Spiff: Considerations for Accelerators

Accelerators act as the high-performance engines of your payout rules, strategically designed to amplify earnings when your sales team achieves outstanding results. In this tutorial, we'll delve into the crucial role Spiff's accelerators play in shaping commission structures, gain a comprehensive understanding of how Spiff handles these tools, and learn how to wield them effectively to optimize your commission plans.

Accelerators can be created via an accelerator table, using a Range table and/or a Lookup table, within your Spiff instance. When your rep surpasses their 100% sales goal, the Accelerator table will automatically calculate their multiplier based on set conditions and timelines.

An Admin can create an Accelerator table by doing the following:

1. In Spiff, click on the Designer button.
2. Click on the Plan tab
3. Click the three dots next to the search bar and select New Range Table.
4. Fill in the corresponding values in the Name, Lower Bound, Upper Bound, and Return Value columns. The Name column is the name of the tier. The Lower Bound and Upper Bound columns refer to the limits of each tier and will be used to place the input value into a tier. Return values are the accelerators that will be returned in the calculation.
5. In the calculated field where the accelerator table needs to be used, use one of Spiff's Lookup or Commission functions with the newly created range table as the second argument. EXAMPLE: range_lookup(InputValue, "New Range Table Name", "Return Value Column").

Spiff supports the following accelerator functions:

• mpercent
  • This function is a commission-specific function in Spiff that calculates tiered commission rates in a marginal fashion, similar to how income tax works.
  • In Spiff, using a mpercent function requires a range table, and will return a rate from the specified return column.
  • Returns a commission rate from a range table’s return column, rather than a number or dollar amount.
• mamount
  • This function is a commission-specific function in Spiff that is an updated version of our Marginal_payout function.
  • Calculates tiered commission amounts in a manner similar to how income tax works.
  • In Spiff, using an mamount function requires a Range Table.
  • Returns a commission total, calculated using a range table’s return column, rather than a commission rate.
• tier_payout
  • Similar to the vlookup function but for a range of values.
  • It utilizes what Spiff calls a Range Table, identifying which range a numerical value or variable falls, returning the specified column expression for that row.
  • In Spiff, using the tier_payout function requires a Range Table.

Considerations:

• Spiff does not support mixing decimal points and percent symbols in the same column in your range table.
• A range table will start with 4 columns automatically; Name, Lower Bound, Upper Bound, and Return Value.
  • We do not recommend renaming these column names, but you can add an additional column to your range table.
• We recommend leaving the Lower Bound empty to cover any values up to the percentage set in your Upper Bound for the first row, and leaving the Upper Bound empty in your last row.

Related Articles:

• Sheets and Tables in Salesforce Spiff Designer

Related Trailheads:

• Accelerators in Salesforce Spiff: Quick Look
• Set Up Range and Lookup Tables