Tip #5 : Setup Approval Workflow for your Subscription Business

Tip #5 : Setup Approval Workflow for your Subscription Business

Hello everyone,

We have been sharing a tip every week to address specific business scenarios which can be implemented for your subscription business. Last week, we shared a tip about implementing the Refer and Earn Workflow system. This week, we will be looking at how you can set up an Approval Workflow for Subscription Business.

Business Scenario:

One of our customers had a special requirement for his Subscription Box Business. He runs a Pet Food subscription box business where the food items are shipped to customers periodically.

Customers subscribe to a box of their choice online. Once they subscribe, he has a set of prerequisites that his customers must meet. For example, he cross-checks with customers for their preferred food ingredients, validates their delivery address, checks his inventory to see if the stock is available, etc. This usually takes a day or two. After he completes the cross-checking, he approves that subscription. Next, he bills his customer periodically from the approved date instead of the date on which his customer subscribed.

To understand this scenario better, let's consider that a customer subscribed to a box on January 1. After the merchant cross-checks, the subscription is approved on January 4. Rather than billing the customer on the 1st of every month, the customer will be billed on the 4th, say February 4, March 4 and so on.

Although the subscription will be in live status in Zoho Subscriptions (with the payment collected upfront from the customers), he needs an Approval Workflow to address the mentioned business scenario. Now, let's look into how we can implement in Zoho Subscriptions.

Addressing His Scenario

We have summarized the customer's requirements and the solutions we suggested to address them below.
  1. Requirement:
    Introduce a new approval status for each subscription.

    Solution:
    We created a custom field with its type as Dropdown and name as  Approval Status. We added two values: Awaiting Approval and Approved. By default, when a subscription is created, the custom field will hold the value as Awaiting Approval and it will change once the subscription is approved.
  2. Requirement:
    Differentiate and view the subscriptions based on their approval status.

    Solution:
    We created two custom views for the Subscriptions module and configured them to display the subscriptions based on the Approval Status custom field. Learn more about configuring custom views.
  3. Requirement:
    Approve the subscription and change the subscription renewal date automatically.

    Solution:
    We created a custom button to address this requirement. Custom Buttons can be configured to run a piece of code when you click them and you can configure them for any module. In this case, the custom button has two actions:
     
    I.    First, it needs to change the value of the Approval Status custom field to Approved.

    II.   Second, it needs to change the subscription renewal date to be after a month from present date, so that the customer gets billed periodically from the approved date rather than the date on which he subscribed.
We addressed these requirements by writing a code for the custom button. You can view the code in GitHub. By configuring this, he was able to change the Approval Status and also the renewal date in a single click.

To configure the custom field:

      1.  Go to Settings > Preferences > Invoices.
      2. Create a custom field with the name as Approval Status and type as Dropdown.
      3. Type the options as Awaiting Approval and Approved and select the Default Value as Awaiting Approval.
      4. Click Save.

To setup the custom button:

      1. Go to Settings > Preferences > Subscriptions.
      2. Create a new custom button.
      3. Enter a suitable name.
      4. Copy and paste the code from GitHub. Modify it as per your requirements.
      5. Click Save and you are good to go.

Now, you'll find the custom button in the subscriptions details page.

Found this useful? Try it out for your subscription business and let us know how it works. If you have any questions, feel free to comment below! We are here to answer them.


Cheers,
Sasidaran K,
Zoho Subscriptions.

      Zoho Campaigns Resources


        • Desk Community Learning Series


        • Digest


        • Functions


        • Meetups


        • Kbase


        • Resources


        • Glossary


        • Desk Marketplace


        • MVP Corner


        • Word of the Day


        • Ask the Experts


          • Sticky Posts

          • Tip #4 : Refer and Earn Workflow system for your Subscription Business

            Hello everyone, We've been coming up with a tip every week to address specific business scenarios which can be implemented for your business. In continuation to the previous post, this week we will be seeing about how you can implement the Refer and Earn Workflow system to acquire more customers. Why are Referrals important? Customer Acquisition is crucial for any business to sustain itself in a constantly evolving market. It involves persuading new consumers to purchase your products. Customers
          • Tip #2 - Cancellation of Offline Subscriptions based on the Expected Payment Date

