Kaizen #90 - CRM Variables and APIs

Kaizen #90 - CRM Variables and APIs

Hello everyone!
Welcome back to another post in the Kaizen series!

This week, we will discuss what are CRM Variables and variable groups, how to create, update, and delete them through an API and the UI, and a simple example in Deluge of using a CRM variable in a function. 

Let's get started!

What are CRM Variables?

Often, we have the need to reuse certain data in CRM at various places. Instead of creating separate fields to hold such values in every module, we can create an org-level field and use the same value across the CRM system. This field is called a CRM Variable. 
These variables can be of any of the following data types:
  • Decimal
  • Single line
  • Multi line
  • Integer
  • Long integer
  • Percent
  • Currency
  • Date
  • DateTime
  • Email
  • Phone 
  • URL
  • Checkbox

Where can you use CRM Variables?

You can use CRM variables in mail merge templates, email templates, functions, workflows, buttons etc,.

What are Variable Groups?

When you have multiple variables, you can group them together for easy accessibility. For example, it makes sense to group all the authentication variables such as access token, refresh token etc., under a group called "Auth parameters".

How can you create a CRM Variable?

You can create CRM Variables from the UI or through the CRM API.

1. From the UI

  1. Go to Setup > Developer Space > Zoho CRM Variables > Create New Variable.
  2. In the Create Zoho CRM Variable pop up, enter the following details:
    a. The name of the variable in the Variable Name field.
    b. The API name of the variable in the API name field.
    c. A brief description of the variable in the Description field.
    d. The data type of the variable from the Variable Type drop-down.
    e. The group that the variable must belong to in the Grouped Under drop-down.
  3. Click Save.


2. Creating a variable through an API

Request URL: {api-domain}/crm/{version}/settings/variables
Request method: POST
Scope: ZohoCRM.settings.variables.ALL or ZohoCRM.settings.variables.CREATE

Input JSON keys

{
    "variables": [
       {
            "name": "Company Address",
            "api_name": "Company_Address",
            "variable_group": {
                "api_name": "General",
                "id": "3652397000004992001"
            },
            "type": "textarea",
            "value": "#24, Austin, TX",
            "description": "The address of the company when the state is Texas"
        }
    ]
}
where,
Key name and data type
Description
name
string, mandatory
The name of the variable.
api_name
string, mandatory
The API name you want to set for the variable.
variable_group
JSON object, mandatory
The API name and the ID of the variable group you want to group your variable under. If you do not have a variable group, you can only group it under "General". Use the Get Variable Groups API to get the ID and name of the variable group.
type
string, mandatory
The data type of the variable. The possible values are integer, text(for single line), percent, decimal, currency, date, datetime, email, phone, url, checkbox(for Boolean), textarea(for multi-line), and long.
value
string, mandatory
The value of the variable.
description
string, optional
A short description of the variable.

Sample Response


How can you update a CRM variable?

1. From the UI

  1. Go to Setup > Developer Space > Zoho CRM Variables.
  2. Hover over the variable you want to edit. 
  3. Click the "Edit" icon on the left-corner of the variable.
  4. In the Edit Zoho CRM Variable pop up, update the relevant details.

  5. Click Save.
Note
You cannot edit the Variable Type and Grouped Under fields.

2. Through an API

Request URL: {api-domain}/crm/{version}/settings/variables (or)
{api-domain}/crm/{version}/settings/variables/{variable_API_name or Variable_ID}
Request method: PUT
Scope: ZohoCRM.settings.variables.ALL or ZohoCRM.settings.variables.UPDATE

Input JSON keys
Note that besides "id", all the keys are optional based on what details you want to update.
{
    "variables": [
       { 
"id":"3652397000012482002";
            "name": "Company_Address",
            "api_name": "Company_Address",
            "value": "#24, Austin, TX",
            "description": "The address of the company when the state is Texas"
        }
    ]
}

where,
Key name and data type
Description
id
string, mandatory
The ID of the variable you want to update. You can get this ID from the Get Variables API.
name
string
The name of the variable.
api_name
string
The API name you want to set for the variable.
value
string
The value of the variable.
description
string
A short description of the variable.

