About Planning Items and Marketing Hierarchies

About Planning Items

Planning items provide a way to group and track information that you need for marketing operations. A planning item is a collection of information and resources about the associated marketing activities at various levels. Planning items might contain the following information and resources: standard and custom properties, attachments of associated files or resources, and so on. You can use planning items to track, approve, and monitor the performance of your marketing activities.

You can add planning items at various levels in a marketing hierarchy. The type of planning items that you can create depends on the marketing hierarchy settings that are configured for your organization. For example, your marketing hierarchy might be organized by using one of the following structures:

Organization

The names of the planning items that you create are based on the hierarchical structure of your organization. For example, you might create planning items such as a Worldwide Marketing Division, Marketing Department, and Web Channels Group.

Product

The names of the planning items that you create are based on the products that you sell. For example, you might create planning items such as outdoor games, sports equipment, football gear, and trekking gear.

Region

The names of the planning items that you create are based on the geographical diversification of your organization. You might create planning items such as Global Sales, North America Sales, European Region Sales, Asia-Pacific Sales, and so on.

Planning items might also be associated with resources such as messages, tasks, and real-time journeys. You can associate planning items with the tasks or journeys that you create in these modules. For example, if you create an email task, you can create a planning item that is associated with this task. When planning items are associated with tasks or journeys, authorized users can create, track, and monitor marketing activities from planning through execution.

About Marketing Hierarchies

A marketing hierarchy is a structure that is used to organize planning items for marketing activities. It uses levels to define the order, the grouping, and the relationships between the planning items.

Your organization can customize the marketing hierarchy to match your marketing structure. Your marketing hierarchy can have up to 10 levels, and must contain at least one level, before you can create planning items. When you define two or more levels, the order of the levels establishes a parent-child relationship. Because each planning item is associated with a level in the marketing hierarchy, when you create planning items at different levels, a parent-child relationship is automatically formed. The planning items associated with each level display above or below other items when you view the hierarchy. The planning items at the top level of the marketing hierarchy can influence the content of the planning items at the lower levels.

An administrator can customize and configure the marketing hierarchy settings to match your organization’s marketing structure. Your marketing hierarchy includes levels that define the order, the grouping, and the relationships between the planning items.

The order of the levels establishes a parent-child relationship. Each planning item is associated with a level in the marketing hierarchy. To create a planning item, at least one level must be configured in the marketing hierarchy. Before you create a planning item and add information, you must select a level for the planning item.

Each level is organized sequentially and automatically creates relationships with the level above and below.

The default marketing hierarchy is arranged in this order:

• Level 1 is Plan. In a plan, you can add or associate programs, tasks, real-time journeys, and messages.

  • Level 2 is Program. Multiple programs can be part of the same plan. In a program, you can add or associate campaigns, tasks, real-time journeys, and messages.

    • Level 3 is Campaign. Multiple campaigns can be part of the same program. In a campaign, you can add or associate tasks, real-time journeys, and messages.

You can add the planning items based on the marketing hierarchy that is configured for your organization and the levels that are available to you. When you create a planning item, you must select the level that the planning item is associated with in the marketing hierarchy. For example, in the default hierarchy, if you create a Campaign planning item, it is a child object of the Program planning item. You can view the marketing hierarchy on the Relationships tab of a planning item.