            Hello everyone, As you all know, we are coming up with a custom function workflow every week to address specific business scenarios. In continuation of this previous blog, this week we will be seeing about Cancellation of Offline Subscriptions based on the Expected Payment Date. Business Scenario: In general, for any business, the customers make payments via online as well as offline. In case of subscription where the automatic collection of charge is enabled (aka online subscription), the customer's
          • Tip #3 : Send SMS Reminders for your Subscription Business

            Hello everyone, As you all know, we are coming up with a tip every week to address specific business scenarios. In continuation to the previous blog, this week we will be seeing how you can use SMS reminders for your Subscription Business. Using SMS messages for your Subscription Business: While managing your subscription business, more often than not, you need to keep your customers informed about upcoming renewals, payment reminders and cancellations. By keeping them informed in advance, you can
          • Tips And Tricks - Announcement

            Hello everyone, Every business is unique and each of them follows a specific workflow. While managing your customers' subscriptions with Zoho, you might have some needs unique to your business. Custom Functions helps you address such needs. This is a start to a series of posts, where we will be coming up with a custom function workflow every week that addresses specific business scenarios. Watch this space for further updates! Also, if you have any specific business scenario which needs to be addressed,
          • Tip #6 : Accessing external URLs from Zoho Subscriptions

            Hello everyone, We have been sharing a tip every week to address specific business scenarios which you can implement for your subscription business. Last week, we shared a tip about implementing the Approval Workflow system. This week, let's look at how you can access external URLs with the help of Custom Link. Business Scenario: Every business functions differently and has its unique requirements. At times, businesses might want to access other websites or applications by appending specific information

          Zoho CRM Plus Resources

            Zoho Books Resources


              Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                Zoho Projects Resources


                  Zoho Sprints Resources


                    Zoho Orchestly Resources


                      Zoho Creator Resources


                        Zoho WorkDrive Resources



                          Zoho CRM Resources

                          • CRM Community Learning Series

                            CRM Community Learning Series


                          • Tips

                            Tips

                          • Functions

                            Functions

                          • Meetups

                            Meetups

                          • Kbase

                            Kbase

                          • Resources

                            Resources

                          • Digest

                            Digest

                          • CRM Marketplace

                            CRM Marketplace

                          • MVP Corner

                            MVP Corner




                            Zoho Writer Writer

                            Get Started. Write Away!

                            Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                              Zoho CRM コンテンツ








                                ご検討中の方

                                  • Recent Topics

                                  • WhatsApp Enhancements to Boost Customer Engagement

                                    We're excited to introduce a series of powerful enhancements to the WhatsApp integration in Zoho FSM, making customer interactions faster, smarter, and more actionable—right from your Zoho FSM interface. Here’s a quick rundown of what’s new: Try It Out
                                  • Store reviews module just got smarter in Zoho Apptics

                                    Hello, Apptics community! Every app deserves better visibility in the marketplace, and reviews play a crucial role in improving your app's App Store Optimization (ASO), rankings, and credibility across stores. That's why we've rolled out a set of enhancements
                                  • Try CRM for everyone button in the way of workflow

                                    Please consider using the bottom bar for offers. Using the top bar for offers like "Try CRM for everyone" really gets in the way of my day to day workflow.
                                  • Include EVERYTHING in Language Files

                                    Hey, we are building out a system, that needs to be translated. The language files lack a few things though. 1. Blueprint names 2. Canvas View elements like tab names Please include everything into these files, otherwise it's not really a multi language
                                  • A way to create kits (groups of items) that do not require bundling and are added to an order as the individual items

                                    We are evaluating moving off of Sage BusinessWorks (which handles accounting, order entry, inventory control, accounts receivable, etc) to Zoho Books/Inventory. One of the things we heavily use is a feature called Kits, which allows creating a group of
                                  • Allocating Salesman To Customer

                                    Hello, please add a feature to allocate a salesman to a particular business customer/account. Regards
                                  • Shipment

                                    I have 70 shipments Out of which 40 delivery date are updated( since it is live tracked) 30 numbers i need to update manually. How to do it in bulk?
                                  • arabic not printing

