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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. Product Name Size Color Price Polo T-shirt L White $25 Polo T-shirt M Off White $30 Polo T-shirt L Black $15 Polo T-shirt M Grey $20 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. Product Name Language Size Subscription in Months Price Tech Info English Full 3, 6, 9, 12 months $15, $12, $9, $7 Learn & Grow weekly newspaper English Full 3, 6, 9, 12 months $15, $12, $9, $7 Tech Info French Full 3, 6, 9, 12 months $18, $15, $12, $9 Learn & Grow weekly newspaper French Full 3, 6, 9, 12 months $18, $15, $12, $9 Tech Info English Half 3, 6, 9, 12 months $10, $8, $5, $3 Learn & Grow weekly newspaper English Half 3, 6, 9, 12 months $10, $8, $5, $3 Tech Info French Half 3, 6, 9, 12 months $12, $10, $8, $6 Learn & Grow weekly newspaper French Half 3, 6, 9, 12 months $12, $10, $8, $6   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. Sr. No Product Name Price 1 Tech info English Full 3 months $15 2 Tech info English Full 6 months $12 3 Tech info English Full 9 months $9 4 Tech info English Full 12 months          $7 5 Tech info English half 3 months $10 6 Tech info English half 6 months $8 7 Tech info English half 9 months $5 8 Tech info English half 12 months $3 9 Tech info French Full 3 months $18 10 Tech info French Full 6 months $15  11   Tech info French Full 9 months  $12 12 Tech info French Full 12 months $9 13 Tech info French Half 3 months $12 14 Tech info French Half 6 months $10   15 Tech info French Half 9 months $8 16 Tech info French Half 12 months $6 17 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 3 months $15 18 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 6 months $12 19 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 9 months $9  20 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English                  Full 12 months  $7 21 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 3 months $18 22 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 6 months $15 23 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 9 months         $12 24 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 12 months $9 25 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 3 months $10 26 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 6 months $8 27 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English Full 9 months $5 28 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper English                  Full 12 months $3 29 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 3 months $12 30 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 6 months $10   31 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 9 months $8 32 Learn & Grow weekly Newspaper French Full 12 months $6   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: Tech info 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:   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. 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. 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. 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. 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.

Gartner predicts that by 2020, all new entrants and 80% of historical vendors will offer subscription-based business models, regardless of where the software resides. The challenge which companies following the subscription based model faces is of having a strong sales pipeline.    A sales pipeline is a journey with a set of stages that a prospect moves through, in order to become a customer from a lead. Once each pipeline stage is completed, the prospects are advanced to the next stage till it reaches the final stage i.e. Closed Won/Won.   These days’ companies spend enormously on building their Sales Pipeline as having a strong sales pipeline helps companies generate more revenue. It won’t be incorrect to say that the sales pipeline acts as a backbone of a business. By having Bulk Rebook feature in your CRM you can build a strong sales pipeline with just one click. It will help you create asales pipeline where initial nurturing of the leads will be already done and they will be on the lateral stages. Your 70% work will be taken care by the Bulk Rebook and you will be on the Proposal/Quote generation stage(as you can see in the below image) from where you will generate the Proposal and send it over to the prospect. Advantages Below are few advantages of having Bulk Rebook in your CRM; It will ease your work of building a strong sales pipeline as it will create a sales pipeline with all the potential buyers with their exact needs. It will reduce the number of clicks in closing the deal as all the important information related to prospect will be captured by the Bulk Rebook. It will save your time and efforts to nurture the Leads as it will already be nurtured and hence it will save your money. It will even bring in all the information associated with the prospects like the past requirements, new requirements, glimpse of their budget etc. With all the important information present, the Sales Rep will be able to pitch the right product/services. It will enable bettersales and revenue Sales Reps will be able to create better quotes within no time. Negotiation time will be reduced significantly. It will provide us early insights of salesin the next subscription period. Proposal generation time can be reduced and hence will result in reducing the time to convert the prospects to customers. Bulk Rebook can be customized; companies can bring in the information associated with the prospects of their choice for quick and effective decision making. Conclusion The importance of having Bulk Rebook is evident from the fact that it leads to significant improvements in the levels of sales closures, sales administration time, and sales cycle timing. All these and many more advantages of having Bulk Rebook in your CRM software undoubtedly help you stay at the top of your league. About Girikon Girikon a Salesforce Consulting Partner based out in the USA with presence across Australia and India. They house a team of Certified and experienced Salesforce Consultants, administrators and developers who offer end-to-end services to global clientele.

