Zoho CRM Community Digest - August 2025 | Part 2

Hello Everyone! Here's a quick round-up of handy tips, clever workarounds, and product updates from late August.

Product Updates:

Meeting Enhancements in Zoho CRM! 

Track whether a meeting is online, in-office, or at the client’s location using the new Meeting Venue option. This enhancement lets you categorize meetings for easier organization, filtering, and reporting. You can also mark meetings as all-day, set them to repeat, or remove venue options from the picklist that doesn’t fit your business needs. For admins, a new Preferences Tab enables managing online meeting providers directly from CRM without needing to visit the Marketplace. This full post has screenshots and key notes worth checking out.

Quick Wins:

Portals: Account-Level Access Challenge

Your customers, linked as Contact records, can access their information via the CRM portal. @Ivan Staykov brought up an interesting use case where individual Contacts should only access records linked to their emails, while the CEO of their company should access all Contact records linked to their Account. As CRM portals are tied to Contacts, not Accounts, this setup isn’t straightforward. @Max explored options, and @Amy shared a workaround that sparked Ivan’s interest. If you’ve run into the same limitation, this thread is a must-read for practical insights.

Understanding how custom view un-enrollment works in Cadences?

@Matt Warner asked if leads enrolled to a Cadence through a custom view gets automatically un-enrolled when they no longer meet the view criteria. @Sunderjan Siddharth clarified that leads will remain in the Cadence and continue their scheduled steps unless an unenrolled property is specifically linked to the custom view condition. Once that property is set, the system will automatically remove leads that drop out of the criteria. Check out the full post for more on how Cadence un-enrollment works and how to fine-tune your setup!

Tip for targeted marketing campaigns for Contacts with closed Deals!

@Dalton wanted to run a marketing campaign targeting Contact records with closed Deals but faced a challenge: some contacts have multiple deals, with a mix of open and closed statuses. Simply filtering for closed deals would still include contacts who have open deals, which wasn’t desired.@Sunderjan Siddharth suggested using roll-up summary fields in the Contacts module to count total deals as well as open and closed deals per contact. This lets you build reports that accurately excludes contacts with any open deals. Check out the full post for detailed steps, screenshots, and where to set this up!

Developer's Corner: 

Can you fetch 200+ records from a Custom View at once?

@Sam wanted to pull all records from a Custom View exceeding  the 200-record limit without using pagination. @Sunderjan Siddharth clarified that COQL can fetch up to 2,000 records in a single query, and suggested using a loop to retrieve up to 100K records efficiently.Check-out the post for the full solution on  handling large datasets effectively in Zoho CRM.

Make attachments mandatory before closing Deals:

@Jhonata wanted to make it mandatory to add attachments before marking a deal as Closed-Won. @Rakesh Kumar suggested triggering a Client Scripts on the Stage field update across touchpoints like the Details, Edit, and Canvas pages to check for attachments, cancel submission if none exist, and display an alert. @Pheranda Nongpiur followed-up with step-by-step guidance and shared the sample Client Script to check attachments on save. Check the full post for the scripts and detailed setup instructions!

How Marta leveraged AI and assistance from the community to automate Quote stage updates:

@Marta wanted all quotes with stage "Next Year" to automatically update to "Draft" on a specific date. @Bhoomi Joshi suggested creating a scheduled function to fetch quotes from a custom view and update the stage, recommending that Marta test with a few records first before connecting it to a Schedule. Despite being a non-coder, Marta used AI to generate the required code and then collaborated with the Community to refine and get it working.Check this post for the step-by-step setup, code tips, and insights on how Marta made it happen!

Kaizen:

Answering Your Questions!

(Kaizen #204) - Perform Field Updates before Blueprint transition via Client Script

Learn how to enhance your lead follow-up Blueprint by prompting users for input during Blueprint transitions and updating description field with detailed comments in Zoho CRM. Kaizen #204 demonstrates how to use beforeTransition scripts to capture comments, validate input, and maintain a running comment history. In this setup, a popup prompts users to enter a comment before each transition. If the comment is fewer than 25 characters, the transition is stopped; otherwise, the system appends the comment along with the transition name and user’s name to the Description field. This is a practical way to improve transparency and traceability in your Blueprint process. Check the post for the full code and setup!


