Getting started with Odoo 16 and contact management

How to navigate Odoo, how to create and archive records, and how to maintain the database of customers, vendors and contacts shared by every area. Here you will find 21 Binovo video tutorials (1 h 32 min) organized into 3 sections. Each video includes a summary and a step-by-step overview of what it shows.

Odoo 16 · Updated October 13, 2026 · See all areas

How do you get around the Odoo ERP home screen?6:00

The Odoo main screen: home menus, chat, activities and reminders, changing your password, accessing modules and searching for options.

What the video shows
  • Home menu with the installed apps, which vary depending on the company and the user’s permissions, and how to open one and return to the home screen
  • Top icons for conversations (messages and notifications) and pending activities, with the example of late purchase orders
  • Company selector in multi-company environments and user menu with documentation, support, shortcuts, My Profile and Log out
  • Changing your password from My Profile on first login, and why you should log out when someone else is going to use the computer
  • Menu search: typing “contacts” or “invoices” lists the matching options and takes you straight to the one you choose

How to create, edit and archive records in Odoo13:07

How to add, edit and archive a record (product, customer, order). The process is always the same; it is important to understand autosave, especially if you are coming from earlier versions or from other ERPs.

What the video shows
  • Access to the same product master from Inventory, Sales, Purchase or Manufacturing
  • New button to open the form: name, product type, invoicing policy and product image
  • Unchecking “Can be Purchased” hides the Purchase tab, where vendors are specified
  • Automatic saving when leaving the form, manual save button and discard changes button, which only works before leaving
  • Default filters in Purchase (can be purchased) and in Sales (can be sold): removing them shows all products
  • The same New button is used to create sales quotations, invoices, customers or opportunities
  • Editing a record: open the record, change the barcode, product code and category, and it is saved when you leave
  • Archiving with Action, Archive instead of deleting, finding records with the Archived filter and restoring them with Unarchive

What is the Odoo Chat Box and how does it work?16:34

What the Odoo chatter is and how to use it: attaching documents, sending messages, scheduling calls and meetings, and adding followers.

What the video shows
  • Side panel available in contacts, sales, purchases, invoices, projects and accounting, which keeps the record’s history from the moment it was created
  • Send message emails the contact, with an expanded editor and attachments, logs the replies and marks the envelope in red if sending fails
  • Log note records an internal comment, visible only to company users, that does not reach the contact
  • Activities with type (call, meeting, to-do, upload document), summary, date and assignee, visible in kanban, list view and the top notification
  • Mark as Done closes the activity and lets you record the outcome, which is kept in the history
  • Attachments: files sent in messages or uploaded directly (PDF, video), which can be viewed and downloaded
  • Internal or external followers who are notified of messages, with external ones unable to see notes or activities, and an email invitation when they are added
  • In a sales quotation, the email sending and the change of amount are logged, but not the creation of the invoice or the change of payment terms

Contacts 12 videos

What you need to know about the Odoo Contacts module0:23

A quick overview of the options and benefits of the Contacts module.

What the video shows
  • Course content: how contacts are created, which fields on the record matter and why filling them in makes processes in other modules easier

What permissions are needed to access contacts?0:52

The Contacts module has no permissions of its own, but some sections are only accessible with settings and accounting permissions.

What the video shows
  • Contacts has no permission that grants or removes access: what you see depends on the permissions of other modules
  • Without access to Invoicing or Sales, the two corresponding tabs on the contact record are not shown
  • Without configuration access in the Administration group, the menu for creating countries, states, contact titles and tags is not visible

How to create contact tags in Odoo2:39

Contact tags, which can have multiple levels, to classify contacts and analyze data.

What the video shows
  • Contacts, Configuration, Contact Tags: a menu visible only with settings permission and with some tags created by default
  • Creating the “Customer” tag with a name, color and Active checkbox, without a parent category
  • Creating a second tag with “Customer” as its parent category to create a lower level
  • Assigning tags in the Tags field of the contact record, where any user can create a new one by typing it and pressing Enter

How to create contact titles in Odoo0:58

Contact titles to know how to address each person, for example in emails.

What the video shows
  • Configuration > Contact Titles: each title has a name and an abbreviation, and new ones are created by typing directly in the list
  • They can be added, for example, to have them in another language, although they are used less and less
  • The title is assigned on the contact record and used in the emails sent to the contact automatically

Setting up localization data in Odoo1:26

Tables of countries, cities and postal codes that need to be filled in so that contact locations can be completed.

What the video shows
  • Tables of countries, country groups, states, cities and postal codes in the localization section of Configuration
  • With cities created, the location autocomplete field on the contact record fills in the full address
  • If they have not been created, the city and postal code have to be typed in manually

How to look up a bank account in Odoo0:07

A summary table, in the configuration, to review and create contacts’ bank accounts.

What the video shows
  • Shown as the last section of the Configuration menu

How to create contacts and their integrations in Odoo7:43

Fields on the contact record, some of which affect accounting. From the record you can also get in touch with customers and vendors and schedule meetings.

