Best Practices for Managing Custom Alerts and Reminders in Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement

This article is sponsored by Inogic.

For businesses using CRM, timing plays a crucial role in building stronger customer relationships and improving internal efficiency. Whether it’s a contract renewal, an approval deadline, or a case escalation, the right alert at the right time ensures users act before opportunities slip away.

Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement provides a flexible foundation to configure alerts and reminders, but the real challenge lies in managing them strategically and ensuring they are timely, relevant, and user-friendly rather than overwhelming.

Here are a few best practices to strengthen alert and reminder management within Dynamics 365 CE.

1. Define the ‘Why’ Behind Every Alert

Each alert should serve a specific purpose to inform, remind, or prompt action. Vague or redundant alerts can quickly create notification fatigue. Define triggers that align with business outcomes, such as SLA adherence, sales follow-ups, or data change notifications. Third-party tools allow you to set different alerts as per your requirements.

You can set the following alerts:

• Event-based alerts
• Rule-based alerts
• Record-based alerts

2. Prioritize and Segment Notifications

Not all alerts deserve the same urgency. Classify them into critical, informational, or reminder-based categories and map them to specific user roles. For example, sales teams may need lead assignment alerts, while service teams benefit from case escalation notifications.
This segmentation ensures that users only see what’s relevant to their role.

3. Leverage Multiple Channels Wisely

Dynamics 365 alerts can reach users through different channels - in-app notifications, emails, or Microsoft Teams messages. Selecting the right channel for each alert type helps balance visibility and noise.

• Use in-app alerts for quick, contextual actions.
• Use email for updates requiring follow-up outside CRM.
• Use Teams notifications for collaborative or cross-department scenarios.

A multi-channel approach ensures critical updates aren’t missed, regardless of where users spend most of their time.

4. Automate for Consistency

Automation guarantees timely delivery. Workflows or Power Automate flows can trigger alerts based on defined conditions, such as approaching deadlines, inactive records, or changed statuses. Automation ensures that alerts are sent consistently and that no important event is left unnoticed. For some businesses using a Power Automate flow and dedicating a team to configure the setting might be a headache. That’s why most businesses use a solution that can be managed inside CRM. 

5. Keep Alerts Contextual and Actionable

Generic alerts like “You have a new task” often get ignored. Instead, include actionable details like record names, due dates, or direct links. Personalization ensures that users can act immediately, reducing friction and improving productivity.

6. Track, Measure, and Refine

Monitoring how users interact with alerts is just as important as sending them. Tracking whether alerts are read or ignored provides insight into their relevance and effectiveness.

Additionally, offering users a summary of unread or recent alerts via email ensures they don’t miss important updates, especially when working across multiple records or modules.

Regular reviews and usage analytics help teams fine-tune alert timing, tone, and frequency, keeping the notification system purposeful and user-centric.

Bringing It All Together

An effective alert strategy transforms Dynamics 365 CE from a static system of record into an active system of engagement. When alerts are timely, relevant, and actionable, they help teams stay organized, responsive, and aligned with business goals.

To extend these capabilities further, many organizations turn to specialized solutions such as Alerts4Dynamics, which offer more flexibility for configuring in-app, email, or Teams-based notifications and tracking user engagement with alerts. Taking such approaches allows businesses to refine their alert strategy and derive greater value from their Dynamics 365 investment without adding complexity for users.

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