Sample Response

How can you delete a CRM variable?

1. From the UI

  1. Go to Setup > Developer Space > Zoho CRM Variables.
  2. Hover over the variable you want to delete. 
  3. Click the "Delete" icon on the left-corner of the variable.

  4. Click Delete in the pop up that asks for confirmation.

2. Through an API

Request URL: {api-domain}/crm/{version}/settings/variables/{variable_id} (or) 
                       {api-domain}/crm/{version}/settings/variables?ids=id1,id2..
Request method: DELETE
Scope: ZohoCRM.settings.variables.ALL or ZohoCRM.settings.variables.DELETE

Sample Response


Use cases

Here are a few use cases where you can use CRM Variables.

  • Consider that you have integrated with RazorPay and want to send payment links to deals that you have won. Here, you can store the payment link in a variable and use it in the function that sends the link to the deal through an email.
  • You can improvise the above function, and have a condition that checks whether the payment link is valid or has expired. If it is invalid or expired, you can send an alternate payment link that is stored in another CRM variable.
  • Consider you have scheduled a function to run everyday. Now, you want to run this function except on Saturday and Sunday of a particular month. In this case, you can hard-code the Saturday and Sunday in CRM variables of the DateTime type, and check this while running your function. You case would be "if datetime =={CRM variable}, stop execution".
  • Another classic example of using CRM Variables would be in the banking sector. Consider that you have multiple modules that deal with the rate of interest. This rate will differ based on the tenure, the type of loan, the age of a person etc, and used at multiple places across the org. Here, you can set up variables for the different rates of interests and use them in various places. The best part is, when the rate of interest changes, you have to just change it at one place - CRM Variable. 

Let us see this example in detail.

I have a module called Loans. For home loans, the rate of interest is 10% for all, irrespective of the tenure. 
So, I have created a CRM variable called Interest, whose data type is decimal, and has the value 10.

In the Loans module, I have the following fields:
  • Customer Name(single line) to represent the name of the customer who has opted for the loan.
  • Principal(decimal) to represent the principal they have borrowed.
  • Tenure(number) that depicts the number of years they will repay the loan in.
  • EMI(decimal) to represent the monthly installment.
  • Total(decimal) to represent the total amount they will repay including the interest.
I have a function that calculates the EMI and the Total. Here is the code.

// In this function, we are getting principal, tenure and record id from the record and Interest from CRM Variables. 
//Calculate Total 
Total = Principal + Principal * Interest / 100 * Tenure;
info Total;
//Calculate EMI 
EMI = Total / (Tenure * 12);
info EMI;
//Variable with MAP type to hold the fields and values
record_info = {"EMI":EMI,"Total":Total};
info record_info;
info zoho.crm.getRecordById("Loans",record_id);
//Updating the record
zoho.crm.updateRecord("Loans",record_id,record_info);

The following image shows the function argument mapping.


I have now set up a workflow that is triggered upon record creation. This workflow has the Calculate EMI function associated to it as shown in the following image.


As you can see, in Argument Mapping, I have chosen the CRM variable Interest.

Here is a demo of how the workflow is triggered and function execution.


As you can see, based on the value in the CRM variable, the Total and EMI is calculated through the function triggered by the workflow upon record creation.

We hope you liked this post. We will see you next week with another interesting topic.

Please let us know if you have any questions in the comment section or write to us at support@zohocrm.com.

Cheers!

    • Sticky Posts

    • Kaizen #217 - Actions APIs : Tasks

      Welcome to another week of Kaizen! In last week's post we discussed Email Notifications APIs which act as the link between your Workflow automations and you. We have discussed how Zylker Cloud Services uses Email Notifications API in their custom dashboard.

