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Business Partner Data Management

process component

Definition

Business Partner Data Processing enables a company to manage all Business Partner data that is relevant to control its business processes, such as sales, purchasing and accounting processes.

Technical Data

Software Component Version	ESM CRM 7.02
Technical Name	BusinessPartnerDataManagement
Namespace	http://sap.com/xi/ESM/CRM

Business Context and Use

The Business Partner Data Management process component allows applications to be provided that create and maintain business partner data using a range of service operations. The service operations support many different scenarios including the following.

Searching for business partners based on various criteria
Reading business partner data and assigning business partners to other processes like activities, opportunities or leads
Creating business partners with required address data and telephone number
Identifying a customer and updating basic data, for example, recording a change of address
Assigning partner functions to a business partner
Creating new contact person data, for example, after business events and meetings
Identifying customers within a marketing campaign based on various criteria, for example, a response ID, and updating information on their preferences and interests
Creating business partners with sales data
Validating business partner address data against external sources
Validating and enriching business partner data using third party services such as “Dun and Bradstreet”
Keeping the data up to date by updating it to reflect changes and deactivating business partners that become invalid

Terminology

In SAP CRM the functionaliy provided is known as account and contact management, which is technically based on the business partner. Account and contact management comprises individual accounts, corporate accounts, and groups, which are techically business partners with category "person", "organization", and "group".

Use Case

The Business Partner Data Management process component supports a wide range of possible use cases. As an example, in the following a sales representative uses service operations to create a business partner (customer) and perform follow up activities throughout a sales cycle.

On a regular visit to a customer site, a sales representative meets a new manager in the customer organization and they exchange business cards. Later the sales representative creates a call report and turns the new contact into a business partner. ( Create Customer service operation)
Initially the sales representative was unclear on the exact position of the customer manager within the organization but that is clarified in routine follow up calls. Based on this, the sales representative creates relationships to various existing business partners. ( Change Customer service operation)
A few months later, a new product is launched. A different sales representative identifies the type of existing business partners that would be likely to be interested. These are turned into search criteria, run and iteratively refined until a short target list is created. ( Find Business Partner Basic Data by Competency and Basic Data and and Find Business Partner Elements by Elements service operations)
The second sales representative looks up the details of all the customers on the target list. ( Read Customer service operation)
The customer manager is on the target list. The sales representative uses the contact information to set up a meeting to present the product which is well received. Further detailed interactions occur which result in the customer manager purchasing the product. The sales representative updates the records at each stage accordingly. ( Change Customer service operation)
Subsequently, the customer manager retires. When the sales representative is informed, the data on the customer manager is updated. ( Deactivate Business Partner service operation)

Integration

This process component communicates with other process components using the following interactions:

Business Partner Data Processing (3rd party) - Business Partner Data Management

Structure

Business Partner Data Management process component view diagram

The following entities are part of this process component:

Service Interfaces

Action Business Partner In	An interface to deactivate a business partner.
Business Partner Processing In	An interface to process business partners.
Business Partner Processing Out	An interface to confirm business partner creation and cancellation.
Customer Processing In	An interface to process a business partner (customer).
Customer Processing Out	An interface to confirm a business partner (customer).
Manage Business Partner In	An interface to manage business partners.
Manage Customer In	An interface to manage a business partner (customer).
Query Business Partner In	An interface to search for business partners based on various criteria.

Business Objects

Business Partner	A business partner is a person, an organization, or a group of persons or organizations in which a company has a business interest.
Customer	A customer is a business partner with whom a business relationship exists. Customers can be internal or external, and they receive, use, and pay for goods or services that are provided by a vendor or service provider.

Constraints

The following are not supported:

Change state identifier
Tax classification
Operating hours (business hours, business appointments)
Notes in the communication data
Creation of new payment cards. Assignment of existing payment cards is possible.

Notes on SAP Implementation

Configuration

Before using the service operations in the Business Partner Data Management process component, ensure that the SAP CRM back-end system is set up in the usual way so that business partners can be created and maintained in the SAP CRM back-end system. In addition ensure that business partners are configured to use Marketing Attributes and Attribute Sets.

Note that in the SAP CRM context, employees are generally created in a connected HCM system. If you are not using an HCM system, you can create an employee by creating a business partner with the role employee.

More Information

For more information see the business partner documentation in the help portal at http://help.sap.com .

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