THE BRAINTREE APPROACH
Map, Evaluate, Deploy, Build.
A customer record is useful when it follows the work. Braintree starts with sales and service operations, then evaluates where automation will help. The AI Value Framework makes cost, value and management approval part of the deployment decision.
01
Map
Follow how leads, opportunities, enquiries and cases move between people. Identify the customer information each stage needs and the handovers that create extra work or lose context.
02
Evaluate
Assess the shortlisted applications and agents against those processes. Model total cost of ownership and expected value, including the data, permissions and adoption work needed to make them usable.
03
Deploy
Configure the supported capabilities that fit the agreed case. Enable them by role, with the customer record, access controls and review responsibilities established for the teams using them.
04
Build
Where the requirement is specific to the business, assess a custom agent on Microsoft Foundry. Apply the same cost, testing and ownership discipline as the standard capabilities.
SERVICE SCOPE
What’s in scope.
01
Dynamics 365 Sales
Organise leads, accounts, contacts and opportunities around a defined sales process. Establish the information sellers need, the stages managers review and the relationship between CRM activity and the Outlook and Teams tools used in daily work.
02
Customer Service and Contact Center
Design service-case handling, knowledge use and contact-centre workflows. Map how a customer request is received, routed, investigated and resolved, including the information a service representative needs from sales or operational systems.
03
Customer Insights
Assess Customer Insights Data and Journeys against the organisation’s customer-data and engagement needs. Identify source records, ownership and consent requirements before defining segments or journeys, so engagement uses an understandable customer model.
04
Sales and service assistance
Evaluate AI features for account preparation, response drafting, knowledge retrieval and other defined tasks. Confirm the product capability and licensing, then test it against the relevant process, data access and human review requirements.
05
Integration and adoption
Connect the customer record with the business applications and workplace environment it depends on. Map ownership of shared data, identify process changes and prepare the users who will maintain the records and act on the information.
Map the journey before choosing the modules.
A CRM assessment should reveal where information is lost between marketing, sales, service and finance. Start with representative customer journeys and the operational decisions each team needs to make.
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Current systems, customer records and handoffs.
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Sales stages, service processes and data-quality gaps.
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A module and integration scope aligned to the customer journey.
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Adoption measures and a TCO model covering licences, implementation and operation.
Choose the next step around the customer record.
A business starting with sales discipline may need a focused Dynamics 365 Sales implementation. An organisation with established sales processes may need service integration or a customer-data foundation. Custom agents should be evaluated only after the record, access and underlying process are understood; automation will inherit those conditions.
01
Locate the handoff where customer context is lost
A salesperson may hold opportunity details in email while service teams work from a separate ticket history and finance maintains another customer record. Start with the handoffs that cause repeated data capture, missed follow-up or conflicting status reports. Define what the next team needs to know and which system is responsible for providing it.
Dynamics 365 Sales supports the sales record and opportunity process; Customer Service supports cases, knowledge and service interactions. Selecting modules should follow the journey. A customer-data requirement may need matching and governance work before a unified view is reliable, and a campaign requirement should identify the appropriate application and consent process.
02
Prepare journeys, records and acceptance scenarios
Bring representative lead-to-opportunity and case-to-resolution examples, including exceptions and escalation. Supply the current customer identifiers, duplicate-record rules, integration owners, reporting definitions and access boundaries. Identify which users will create records, which will enrich them and where updates must return to another system.
Agree stage definitions, required fields, routing and permissions before adding automation. Customer representatives should validate real scenarios: a reassigned opportunity, a customer with multiple accounts or a service case needing finance information. The handover should explain record ownership, import and integration failures, reporting definitions and release responsibilities. Channel configuration, data cleansing, migration and ongoing support each need an explicit scope.
03
Customer-platform decisions to make early
Decision
Evidence to examine
What to agree
First implementation boundary
The customer journey with a clear owner and observable failure.
A usable end-to-end phase and the interfaces to teams outside it.
Customer identity
Account hierarchies, identifiers, duplicates and authoritative sources.
Matching, update ownership and the process for correcting records.
Service routing
Case types, channels, skills and escalation requirements.
Which queues, assignments and service commitments are configured.
EVIDENCE & DOCUMENTATION
See the work in context.
BEFORE YOU DECIDE
Practical questions.
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Must every team move at once?
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How does CRM relate to ERP?
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What establishes data residency?
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Can we migrate all old customer records?
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What should a CRM pilot test?
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Does Customer Service include our preferred communication channel?
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Who decides which record is authoritative?
BUILD YOUR BUSINESS CASE
Show how a connected customer record changes the work.
The problem to solve.
A CRM proposal loses relevance when it starts with fields and licences instead of missed handovers, inconsistent follow-up and customer information spread across teams.
What success should look like.
Choose the customer journeys to improve, define the records and responsibilities behind them, and agree how users will judge the change.
Bring these into the discussion.
A useful starting point for your team and the people approving the investment.
Useful reading for your proposal.
Evidence, examples and questions to take into the decision.
Customer story
18 August 2026
Customer story
Eduvos: one view of the student lifecycle
See how Sales, Customer Service and connected business applications supported an end-to-end journey.
Read the customer story
Insight
25 February 2026
Adoption & design
Co-design CRM with the people using it
Prepare the user conversations that turn a software project into an operating improvement.
Read the insight
Insight
5 August 2025
Security by design
Make security part of CRM design
Bring roles, data access and integration controls into the initial scope.
Read the insight
LET’S GROW.
Work through the next step with Braintree.
Bring one customer journey that needs to work better. We will help map it to the data, applications and change needed.