 Performance:             Usually to increase the speed of execution process or improving the Performance of a job, the developers should follow some performance techniques. This Performance technique is a key matrix of a Jobs’ success or failure. We can speed up the job execution process in below following ways:  Global Context: Defining the context group and access context details based on the context group and appropriate context variable throughout the job and we can pass the same context to sub jobs also. If we have more complex job, then we can divide the job into multiple sub jobs to increase the processing time and speed. For the job parallel execution purpose, we can use Multithread option to increase the processing time and speed.       (Job –> Extra –> Multithread Execution)  By increasing the JVM parameters is also one of the performance techniquesin talend.                (Allocating more memory to the jobs).  Use Database Bulk Components (While loading huge datasets to database from Talend Job, it is recommended to use Bulk components provided by Talend for almost all databases.) Ex: – tMSSqlBulkExec, tMSSqlOutputBulk, tMSSqlOutputBulkExec etc. Use SELECT Query to retrieve data from the database. Ex: – tOracleinput, tMySqlinput…..etc.  Removing   the    unnecessary    data/rows     using   tFilterColumns Removing the unnecessary fields/columns using tFilterColumns We can also increase the performance by changing the commit size and batch size. Avoiding the tMapcomponent for the single piece of work. It will also increase the performance and time.   Reusability:  Talend provides many ways to make our code reusable.  Custom Code– Talend provides few custom components like tJava, tJavaRow, tJavaFlex These components are used to integrate our custom java code into a talend program. By using these Custom Code components, we can create codes for specific needs and for accessing the codes very quickly.  Job: With the help of tRunJob, we can call the another Job.  Metadata-Data that gives the information about the data is called as Meta Data. In terms of Talend open Studio, metadata refers to reusable configurations that describe the data, its attributes.   Once we defined the metadata, it can be used across multiple jobs. For example, if the Username or Password to an DB account changes and this DB connection is used in 5 different jobs, the details would have to be updated 5 times. However, if we store this configuration in a single metadata component, then it only needs to be updated once, no need to change in differentjobs.  Context Groups– We can define the contexts are User-Defined parameters. Context Variables are the values that may change from one environment to another environment like Development to Testing or Testing to Production.   In these cases, Talend provides the Context Group facility. Here, a group of context variables that can be added to our job or multiple jobs as a context group from the metadata section. Suppose if we change any value from context group it will reflect to all other jobs wherever we used the same context group. Job Lets:We can use job lets for reusable purpose. In job any piece of code we get repeatedly that piece of code put into job let.    SQL Templates: In Talend, we have by default some SQL Templates. If we are using Databases in our jobs, then we can create our own SQL Templates, or we can use default SQL Templates.  Use Repository mode for storing the information that you want to use repeatedly in multiple components or Jobs, such as a database connection. Avoid the built-in mode. About GIRIKON: Girikon is a reputed provider of end-to-end IT services including but not limited to Salesforce consulting, Salesforce implementation and Salesforce support.

What makes python so popular that it has become one of the hottest tech skills for 2020? Released in 1991 and created by Guido van Rossum, Python was and is still extremely relevant for all developers to learn and grow. Python is interactive, dynamic, versatile, one of the most relevant languages and one of the most talked about language for the year 2020. It is on the top charts of Most Popular programming language used by 25 Unicorn companies.Python is interpreted (Compilation not needed as in other object-oriented languages), object-oriented, high-level programming language with dynamic semantics. It has high end built in data structures, dynamic typing and dynamic binding and has a rapid application development support. It supports modules and packages which gives support to modularity and code reuse.There is no compilation step which makes edit-test-debug cycle incredibly fast.Currently according to DataSlash there are 8.2 million developers’ uses python worldwide. Python became a solution in many different areas. From web applications to data science and machine learning.There are more than 2000 financial and non-financial companies that use Python for backend. Instagram, Uber, Spotify, Amazon, Safari Books Online, Testive, Harvard Medical School, Vitality, Bank of America, Entrepreneurial Financial Lab and Robinhood etc. are few of them. Python is widely used in data science and numeric computing for list, arrays and dataframes: SciPy is used to solve scientific and mathematical problems. Pandas is used for data analysis and data manipulations. Matplotlib and seaborn is a Data visualization library. Python also supports 3D Data visualization as well. Few of the 2D and 3D visualizations from Python’s matplotlib and seaborn About Girikon: Girikon is a reputed Salesforce consulting and development company that caters to its global clientele with quality services and solutions.