Consulting Services/Package Plans
Contents
Overview
The purposes of this article (and other articles in the Emersion Consulting section), these objects will collectively be referred to as 'Packages and Plans' and 'Products' unless specifically stated.
How service providers choose to structure these objects affects how the objects appear on the end user's invoice, how usage is rated, what other charges apply and other factors. If Packages and Plans are not structured and configured correctly, the consequences are that your end users will receive confusing or incorrect invoice.
In order to sell products and subscription-based services using the Emersion software platform, service providers will need to structure correctly the following objects:
- Packages plans
- Service plans
- Rate cards
- Product rate cards, including service features
- Bolt-ons
- Bolt-on add-ons
- Products
Where invoice charges are shown, the Emersion Standard Invoice template (no cost centres) is being used. If you have a custom invoice template, the presentation of content will likely differ to what is shown.
Articles
The following suite of articles are designed to assist service providers set up their packages & plans by providing some commonly-used plan structures. While these articles cannot take into account any specific business requirements, these article aim to supplement your training by addressing case examples and potential solutions for those use cases.
Plan Construction Approach
Emersion recommends the following process when constructing plans packages and plans and preparing them for sale:
Start early!! Plan construction takes time. How long you need will depend on the number of plans you have to build, if you have a multi-tier environment (wholesale and retail) and the complexities of the products and services you're selling. This will likely be an iterative process, so we emphasise the need for early planning and resourcing the task appropriately.
Create your plans in Draft first. Conduct an internal peer review to ensure the configuration is correct. Once complete, approve the packages and plans, and products for sale. Create a test service (have a test account or two handy for this purpose). Activate the service for billing Review the pending cardlines that are created.
'There is almost always more than one way to achieve the same outcome in Emersion.'
Keep in mind that the "right solution" will come down to us understanding your objectives.
The Emersion billing platform is designed to be agnostic. In an IT context, agnosticism refers to anything that is designed to be compatible across most common systems. In an Emersion context, it refers to being compatible for a client base across any industry. While validation in the Cumulus user interface prevents users from doing something they obviously shouldn't, the software will not stop you from configuring your plans in a way that does not achieve your desired results. What does not work for your business may work perfectly for another business. Emersion can solve similar problems in multiple ways. Therefore when engaging our consultants, provide as much information as possible. The more we know about the problem you are trying to solve, the faster we can offer the "right solution" for you.
Training vs Consulting
Emersion provides training to users in Packages & Plans as part of their Implementation project and upon request on an as needed basis (please allow 14 working days if requesting any training). The basic training for Packages and Plans and Products modules runs for 3 hours provided all pre-requisites are completed by the participants. This is an intensive, generic introductory training session where we cover quite complex material. Despite this, the training is high-level and rarely results in a business being armed with enough knowledge on how to build package and plans and products in Emersion. Training is almost always supplemented with Consulting. A Consultant can be engaged to work with your business stakeholders to work with your specific business requirements. They will need to learn about your business, what you sell, how you sell it, who your suppliers are and how you invoice your customers. They can also take into account your objectives for future growth. Once the Consultant understand your products and services better, they can provide recommendations to you on what tools you can leverage and what configuration you need in order to construct your packages & plans in Emersion in order to achieve your objectives.
Need More help?
If you would like to engage a Emersion plan consultant, please create a Work Order ticket in the Emerson Support Portal. It is recommended you buy a set of block hours unless you can be very precise about the amount of consulting time you need. Check the consulting rates in your Emersion Subscriber Agreement for pricing.
