Group creation: In your pivot table report, select items in the Page area and include fields in the Row or Column areas to define segments graphically.  By showing you the number of records that meet your criteria or many potential sets of criteria, this replaces the work you would normally have to do creating many complex SQL queries to isolate your target records.  From there, drill down to a line-listing page, showing a row-by-row listing of the target records.

You may wish to aggregate records from several different cells in your pivot table into a single GoldMine group.  Do this by grouping items (see Grouping Field Items, page 63 of MasterMine’s new Version 6 User Manual) within the pivot table to bring them all into a single subtotal, then drilling down on the subtotal.  Alternatively, you can drill down on separate items, creating separate drilldown sheets, then copy/paste data from one sheet to another.  If you use this method, be sure to create only one header row, in row 1.

Once you have created a drilldown sheet displaying your target records, simply hit the Group button on the MasterMine toolbar, and specify a name for the group.  You may optionally specify a field (only if it is part of the original query) that will be used to sort the group members, as well as a field whose items can help you to reference records once you return to GoldMine.

Group selected rows: If you want to build a group on only some of the rows represented in your MasterMine drill-down screen, highlight the rows or individual cells in only one column, for the rows to be included.  MasterMine will detect that you have done so and build the group of only the selected rows.

MasterMine creates only one group member for each account number appearing on the page.  It colors the rows of would-be “duplicate” members blue, and the rows of members not found in the current GoldMine contact set red.  This means you can safely create non-duplicated groups even from activity-centric reports or any other kind of report that contain more than one row per GoldMine account.

Once you have created the group, switch over to GoldMine itself.  The group you created is sorted under the group code (by default,“MM” – some users like to use the date to help identify groups that might be kept for a long time), and may be activated using normal GoldMine procedures.

The potential uses of groups in GoldMine are very many.  You now have a capability that makes creating them far easier and faster, even without technical knowledge.