Launch Marketing Campaign Error

[FCUSA]

I am operating Vista on Dell Studio XPS with Office 2007 Small Business. Not even 1 1/2 years old - I use Contact Manager for our small business and launched Marketing Campaigns successfully 1-2 times a month during this time. Several days ago it decided it no longer wanted to LAUNCH. I am at my wits end (as many of you are) for several reasons: most of the links pertaining to the software are no longer valid at Microsoft ; I found only 1 post at Microsoft pertaining to this issue posted about 3 weeks ago and no valid responses to it. The typical re-install which I tried and there was also an error in the re-install (pre-installed by Dell ) - location not found!! I have SP2 and am concerned about a full re-install as Microsoft no longer supports this if SP2 is not installed. I even used my product key at MS to locate the info and it tells me my input of the key was an invalid format and try again - how stupid can I be on inputting #'s in the format that is listed!!




The error reads as follows "BCM for outlook could not complete your last action or actions." This occurs when trying to launch a campaign after I select my group from the reports (as I have always done). I have even tried the back door through Publisher.




There are three users in total (including the administrator) on this computer and the error is only on one user (of course, the one used for our business). The error occurs when trying to Launch a Marketing Campaign (all other functions seem to be fine). It will not work in any form, that is, withing Outlook or launching from Publisher. Now when I pull up a previous publisher mailing and try to launch it uses the original data (the number of contacts from way back when) and will not allow be to change it. I also tried creating a New Publisher without any data and it does the same.




I've spent three days searching (in circles) - like trying to conduct business these days isn't hard enough! Help, Help & Help!

 

[Forum Admin]

When 1 user account has problems, its often a problem with the profile or other files used by the user account. First step would be making a new outlook profile- don't delete the old one - we just want to see if the new profile has the same errors.

The problem could be caused by a recent update -both the july 13 and sept 14 updates caused a number of problems but no one has reported issues with BCM. But because only one user account is affected, i don't think it is an update.

System restore might fix it, if you have a restore point from before the issue started. However, because only 1 user account is affected, system restore should not be necessary to fix it.

 

[FCUSA]

Thank you so much for your input. I agree that the confusing part is problems with only 1 user. I last successfully launched a campaign on August 21st (should I need to do a restore (helpful suggestion from the Vista site, but they do acknowledge not having BCM). Last night I looked at the recent updates and although there were numerous ones since this date (1 Defender update on the 14th and several Outlook/Vista on the 15th. One that I did think was unusual as it pertains to 2003 read as follows:




Security Update for Microsoft Office 2003 (KB2288613)




Installation date: ‎9/‎15/‎2010 8:49 AM




Installation status: Successful




Update type: Important




A security vulnerability exists in Microsoft Office 2003 that could allow arbitrary code to run when a maliciously modified file is opened. This update resolves that vulnerability.




More information:


http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2288613




Help and Support:


http://support.microsoft.com/?LN=en-us






I viewed the website and it does not seem to pertain in any way to 2007 (this computer never had 2003 installed (to my knowledge) - I purchased it directly from Dell (preinstalled) last year (we won't go there).




Although I am (somewhat) computer illiterate, logically (like your thoughts) I could not understand that an update would be isolated to only one user. I found an old thread on your forum which spoke about Registry Key - here is the link




?19070-Busness-Contact-Manager-Error




but like the last post, I looked at it and had no idea what I was looking at.




I will create a new profile - but I have to ask - do you mean a new user through the administrator?




Thank you so much for your assistance,


Sally

 

[FCUSA]

New profile did not address the problem, nor did a system restore. We have created a new user and so far so good. We have set up the database in the affected user to be shared and when we chose that database in our regular users, it duplicated the same error. We are now thinking that the database is corrupted. Would exporting the database and then importing it into the new user be the way to go? Does anyone know exactly what the name of the database file is?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

BCM database is stored in SQL - ldf and mdf are the files on the hard drive. if everyone is getting the same error it could be the database.




If you have outlook 2007 installed you should have the Sept 14 security update for office 2007 too. The security update is full of "issues" so it could be the cause - no one has mentioned this specific problem though and linked it to the update. It's one of those things where not enough people reported it to have figured out a solution.




Or its possible you need to update sql. Go to windows update and see if it offers any sql updates.

 

[FCUSA]

Thank you so much for the input. I do have an Update Sept 15 and I have narrowed down the problem to September. Last successful launch was August 21. We did a restore - that did not work.




We have pretty much narrowed it down (I believe) to that database. I have tried all other users - they are fine on their own database but not when sharing the affected database. I have also tried the affected user with another user's database and all was fine. I have now created a new database within the affected user's BCM and with just two test contacts but it is working fine. Now it seems I need to get the data into the newly created database. Trying that today but not certain. We created a new user the other day and then tried an export / import and that failed. Not very familiar with SQL databases.




any additional input - greatly appreciated.

 

[FCUSA]

For those of you having a similiar problem, here was my resolution:




I created a New Database within the affected user:




1. Business Contact Manager


2. Database Tools


3. Create or Select New Database




With the new database created, I exported Business Contacts & Accounts separately using the .csv option. (On previous attempts, the .bcm file did not work (probably because, for us, we narrowed down our problem to a corrupt database through a process of elimination).




I exported and imported in .csv format and most all fields populated. Had to import Business Contacts and Accounts separately. Unfortunately, each Business Contact is associated with (actually created from within) an Account - that connection did not import. The upside is at least the Business Contacts imported with their Category intact (something I painstakingly updated several months ago when I realized the benefits of pulling reports by that value - so glad I did). I tried launching from Publisher and again, all seems to be fine. The old database is still intact, so I'll print that report (hopefully it will print) and manually reassign the accounts. A month ago, I would have been annoyed about this extra task and today, I feel blessed - funny how that works!!




I hope this helps!




BTW (not sure how to show this post has been resolved) - please advise

 

[Forum Admin]

So the users each have their own database?