(Kaizen #205) - Managing Picklists and Enabling History Tracking via Zoho CRM APIs

Kaizen #205 breaks down the difference between Picklist and Multi-select Picklist, shows you how to set up global picklists across modules, and explains how to enable history tracking in Zoho CRM using APIs. It's super detailed and walks you through creating and updating picklist fields, removing options, assigning and updating values in records, and turning on history tracking with step-by-step API examples. The inclusion of sample code and responses for each part makes it easy to follow. Give this post a read if you want to get these features set up smoothly!

And that’s a wrap for this fortnight’s Zoho CRM Community Digest. Caught something cool we missed? Or have a favorite from this edition?

Drop it in the comments! We’d love to hear from you. We’ll be back in two weeks with more updates and community gems.

Until then, stay tuned!

• Topic Participants

• Swetha S

  

• Sticky Posts

• How to reach the official Zoho Support channels and avoid fake ones.

  Dear Customers, Thanks a lot for choosing Zoho! Our applications are built to help achieve your day-to-day business goals. We are committed to engaging with you, to understand and develop solutions that enhance your productivity.  We are happy and ready to help you use our services effectively. Understanding and avoiding fake support Just like using popular bank names and financial applications for phishing purposes, using Zoho and claiming to be providing Zoho Support or services with false numbers

• Function #35: Close all tasks associated with a lead and create a new task.

  Welcome back everyone! Last week, we learnt how to close all tasks of a deal depending upon the deal stage. This week, let's look at a custom function that lets you close all of the tasks associated with a lead while simultaneously creating a new task, like when you need to halt all progress towards a lead while the lead is not available at the moment but create a reminder task. Business scenario: The success of a company, in one way or another, is determined by the leads it gets. Each lead is just

• Zoho CRM Webinar - Redesigning Daily User Experiences with Canvas

  <br> Your users across roles use the CRM for day-to-day tasks that are necessary. Whether they perform their tasks on time, the right way, or at all depends on a lot of factors, including User Experience. Many businesses struggle with rigid layouts,

• Join us at the Canada ZUG Meetup: What’s New in Zoho CRM

  Hello Zoho Community! Start your year with fresh insights into Zoho CRM’s latest updates and tools. Whether you're a CRM beginner or a experienced user, this meetup is crafted to help you optimise your processes and leverage new features. Explore practical

• CRM Hack #2: Automate sending of birthday greetings to your customers.

    Hello everyone! What sets you apart as a sales person is your ability to add that personal touch to your business relationship with your customers. Sending a gift on a special day, or leaving a note wishing them on their birthdays, are small, yet significant actions that show your customers that you care. And these are actions done without any expectations :) You must be engaging with a lot of customers and it is highly unlikely that they all are your friends on Facebook or some social channel,

• Recent Topics

• Understanding Zoho Contracts

  Effective contract management relies on systems that are structured, organized, and reliable. Every feature, workflow, rule, and restriction in Zoho Contracts are designed the way they are to ensure consistency, compliance, and control across every stage

• Tip of the Week #76– Automate your inbox during vacation in Zoho TeamInbox

  When you're on vacation or away from your desk, the last thing you want is for important emails to be missed or left unanswered. The good news is, you can easily set up rules in Zoho TeamInbox to assign incoming messages automatically to a teammate who's

• Domain restriction for User Management actions in Zoho One

  Greetings, Zoho One Admins! To strengthen account security further and safeguard user management settings, we are imposing domain-based restrictions for user account-focused admin actions in Zoho One. In addition to password reset of user, organization

• Zoho Mail iOS app update: Signature

  Hello everyone! In the latest version(3.1.7) of the Zoho Mail app update, we have brought in support to create, edit and remove signature within the app. You can create signature from the compose screen as well as from within the Settings module(inside

• Copy paste from word document deletes random spaces

  Hello Dear Zoho Team, When copying from a word document into Notebook, often I face a problem of the program deleting random spaces between words, the document become terribly faulty, eventhough it is perfect in its original source document (and without

• Desktop app doesn't support notecards created on Android

  Hi, Does anybody have same problem? Some of last notecards created on Android app (v. 6.6) doesn't show in desktop app (v. 3.5.5). I see these note cards but whith they appear with exclamation mark in yellow triangle (see screenshot) and when I try to

