outlook allows you to leverage the power and features of SalesLoft email and templates in your inbox. Quickly add a template while your composing an email so you use the same consistent messaging, with the added benefit of tracking metrics.
Speaking of tracking, using the “Loft It” feature in Outlook logs and tracks your emails in SalesLoft (and Salesforce). If you do not wish for the email to be tracked, you can use the normal Outlook Send button to send without syncing it to SalesLoft.
To add a template or snippet to your Outlook emails, follow these steps:
- Open a new message.
- Click the SalesLoft icon in the bottom right corner.
- From the dropdown menu, click Open SalesLoft. The SalesLoft Connect side panel will appear.
- Select the tab for the object you wish to use: Templates or Snippets.
- Access your personal or team templates/snippets.
- Search for the template or snippet you want to use.
- Select the template or snippet to insert it into a new email or reply. Dynamic tags populate automatically with the corresponding recipient’s information.
To send SalesLoft emails from Outlook, follow these steps:
- Open a new message.
- A SalesLoft menu, represented by the SalesLoft icon, will appear in the lower right-hand corner of the email compose screen.
- Once your message is ready, hit Loft It. The Loft It feature allows the email to be tracked for opens, clicks, and replies via the SalesLoft platform.
- Things to Note: While the email is processing, it will be moved to the "Drafts" folder. Successfully Lofted emails will appear in Outlook's "Sent" folder and in the SalesLoft platform after they're completely processed on the back end (on average, up to 1 minute). To successfully complete Lofting, the email should not be manually moved from the "Drafts" folder to any other folder.
CRM Record Selection - Office 365 Online
Logging email activity to alternative records (aka CRM Record Selection) gives you complete control over which Salesforce record an email will be logged to when you send an email from your Outlook.
For more information on this feature, check out our complete explanation in the SalesLoft Activity Logging article.
Things to Note: This feature must be enabled by your team admin from the Salesforce Connector Settings. To enable logging to alternative records, reach out to your team admin to enable the feature.
To log email activities to different Salesforce records from Outlook - Office 365 Online, follow these instructions:
1. When you open an email, a grey bar will appear on the Connect side panel. The grey bar indicates which Who (Lead/Contact) and What (Account/Opportunity) record the email will be logged to in Salesforce.
- Regarding the Who: the Salesforce Lead or Contact record tied to the Person record in SalesLoft will be selected by default.
- Things to Note: In the event that there is both a Lead and a Contact in Salesforce with that email address, we select the default Salesforce record (Contact or Lead) based on the "Linking People to Salesforce" selection the team admin has selected in their Salesforce Connector Settings.
- Regarding the What: if the Person is tied to a Salesforce Contact and that Contact is related to an open Opportunity in Salesforce, that Opportunity will be selected by default. In the event there are multiple open Opportunities, the most recently modified Opportunity will be selected as the default.
2. To change either of these records, click the Edit button. The side panel will navigate to the Edit Log To page.
3. To select an alternate Lead or Contact, click the link with the number of matches in the Name field to open the list of all Lead and Contact records in Salesforce tied to the email address.
4. If none of the available options are the records you would like to log to, click the X on the right side of a dropdown to remove the current record. The name field will turn into an input field. Start typing the record you're looking for. SalesLoft will search Salesforce for any records that match.
5. To edit the Account or Opportunity information, click the link with the number of matches in the Related To field. This will open the list of all Account and Opportunity records in Salesforce related to the selected Contact. Things to Note: You are not allowed to select the Related To record if a Lead is selected in the Name field.
6. Once you confirm a Who and/or What record the first time for a Person, SalesLoft will remember the record(s) and use them as the defaults, but you will still be able to edit and change which Who and What records you want future emails to that Person to log to subsequently.
Reminders in Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
SalesLoft Reminders allow you to stay on top of your one-off events and make you sure you never miss a beat.
Within your Outlook, you can view, complete, and add reminders to stay on top of your non-Cadence tasks.
Viewing Reminders
You can view a full list of your SalesLoft Reminders in the Connect for Outlook side panel.
To access your list of reminders, select the SalesLoft icon. From the dropdown, click View Reminders. The side panel will expand with the Reminders tab on display. Reminders can be filtered by day, week, month, or all, depending on what you would like to see.
