Routes

Retail sales managers can create routes and schedule visits for the sales representatives that they manage. This chapter describes how to organize retail accounts into routes, use routes to schedule visits, and maintain routes that frequently change. Topics include:

About Routes

A route specifies the order in which retail sales representatives visit the accounts and the starting time for each visit. Use routes to schedule visits to groups of accounts that retail sales representatives visit regularly and on the same day or series of days. You can also schedule nonroutine visits to accounts by assigning target lists created in Account Targeting. By arranging a group of accounts into an efficient route, you can make sure that retail sales representatives minimize the amount of time spent traveling between accounts.

After you create a route, you can use the route repeatedly to schedule store visits to the accounts in the route. You can also create routes to schedule store visits for a specific period of time in support of a corporate promotion, a campaign, or an objective.

Scenarios for Creating and Using Routes

Retail sales managers and retail sales representatives perform the processes in these example scenarios for creating routes. Your company might follow different processes according to its business requirements. Topics include:

Scenario for Creating Routes, which illustrates how retail sales representatives can use the Routes views to organize retail accounts into routes and use routes to schedule visits.
Scenario for Creating Routes for Sales Representatives, which illustrates how retail sales managers can create routes and schedule visits for the retail sales representatives who they manage.
Scenario for Creating Routes That Change Frequently, which illustrates how retail sales managers and retail sales representatives can create and manage routes that change frequently.

Scenario for Creating Routes

A retail sales representative for a large beverage manufacturer has a sales territory covering a large section of central Virginia. She visits each of the large grocery stores in her territory once a month. Most of her accounts are in Richmond, a large city. However, she visits grocery stores in several small cities. Because she always visits the same accounts in the same order, she organizes her accounts into efficient routes that she can use each month to schedule her visits.

The retail sales representative begins by creating a series of routes for the accounts in the Richmond area. Each route covers a group of accounts from one geographical area, such as northeast Richmond, that she can visit in one day. Next, she creates a four-day route that includes all of her accounts in the outlying parts of her sales territory. Day one of the route takes her to accounts in Danville and Pulaski. The following three days take her to accounts in Roanoke, Lynchburg, and Charlottesville.

After she finishes creating her routes, she uses them to schedule visits to all the accounts in her territory for the upcoming month. She specifies the date on which the route begins. Additional details, such as the starting time and duration of each visit, are determined by information she enters when she sets up the route. Each month she can again use the routes that she creates to schedule account visits.

Scenario for Creating Routes for Sales Representatives

A retail sales manager for a large beverage manufacturer manages 12 retail sales representatives working in the Baltimore-Washington area of the eastern United States. One of his representatives, a new employee, is not familiar with her territory, which includes several grocery stores and drugstores in the District of Columbia. The retail sales manager is familiar with this area, so he handles the task of organizing the new representative’s accounts into a series of routes. Each route covers one section of the District. The representative needs to visit the accounts in each route every two weeks. Therefore, he decides to create 10 routes—one for each workday in a two-week period. Each route includes six or seven stores in one neighborhood, such as Georgetown, and the representative can complete each route in one day.

When he finishes creating the routes, he uses them to schedule a month’s worth of store visits for the new sales representative. The retail manager schedules the first route to begin on the first and third Mondays of the month, the second route to begin on the first and third Tuesdays of the month, and so forth, so that each route is scheduled twice during the month. The starting time and duration of each store visit are determined by information he enters when he sets up the routes.

When the retail sales representative becomes familiar with the area, the retail manager gives the representative the task of maintaining her routes. The retail sales representative can now add new accounts to a route, change the order in which she visits routes, or adjust the starting times and durations of the visits.

Scenario for Creating Routes That Change Frequently

A brand manager at the beverage manufacturer establishes a corporate promotion that will run for the next two weeks. The retail sales manager for the beverage manufacturer reviews the corporate promotion criteria to understand the target group of accounts, and concentrates on managing the retail execution with retail sales representatives. He sends an email message to his sales team detailing the criteria they must use when generating their account lists and telling them to schedule a new call cycle for the corporate promotion.