                                    Qatar has a legal requirement to have invoices in English and Arabic. When writing invoice fields in Arabic, they don't print. Why?
                                  • How to show Order Number/SO Ref on Invoice emails

                                    When creating a sales order or invoice we have an option to input an order number or ref# (see attached images). For the Sales Order email template we can add a placeholder for the SO_REF. However, for the Invoice email template there's no option to reference
                                  • Specify in-line image size in question

                                    I have an image inserted into a file upload type question. I can click and drag the corner of the image to make it larger or smaller, but I would like to manually input the dimensions I need. No matter what size I make the image in photoshop before uploading
                                  • Can you limit who creates tags?

                                    Hi there, I'd like to find out if it's possible to limit which Agents create tags on Zoho desk. Thank you. 
                                  • Auto CC - Moving Departments

                                    We have Auto CC e-mail replies to your support mailbox enabled. We have two departments: Helpdesk (helpdesk@domain.com) Delivery (delivery@domain.com) If we create a Helpdesk ticket, and reply, replies are CC'd to helpdesk@domain.com (OK) We then move
                                  • Sudden Layout Issue After Last CSS Update for ZML (Temporary Fix Inside)

                                    Hi, Our clients have noticed today that every section laid out with ZML suddenly shows an unwanted top padding/blank space that interrupts the user screens. It appears that Zoho has changed the default CSS for the .zcp-col.zcp-panel-rowtype-auto element.
                                  • Customer paid excess. How do I record payment?

                                    A customer has paid me Rs. 7150 which is in excess. The amount due is Rs. 5388 I owe them Rs. 1762 back which I will be transferring to their account tomorrow. How do I get this entered into Zoho Books? I'm a little lost. :) Rishi
                                  • Search Bar Improvement for Zoho Commerce

                                    Hey everyone, I've been using Zoho Commerce for a bit now, and I think the search bar could really use an upgrade. Right now, it doesn't show products in a dropdown as you type, which would make finding items a lot faster. On Shopify, for example, you
                                  • Tabular View Report | Scale To Fit Screen

                                    Please add the option to scale Tabular View reports to fit the screen. I constantly have to adjust the column size of Tabular View reports to fit various screen sizes and it just looks messy. You can see in the screenshot below there is a blank gap after
                                  • Why Server error in creatiing Landing Pages

                                    Hi Zoho Team, pls see my screenshot and tell me, what's wrong. Thx
                                  • Tip 31: How to make a field in a Zoho Creator form mandatory based on criteria

                                    Hi folks,   I'm sure most of you are familiar with the Mandatory property available in our form builder. It enables you to ensure that your users enter an input in a required field. If they don't enter an input in that field, they'll be unable to submit
                                  • Bulk update account type when adding a bill

                                    Hi I've only been using Zoho Books for a short while but I'm impressed so far, keep up the great work. One minor issue I'm coming up against is when creating a new bill from a scanned document (supplier invoice). In some cases, the supplier invoice could
                                  • How to start fresh after many years of using Zoho Books without deleting everything and creating a new organisation?

                                    Hi, I have used Books since 2016, but never reconciled with my bank account. I was thinking of trying to go back and fix that, but I don't just don't have the time it would take. Instead, I'd like back up my old records and start anew. What is the best
                                  • How do I modify the the incoming/current call popup? I can modify other call pages but not that one.

                                    I want to modify the incoming and active call popup on the crm to include customer relevant information, such as purchase history or length of relationship. Under modules and fields, I don't seem to see active call as a choice to modify, only the main
                                  • Canvas: Add Sections to Detail View

                                    Currently it is only possible to add fields to a canvas detail view. This makes Canvas hard to maintain, because everytime we add a field to our system, someone needs to go into the canvas view and add it there as well. This leads to additional work and
                                  • Automation#32:Auto Add New Portal Users to the Help Center User Groups

                                    Hello Everyone, Introducing a custom function that automates the process of adding new portal users to Help Center user groups, making user management effortless! By default, Zoho Desk allows you to assign new portal users to groups manually. But with
                                  • Cannot delete old accounts

                                    Hello, I try to delete old accounts from CRM, but it won't permit, saying documents are still linked to them. I searched in CRM and BOOKS, found some documents and deleted them, but still CRM won't delete them. Any idea how to do that ? I have a lot of
                                  • Offline mode on Android TV app?

