Product configurators and Exact Online
A product configurator prices a configured product and sends the result to Exact Online.
What the configurator exchanges with Exact
In a product configurator, a customer or a sales rep builds a product from options and dimensions. The configurator enforces which combinations are allowed and calculates the price. An integration then sends the result to Exact Online, so nobody has to retype the order.
Data flows both ways. The configurator reads items and sales prices from Exact, so it works with the same item codes as your administration, and it sends the quotation or the order back to Exact.
Quotations and sales orders
The integration creates a quotation, lines included, through the Quotations endpoint. When the customer accepts, the integration reports that through AcceptQuotation, and Exact can turn the quotation into a sales order in the same call.
Through the API, sales orders are only available in the Wholesale & Distribution and Manufacturing packages. If your company uses another Exact package, decide up front how an accepted configuration enters Exact, for example as a quotation your sales team processes.
Exact can report changes to sales orders and items through a webhook, so the configurator can show order status and current items without polling for them.
Bills of materials for production
If you manufacture the product yourself, the shop floor also needs the bill of materials. Exact Online Manufacturing manages bills of materials in every plan, and multi-level bills of materials from the Plus plan upwards.
In the API, a bill of materials belongs to a make item. The integration first creates a bill of materials version for that item and then adds the materials to it. Exact rejects materials until the make item and the version exist.
This leads to the main design decision. If every configuration gets its own item with its own bill of materials, the shop floor sees exactly what to build, but the item list grows with every order. If the product is built from fixed modules that each have their own bill of materials, with each module as a line on the order, the item list stays small.
How many calls an order takes
Exact Online allows 60 calls per minute and 5,000 per day, per app and per administration. An order with a new make item, a bill of materials version, twelve materials and a quotation takes fifteen calls when each material is created separately. That leaves room for hundreds of orders a day, and four a minute.
A configurator that asks Exact for a price every time the customer changes an option can reach that limit. Have the configurator keep its own copy of items and prices, and update it when Exact reports a change through a webhook. How sign-in and the other limits work is covered in the article on connecting to Exact Online.
Off the shelf or custom
The Exact App Store lists configurators that already connect to Exact Online, such as Elfsquad's. If your product fits their model, no integration has to be built.
Custom work makes sense when your product rules do not fit a standard configurator, or when the configurator has to be part of your own website or customer portal. We then build the configurator and the integration together, starting with the bill of materials decision above.
Sources
Frequently asked questions
Which Exact package do we need?
For sales orders through the API you need Wholesale & Distribution or Manufacturing. If the configurator also has to create bills of materials, you need Exact Online Manufacturing, on the Plus plan or higher for multi-level bills of materials.
Can the configurator sit in our online store?
The configurator can be part of the online store, with the connection to Exact running on the server, so the keys to your Exact administration never reach the customer's browser.
What happens when an item changes in Exact?
Exact reports the change through a webhook, and the configurator updates its own copy of the item. Any product configured after that is priced with the new data.