The CRM Product catalog is intended for you to host all the product records of all the items you sell across the business. These include resale products from Microsoft, other Manufacturers, or other Distributors. They may also include other third party vendor products, your own IP solutions, and your own value added services. Anything you put in the product catalog can be created as a Subscription or Non-recurring item in Work 365.
Q: What do I do when Microsoft changes the price on one of their products? Is Work 365 integrated with Microsoft’s price list?
- Work 365 offers a Product Service feature which streamlines the product catalog management. Through the product service, Work 365 pulls the Microsoft Price List.
- Microsoft Price List changes:
- Use the Product Service to update pricing in your catalog. New customers purchasing this product will be paying the updated price.
- Customers who already have this subscription are still committed to the selling price at which they originally bought the product for the remaining of the term. Use the Subscription Pricing feature to manage subscription pricing
- Note: if Microsoft actually changes the sku # and the pricing of an existing product: This essentially results in a new Product in your system along with a new subscription.
- Note: If Microsoft actually changes the product name of an existing product, but leaves the sku # the same: update the product name in the catalog to reflect the new name. Note that even though the product name will change, all subscriptions associated with this product will still have the same subscription name and friendly name. Due to customers' commitment end dates (price commitment end dates), it is recommended that the subscription name remains the same until this date arrives. At that point in time, the subscription name can be updated. New subscriptions created from this product will reflect the new subscription and friendly names.
Q: I am in multiple regions. How do I set up my product catalog?
Best Practice is to setup a different Price List and define new Price List items for each Market and currency. A product can be associated with multiple price lists. Each Price list can have multiple price list items representing the Commitment Term/Sales Unit and currency for that region.
Q: How do I handle special pricing skus or trial subscriptions in Work 365?
Refer to this article on handling special pricing in Work 365?
Q: How do I manage discounts?
If the discount is a global discount applied for all customers, the discount can be calculated into the selling price for the product on the product’s price list item(s).
If the discount varies per customer, then when creating a new product as a subscription update the discount percentage on the subscription. Not the discount can only be a percentage and not a flat amount.
if the customer receives an overall discount an invoice level discount can be applied at the Billing Contract by updating the Discount % field on the Billing Contract.
Q: What is the difference between write-in vs. real products as subscriptions?
It is a best practice that all products and services are defined in the Product Catalog. A Subscription may have a write-in product if the Product does not exist in your catalog.
A write in Product can still be invoiced. A write-in product however will be synced into your accounting system as a write-in product which could impact revenue reporting. Watch this video for more information on write-in vs real products.