CPQ Product Pricing Based On Attributes

Introduction

CPQ stands for Configuration, Price and Quote.It is a sales tool for companies to provide accurate pricing of the products with any given product configuration. CPQ helps sales rep to provide discounts, increment or decrement in the quantities, customizations on products while preparing the quote. This feature allows sales rep to quote prices quickly and more accurately.

Purpose of the Document

The purpose of this document is to provide the knowledge on CPQ and CPQ product pricing with attributesto the user. In this, user can understand below important topic related to CPQ pricing with attributes:

• Introduction of CPQ
• Why we need CPQ pricing based on attributes
• How can we achieve this?
• Benefits of CPQ pricing with attributes

Need of CPQ Pricing based on attributes

In most of the business there will be products which don’t have any configuration. We can easily handle those kinds of products in salesforce because there will be nothing other than products and their Prices. But now a days business and industries are growing rapidly. This growth introduces products with some specific configuration.

For Example: Let’s take the example of clothing industry; according to below table we have a product(Polo T-shirt) and we have some fields with respect to that product (Size, Color, and Price). Here Size, Color and Priceare the attributes of Product. After selecting the product, user need to select the corresponding attributes and their values of the product and user will notice the price will occur once he/she selects all the attributes of the product. Also, if user changes the values of the attributes then Price will automatically change for that particular product.

This kind of requirement is difficult to fulfill without CPQ attributes, because user needs to create each product separately with every single attribute. But with CPQ Attributes user needs to create only 1 Product and all the configuration can be mapped to the corresponding attributes. 

Configuration Attributes

• Configuration attributes are used to gather information during sales and perform some product actions (like showing / hiding / selection products, performing validations / alerting the sales agent) or pricing actions.
• A single product can have many configuration attributes, depending upon the variations in their fields.

How to setup CPQ Product Attributes for Salesforce CPQ

Below are the steps for setting up the CPQ product pricing based on Attributes:

Step 1: Create a custom object ‘CPQ Product Attribute’

Fig 1.1

Step 2:Create the required field in the CPQ Product Attribute object, which will be displayed on the Product Attribute

Step 3: Set the Page Layout and Search Layout accordingly

Step 4: Create the required attributes field in the Quote Line Item (SBQQ__QuoteLine__c) object

Step 5:Go to field sets in Quote line object and add the new field in that by dragging

Step 6:Create a Price Rule for copying List Price to Quote Line Item, based on Product Attributes. This will automatically display the List Price on the selection of fields

Step 7:For creating the new product attributes for a product:

• Create a product in salesforce

Fig 1.2

• Make the Price Book entry at 0 pricing, as shown below

Fig 1.3

• Now upload the list of CPQ Attributes from Data Loader into the org, by selecting the object as ‘CPQ Product Attribute’

Fig 1.4

• This will create the entries within the CPQ attribute with the entries as uploaded

Fig 1.5

Step 8: Now create an opportunity and choose the pricebook in which you have entered the above products

Step 9:Create a Quote and select the CPQ product. On selection of the product, all its attributes will get displayed. Due to the pricing rule, we will be able to see the list price displaying automatically on the List_Price attribute

Fig 1.6

Use Case:

HTC Media ltd runs a small Media House on a digital platform and publishes one typeof magazine and oneweekly newspaper. They target youth in magazines and children’s in weekly newspaper. They publish their products with different specifications. They earn their revenue based on sale of these products. Customer can take subscription based on their interests.

According to the table, we have one type of Magazine and one weekly newspaper as product. Language, Size, Subscription in Months and Price are the attributes of the products. As we can see in this table on the basis of attribute, price of the product will generate. If any of the attribute is changed by the customer or user, the price will change.

Now we will try to understand how we will achieve this requirement without CPQ attributes. In order to achieve this, we need to create each product with every single attribute in Salesforce system. So in this scenario, one has to create 32 different entries of products in Salesforce in order to capture every attribute.

As you can see without CPQ attribute it would be a very tedious task for anyone to create products. In this scenario we have only 2 products with limited number of attributes and their values. But what happen if we have many products with multiple different attributes and with different values.

To resolve this kind of complexity, CPQ Attributes functionality comes in the picture.

• User need to create CPQ Product Attribute
• All the required fields will be created under this object.
• Add the same fields to the field in the Quote Line Item object.
• Add the required value to the field in CPQ Product Attribute
• Add the same value to the field in the Quote Line Item object.
• Add the required field in the Price Rule.
• Make the Price Book entry at 0 pricing.
• Now upload the list of CPQ Attributes from Data Loader into the org, by selecting the object as ‘CPQ Product Attribute’.

As we understood how to set up Configuration Attributes in above section, now we will understand how product will display on Product selection window.

Product listed on product selection window:

1. Tech info
2. Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper

All the corresponding Attributes will display on the QLI after selecting the product.

Benefit of CPQ pricing based on Product Attributes:

1. It is easy to manage the products in Salesforce with the help of CPQ attributes.

 As we have seen in use case without CPQ attributes we need to create separate product on the basis of attributes and their values. This problem can be overcome with CPQ attribute.

2. Easy to generate reports on the basis of attributes.

User can pull the report on the basis of attributes in order to get the revenue information.

3. Change the Product Prices for a campaign.

User needs to download the existing CPQ Product Attributes sheet and replace the campaign with the new one and update the prices for the respective product.

4. No need to remember the prices of the product on the basis of attributes and their values.

After selecting all the attributes of the product on QLI, price will come automatically. In this case, user doesn’t remember price of the product.

5. The view on QLI will be compact with less number of products.

QLI is always manageable with less number of products. Also, it will be easy to select the product when count is less.

Conclusion:

CPQ pricing is, without any doubt is a great feature of salesforce for evaluating the pricing of the products. CPQ pricing with product attributes fulfills the need of a business when market demands a lot of customizations and specifications on any product. CPQ makes it easy for user to manage the products and their prices when different types of attributes are present. User doesn’t need to struggle with the attributes, number of products and how pricing could achieve in salesforce. In a nutshell, CPQ pricing with product attribute is the solution for attributes related issues.

About Girikon:

Girikon is a reputed name in the Salesforce consulting and Salesforce implementation space. Over the years they have carved a niche for themselves by catering to clients requirement by providing them with quality services and solutions.

About Author

Nishtha Mangla

Nishtha is an ISTQB certified tester. She has sound knowledge on different types of testing mainly in the Manual, Web application, desktop application, database and Salesforce Testing. In her leisure time, she likes to sketch, read novels, and amazing facts on different topics.