Completing Reminders
Completing a reminder is just like checking an item off of your to-do list. Once a reminder has been completed, go to the Reminders tab and select the circle to virtually check off the reminder (so satisfying!).
Adding a New Reminder
Email exchanges can spark certain one-off actions that you need to take. For example, if you receive an out of office reply that a recipient is off because they just had a baby, you may want to remind yourself to send them a congratulatory gift.
You can create this new reminder directly in your Outlook. From the side panel, select the Add Reminder action. Then add a due date to complete the reminder. Hit Save.
The Person Panel in Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
SalesLoft Connect for Outlook puts the power of SalesLoft into your Outlook window, meaning you can view SalesLoft Person info, manage Cadences, keep up with reminders, and send SalesLoft templated emails all from your Outlook application.
That’s a whole lot of functionality inside of one tool. So let’s walk through the different features available with Connect for Outlook in your Office 365 instance.
Adding a Person to SalesLoft
In order to experience the benefits of SalesLoft in your Outlook, the Person must be added to SalesLoft’s database (or else we have no data to work with). If the Person is not in SalesLoft, you can quickly add them directly from Outlook.
Follow these steps:
- Select the Person’s email.
- The SalesLoft panel will display This Person was not found in SalesLoft.
- Click the button Add to SalesLoft.
- Enter the Person’s information and click Add.
The SalesLoft Connect Person Profile View
View a Person’s SalesLoft profile from your inbox. The Person Profile view gives you a snapshot of SalesLoft information. This way you don’t need to bounce back and forth between your email and the SalesLoft platform.
You can view the SalesLoft profile of the corresponding Person you’re emailing by clicking the SalesLoft icon in the email toolbar, then opening SalesLoft.
The Person Profile view provides the following:
- People tab: Contains Person information and actions
- Reminders tab: Manage reminders.
- Person Actions: Three-dot menu where you can mark a Person as a success and edit their profile information.
- Person’s Name
- Person’s Role
- Person’s Account
- Company URL
- Person Stats: Up-to-date metrics on your team’s engagement with this Person.
- Contact Info tab: View and edit contact information, update the Cadence stage, and add tags.
- Cadences tab: See Cadence history and add the Person to Cadence.
- Activity tab: View their activity history.
- Notes tab: Read past notes and create new notes.
Edit a Person's Profile Information
If you receive an email that informs you about a new phone number or updated contact information, you can update that Person’s SalesLoft profile directly from Outlook. Follow these instructions to edit profile information:
- Click the three-dot menu towards the upper right of the Person’s name.
- Select Edit.
- In the Edit Person tab, enter the updated information.
- Click Save Person.
Connect Profile Contact Tab
Below the Person’s profile information there are multiple tabs to view. The first is the Contact tab. The Contact tab shows the Person’s contact information.
Things to Note: Contact information pulls from the completed fields of the Person’s SalesLoft profile.
In addition to viewing the contact info, you can take the following actions:
- Click available email addresses to send an email.
- Add Tags: Tags are labels or folders that you can use to organize groups of People in SalesLoft. To add a tag, type the name of the tag in the text box and hit your enter key.
- Update the Cadence Stage: The Cadence stage keeps you up-to-date with where the Person is in the sales cycle. To update a Person’s stage, select the Cadence Stage dropdown menu and pick the stage you want.
Connect Profile Cadences Tab
The Cadences tab displays information about Cadences a Person is on as well as their Cadence history.
In addition to viewing the Person’s Cadence history, you can also add the Person to a Cadence. Select the blue Add to Cadence button. Search from My Cadences or Team Cadences in the Add to Cadence popup window. Select the Cadence you want.
Connect Profile Activity Tab
The Activity tab shows all of the email, call, and Cadence activity for this Person. This is a quick way to recap all previous interactions between you and the Person or between the Person and any other SalesLoft user on your team.
To view the previous activities, click the Activity tab.
Connect Profile Notes Tab
The Notes tab does exactly what the name says. It allows you to log notes on the Person’s record in SalesLoft. When you log a note you can quickly reference it from the Notes tab, or view it under Recent Activity. Notes even log into your Salesforce activity history with the subject line “note” for seamless logging and clarity across the platforms.