                                    Hello! Is there a way to use Zoho Show offline in the Android TV app? I have an Android TV based projector, and I travel with it, and don't want to have to rely on a steady internet connection when giving a presentation.
                                  • Choice-based Field Rules on Global Lists

                                    Hi, The new Choice-based Field Rules should also be able to work with Global Lists not just local lists. Thanks Dan
                                  • Tip #36- How to use Survey in Zoho Assist to capture valuable feedback from remote sessions- 'Insider Insights'

                                    How to use Survey in Zoho Assist to capture valuable feedback from remote sessions The survey feature allows technicians and customers to share their valuable feedback, contributing to the improvement of remote service quality. After the completion of
                                  • Narrative 3 - Comprehending User Management

                                    Behind the scenes of a successful ticketing system - BTS Series Narrative 3 - Comprehending User Management User management in a ticketing system includes important aspects of how administrators oversee user access, roles, and permissions. This process
                                  • Product Details's Description is lost

                                    Hi CRM lost its description in Product details subform. Can you make some test before deploy any update?
                                  • Sent items with shared folders

                                    Hello, this is in some way in between a problem and an idea.  When sharing folders (which is actually not any close to a shared mailbox...) the person which the folder has been shared with can access that folder and can send emails when delegation is
                                  • Zoho Bookings Issues We are facing

                                    Hi team, Here are list of issues we are facing with Zoho Bookings when migrating from other platforms. Sorry there is a lot but the bookings app need to be functional and practical for people to actually use it and not-cause MORE problems by being so basic and not customisable to each business.  1: SMS reminders for staff  There should be time limits on these reminders to make them useful. EG. if a new booking comes in more than 4 hours from now we don't really need to get a reminder, however if
                                  • Booking outside of scheduled availability

                                    Is there a way for staff (such as the secretary) to book appointments outside of the scheduled availability? Right now to do this special hours must be set each time. There should be a quicker way. Am I missing something?
                                  • Run workflow on data import in Creator 6

                                    How to run a workflow on data import in Creator 6?
                                  • Multi Day booking for resources

                                    I have following business-case: Rental for Tablets. Customer should be able to select how many device for how many days he'd like to rent. Same as a car rental for multiple days. Is this possible with Bookings on the current version?
                                  • Add Usage & Voting Analytics for Knowledge Base Articles in Zoho SalesIQ

                                    Dear Zoho SalesIQ Team, We appreciate the current integration between Zoho Desk and Zoho SalesIQ that allows knowledge base articles to be synced and displayed to users directly within the SalesIQ chat interface. One valuable feature already available
                                  • Real-Time Alert or Status Indicator for WhatsApp Connection Issues in SalesIQ

                                    Hi Zoho Team, We’d like to request a feature enhancement in Zoho SalesIQ related to WhatsApp integration stability and visibility. Recently, we encountered a critical issue where our WhatsApp bot stopped responding to messages without any warning or alert
                                  • Customization of Chat Transcript Emails in Zoho SalesIQ

                                    Hi Zoho SalesIQ Team, I hope you're doing well. We would like to request the ability to customize the email template that is sent to clients when they request a chat transcript from SalesIQ. Currently, when a client clicks the button to receive their
                                  • Import from Linkedin

                                    Please provide a way to enable importing contact information for Contacts and Companies from Linkedin? Thanks
                                  • The ability to format text fields, ie when data is number or currency

                                    Hello, I have spent some time trying to determine how to accomplish this but it appears to be impossible. I want to merge a currency field from CRM into a PDF document. The CRM data shows $1,234, but when zSign gets the data it shows 1234 in the text
                                  • Tip of the Week #64– Customize your sidebar for a more focused workflow.

                                    When your shared spaces start filling up with too many views, it gets a little harder to zoom in on what really matters. You find yourself scrolling more than working, and the things that need your attention? They’re often buried down below. Custom sidebar
                                  • Next Page