• Approval Button in Subform

  Hi Team, I’m working on a subform-based requirement where users will submit requests, and these requests must go through approval by multiple team managers. Each line item in the subform needs to be individually approved or declined based on the user's

• Setting checkbox value on template in Sign from Creator

  Good day, Please help me understand how do I set a tick from a checkbox in Creator into a checkbox on a Sign template. Below is the only values on the Sign template and the code from Creator, "field_boolean_data": {}, "field_date_data": {}, "field_radio_data":

• Zoho Projects - Unread Comment Icon

  Hi Projects Team, It would be great if there was a notification I con on the comments icon so it's easy to see which tasks have new comments. Something like a red circle with a number of unread comments would be great. Thanks for considering my feed

• Zoho Projects - Update Feed via API

  Hi Projects Team, Please consider adding an API to allow update and retrieval of messages to the Feed. Thank you

• Automated log-out/session end

  I'm concerned about security of our data. Is it possible to set an automatic time-out for user sessions on Zoho CRM, after a certain period of inactivity or when the session reaches a certain duration (12 hours perhaps)? 

• Subform auto populate values

  Hi Team, I’m trying to retrieve values from Zoho People using API functions and dynamically populate them into a subform. For example, I’ve created a form with several fields that users will fill out. Based on their input, I need to fetch records from

• What is New in CRM Functions?

  What is New in CRM Functions? Hello everyone! We're delighted to share that Functions in Zoho CRM have had a few upgrades that would happen in phases. Phase 1 An all new built-in editor for better user experience and ease of use. ETA: In a couple of days.

• Gantt Chart - Zoho Analytics

  Are there any plans to add Gantt Charts capabilities to Zoho Analytics?

• WhatsApp Calling Integration via Zoho Desk

  Dear Zoho Desk Team, I would like to request a feature that allows users to call WhatsApp numbers directly via Zoho Desk. This integration would enable sending and receiving calls to and from WhatsApp numbers over the internet, without the need for traditional

• Identify long running sync jobs/tables

  My sync process causes strain on my production database and I'd love some tools/alerts to help me identify which tables are taking the longest. The current screen only shows 3 tables at a time and truncates the last fetch time so that it is very cumbersome

• Temporarily rate limited due to IP reputation.

  We have suddenly started receiving the following Mail Delivery Status Notification: Diagnostic-Code: 4.7.650 The mail server [136.143.184.12] has been temporarily rate limited due to IP reputation. For e-mail delivery information, see https://aka.ms/postmaster

• Automatically CC an address using Zoho CRM Email Templates

  Hi all - have searched but can't see a definitive answer. We have built multiple email templates in CRM. Every time we send this we want it to CC a particular address (the same address for every email sent) so that it populates the reply back into our

• Solution to Import PST File into Office 365.

  MailsDaddy OST to Office 365 Migration Tool is an outstanding solution to recover OST files and migrate them into Office 365 without any hassle. Using this software users can multiple OST files into Office 365 with complete data security. It offers users

• Best-practice setup in Zoho One for managing combined candidate pools and exporting anonymised CVs

  We are new users of the Zoho One bundle and operate a consulting and engineering company. Our workforce model includes a mix of permanent employees, active job applicants, and freelance/independent consultants. All three groups need to be searchable,

• Associate emails from both primary and secondary contacts to deal

  We need to associate emails from multiple contacts to a deal. Please advise how this can be achieved. At present, only emails from primary contacts can be associated. Thanks

• New integration: Zoho Sign for Zoho Projects

  Hey there! We’re excited to announce the brand-new Zoho Sign integration for Zoho Projects! With this integration, users can now send documents for signatures, track their progress, and manage approvals—all without leaving Zoho Projects. This bridges

• Update to attachment display in ticket threads

  This enhancement will provide faster access for support teams and end-users, significantly boosting productivity for everyone. Get ready for a more efficient and satisfying experience! Immediate benefits Faster ticket rendering reduces wait times and

• Narrative 15: Blueprint - Automate, guide, and transform your support processes

  Behind the scenes of a successful ticketing system: BTS Series Narrative 15: Blueprint - Automate, guide, and transform your support processes Even organizations that deliver quality products and services can face low customer satisfaction when their

• Different MRP / Pricing for same product but different batches

  We often face the following situations where MRP of a particular product changes on every purchase and hence we have to charge the customer accordingly. This can't be solved by Batch tracking as of now so far as I understand Zoho. How do you manage it as of now? 