Click the Notes tab to view and add notes for this Person.
Add a Person to a Cadence in Connect for Outlook - Office 365
You can add a Person to a Cadence from the Person Panel in Connect for Outlook. When you click the Add to Cadence button you can see separate lists of Personal and Team Cadences, search for Cadences, view Cadence steps, assign Cadences to other reps, and even add prospects to a specific step directly from Connect for Outlook.
To add a Person to a Cadence from Connect for Outlook, follow these steps:
- Open the Person Panel in Connect for Outlook.
- Go to the Cadences tab.
- Click Add to Cadence.
- Select either My Cadences or Team Cadences.
- (Optional) Search for the Cadence by name.
- Select a Cadence or find the Cadence and click Show Steps. Select the step where you would like the Person to begin the Cadence.
- Click Add to Cadence near the bottom of the panel.
Assign a Person to another SalesLoft user's Team Cadence
If you would like to hand a Person off to another team member, you can assign the Person to another teammate's Cadence.
Things to Note: Assigning only applies to Team Cadences.
To assign a Person to another teammate's Cadence, follow these steps:
- Open the Person Panel in Connect for Outlook.
- Go to the Cadences tab.
- Click Add to Cadence.
- Team Cadences.
- Search and/or select the Team Cadence you want to use.
- Under Assign to, click the drop-down menu. Scroll and select the teammate you wish to assign the Person to.
- Click Add to Cadence near the bottom of the panel.
Disconnect the Add-in - Office 365 Online
To disconnect the SalesLoft Connect for Outlook add-in from Office 365, follow these steps:
- Select the gear shift icon to go to your Outlook settings. This should be an icon in your top navigation toolbar.
- Select Manage add-ins.
- Under the Add-ins tab, select My add-ins.
- Find the SalesLoft Connect add-in from your list.
- Select the ellipses icon (three dots) in the bottom right corner of the SalesLoft Connect add-in.
- Click Remove.
- The add-in will be removed from your Outlook, but will remain in your list of add-ins within the store. If you want to re-enable the add-in, select the Add button on the SalesLoft Connect add-in tile.
Troubleshooting Connect for Outlook - Office 365 Online
When you integrate different software applications, it’s possible to run into technical issues between the two applications. Below are some common problems you might encounter with Connect for Outlook, along with some tips and resources to help you troubleshoot.
Can’t Install from Store
The users might not have access/permission to download apps. Verify with your IT team that you have permission to download apps.
Buttons Disabled in Compose Window Only
Connect for Outlook allows you to access templates and send emails (Loft It) from your Outlook. But if the SalesLoft-specific icons appear greyed out and you can’t click them, they have been disabled.
For Outlook in Office 365, try the following solutions:
- Save the message as a draft, close the message, and reopen it.
- Remove other COM add-ins, specifically GlobalMeet and ToDoist.
- Remove the Antivirus add-in.
Check these additional resources to learn more:
- Microsoft Answers: Add-ins greyed out
- Stack Overflow: Outlook Add-in command button disabled when composing
The Person (side) Panel Won't Load
If you cannot access the Person side panel in Connect for Outlook, it may be due to an out-of-date internet browser (Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, etc.).
Comments
4 comments
Hey Stephanie, is it possible to access a list of completed reminders if we check them off prematurely by accident?
"Completing a reminder is just like checking an item off of your to-do list. Once a reminder has been completed, go to the reminders tab and select the circle to virtually checking off the reminder (so satisfying!)."
Hey Ryan! Great question! Reminders are attached to the individual person record in SalesLoft. You can view a complete list of reminders that have been assigned to a person from the Reminders tab on the Person's Profile Page.
If you check off a reminder before it's totally complete, go to the Reminders tab, find the reminder you completed, and uncheck the reminder. This will mark the reminder as "uncomplete" and re-add it to your upcoming reminders list.
Thank you!
Why would my attachments 'fall off' of emails when I'm using the "loft-it" button in Outlook? One of my sales guys is reporting that when he uses the "Loft it" button in Outlook 365 the attachments disappear and the email sends -- which isn't a great look. Any ideas on how to troubleshoot this?
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