Creating a Product Catalog
This article will cover how to set up your Product Catalog effectively, and offer some best practices on how to organize your Products for pricing and billing.
What is a Product Catalog?
Product Catalogs are composed of several elements that help you create a logical hierarchy for your Products. The idea is to create a clear and consistent pattern that can be applied wherever your products are displayed. It’s good practice to ensure your customers have a clear understanding of how your products are structured by having them displayed consistently on your website, marketing materials, contracts, order forms, and invoices. In Solvimon, this can be achieved using Product Categories, Products, and Product Items.
Product Categories
Product Categories are the highest level resource within the Product Catalog. They serve as a way to create high level collections of products, making it easier to organize larger collections. Typically, businesses start out using one Product Category before branching out to multiple as business expands. Think of Product Categories as a way to group products logically. For example a fintech business which offers multiple products that can be categorized in Payments, Cards, and Compliance.
Products
A Product is defined as an entity that can be sold to a customer. This can be a physical good, a piece of software, or a service. A good rule of thumb is that a Product is something that can either be sold on its own or as part of a plan that includes multiple Products. In Solvimon, a Product is required to fall within a Product Category, and have at least one Product Item.
Product Items
Product Items are the components that make up a product from a billing perspective. Product Items should consist of items that would not be sold individually, instead look at them as the building blocks that make up a Product. Let’s take a business that sells software enabling customer service agents to provide support via Chat and Email. The Product can contain several Product Items like Agent Seats, Email, Live Chat, Reports, and AI Agents.
Product Items can be added either as Revenue Items or Deduction Items. These will typically show up as Invoice lines, so it’s a good idea to use clear and consistent names and descriptions.
Revenue Items
A Revenue Item is used to create a resource that can be linked to a pricing structure in a Pricing Plan. These are items that are to be billed to the customer, which can be charged using a specified type of model. Revenue Items can use the following model types:
Usage Based
Revenue Items that are charged based on usage, for example: per transaction, or per email sent. This model type requires you to set up Meters to ingest usage.
Seat Based
Revenue Items using Seat Based pricing are charged based on the amount of seats allocated within a certain period (e.g. per year or per month).
Recurring
Revenue Items using the Recurring model type are invoiced to customers using a flat fee that’s repeated on a periodic basis (e.g. a base fee that’s paid every year).
One-Off
A One-Off Revenue Item is charged only once. This is typically used for items like an onboarding or administration fee.
Deduction Items
Deduction items are usage-based product items used in a specific context for payments and transaction services. They’re used to deduct or withhold costs that have already been made, and therefore should not be charged to the customer.
For example: a payment service provider takes a certain percentage when processing a transaction for their customers. This means that this cost is already considered paid for, and should not be included in the amount due on the invoice.
In this table, we’ll show an example Product Catalog for the customer service platform:
Product Category
Product
Product Items
Model Type
Platform
CX Pro
Platform License
Recurring
Emails Sent
Usage Based
Agent Seats
Seat Based
AI Resolutions
Usage Based
Services
Premium Support
Tier 1 Support
Recurring
Training Hours
Usage Based
Onboarding Fee
One-Off
Features and Entitlements
Aside from Product Items, a Product can also contain Features. These are objects that define which features are included as part of your Product and Pricing Plans. The distinction with a Product Item is that you do not specifically bill for them, and they are not included on invoices.
Once a feature has been created, it can be added to a Pricing Plan as an Entitlement. Solvimon enables you to track usage for features by using Meters, making them Usage Based Features. Note however they are not billed or shown on the invoice.
Creating your Product Plan
Let’s walk through the process of creating a Product Catalog that’s ready to be linked with a Pricing Plan. This requires us to create at least one Product Category, Product, and Product Item. Once that’s done we can activate the Product and use it to create Pricing Plans and Subscriptions.
Click to the Products page in the sidebar (Product Catalog → Products)
ℹ️
Consider how you want to structure your Products and Product Items before getting started. Use the example provided above for an idea of a typical setup.
You’ll need to create a Product Category if one doesn’t exist already. Click ‘Add Product Category’. This will open a panel to create a Product Category by adding a name, reference, optional Description and Tax Category. Click ‘Save Changes’ to create the category.
Once you have a Product Category created, you can proceed to create a Product. Clicking on ‘Add Product’, select the Product Category, add a name, reference, optional description and tax category.
You should now see your newly created Product in Draft status. Next we’ll add a Revenue Item as our first Product Item. First give the Product Item a name, reference, optional description, and tax category.
Select the model type for the Revenue Item. Note that in order to add a Revenue Item with the Usage Based model type, you need to have a Meter set up. Learn how to set up Meters using this guide.
Once you’ve added your Product Item, you’ll see it in the Product panel in Draft status. It’s good to know that both Products and Product Items have independent statuses.
Create any additional Product Items you want in your Product and proceed to the next step.
Your Product is now ready to be activated. To do so, open the Product panel and click the menu button(the square with 3 horizontally aligned dots) and select ‘Active’.
You’ll be prompted with a confirmation modal explaining the impact of the status change. Note that you can toggle whether Product Items can inherit status from their parent product. Once you’ve read and understand the implications, click ‘Change status to Active’.
That’s it. You have successfully created a Product that’s ready to use in your Pricing Plans and Subscriptions.
Next Steps
You should now be able to create Products and Product Items and complete your Product Catalog. Next we’ll cover the process of creating and managing your Pricing Plans.
Why Solvimon
Helping businesses reach the next level
The Solvimon platform is extremely flexible allowing us to bill the most tailored enterprise deals automatically.
Ciaran O'Kane
Head of Finance
Solvimon is not only building the most flexible billing platform in the space but also a truly global platform.
Juan Pablo Ortega
CEO
I was skeptical if there was any solution out there that could relieve the team from an eternity of manual billing. Solvimon impressed me with their flexibility and user-friendliness.
János Mátyásfalvi
CFO
Working with Solvimon is a different experience than working with other vendors. Not only because of the product they offer, but also because of their very senior team that knows what they are talking about.
Steven Burgemeister
Product Lead, Billing