Document Management Guide

Documents connected to customers, not folders

In most small businesses, customer documents live in email attachments, personal desktops, and shared drives, with no connection to the customer record. Dove365 CRM — Starter’s document management changes this fundamentally.

Upload once, find it always

Document management is accessed through a Documents or Files tab on the relevant CRM record. Uploading from within CRM saves the file to the corresponding SharePoint folder and links it permanently to that record.

• Access the Documents tab

  On an account, contact, opportunity, or case record, navigate to the Documents tab. All files associated with that record are displayed here, both those uploaded from CRM and those added directly in SharePoint.

• Upload files from within CRM

  Use the upload function in the Documents tab to add a new file. The file is saved to SharePoint and associated with the CRM record immediately, no separate SharePoint navigation needed.

• Open and edit in Microsoft 365

  Files can be opened directly from the Documents tab. Editing opens in the relevant Microsoft 365 application, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, with full co-authoring support.

• Access the same files in SharePoint

  The underlying SharePoint document library contains the same files. Users who work primarily in SharePoint can access and manage files there, and they remain linked to the CRM record.

Organised, governed, and findable

Good document management isn’t just about storage, it’s about structure. Knowing where files are, who has access, and how they relate to your customer relationships.

• Account-level documentsProposals, contracts, onboarding packs, and relationship summaries stored against the account record give every team member access to the complete customer file, not just the person who originally created it.
• Contact-level documentsSigned terms, correspondence specific to an individual, or identity verification documents can be stored against the contact record. Particularly useful for regulated businesses or those with compliance requirements around individual-level documentation.
• Opportunity-level documentsQuotes, scoping documents, proposals, and signed orders linked to the specific opportunity record give the complete document trail for each deal, all in one place, accessible without searching email.
• Case-level documentsInvestigation reports, evidence files, and resolution documentation linked to support cases create a permanent, auditable record of how each case was handled and what supporting documentation was produced.

Team access to customer documents

Because documents are stored in SharePoint and linked to CRM records, your whole team can collaborate on customer files using standard Microsoft 365 tools, without managing document access separately.

• Co-authoring in Microsoft 365

  Multiple team members can work on the same document simultaneously using Microsoft 365 co-authoring in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, no more emailing documents back and forth between colleagues.

• Version history

  SharePoint maintains a full version history for every document. See when a file was last modified and by whom, and restore earlier versions if changes need to be undone.

• Consistent access permissions

  File access follows SharePoint permissions, which align with your Microsoft 365 governance. There’s no separate CRM document permission system to configure or maintain.

• Shared visibility across the team

  When a colleague uploads a document to a CRM record, the whole team with access to that record can see and open the file immediately, no need to email it around or share a link manually.

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