Rules in Territory Management

You use rules to define the scope of a territory. The scope of a territory tells you which accounts, products, and sales areas are part of a territory. Territory management uses the rule builder to create and edit rules.

Example Example

We have created territory T₁. Now to specify which accounts, products and sales areas are part of T₁, we formulate the following rule statements:

If postal code IS BETWEEN 01821 AND 3800

AND

City IS Boston

AND

Country IS U.S.

AND

Product Category IS Medical Equipment

Then

Action = return territory T₁

Result: All accounts that have addresses lying within zip code range 01821-3800, are located Boston, U.S., and products that belong to product category medical equipment belong to T₁.

Accounts and Products are the condition groups.
Postal Code, Country, City, and Product Category are conditions, that is, attributes.
IS, IS BETWEEN, and AND are the operators.
01821, 3800, Boston, U.S., and Medical Equipment are values.

End of the example.

Once you have created the required rules, execute the Update Territory Relationships report to display the latest territory relationships.

Prerequisites

You have read and understood the concepts of the rule builder. You have made the necessary settings to set up the rule builder for territory management. For more information, see Rule Builder Setup.
You have set the rule policy type for Territory Management to TM. You do this in Customizing for Customer Relationship Management by choosing CRM Cross-Application Components Rule Builder Define Rule Policy Types .
You have created a rule policy and the required number of rule sets, in the WebClient UI. When creating rules, you have to specify the rule set and rule policy in which to create them.

You can create rule policies and rule sets only if authorization object CRM_FDT is assigned to your business role. Further, you need display authorization to CRM_FDT, to display rules.
Standard attributes are provided and active by default. Create all the additional attributes you need, in Customizing for Customer Relationship Management by choosing Master Data Territory Management Maintain Territory Attributes .

If you have defined additional attributes, you should also complete step BAdI: Implement Business Logic for Additional Attributes.
You have read and understood how rule validity periods and territory validity periods work. For more information, see Specifying Validity Periods.

Activities

When defining rule statements, consider the following:

You can use attributes from condition groups (accounts, sales areas, and products) individually or collectively.
Do it for the lowest territory in the territory hierarchy. This territory is called as a leaf node. This gives you greater flexibility when you restructure territories.

Example

A manager is responsible for four territories. Consequently, the manger's position is assigned to the territory that contains the four end nodes in the hierarchy. If the manager is also personally responsible for a business partner (that is, as a sales representative, and not in the function of manager), you can assign this business partner directly as an attribute for the manager. This avoids your having to create a fifth end node, and then assigning the manager's position to this node.

End of the example.
If you assign attribute values to territories higher up in the territory hierarchy, note that these attributes are valid only for that node and not inherited by the lower-level nodes.
The optimum number of relationships you want formed as a result of that rule statement. For example, a rule statement that specifies that territory T₁ includes all accounts where attribute Country is DE would have far too many accounts under one territory, to be of any real use.

When using attributes in a rule statement, you can do the following:

Enter a specific value

This allows you to make sure that the attribute value is unique. For example, specify that only those business partners whose zip code 01800 is where Region is Boston, Country is U.S. AND Postal Code is 01800 are part of a territory. Compare this to entering 01800-03800 for the attribute Postal Code. In this case, all business partners falling under zip code range 01800-03800 belong to this territory. A zip code range is likely to be used elsewhere in the world.
Enter several values

You select attribute, Postal Code, and enter two values, for example, 01833 and 01955. In this case, all business partners that have these two zip codes belong to this territory.
- Enter values ranges combined with exceptions for a single attribute
  
  For example, maintain Territory T₂ where Postal Code is between 50000 and 51000, but NOT 50001 and 50009.
- Enter value ranges combined with one exception range for a single attribute.
  
  For example, maintain Territory T₃ where Postal Code is between 50000 and 51000, but NOT between 50001 and 50009.
- Enter value ranges combined with the AND, OR operator.
  
  For example, maintain Territory T₅ where Postal Code is between 50000 and 51000 AND where Department is “Oncology”OR “Radiology”.
- Enter value ranges combined with exception ranges, and also the AND / OR operator.
  
  For example, maintain Territory T₆ where Postal Code is between 50000 and 51000, but NOT between 50001 and 50009, AND where Department is “Oncology” AND/OR “Radiology”.
- Use AND/ORoperators for different attributes.
  
  For example, maintain a Territory T₇ for all accounts where department is “Oncology”AND/OR “Radiology” AND/OR district is “Munich” AND/OR “Cologne”.
Multiple attribute values for one attribute are automatically connected by OR. For example, you want to include business partners whose addresses have the zip code ranges 01821-03800 OR 01821-03900. In this case, one attribute (Postal Code) has several values: Postal Code IS BETWEEN 01821 and 3800 OR 01821 and 3900.

When you have several attribute values in a territory, they are not automatically connected in any sequence. For example: You want to assign products of a particular category to a sales representative who is responsible for a particular territory.

((Country IS U.S. AND Region IS Boston)

AND

(Postal Code IS BETWEEN 01831 and 03800 OR Postal Code IS BETWEEN 01831 and 03900)

AND

(Product Category IS 45 OR Product Category IS 55))
Enter generic values

You can enter generic values for an attribute by adding an asterisk (*) as part of the attribute value. For example, you enter 018* for the attribute Postal Code. In this case, all business partners that have a zip code beginning with 018 belong to this territory.

More Information

Assign Employees

Assign Accounts

Assign Account Hierarchies

Assign Products

Assign Sales Area Attributes

When you create new rules, or changes existing ones, you have to update territory relationships. For more information, see Customizing documentation, under Start of the navigation path Customer Relationship Management Next navigation step Master Data Territory Management Update Territory Relationships End of the navigation path .