Considerations for Advanced Account Forecasting When Processing Large Volumes of Data

Key Considerations

• The total number of forecast fact records to process.
• The forecast fact object used to store the forecast data. The out-of-the-box forecast fact object supports higher data volumes and provides higher scalability compared to a custom forecast fact object.
• The number of forecast sets that you use to generate the forecasts.
• The configuration of the forecast sets, dimensions, and period groups.

Forecast Calculations by Using an Orchestration Flow

• You can process up to 60 million forecast fact records in a single Data Processing Engine flow process. For larger volumes, divide the fact records into smaller volumes based on criteria such as region or account groups before processing.
• Writeback of forecast data calculated using forecast formulas takes time due to the large volume of data to process in the forecast fact records.

Forecast Formula Baseline Calculation by Using Data Processing Engine

• Leverage the data processing engine by modeling the forecast formula as formula nodes in the data processing engine definitions for baseline formula calculations. This improves the scalability and performance to address the processing of up to 16 million rows of forecast fact records in a single data processing engine job run and reduces the overall processing time by over 60% compared to the orchestration flow.
• You model the forecast formulas in the forecast set but the Calculate Advanced Account Forecasts and Update Advanced Account Forecast Set Partner invocable actions aren’t used as part of the orchestration flow to calculate the forecasts.
• The forecasting data processing engine job run creates or updates the forecast set partner records to an Active status.

Model Forecast Formulas as Fields on the Forecast Fact Object

Use this approach when the forecast formulas don’t vary with time. Leverage the platform capabilities to model the forecast quantity and forecast revenue as formula fields on the fact object that you’re using for your forecast calculations. You aren’t required to model the forecast formulas in the data processing engine definitions or to use an orchestration flow with the Calculate Advanced Account Forecasts and Update Advanced Account Forecast Set Partner invocable actions to generate forecasts.