Siebel Consumer Goods Guide > Trade Promotions > Process of Managing Plans for Account Promotions (End User) >

Creating Plans for Account Promotions

A plan applies to a specific account and a specific category of products, contains a group of account promotions for a time period, such as a fiscal year, and shows the aggregate data for the account promotions that it contains. Account managers can create plans and then add account promotions to those plans. Alternatively, they can create account promotions that are not associated with a plan. Account promotions include promoted categories and promoted products.

By default, the visibility filter in the Plan List view filters plans based on the team members for the accounts in plans. You can change this default so this visibility filter filters plans based on the team members in plans. Changing the default for this visibility filter is applicable to situations in which a manufacturer works with multiple brokers who share the same account. The brokers can view only the plans that include them as members. For more information, see Changing the Visibility Filter for Team Members.

This task is a step in Process of Managing Plans for Account Promotions (End User).

To create a plan for account promotions

1. Navigate to the Plans screen, then the Plan List view.

   Alternatively, you can navigate to the Accounts screen, then the Accounts List view, drill down on the Name field hyperlink for an account, and click the Plans view tab.

2. Create a new record, and then enter a name in the Name field.
3. Complete the other necessary fields.

   About Some Fields for Promotions and following table describe some fields.

   Field	Description
   Product Category	Allows the account plans for an account to be segmented by category of products for which the account managers are responsible. This is especially important for large companies that use multiple account managers or brokers to service a single account. Selecting a category at plan level acts as a parent category. When the user creates promotions under the plan, the parent category copies to the promotion and displays the sub-categories to add at the promoted category level.
   Period	Designates the fiscal year of the plan. This is can be used to group promotions and perform analyses by fiscal halves, quarters, or months.
   Status	Enables account managers to inform management when the plans are complete and ready for review.
   Volume Planning Type	Enables account managers to designate the data type: For a direct retailer, this can be ePOS/consumption (sell-out) data, ex-factory/shipment (sell-in) data. For a wholesaler or distributor, this can be wholesaler to retailer, also known as spin (sell-out) data or ex-factory/shipment (sell-in) data. For an indirect retailer it can be ePOS/consumption (sell-out) data or wholesaler to retailer, (spin sell-in) data. It allows account managers to plan data volumes using the best data sets available to them. Consumption-based volume planning is the most ideal, but ePOS and wholesaler sell-out data are not available for all accounts. Creating a new record automatically adds the account team as the plan or promotion team. The creator then becomes the primary in the plan or promotion team.
   Main Volume Planning Methodology	Enables account managers to plan by the most appropriate methodology: Baseline & Incremental is the ideal volume planning methodology, as true Promotion ROI Analysis cannot be done otherwise, but it is also the most labor intensive and it might not be appropriate for regional account managers who can be responsible for dozens of different accounts. It is also not appropriate for accounts or products that are over-promoted or for accounts for which good sales data is not available. Total Volume (Promoted/Non Promoted) is the appropriate methodology for accounts and products that are not responsible for a significant percentage of sales, such as the smaller wholesalers, accounts and products that are over-promoted or almost never promoted, or for accounts products for which good sales data is not available. Promotion Volume Only is the appropriate methodology for indirect accounts.
   Account Plan Team	Allows the visibility to account plan level data to be limited to only the people actively involved with the account or category of products that are being sold into that account.
   Category	Click the select button, select a category in the Category dialog box, and click OK. The Category dialog box shows the categories that are public and the categories that are private and are associated with the access groups of which you are a member.
   Plan Team	The team members for the plan. By default, the user who creates the plan is designated as the primary team member, and you cannot change this designation. Also, by default, the other team members are users who are associated with the account for the plan. You can change these other team members.
   Execution Status	The status of the processing that updates the baseline fields when you click Update. Values include: Pending, In Progress, Error, and Finished. When the value is Pending or In Progress, the Update button is disabled.
   Lift	(Est Incremental Volume divided by Est Baseline Volume) multiplied by 100. This field is populated when you click the Simulate button to simulate an account promotion and thus change the Est Incremental Volume field for the plan. If you change the Lift field, the Est Incremental Volume field is recalculated as follows: (Est Baseline Volume multiplied by Lift) divided by 100. For more information about these fields, see Est Incremental Volume and Est Baseline Volume.

4. Click Update to update the baseline fields in the plan with data from the sales volume plans:
   • Est Baseline Volume
   • PY Baseline Volume
   • Target Baseline Volume
   • PY Baseline Revenue
   • Target Baseline Revenue

     To configure these fields, access the user properties for the CS CG Account Plan Service business service in Siebel Tools.

     These fields are populated with product baseline data that is retrieved from sales volume plans based on the account for the plan, the time period for the plan, and, if a category is selected for the plan, the products that are associated with that category and its subcategories. For information about viewing baseline data in sales volume plans, see Viewing SVP Data (End User).

     NOTE:  For information about configuring the Update button to update other fields, see Configuring the Update Button.