Managing custom fields

Custom fields are user-defined fields that store information not otherwise provided in an entity's Detail tab on the Contacts workspace. Custom fields differ from user fields because custom fields are designed to hold specific types of structured data while user fields are designed to hold unstructured data. You can add text, number, currency, convertible currency, date, and relationship custom fields to the system. For example, you can add a custom date field that only accepts date values or a custom relationship field that accepts contacts or users as values.

Custom field groups enable you to group related custom fields together. They also define the types of entities that you can add the custom field to. For example, a custom field group can make a custom field available only for companies. A custom field can belong to only one group. When you add a new custom field to the system, you select a custom field group for the new custom field.

On the Contacts workspace, you can add and remove custom fields for individual entities, modify custom field values, and add custom fields to the system.

NexJ recommends that a business administration group manages custom field types.

Best practices for using custom fields

Custom field data is useful because it becomes available for filtering, searching, and reporting as soon as it is added to the system.

Consider using custom fields to:

Store optional data used by a limited number of entities in the system.
Store contact-level information, for example, interests, demographics, and financial information.
Track relationships.

Avoid using custom fields to:

Store business-critical data that:
- Is frequently used for the majority of entities in the system.
- Is used by NexJ CRM business logic or that is integrated with other functionality in NexJ CRM.
Track aggregate account-level information, such as products and services, or restrictions. Custom fields do not aggregate at the household-level.

Some examples of custom fields include:

Referral Source
Favorite Sports Team
Lawyer

Adding custom fields to entities

To add a custom field to an entity and specify a value for the field, navigate to the entity's Detail tab, click the Add button

on the Custom Fields card and select a custom field type.

If the target custom field type does not exist, administrators can click the Add a new item button

in the Select a custom field type dialog, enter the required information in the Add Custom Field dialog, and save their changes to add the required custom field type. If you select Allow Quick Picks Only in the Add Custom Field dialog, you are not prompted to add the quick picks before saving the custom field. Because the new custom field only allows quick picks but does not have quick picks configured, the field cannot have a value.

The input for the Value field varies depending on the type of custom field you select. For example, for a date type custom field, click the calendar icon

to specify the date. For a custom relationship field, double-click in the Value field or click the Select button

to select an entity. The Select an entity dialog that opens, enables you to search and filter the entity list before making your selection. For more information on searching and filtering functionality, see Searching and filtering in NexJ CRM.

To modify values for custom fields that you previously added to an entity, click the More Actions button

for a custom field and select Edit. To remove a custom field from an entity when you no longer need to track the information in the field, click the More Actions button for the custom field and select Delete.

To insert a copy of the field and enter a different value, click the More Actions button and select Insert Copy.

Sorting custom fields

To sort the custom fields on the Custom Fields card by field name or by custom field group, click the Sort by button

and select either Name or Group. The up and down arrows beside the selected option indicate the sort order. Select the same option again to reverse the sort order.

Opening entity records from custom fields

Some types of custom fields can accept other entities as values. To open the detail page for an entity from a custom field that contains the entity as a value, click the More Actions button

for that custom field and select Go to Contact.