Configure Sales Forecasting Using Guided Process

Sales administrators can configure the sales forecasting process to suit the implementation requirements of your organization. A guided process guides the administrator through a series of setup screens as outlined in this Setting Up Sales Forecasting video on Oracle Cloud Customer Connect.

This video provides an overview of how to set up Sales Forecasting when forecasting by opportunity rolling up the resource hierarchy and forecasting by opportunity revenue and rolling up the territory hierarchy. It also contains information about the sales forecasting scheduled processes and details about sharing a forecast.

To configure Sales Forecasting for Redwood UX using the guided process, go to the Navigator > Redwood Sales > My Forecasts. You can also select the Configure Forecasting menu item from the Actions drop-down list on the Forecast Overview page and the following page is displayed:

The configuration process guides you how to:

1. Set Sales Forecast Type and Period Parameters
2. Set Sales Forecast Metrics and Mappings
3. Select Filter and Display Options for Sales Forecasts
4. Review and Submit Sales Forecast Parameters and Processes

Set Sales Forecast Type and Period Parameters

The first UI in the process lets you make a series of setup choices such as selecting the forecast type and period you want to configure.

From the Forecast type step in the Configure Sales Forecasting guided process:

1. Select the Forecast Type you want to use for your sales forecasting process. For example, to forecast by opportunity rolling up resource hierarchy, enter the following details:
   1. Select Opportunity as the forecast object
   2. Select Resource as the rollup hierarchy
   3. Enter Amount in the Measure field
   4. Enter close date as the data type
   To forecast by opportunity revenue rolling up territory hierarchy, enter the following:
   1. Select Revenue as the forecast object
   2. Select Territory as the rollup hierarchy
   3. Enter Amount in the Measure field
   4. Enter close date as the data type
2. From the Additional criteria section, you can click + Add to include some filters that will limit the scope of the set of records included in the forecast for the selected forecast type. You can add up to 3 filters.
3. Select the Forecast Period and decide on the Number of Active Periods you want to forecast.

   These are the periods displayed in the period drop-down list in the forecasting pages. Valid values include:

   • Minimum: 1
   • Maximum: 5

   The default value is 2.

   Note: You can use the salesForecastParameters REST service to change the default value.
4. Click Continue to move to the next step.

Set Sales Forecast Metrics and Mappings

From the Forecast metrics page you can select the type of adjustments and sales forecast metrics to use for your sales forecast. For example, a manager can make summary adjustments to the product level best case forecast and committed forecast numbers for themselves and their direct reports. See About Summary and Item Adjustments and Define Custom Dimensions for Filtering and Adjusting Sales Forecasts for more information.

You select the available metrics in sales forecasting and map the opportunity or revenue win probability values to each forecast category for updating opportunities in the forecast active periods. If you don't enable the Best Case Forecast metric, then the metric card and columns will not be displayed in either of the forecast by opportunity rolling up resource hierarchy and forecast by opportunity revenue rolling up territory hierarchy forecast pages.

From the Forecast metrics page, you can choose to allow the calculation and display of best case forecasts, adjusted team rollups and opportunity rollups.

1. Select the sales forecast metrics to use by enabling the checkbox values that you want. For example, select these 3 checkboxes to enable the following metrics:
   • Best Case Forecasts
   • Adjusted Team Rollups
   • Opportunity Rollups
2. In the Forecast category mapping section, map the win probability values to each forecast category for one-time updates of opportunities for the active periods you selected in step 1, Forecast type of the guided process.
   Note: You can click Edit forecast categories to edit the forecast category names and enter low and high percentage values to suit your requirements.
3. Click Save and then Continue to the next step.

Based on the options selected, this step updates the open and closed opportunities with a close date in one of the active periods and set the opportunity forecast category values as defined.

This setup also enables existing open, closed, and won opportunities to be updated with the desired forecast category values so that the opportunities appear in the forecast when you enable Sales Forecasting for Redwood UX. See About Opportunity Forecast Categories for more details.

Note: This is a one-time update of the forecast category for opportunities in the active periods. To set the forecast category to best case or committed on opportunities on an ongoing basis, Oracle recommends using Routines or a Groovy script.

Your sales administrator can use Groovy scripts to automatically set the forecast category to Best Case or Committed for open opportunities based on the progression of the opportunity. See Use Routines and Groovy Scripts to Set Forecast Category Values for more information.

Select Filter and Display Options for Sales Forecasts

The Filter options step 3 lets you select the object and the options by which you want to filter your forecasts.

From the Filter and display options page:

1. Select the filters available for Opportunities in the Forecast page and whether you want a single or multiselect. The default is Resource but other dimensions can also be added. If any custom dimensions are defined, then select the dimension to enable it in forecasting, and if multiselect is appropriate for filtering, then select Allow multiselect See Define Custom Dimensions for Filtering and Adjusting Sales Forecasts for more information about adding filters for custom sales forecast metric dimensions.
2. Use the Display Sequence and Graph Display Sequence options to display the won, committed and best case forecast numbers within graphs in your forecast and graphical pages as follows:

   

3. Select the Show sales quotas checkbox to display and edit sales quotas as part of your forecasts. This option is enabled by default.
4. Select Generate snapshots checkbox to review and access weekly snapshots of key forecast metrics and adjustments as highlighted in this screenshot:

   

   Snapshots allow sales managers to view sales forecast trends. Use snapshots to review and access weekly snapshots of key forecast metrics and adjustments to easily identify changes to your sales forecast commitments since the forecast was last reviewed, or earlier in a period.

   By default, the process runs automatically every week on Saturdays at 2.00 a.m. UTC. This process captures forecast metrics such as committed forecasts, best case forecast, best case, committed, unforecasted, and so on.

   Also, sales managers can view and adjust their sales forecast using a best case forecast summarized metric. This represents the sum of opportunities or revenue lines for Best Case, Commit and Won forecast categories.

   To see the trending information driven off snapshots click the Changes Since filter chip in the forecast pages. For example, here's an example of a screen where you can view increases or decreases in your key forecast metrics since last week’s snapshot.

   

   Watch this video Track Changes Using Changes Since Filter on Oracle Cloud Customer Connect which provides an overview of Sales Forecasting trending and how managers can track the trends and changes in their forecast using the Changes Since filter.

5. Click Continue to move to the next step.

Review and Submit Sales Forecast Parameters and Processes

From the Review and submit final step 4, you can review a summary of the configuration information you selected in the previous steps.

You can go back to previous steps to make further changes if required. Otherwise, if you're OK with your selections, click Submit.

The submit process runs the Generate Sales Forecast Metrics process to run immediately. See Generate Sales Forecast Metrics for more information.