• Batch/lot # and Storage bin location

  Hi I want to ask for a feature on Zoho inventory I own a warehouse and I've gone through different management software solutions with no luck until I found Zoho, it has been a game changer for my business with up to the minute information, I'm extremely happy with it. It's almost perfect. And I say Almost because the only thing missing for me (and I'm sure I'm not alone) is the need of being able to identify the lot number of my inventory and where it is located in the warehouse. Due to the nature

• ZOHO BOOKS - RECEIVING MORE ITEMS THAN ORDERED

  Hello, When trying to enter a vendor's bill that contains items with bigger quantity than ordered in the PO (it happens quite often) - The system would not let us save the bill and show this error: "Quantity recorded cannot be more than quantity ordered." 

• Good news! Calendar in Zoho CRM gets a face lift

  Dear Customers, We are delighted to unveil the revamped calendar UI in Zoho CRM. With a complete visual overhaul aligned with CRM for Everyone, the calendar now offers a more intuitive and flexible scheduling experience. What’s new? Distinguish activities

• Sync desktop folders instantly with WorkDrive TrueSync (Beta)

  Keeping your important files backed up and accessible has never been easier! With WorkDrive desktop app (TrueSync), you can now automatically sync specific desktop folders to WorkDrive Web, ensuring seamless, real-time updates across devices. Important:

• Writer update results in BitDefender blocking it as malware

  After updating Writer to latest update, Bitdefender blocked the app and writer no longer runs.

• Refresh frequency

  Dear Zoho Team, I really, truly appreciate that Zoho Books gets frequent updates. As a matter of fact this is how a good SaaS company should stay on top. However, I feel that I have to hit refresh almost every day. This was exciting at the beginning but

• Refund

  My plan expired today, and I updated my payment details with a new credit card. At the same time, I wanted to downgrade, but the system wouldn’t allow the downgrade until the payment details were updated. As a result, I was charged for the same plan before

• Calling Function via REST API with API Key gives 401 using Zoho Developer

  Hi, I created a couple of functions using the one month trial of Enterprise edition, which I was able to call using the API Key method from Postman and from an external site. Now that my trial has expired, I have created the same functions in the Developer

• Error due to - 'Internal Exception' when uploading Sign-generated PDF file to workdrive via Deluge in Zoho CRM

  Hi I wasnt getting this error a few days ago and my code had not changed, so I'm wondering if there's a Zoho bug somewhere? I am downloading a PDF file from a Zoho Sign url using invokeurl and then uploading it to a Workdrive folder using zoho.workdrive.uploadFile.

• Embed CRM record images in email templates

  I have email templates that I want to embed dynamic images in their body - not as an attachment. For the context, the image is a QR code individual to each contact. So there are couple of challenges for which I think there is no solution in CRM: 1/ I

• Assign multiple departments to multiple helpcenters

  Hi there! I have a reseller company for a software and I'm using Zoho Desk as my helpcenter and ticket management system. The software is great and I would like to make a suggestion! With multi-branding activated, your departments that visible in help

• Zoho Desk Training

  Hello, We've had Zoho desk for a while now, but we run into issues occasionally, and I was wondering if there was a customer who currently uses it and really enjoys the functionality, that would be wiling to chat with us?

• Edit default "We are here to help you" text in chat SalesIQ widget

  Does anyone know how this text can be edited? I can't find it anywhere in settings. Thanks!

• PO Based Advance payment to Vendor

  We recommend to introduce a provision at PO to make advance payment to vendors and auto apply that advance paid later at the time of Vendor Bill submission for that PO. This will help us track PO-wise Total Payments.

• Converting Customer Invoice to Purchase Bill

  Hi, In my service-based business, I sometimes create the customer invoice first, and later I receive the purchase bill from the vendor for the same job. Is there any option in Zoho Books to: Convert a customer invoice into a purchase bill, or Link/associate

• Next Page