What the video shows
  • Contacts > New: individual or company, name with logo and website suggestion, address autocompleted by city and tax ID (NIF) with prefix, validated on saving
  • Phone, mobile, email and tags, and the Sales & Purchase tab with payment terms, pricelist and fiscal position that carry over to invoices, plus the industry
  • Invoicing/Accounting tab with bank accounts (bank, number, currency, holder) and Internal Notes tab with text, images, links or tables
  • Contacts & Addresses tab: creating a person with title, job position, email and phone numbers, also accessible from the general contact list
  • From the record you can send emails, schedule activities (example of a call) and meetings, and see the summary of invoiced amounts and sales

How to see each customer’s orders and invoices in Odoo3:51

From the contact record you can access the customer’s orders and invoices, see how much has been invoiced to them, and schedule and review meetings held.

What the video shows
  • Meetings button: calendar and list view of appointments with the contact, and creating a new one that already includes the user and the contact as attendees
  • Sales button: the contact’s quotations and orders, with the option to create a new one that carries over the customer or to confirm existing ones
  • Invoiced button: the contact’s invoices, with an example of a 30% down payment invoice created from a confirmed order
  • Go to website button: shows the page where the contact’s details are published, if it has been decided to publish them on the web

Duplicating contacts… How does it work in Odoo?1:20

Duplicating a contact to create a new one without re-entering data that already exists.

What the video shows
  • Duplicate action on the record of a company employee to create another contact with the same characteristics
  • In the copy, the name and image are changed, while the linked company, address and job position are kept
  • The new contact appears as one more within the company

Exporting and bulk-editing contacts3:35

Exporting contacts to Excel to analyze or edit them, and importing them afterwards to update contacts in bulk, with a maximum of 500 records per import.

What the video shows
  • In the Contacts list view, records are filtered and selected, and Action > Export is used
  • The checkbox that prepares the export for re-importing is ticked and the necessary fields, such as Tags, are added
  • In Excel the data is reviewed or modified, separating the tags of a single contact with commas
  • Favorites > Import records: the file is uploaded, you check which field each column maps to and click Test before Import
  • Useful for bulk changes, such as assigning a tag to all contacts or prefixing ES to the tax ID

How to import cities and postal codes in Odoo1:12

A module that makes it easier to create cities by importing postal codes and cities from the GeoNames database.

What the video shows
  • From Configuration, the Import option lets you choose the countries (Spain and France in the example) and the capitalization format of the names
  • The import takes a while and leaves the cities loaded with their postal code and state

Binovo developments and extras 5 videos

What Odoo is and how it works7:24

A functional overview of several modules: quotations, purchase and sales orders, invoicing from delivery notes and invoicing analysis.

Odoo v16: usability and productivity3:24

Usability improvements in version 16: a more agile working environment, focused on managing and tracking the main and secondary data of each process.

What the video shows
  • CRM opportunity with the main data and, in the right side panel, the traceability of actions, tasks and milestones, previously located at the bottom
  • Sales quotation with the same layout: customer, lines, confirm, proforma invoice and send by email buttons, and the milestone of sending to the customer
  • Scheduling a follow-up call from Activities without leaving the full record view

Disabling autosave in Odoo 16 and dark mode6:32

A module developed by Binovo that lets you disable Odoo 16 autosave so you can save changes manually.

What the video shows
  • Native autosave in version 16: changes to a quotation are saved when leaving via the breadcrumbs even if Save is not clicked
  • Risk: an unintended change in a barely visible field, such as the sales team, is saved without warning
  • With Binovo’s Auto save prevent module installed, you are asked on leaving whether to save the changes; answering No discards them
  • It applies to all records (quotations, products, contacts); example of a customer tax deleted by mistake that is not saved
  • Dark mode: after installing the module, the Dark Mode option in the user menu reloads the whole interface with dark colors

Dynamic geolocation of contacts2:37

A module developed by Binovo to see on a map where customers and vendors are located.

What the video shows
  • New Map view button in Contacts that shows where companies and people are, with the usual filters and zoom using the mouse wheel
  • Clicking a point shows the address, and from there you can open the contact record
  • The same map view is available in CRM opportunities and in Sales
  • Requirement: a correct address on the contact and clicking Update in the Partner Assignment tab to obtain the latitude and longitude

Binovo’s Odoo training platform3:47

Binovo’s training platform for taking Odoo courses and using it as a reference through a search engine.

What the video shows
  • Access by URL from any device with an internet connection, with the courses you are enrolled in on the left
  • Courses organized by topic and followed in strict order: you must complete one topic to move on to the next
  • Search bar at the top that finds all content where a term is covered, with the example of searching for “payments”
  • Each piece of content is a video with a voiceover explaining the procedure in detail, accompanied by a short written explanation below

Frequently asked questions for getting started with Odoo

How do you navigate Odoo 16?

From the main screen you can access each app, the chat, pending activities and the option search. Breadcrumb navigation lets you go back to any previous screen in one click.

Does Odoo save changes automatically?

Yes, Odoo 16 automatically saves records when you leave them. Binovo has developed a module that lets you disable that autosave for those who prefer to save manually.

Can contacts be edited in bulk?

Yes. Contacts are exported to Excel, modified and imported again to update them all at once; in the tutorial example, up to 500 records per import.

Want to see how Odoo would work in your company?

At Binovo we implement Odoo, develop custom modules and train your team. We show you your own processes in a demo.

Contact Binovo Odoo ERP implementation · 943 569 206

More Odoo features