NetSuite Featured on Software Advice

Derek Singleton of Manufacturing Software Advice recently published a shortlist on cloud-based ERP solutions, specifically for manufacturers. NetSuite, one of the five featured products, offers a variety of functionalities and is clear choice for businesses looking for a SaaS solution. It is a great choice for companies that are looking to expand as it is applicable for companies ranging in size from 25 to 1000 employees. The article looks at four main criteria; size of client's business, manufacturing support modes, variety of industries served and the breadth of applications.

"In June of 2010, [NetSuite] launched their first full-suite manufacturing offering to target mid-market manufacturers. As a pure SaaS company, NetSuite’s manufacturing clients all operate in the cloud. NetSuite currently supports multiple sites, multiple languages and currencies. In future releases, they plan to expand upon this functionality and target more complex manufacturing industries."

Click here to read the full article

February: Tips and Tricks

Welcome to the February edition of NetSuite Tips and Tricks! This month, we’ll be looking at promo codes, autocomplete suggestions, and how to avoid errors while calculating shipping costs while using scripts.

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1- Track Promotion Codes

If you want to use a promotional code in an online customer form, NetSuite won’t keep track of it unless it’s in a Marketing Campaign--it will simply vanish. This means that in order to use the promotional code, we need to follow these steps:

• Create a new marketing campaign


• Under the "Events" tab, select "Other Events" unless you want it associated with a specific event, such as a mass email.


• Put the code in the Promotion Code field. You can either select from a pre-existing code, or create one on the spot by clicking >> and then "New"

• Create or update the online customer forms, setting the newly-created campaign as the “Lead Source” (found in the "Set Up Workflow" tab)

Just like that, you will be able track and report lead creation by promotion code used.

2- Shipping Cost Errors when Running Scripts

When working with a NetSuite webstore that has Shipping Integration enabled (for instance, FedEx, UPS or USPS), be careful when running any script that changes the “shipaddresslist” during a transaction.

Often times, the Shipping Integration will erroneously recalculate the shipping cost and final total of the transaction will be incorrect.

To ensure this doesn't happen, set the “fire field changed” parameter of the “setFieldValue” method to “false”.

3- Autocomplete Suggestions

When you enter several letters in a field, NetSuite offers auto-completed suggestions.

NetSuite will filter out suggestions that don’t start with the text you've entered as opposed to displaying anything that contains those characters. For example, if you are looking for the record "Test Vendor" and you enter the text "vendor", NetSuite will not offer "Test Vendor" as a suggestions.

Knowing this can come in handy if you aren’t sure what you’re looking for— always be sure to remember the first word of what you are looking for!

Integrating Jigsaw's API with NetSuite

A while back, we were asked to look into a solution that would allow Sales Reps to create lists of leads and import them directly into NetSuite.

While tools and add-ons have already been created for this purpose, they are often costly and not an option for smaller companies on a tighter budget. The benefit to these expensive add-ons, is that they also offer many other CRM features besides just lead imports.

However, if you are interested in only creating lead lists for Sales Reps and importing them into NetSuite, you can do so yourself with minimal knowledge of NetSuite SuiteScripts.

After a little bit of investigation, we realized that Jigsaw, an “online business directory of companies and business professionals that is built, maintained and accessed by a worldwide community of over a million subscribers”, would be a perfect third party tool to help us create our lists.

What's interesting about Jigsaw is that they provide a RESTful API to interact with.

This allows you to create a mash-up for NetSuite. Using the Jigsaw's API, you can:

• Search companies and contacts;
• Access company and contact information
• Purchase contact information using the Jigsaw credit system
• Make requests (read : nlapiRequestURL) to Jigsaw and get results in either JSON or XML

This last point allows you to use basic coding and your own logic process in order to import the lists as entities directly into NetSuite.

The only downside in the API is that they don't provide developers with a way of letting you pull a "list" or query the lists of contacts that you've created directly on the Jigsaw website. This may change in the future.

However, this obstacle is easily overcome with a few custom records in NetSuite. The possibilities of what you want to import and how it is imported is truly limitless.

What do you need to get started?

• A Jigsaw account
• A Jigsaw's Developer account in order for you to get a token to access the API;
• Basic coding skills.

Once you're done with your own implementation, you'll have empowered your business with further automation and keep your Sales Reps busy!