    • Kaizen #216 - Actions APIs : Email Notifications

      Welcome to another week of Kaizen! For the last three weeks, we have been discussing Zylker's workflows. We successfully updated a dormant workflow, built a new one from the ground up and more. But our work is not finished—these automated processes are

    • Kaizen #152 - Client Script Support for the new Canvas Record Forms

      Hello everyone! Have you ever wanted to trigger actions on click of a canvas button, icon, or text mandatory forms in Create/Edit and Clone Pages? Have you ever wanted to control how elements behave on the new Canvas Record Forms? This can be achieved

    • Kaizen #142: How to Navigate to Another Page in Zoho CRM using Client Script

      Hello everyone! Welcome back to another exciting Kaizen post. In this post, let us see how you can you navigate to different Pages using Client Script. In this Kaizen post, Need to Navigate to different Pages Client Script ZDKs related to navigation A.

    • Kaizen #210 - Answering your Questions | Event Management System using ZDK CLI

      Hello Everyone, Welcome back to yet another post in the Kaizen Series! As you already may know, for the Kaizen #200 milestone, we asked for your feedback and many of you suggested topics for us to discuss. We have been writing on these topics over the

    • Recent Topics

    • Converting Sales Order to Purchase Order

      Hi All, Firstly, this code works to convert a sales order(SO) to a purchase order (PO) via a button, however I am running into an issue when I convert the SO where the values from the line items are not pulled across from the SO to the PO. The ones in

    • how to Solve Conflict Invoices in Zoho POS

      Hello Team, I am facing a repeated issue in Zoho POS while saving a sale that contains service-based items. My products are intentionally created as Service (Non-Inventory) items because I do not want to track stock for them. However, every time I try

    • All new Address Field in Zoho CRM: maintain structured and accurate address inputs

      The address field will be available exclusively for IN DC users. We'll keep you updated on the DC-specific rollout soon. It's currently available for all new sign-ups and for existing Zoho CRM orgs which are in the Professional edition. Latest update

    • Copy, Paste, Highlighted text

      when i copy paste text it gets highlighted. Fix this.  WTF is with this black highlight ? Fix copy pasting. Some people pay for using this mail service. 

    • Pricing Strategies: #6 Common Mistakes while Configuring Pricing

      "Why does this month's billing feel messy again?" That was the exact line Priya muttered while staring at the spreadsheet full of edited pricing, one-off discounts and mismatched subscription details. Her business was growing, but the pricing machine

    • Publish to LinkedIn via API

      Hi, Is it possible to publish a job opening to LinkedIn (paid job slots) if creating a job opening via api / deluge function? Or is the user required to manually publish via the job boards process? Many Thanks Adrian

    • FSM - Associating and selecting Contacts based on Service Addresses

      Hi FSM team, I've come across an FSM limitation I wanted to share for improvement. I'm currently configuring FSM for a client who provides heating system install and maintenance services. The are often sub contracted by building management companies to

    • 日本語フォントの選択肢拡充についての要望

      日本語フォントの選択肢がとても少ないと感じたことはありませんか？ 多くのアプリ（たとえば Invoice）ではフォントが1種類しかなく、正直あまり使いやすい・見た目が良いとも言えません。 そろそろ、もっと多くの日本語フォントを追加してほしい、そしてすべてのアプリで同じフォント選択肢を使えるようにしてほしいと、私たちユーザーが声を上げる時期だと思います。 ご存じのとおり、現状ではアプリごとにフォント周りの仕様にほとんど一貫性がありません。 みなさん、一緒に要望を出していきましょう！

    • Do Unpublished Products in Shopify Sync to Zoho POS?

      Will an unpublished product in Shopify sync to Zoho POS? I would like to know how Zoho POS handles products that are in draft/unpublished status in Shopify.

    • Problem in Zoho POS frontend ERP.

      We are facing some difficulties in our billing and inventory processes and require your support to resolve them at the earliest. Customer Advance Payments We receive advance payments from customers for upcoming sales. Please guide us on how to record

    • How to create estimates/Invoices with sub-totals

      Every other accounting package can create estimates and invoices with Sub-totals. How can I do that in ZohoBooks?

