Email Integration Options for Oracle Sales in the Redwood User Experience

Your organization has several options for setting up email for Oracle Sales in the Redwood User Experience. The option your implementation team chooses affects the way you send and receive emails. Three of options involve integration with Microsoft Exchange.

No matter which one of these options you use, you must always initiate your email conversation from within Oracle Sales. To compose the initial email, click an email address or enter "send email" in the Action Bar. Oracle Sales inserts a code in your draft email. The code, which is invisible to recipients, lets the application track the email thread.

These sections give you an overview of the different email options:

Microsoft Office 365
Microsoft Outlook or Another Client Application Integrated with Microsoft Exchange
Oracle Sales UI with Microsoft Exchange
Oracle Sales UI with Oracle Email

The last section, Overview of Email Setup, gives you an overview of the setups required for Microsoft Exchange and Oracle Email, along with links to the setup steps for each option.

Microsoft Office 365

You compose your email in your regular Microsoft Office 365 Outlook compose window. As long as you start the email conversation from within Sales, the complete email conversation gets recorded in the record where you started it and is also visible in Outlook. You can view and reply to emails in either application, and you get the benefit of all the Office 365 features: your drafts get saved as soon as you start typing, for example, and you can use your usual signature.

Here's a screenshot of an email thread with a contact that you can view and respond to interchangeably in Sales and in Office 365. Your drafts and sent emails get saved as usual (callout 1) and you get the same options when composing your email (callout 2):

Office 365 screen showing email thread with a customer contact

Microsoft Outlook or Another Client Application Integrated with Microsoft Exchange

You compose emails in Microsoft Outlook or another client. The main differences are:

The tracking code is visible in your out-going draft, though it's not visible to the recipients. Here's a sample code:
```
------
CRM Reference:
Oracle Sales
(##0000014003##)
```
In Office 365, the entire email thread is automatically copied in outgoing replies. In the Outlook client, the email recipient sees only the header and the subject of the email you're replying to.
Here's a screenshot of a sample email compose window in Outlook when you reply to an existing thread with a contact. The reply includes only the subject of the email you're replying to (callout 1) and includes a reference number that email recipients don't see (callout 2):

Oracle Sales UI with Microsoft Exchange

You compose your initial email in the Sales UI.

Here's a screenshot of the Sales compose page:

Just like with the other Exchange options, you can view customer replies and continue the conversation either in Sales or in the client you're using. Here are a couple of differences:

You see the emails you compose recorded in Activities right away. You don't have to wait a few minutes for them to appear as you do with the other options.
The Sales UI doesn't save your draft, so you must send the email before you close the browser tab.
You can't use your signature for the initial email and any others you send from Sales.

Oracle Sales UI with Oracle Email

If your organization isn't implementing integration with Exchange, then you use the Sales UI exclusively to send and receive email. Here are the main differences:

You can't use client applications to view and send emails. There are no email signatures, and you must send your email before you close the browser tab. Oracle Email doesn't save drafts.
Unlike the other options, this one doesn't use your email address for outgoing and incoming emails. Your contacts see your name in the From: field as usual, but Oracle inserts a special email address with a code that identifies the email for tracking in the application.

Comparison Between the Different Options

Here's a quick comparison between the different options:

Email Feature	Microsoft Office 365	Outlook or Another Client That Integrates with Microsoft Exchange	Oracle Sales UI with Microsoft Exchange	Oracle Sales UI with Oracle Email
You must create the initial email in Oracle Sales.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Compose window you use in Oracle Sales	Microsoft Office 365	Microsoft Outlook or another client	Oracle Sales compose UI	Oracle Sales compose UI
Enables cc, bcc, and attachments	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Hides autogenerated IDs in compose window	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Displays email thread in replies	Yes	Only the subject and header of the most recent email you're replying to	Yes	Yes
Signatures and templates	Yes	Yes	No	No
Drafts get saved automatically	Yes	Yes	No for emails sent from the Digital Sales UI, including the initial email. You can save drafts in your client application.	No
Uses your own email address in the From: field	Yes	Yes	Yes	No. The recipient sees the sender's name, but the application includes a computer-generated reply email address.
Send later at a scheduled time	Yes	Depends on which client you use	No	Yes
How you know you have mail	Receive notification (bell icon) in Oracle Sales Check Inbox	Receive notification (bell icon) in Oracle Sales Check Inbox	Receive notification (bell icon) in Oracle Sales Check Inbox	Receive notification (bell icon) in Oracle Sales
Where you can read and respond to replies, including attachments	Inbox in Microsoft Office 365 Outlook In the Activities page of the Oracle Sales record where you composed the initial outgoing email and in the Activities page of the contact	Outlook or other client Inbox In the Activities page of the Oracle Sales record where you composed the initial outgoing email and in the Activities page of the contact	In the Activities page of the Oracle Sales record where you composed the initial outgoing email and in the Activities page of the contact In a client application integrated with Microsoft Exchange.	In the Activities page of the Oracle Sales record where you composed the initial outgoing email and in the Activities page of the contact
When your initial email appears on the Activities page	In a few minutes, after a process runs	In a few minutes, after a process runs	Immediately	Immediately

Overview of Email Setup

You have the choice of setting up either Oracle Email or an integration with Microsoft Exchange.

Important: As of June 2023, Microsoft Exchange doesn't support the REST APIs to access on-premises mail boxes, so you must set up your integration with the cloud version only.

Option	Setup Description	Where to Get More Details
Microsoft Exchange	To set up the integration with Microsoft Exchange, you must perform setups in Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Exchange Server, and Oracle Sales. In Microsoft Azure, you create an application for the integration and provide application access to the mailbox. If you're using the Microsoft 365 add-in, you must create a new application in Microsoft Azure for this integration. In Microsoft Exchange Server, you create a rule to add identifying information in emails. In Oracle CX Sales, you must register your choice to use Microsoft Exchange by setting the system profile option ORA_ZCA_DS_EMAIL_OPTIONS to `MS Exchange with Redwood Compose UX`. By default, the profile is set to Oracle Email.	See the topic: Microsoft Exchange Email Integration in Oracle Sales
Oracle Email	If you aren't using Microsoft Exchange, set up Oracle Email. The setup involves: Registering access points. Configuring an email channel. Running scheduled processes to retrieve inbound emails. Setting profile options to display past conversations in the outbound emails.	See the topic: Oracle Email Integration with Oracle Sales