Verba Compete
November, 2012
Copyright 11/20/2012 by Nebraska Book Co., Inc. All rights reserved.
This document contains proprietary information of Nebraska Book Co., Inc. Any reproduction of this information in whole or in
part without prior written authorization is prohibited. Use of this material for purposes other than in connection with WinPRISM
is in violation of the license agreement. WinPRISM is a registered trademark of Nebraska Book Co., Inc. iPhone and iOS are
registered trademarks of Apple, Inc.
Every attempt has been made to make this material complete, accurate, and up-to-date. Users are cautioned, however, that
Nebraska Book Co., Inc. reserves the right to make changes to the software and its related documentation without notice and
shall not be responsible for any damages (including inconsequential) caused by reliance on the material presented, including, but
not limited to, typographic, arithmetic, or listing errors.
If you have any comments or suggestions regarding this document, please send e-mail to [email protected].
WinPRISM Installations and Training
Published 11/20/2012 by:
CBMS (College Bookstore Management Systems)
A division of Nebraska Book Co., Inc.
4700 South 19th
Lincoln, Nebraska 68512
(402) 421-7300
Printed in U.S.A.
Verba Compete
2
11/20/2012
Table of Contents
Verba Compete with WebPRISM ....................................................................................... 4
Setting Up Verba: ....................................................................................................................... 4
Sending Information to Verba: ................................................................................................... 4
Changing Prices Through Verba:................................................................................................ 4
Deciding on Price Changes in WinPRISM: ................................................................................ 4
Reporting for Price Changes: ...................................................................................................... 7
Changing Prices in WinPRISM: ................................................................................................. 7
Verba Compete without WebPRISM.................................................................................. 8
Setting Up Verba: ....................................................................................................................... 8
Sending Information to Verba: ................................................................................................... 8
Changing Prices Through Verba:................................................................................................ 8
Importing Changes into WinPRISM:.......................................................................................... 9
End of Term ...................................................................................................................... 10
To import prices to review: ....................................................................................................... 10
To view proposed changes: ....................................................................................................... 11
Reporting for Price Changes: .................................................................................................... 13
Changing Prices in WinPRISM: ............................................................................................... 13
Verba Compete
3
11/20/2012
Verba Compete with WebPRISM
Verba Compete enables Nebraska-partnered bookstores to view textbook prices (new, used,
rental, and digital) of the online competition for every title in the store. Based on the online
marketplace, Verba will recommend both price increases and decreases to the bookstore in order
to maximize market share and revenues. Once the store has made their pricing decisions in
Compete, the store can easily export that pricing to their Nebraska system for price changes both
in-store and online. Verba Compete also recommends pricing strategies on buyback titles and
strategic online sourcing for those titles where buying online is the only way to offer a
competitively priced option to students.
Setting Up Verba:
To begin using Verba, the first step is to contact Verba. They can give you information about
their services, and provide you with the tools needed on their side of the communications
process.
Sending Information to Verba:
Once the Verba side is set up, you can send your course requests, with the books, over to Verba.
This communication occurs through the Web line in WPConsole, and communicates these
books, along with pricing information, to Verba. Thus, to send items to Verba, you merely need
to check them to go to the web. On the Verba Compete site, then, Verba compares your pricing
information, title by title, to a host of online competitors, and reports back to you which of your
prices is outside of a competitive margin. This pricing information is based on parameters you
set on the Verba Compete side. So, for example, you may choose for Verba to show you all new
titles that are not within ten percent of competitor prices.
Changing Prices Through Verba:
Once this comparison is done, you can then choose to change your store pricing to match the
competition. This is done on the Verba Compete side. For each title listed, you can choose
whether or not to accept the Verba Compete recommendation for a price change. Once you have
gone through the list, you can export these price changes over to WinPRISM. This is where the
WinPRISM version 24 changes come in. WebPRISM will pick up the packet containing the
price changes from Verba, and route it to the CampusHub system, which will allow WinPRISM
to import these prices.