    • Categorize Items with Item Headers

      Hello customers, Did you ever want to classify items based on specific categories to help your customers understand your invoice better? With the new Item Header feature, you can easily categorize items in your invoices and estimates and give them a common title.  Item Headers are available in the Invoices, the Recurring Invoices and the Estimates module. It can be carried forward from estimates to invoices at the time of converting the estimates.  To add an item header: Go to the Estimates, Invoices

    • Emails sent through Bigin are not posting in IMAP Sent folder

      I have set up my email to work from within Bigin using IMAP.  I am using IMAP so I can sync my email across multiple devices - phone / laptop / desktop / iPad / etc.  I want all my emails to populate my email client (outlook & iphone email) whether or

    • Ask the Experts 26: Brighten every customer interaction with Zoho Desk all year long

      Hello everyone, Greetings and welcome to Ask the Experts 26. As we wrap up 2025, we are excited to invite you to the 26th episode of our Ask the Expert series. 🎄The Merry Metrics Edition = Best of Zoho Desk [Best Practices + Holiday Automation + Year-End

    • Painfully Slow Zoho mail

      Since yesterday Zoho Mail seems to have starting functioning very slowly and having a few bugs. It's slow to open mails, slow to send, slow to change between email accounts. Sometimes clicking on a particular folder (eg Sent folder) stops working and

    • Discount on the transaction level in POS

      "Is it possible to apply a discount on the total bill before tax in Zoho POS?" I want to apply a discount on the total transaction amount in Zoho POS, but the discount should be calculated before the taxes are applied. Is there an option to do this in

    • Zoho DataPrep switching Date Format

      When using a pipeline that is importing Zoho Analytics data into Zoho DataPrep, the month and day of date fields are switched for some columns. For example, a Zoho Analytics record of "Nov. 8, 2025" will appear in Zoho DataPrep as "2025/08/11" in "yyyy/MM/dd"

    • Create Tasklist with Tasklist Template using API v3

      In the old API, we could mention the parameter 'task_template_id' when creating a tasklist via API to apply a tasklist template: https://www.zoho.com/projects/help/rest-api/tasklists-api.html#create-tasklist In API v3 there does not seem to be a way to

    • Send Automated WhatsApp Messages and Leverage the Improved WhatsApp Templates

      Greetings, I hope all of you are doing well. We're excited to announce a major upgrade to Bigin's WhatsApp integration that brings more flexibility, interactivity, and automation to your customer messaging. WhatsApp message automation You can now use

    • Jobs at multiple locations

      Hi A lot of times we have same job open at multiple locations. So I would like an option where we can create a job and choose multiple locations. Currently we have to create individual jobs for each location. If we can create one job and mention multiple

    • From Zoho CRM to Paper : Design & Print Data Directly using Canvas Print View

      Hello Everyone, We are excited to announce a new addition to your Canvas in Zoho CRM - Print View. Canvas print view helps you transform your custom CRM layouts into print-ready documents, so you can bring your digital data to the physical world with

    • Passing the CRM

      Hi, I am hoping someone can help. I have a zoho form that has a CRM lookup field. I was hoping to send this to my publicly to clients via a text message and the form then attaches the signed form back to the custom module. This work absolutely fine when

    • Tag Adding Option in Kanban Card Customization Bigin CRM Mobile App

      I would like to request an option to add and display tags on Kanban cards in the Bigin CRM mobile app. This feature would make it easier to categorize deals and quickly identify priorities while working on the go.

    • Empowered Custom Views: Cross-Module Criteria Now Supported in Zoho CRM

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to introduce cross-module criteria support in custom views! Custom views provide personalized perspectives on your data and that you can save for future use. You can share these views with all users or specific individuals

    • WhatsApp Voice Message Sending Option in Bigin CRM

      I would like to request a feature that allows users to send WhatsApp voice messages directly from Bigin CRM. This would help improve communication efficiency and make it easier for teams to respond quickly to customer inquiries.

