Hi Kieran,
Usually, I always use Account or Contact to store Partner records, depends the type of Partner, is that Business Company or Personal.
Why, because I can utilize the features that only Account and Contact can have this.
For example: Marketing List and Campaign Activity, only can spread to members from Account, Contact, and lead.
Then, case.
Case basically in CRM has relationship to Contact and Account.
For example, your Partner submitted a case, then you can link Case to Account without any addition of custom relationship.
Then, it has relationship Parent Account as well, for example your Partner is big group, for example: A Bank, that might have more than 100 branches around nationwide or worldwide.
And another one is Address entity.
Only Account and Contact that can be linked to this entity.
It enables you to store multiple address and as well you can get the bing map.
It also has Composite fields as well, for example for Full Name (First Name + Last Name) and Address fields.
The Marketing List is the best feature that you can use for marketing purpose if you use Account.
Then, the fields that are in the Account, including Bulk Promotion Email, Address fields, etc.
Usually, I just use picklist status in the Account or Contact entity, for example: Account Type: Partner, Customer, Potential Customer, to let them different each other.
You also can learn about Connection Roles, you can find from Google or this link:
msdn.microsoft.com/.../gg328381.aspx
msdn.microsoft.com/.../gg328007.aspx
www.powerobjects.com/.../replace-relationship-roles-with-connections-in-dynamics-crm
Which is you can defined the Connection between multiple Contact and Account.
Then, for example you have Prospect to become Partner, Prospect is not only about Customer, but also can be Partner, then you can qualify the Lead to become Account and Contact only.
Yes, you can create another custom entity, but please consider about the enhancement and the main feature that you can get from using Account as Partner.
"And if I create a new entity is it possible to add it to the main header ribbon along with sales, accounts, competitors etc"
You should create custom relationship to all of the Sales Modules, for example: Opportunity, Quote, Order, Invoice, Competitor.
Then if about Service, then custom relationship to Case.
You cannot link to the Address entity as well.
But, you will lose the Marketing List membership feature, for example you want to group Partner by some criteria, by location, by age, by its size, etc.
Then, you can use RibbonWorkbench,
crmvisualribbonedit.codeplex.com
a ribbon editor to add your own custom ribbon. You can check the Ribbon Commands of Accounts and then use those commands o your own ribbon.
Hope it helps!
Thanks.
