If I had it to do all over again, I never would have used ACT. I would have focused on fewer, higher quality social networking contacts, and gotten permission to do more email - ( Of couse, there was no email back then.) - followed by phone, etc.

Don't waste your time on small accounts. Prequalify.

Chasing hundreds of names is the equivalent of later on spending your energy thinking about changing broker dealers. It's a racket, in that the inefficiency of chasing will probably result in the accretion of your labor for someone else's book. (Failure is likely.) FWIW.

I have used ACT for 10 yrs in two different industries and really dig it.  Remember that ACT is nothing more than a tool to help organize info, history of prospect/client touch, etc.  Think of a well organized filing cabinet with as much information and history that you could ever store in it.  The questions you are asking about how to effectively use ACT would be developing a list of IDStatus for prospects and to use them.  Make sure to note the records well in the "notes" section and therefore you will have a great history.  There are many ways to search and organize data as well as to put follow up call reminders, etc.  You can attach letters, proposals, etc. to the notes section which will allow you to pull up what you have discussed before.  I'm not an FA but operate a sales orginization of 7 that all use ACT.  If I can be of further help to you drop me a line.