Siebel Consumer Goods Guide > Product Distribution >

About Controlling Product Distribution

Distributing the right products to the right account is a key challenge for many companies. The Siebel Consumer Goods application allows you to structure and track the distribution of a wide range of products to large numbers of accounts. In addition, you can control where the product is held within an account's premises.

Your company can control product distribution in the following ways:

• Managing distribution lists to automate product distribution. By assigning distribution codes to categories, products, and accounts within a customer's product distribution account hierarchy, you build a distribution system that determines which products are distributed to each account. For more overview information about distribution lists, see About Distribution Lists.
• Classifying accounts by market segment. Classifying an account's market segment automates the product distribution process by controlling the products (or product categories) that are displayed in that account's product catalog. You classify your customer accounts' market segments by applying the personalization attribute Account Channel for each account.

  For more overview information about account market segments, see About Account Market Segments.

• Assigning product categories to an account. Administrators or end users can manually assign specific product categories to specific accounts, so that only products in those categories are available for distribution.
• Creating buying groups. Buying groups are accounts that act as product distributors, or suppliers, to their multiple member accounts. For more overview information about buying groups, see About Buying Groups.
• Designating merchandising locations. You can assign multiple merchandising locations to an account.