Revenue Lifecyle Management (RLM) - Pricing Setup.

Amidst the excitement of my SteelBrick CPQ project that went live, I?was drawn?to RLM's intriguing features.?In this?post, we?will share my thoughts on RLM's pricing features.

In general,?Salesforce notes the pains of using Steelbrick CPQ, the pricing setup in RLM is much more FLEXIBLE.

From the perspective of the end user, below is the improvement:

• Sales users can easily communicate with their customers regarding the pricing breakdown by hoovering the pricing item [1].?They?also can tell quickly?the tax amount and total price (with and without tax) [2].

• Bundle Configuration offers a selection summary with listed pricing.?This?is an excellent benefit for in-flight negotiation for Sales Reps who can?offer?a specific selection for the customer's needs.

On the other hand, as a RLM product owner or system admin's perspective, the below improvement, in my opinion, is significant:

• RLM offers an out-of-the-box application, namely Pricing Management to centralise all the related pricing:

a. The Price Adjustment Schedule is a collection of Pricing Rules/ Data organised by related Salesforce objects. In this case, you can view a holistic view of tier or attribute discount or override pricing. You also can filter and view the details by?either?entering the record or via pop-up windows.

b. The?pricing?engine?is run?by Pricing Procedure, which lists all pricing steps. This?offers flexibility with drag & drop Pricing Elements [2]; this also means you can define the specific order of price types (partner, distributor) or discount types (Volume, term, attribute, or manual). With its beneficial and elegant visualisation [1], the project team can explain the pricing structure or allow the admin to take over the system quickly. You also test your Pricing Procedure?by?using the simulate button [3].

• Even though the pricing waterfall structure is still in place, the pricing elements can be moved up or down?in the Pricing Procedure to reflect the business pricing structure, which can be one of the difficulties in implementing a CPQ project.

The example below shows two scenarios that apply different adjustments, resulting in 2 different Net Unit Prices.?

• Many out-of-the-box pricing and discount types (bundle, promo (in roadmap), tier, or custom) can be implemented?promptly without requiring the same level technical skills like in Steelbrick CPQ (price rules and QCP).

I have yet to say that the Pricing Discount Calendar is also?a cool?tool for managing all discounted prices or adjustments?that are?set up.

• Lastly, RLM offers the Context Definition function, which provides data input to execute a pricing procedure.?This?is a new concept compared to Steelbrick CPQ.

It is not?a 100% compatible comparison; however, you can think of the Pricing Procedure as a Flow; each Price Element is an action, and then Context Definition loads data to use in each Action. Considering enhancing data to use in the Steelbrick Price Rule, the Product Rule condition is very cumbersome; this is more intuitive and reusable.??

The screenshot below shows that I added a new field on Quote Line, then defined and mapped this field with a Sales Transaction tag in Context Definition. As a result, I can use this input to manipulate pricing across the pricing elements whenever needed.

Of course, there are some not-very-fun parts:

• Flexibility also means complexity—setting Pricing requires a good understanding of?RLM?Pricing Structure and a decent level of technicality. That said, if you are familiar with Flow and the concept of using Price Rules with custom objects, this is significantly helpful.
• Some pricing concepts in RLM are completely new to anyone who is used to the Steelbrick CPQ. So,?adopting RLM could be time-consuming for Steelbrick?CPQ-er.
• A lot pricing types are not implemented or support yet, for example: Cost, Uplift, Ramp Deal, etc. I hope we can see these in the next release.

The above highlights the pros and cons of RLM pricing based on my short experience with the new tool. I'm happy to hear your thoughts about RLM pricing. The next post will be my take on the Quote to Contract with Amendment and Renewal process.?