    • CRM: hosting a single html file in Zoho and displaying it as a widget

      I have seen that CRM offers the option of uploading a web project to Zoho itself and displaying it as a widget in CRM. The instructions then talk about setting a development environment with Node and developing an application to upload to Zoho. But I

    • Synchronise item image between Zoho Commerce and Zoho Books/Inventory/CRM

      Here is a blindingly simple idea to tie several Zoho products together. Zoho - please include a method to synchronise the item image (or images) from one Zoho application to another. For example, if you upload an item image in Zoho Inventory, a user should

    • How to change position button transtition of Blueprint?

      Hi Everyone, Look at my screenshoot, it is possible move the reject button to the right? I couldn't find that setting in the blueprint. Thank you.

    • Marketer’s Space - WhatsApp Pricing Update: What Marketers Need to Know and Do

      Hello Marketers, Welcome back to Marketer’s Space! WhatsApp made changes to their pricing model on July 1, 2025, moving from conversation-based pricing to a per-message pricing model. This week’s post focuses on what these changes mean for your WhatsApp

    • Multi file upload

      Hi, I just wonder if one could upload multiple files in one shot, say between one and three files, without adding multiple File Upload fields? Thanks, Alalbany

    • Sorting Descending in a lookup

      I have a case number lookup on multiple forms. I need the most recent added to appear at the top of the lookup or as the list of cases grom it's too much to scroll. Is there a way to have a look up sort descending?

    • Importing customer comments and multiple shipto addresses

      I am evaluating Zoho Books and have most of my data imported with two exceptions: (1) Import customer comments - in my current system I have several comments of different types, and I need to bring these into Zoho. Preferably Books customer records, but

    • Can we add custom fields to portal community profiles?

      How do we add custom fields to our profile pages in our portal community? If we have the ability to add custom fields, will we be able to access those fields via API? We want to use our Desk community in our help portal as our primary community and would

    • Auto-upload Creator Files to WorkDrive

      Hi everyone, I’m working on a workflow that uploads files from Zoho Creator to specific subfolders in Zoho WorkDrive, as illustrated in the attached diagram. My Creator application form has two multi-file upload fields, and I want—on successful form submission—to

    • Asap Widget 2.0

      Where's the documentation for the new ASAP widget? https://www.zoho.com/desk/developers/asap/#introduction this one is outdated How can we dynamically navigate between different views? How can we prefill ticket forms using ASAP 2.0?

    • Update date & time when a cell is edited

      Hi All, I am desiring to have a cell update with the current date and time when another cell is edited. Any ideas?  Thank you

    • CRM x WorkDrive: File storage for new CRM signups is now powered by WorkDrive

      Availability Editions: All DCs: All Release plan: Released for new signups in all DCs. It will be enabled for existing users in a phased manner in the upcoming months. Help documentation: Documents in Zoho CRM Manage folders in Documents tab Manage files

    • Can the Trigger be changed?

      I'm afraid I already know the answer, but here goes... After activating a workflow (under Campaigns > Automations), Then later choosing to Edit the workflow, Can the Workflow's Trigger be changed? Currently the entire Trigger section + options are gone

    • Marketer's Space: Proven tips to improve open rates – I

      Hello Marketers! Welcome back to another post in Marketer's Space! In this week's post, we'll discuss the ever-important concept of open rates. This will be a multi-part series, as we have a range of topics to cover. Open rates—which measure the percentage

    • Creating Custom PDF Template from Form

      I am trying to create a custom PDF from form submissions. I have the standard subscription and it indicates that PDF forms are included. I cannot find anywhere to create PDF forms. I try to follow the instructions from here: https://help.zoho.com/portal/en/kb/forms/form-settings/pdf-settings/pdf-editor/articles/creating-your-own-pdf-template#Creating_your_template_from_the_scratch

    • Next Page