Options for managing pricing
The Catalog Filter and Pricing tool in Management Center gives you a flexible, alternative way of managing pricing for your store. Before you begin using this tool, you should be aware of the price management options available to you.
Your options are:
Option 1: Use the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool to manage price lists, and use price rules for storefront pricing
The Catalog Filter and Pricing tool contains all the features you need to:- Create and manage your price lists, including upload and export functions.
- Create and manage price rules. Price rules offer significantly more flexibility than using static price lists.
If you are not already using HCL Commerce for your store, choose Option 1. This way, you can take advantage of all the pricing features offered in the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool. If your store already uses HCL Commerce, moving to Option 1 makes managing pricing easier and more efficient, but some setup is required.
- Advantages of Option 1:
- In the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool, you can use a user interface dedicated to price list management. For existing HCL Commerce customers this means you are no longer limited to using the Data Load utility to load price lists, and to using the Catalogs tool in Management Center to manage the default List Price and Offer Price lists for individual catalog entries. Both of these methods are still available to you, but the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool supports these tasks in a single user interface.
- You can create as many different price lists as you need, and use them for storefront pricing without involving IT.
- You can use price rules to manage customer-specific or store-specific pricing.
- Considerations for Option 1:
- If you have an existing HCL Commerce store, moving to the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool, and to price rules, requires some initial setup. This setup can include an optional step to migrate your list price data to a new data model.
- You must invest some time learning about price rules and price list management in the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool.
Option 2: Use the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool to manage only price lists
If you want to use the price list management tools in the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool, but you do not have a business need for price rules, choose this option.- Advantages of Option 2:
- In the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool, you can use a user interface dedicated to price list management. For existing HCL Commerce customers, this means you are no longer limited to using the Data Load utility to load price lists, and to using the Catalogs tool in Management Center to manage the default List Price and Offer Price lists for individual catalog entries. Both of these methods are still available to you, but the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool supports these tasks in a single user interface.
- Considerations for Option 2:
- If you have an existing HCL Commerce store, moving to the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool requires some initial setup. This setup can include an optional step to migrate your list price data to a new data model.
- You must invest some time learning about price list management in the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool.
Option 3: Continue using existing price management methods
If you have an existing HCL Commerce store and you are satisfied with the methods you are currently using to manage pricing, you are not required to use the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool. You can continue to:- Use the Data Load utility to load price lists into the database.
- Use the Catalogs tool in Management Center to manage the default List Price and Offer Price lists for individual catalog entries.
- Use the Catalog Filter tool in HCL Commerce Accelerator to mark up or mark down prices for products or categories.
- Advantages of option 3:
- You do not have to change how you currently manage pricing.
- No additional setup, migration, or education is required.
- Considerations for option 3:
- You might miss out on significant time savings and flexibility by not using the Catalog Filter and Pricing tool.
- You must continue to use HCL Commerce Accelerator to manage store-specific and customer-specific pricing.