Product Catalog, File Guidelines, Data Elements, and Formats
Purpose and Usage
The Product Catalog file is used to give TIBCO Reward a complete and
current record of your product catalog and product hierarchy.
TIBCO Reward
can support up to five levels of product catalog categories
in a hierarchical fashion. Here is one example of a product hierarchy with a
product:
Women’s Apparel/Outerwear/Leather/Leather Jackets/Brown Leather Jacket
Model 100.
When TIBCO Reward imports a Product Catalog file, you will receive an
email warning you if there is an orphaned category. If there are orphans, you
can submit a new product file to correct the problem.
You can use all TIBCO Reward features if there are orphaned products,
but you might not obtain the desired behavior. For example, if you have set up
an offer that awards 50 bonus points for all leather jackets, but a particular
model of leather jacket is not correctly mapped to the right category, the
purchase of the orphaned product will not qualify the shopper to receive the
award.
Each time you upload the product file, a new set of products and
categories is created. That is, the product file is considered a complete and
comprehensive list of all current products every time it is imported. Even if
products and categories were included in a previous Product Catalog import
file, if they are not included in the current import file, then they will be
effectively deleted and no longer available.