One of the retail sales representatives who reports to the retail manager is planning for the next week. She receives the email message and decides to plan her route immediately. In her local database, she generates a target list. After she generates an optimal list of target accounts, she creates a new route and applies the target list to it. Finally, she schedules visits over the next two weeks for all of the accounts in the target list.

Process of Creating and Using Routes

End users, such as retail sales representatives, typically create routes. A retail sales manager can create routes and assign them to a retail sales representative. This topic lists the tasks that end users typically perform to plan routes. Your company might follow a different process according to its business requirements.

The following list shows the tasks that end users typically perform to create routes and use them to schedule store visits:

Note: When creating and scheduling a route with a limited duration, such as a route in support of a corporate promotion, you can perform all of the preceding steps in the Target Accounts view.

Creating Routes (End User)

Create routes to manage the scheduling of retail visits to accounts in a geographical area. Use the following guidelines for creating routes:

You must specify the person (generally, a retail sales manager or a retail sales representative who reports to a retail sales manager) for whom you are creating the route.
A retail sales representative can have many assigned routes, but each route can have only one assigned retail sales representative.
A route can have any number of accounts.
A route name cannot exist for more than one route assigned to a retail sales representative. However, the same route name can exist for routes that are assigned to different retail sales representatives.
If a retail sales representative will use the route repeatedly to schedule visits, do not specify a start date when creating the route.

This task is a step in Process of Creating and Using Routes.

To create a route

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
In the Routes list, create a new record, and complete the necessary fields.

The following table describes some fields.

Field	Comments
Route Id	The automatically generated unique number assigned to the route.
Route Name	A name for the route (for example, Northeast Richmond). A route name must be unique to the retail sales representative to which it is assigned.
Description	A description of the route.
Sales Person	The salesperson to whom the route is assigned. You can assign a route to only one person. In the My Routes view, the Sales Person field is automatically populated with the current user name. If you want to assign a route to someone other than yourself, enter that person’s name in the Salesperson field.
Start Day	The day of the week in which the route begins. This field is only reference information and does not prevent you from using the route to schedule visits starting on another day of the week.
Active	Select this field to indicate that the route is active and available for use in scheduling visits.
Last Updated	The time and date a user last changed the route.

Adding Accounts to Routes (End User)

After you establish a route, you can add accounts to it. You can assign any number of accounts to one route. Add accounts to routes in two views:

Route Accounts. Displays accounts in a list.
Route Explorer. Displays routes and accounts in a hierarchical format.

Note: When you add accounts to a route using the Route Explorer view, you associate the account record with the route based on a parent-child relationship. When you add accounts to a route using the Route Accounts view, you add an individual account record without needing to understand the account’s relationship with other account records.

This topic provides separate procedures for using each of these views.

Note: You can pick any existing account in the database when associating an account with a route. When associating an account with a route, select only those accounts for which the owner of the route is on the sales team.

This task is a step in Process of Creating and Using Routes.

To add accounts to a route using the Route Accounts view

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
Drill down on the Route Name field hyperlink for a route.
In the Accounts list, create a new record, and complete the necessary fields. Repeat this step for each account you want to add to the route.
The following table describes some fields.

Field	Comments
Call Duration	The scheduled duration of the account visit. Note: In Siebel Tools, this field has a Predefault Value of 5. Do not edit this predefault value. Changing this value leads to an error when you commit target accounts.
Call Time	The current time. Edit this field to reflect the time when you visit the account.
Offset Day	This field allows you to create routes that span more than one day, and indicates the number of days after the beginning of the route that you visit an account. For example, if you visit an account on the first day of a route, this field is 0. If you visit the account on the second day of a route, this field is 1.
Last Call	This field identifies the date and time of the most recent visit to this account.

Use the following procedure to add accounts to a route using the Route Explorer view.

To add accounts to a route using the Route Explorer view

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
Drill down on the Route Name field hyperlink for a route, and click the Explorer view tab.
In the Routes explorer tree, click the plus sign (+) next to the folder of the route to which you want to add an account.
Click the plus sign (+) next to the Accounts folder that is under the route.
A list of all the accounts assigned to the route appears.
In the Accounts list, create a new record, and complete the necessary fields.
The preceding table describes some fields.
Repeat this step for each account that you want to add to the route.

