Link a single Contact to Multiple Accounts

Have you ever had an Issue trying to figure out how to solve a Client's data structure or model Issue when it comes to Contacts being duplicates in so many places because they are really not duplicates but are contacts for all the Accounts you are working on for one reason or another.

In some businesses and industries it is common to link one contact with multiple accounts. And you can find this idea in IdeaExchange.

https://success.salesforce.com/ideaview?id=08730000000BrBSAA0

Now "Contacts to Multiple Accounts" is now generally available as of the Summer 16 release.

Let's watch a recent webinar highlighting this feature:

We can view the details from the release note:
https://releasenotes.docs.salesforce.com/en-us/summer16/release-notes/rn_sales_shared_contacts.htm


Example

John Smith is a vice president at Acme Corporations, and Acme is the account on his contact record (1). But John is also involved with the nonprofit organization Greendot Media. By adding Greendot Media as a related account on John’s contact record (2), reps can track this other relationship. John is considered a direct contact to Acme because Acme is the account on his contact record (3). And he’s considered an indirect contact to Greendot Media and any other accounts that he becomes related to (4).

Directly and indirectly related accounts on a contact record
John also appears as a related contact on the Greendot Media account record and any other accounts that he’s indirectly related to (5).

Directly and indirectly related contacts on an account record.



Caution**
This feature needs to be enabled on the Account Settings screen. Once enabled, you decide the behavior when a user deletes an account with direct contacts related to other accounts or when users replace the primary account as shown below.

• From Setup, enter Account Settings in the Quick Find box, then select Account Settings.
• Select Allow users to relate a contact to multiple accounts.
• Add the Related Contacts related list to the account page layouts that your reps use.