Assigning Target Lists to Routes (End User)

On your local database, you can use account lists that are created with the Account Targeting feature. After creating and saving a target list, you can optimize the target list by merging (intersecting or combining) it with other target lists. When you finish merging target lists, you can assign the results to a route. You can also add or delete accounts after assigning the list of accounts to a route.

Note: The Account Targeting module is designed for end users, such as retail sales representatives who have local data access and are not continuously connected to a network. For more information about Account Targeting, see Account Targeting .

This task is a step in Process of Creating and Using Routes.

To merge a target list

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
Drill down on the Route Name field hyperlink for a route, and click the Target Accounts view tab.
Select a record in the Target Accounts list to activate the list.
In the toolbar, click the Apply Target List button (located on the toolbar) and apply an account target list.
(Optional) Select multiple target lists and click Union (to combine the lists) or Intersection (to intersect the lists).
If you combine or intersect lists, you can save the new list as a target list.
Repeat the previous two steps until you optimize your target list.
You are now ready to assign the target list to a route. For information about target lists, see information about global target list management in Siebel Applications Administration Guide.

To assign a target list to a route

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
Drill down on the Route Name field hyperlink for a route, and click the Target Accounts view tab.
In the Target Accounts list, select the accounts that you want to add to a route.
Click Commit.
The selected accounts are added to a route and appear in the Accounts list.
Enter values in the fields for each account that you add.
The following table describes some fields.

Field	Comments
Call Time	Edit this field to reflect the time when you visit the account. For the first account you assign to a route, this field defaults to the value in the Working Hours Start At field in the Calendar view of the User Profile Preferences screen. Subsequent accounts you assign to the route accommodate existing accounts. For example, if a route has one account with a call time of 8:00 AM and a call duration of 30 minutes, the second account you assign to the route defaults to a call time of 8:30 AM.
Call Duration	Edit this field to reflect the scheduled duration of the account visit. For all accounts you assign to a route, this field defaults to the value in the Appointment Duration field in the Calendar view of the User Profile Preferences screen.
Offset Day	This field allows you to create routes that span more than one day, and indicates the number of days after the beginning of the route that you visit an account. For example, if you visit an account on the first day of a route, this field is 0. If you visit the account on the second day of a route, this field is 1.
Last Call	This field identifies the date and time of the most recent visit to this account.

Using Routes to Schedule Visits (End User)

After you create a route, you can use it to schedule visits to all the accounts you add to the route.

Caution: You can schedule multiple appointments for the same time period when using the Routes views to schedule visits. Such scheduling conflicts do not trigger an automatic notification. Check the Daily Calendar view for possible conflicts after routes are available on schedules. If scheduling conflicts exist, adjust the starting times of appointments or delete them as necessary to resolve the conflicts.

This task is a step in Process of Creating and Using Routes.

To schedule visits from the My Routes view

Navigate to the Routes screen, then the Routes List view.
Drill down on the Route Name field hyperlink for a route, and click the More Info view tab.
In the More Info form, click Schedule.
In the Schedule Visit dialog box, enter a date in the Start Date field, and click OK.
In-store visit appointments for each account in the route are added to the calendar of the retail sales representative to whom the route is assigned. All activities that are relevant to the visit are automatically applied. Therefore, you do not need to associate activities to visits after you create them.

About Configuring Routes

This topic contains information that might be useful when configuring the Routes features.

The procedures documented in this chapter include buttons that invoke specialized methods, as described in the following table.

Button	Method	Description	Supported On
Commit	CommitAccnt	Writes account names from temporary targeting tables to permanent tables where routes are stored.	Applet Layer
Schedule - Routes More Info view	ShowPopup	Opens a dialog box for sales representative and start date.	Bus Comp Layer
Schedule - Routes More Info view	OK	Creates an activity for the sales person to visit all accounts specified as route accounts.	Bus Comp Layer
Schedule - Target Accounts view	ShowPopup	Opens a dialog box for sales representative and start date.	Bus Comp Layer
Schedule - Target Accounts view	OK	Creates an activity for the sales person to visit all accounts specified as route accounts.	Bus Comp Layer