Deciding on Price Changes in WinPRISM:
These changes, then, are written to the Verba Price Change Queue, available under the hammer
in the Price Changes module.
Verba Compete
4
11/20/2012
Verba Compete
5
11/20/2012
The VERBA Price Change Queue will show the following information:
1. Process Price Change Flag
2. Location
3. Term
4. N/U
5. ISBN
6. Description
7. SKU
8. Current Retail
9. Current Item Cost Margin
10. Current Acct Cost Margin
11. Retail Difference
12. Item Cost
13. Acct Cost
14. Proposed Retail
15. Proposed Item Cost Margin
16. Proposed Acct Cost Margin
17. SOH
18. Rental Qty
19. Bd/Ed/Cp
20. VERBA user
At the bottom of the screen, there are several options:
At this point, users will need to decide whether or not to accept the price changes listed
by Verba, and preapproved on the VERBA page. To check all items in the list to be
changed, choose ‘Check/Uncheck All Items’. Conversely, users can pick and choose
which titles to update by checking the ‘Process Price Changes’ box in the grid.
If deciding to update prices, one will need to decide if, when changing a new/used title,
the alternative title should also be changed. If so, check either ‘Update New Prices from
Used Prices’ or ‘Update Used Prices from New Prices’
Verba Compete
6
11/20/2012
Reporting for Price Changes:
Once users have chosen their options, they can run the report, process the changes, or exit
without making changes. To run a report, choose ‘VERBA Price Chg Queue Report’.
This report shows a comparison of titles, and will show what price changes will occur.
Changing Prices in WinPRISM:
When finished, to make the price changes, users will choose Process Price Changes. A
dialog will appear, asking if the user wants to Process Changes.
This will change the Item Maintenance Retail price of all items selected in the grid.
When finished, the system will display:
A markup (markup cancellation) will be recorded in the stock ledger for this change.
NOTE: These Verba price changes will ignore the WPAdmin settings “Update Used
Prices from New Prices” and “Update New Price from Used Prices”. The corresponding
New or Used textbook price for each checked item in the list will only be changed in
conjunction with the Verba price change boxes at the bottom of the screen if one of these
checkboxes is checked in this dialog. If the user leaves the default and does not check
either box in the Verba Price Change Queue dialog, the corresponding New or Used
textbook price will not be changed along with the Verba price change regardless of the
WPAdmin settings. Also, if the store has the parameter “Round prices using Store
Information parameters” checked in System Parameters, this option will be ignored and
prices will never be rounded for these price changes.
Verba Compete
7
11/20/2012
Verba Compete without WebPRISM
Setting Up Verba:
Verba can be used even by stores that do not have a Webprism website with NBC.
Again, however, the first step is to contact Verba. They can give you information about
their services, and provide you with the tools needed on their side of the communications
process.
Sending Information to Verba:
Once the Verba side is set up, you can send your course requests, with the books, over to
Verba via an export from WinPRISM. This export can be done through Report
Generator.
The report generator can have any name, and should have a query similar to the
following, where the Value field is the name of the term you are working with.
The fields to include in the report should be similar to the following:
We recommend that you generate the report, and then export it to Excel.
On the Verba side, then, you will import this file. Once complete, on the Verba Compete
site, then, Verba compares your pricing information, title by title, to a host of online
competitors, and reports back to you which of your prices is outside of a competitive
margin. This pricing information is based on parameters you set on the Verba Compete
side. So, for example, you may choose for Verba to show you all new titles that are not
within ten percent of competitor prices.
Changing Prices Through Verba:
Once this comparison is done, you can then choose to change your store pricing to match
the competition. This is done on the Verba Compete side. For each title listed, you can
choose whether or not to accept the Verba Compete recommendation for a price change.
Once you have gone through the list, you can export these price changes over to
WinPRISM, using the ‘Export’ option on Verba.
Verba Compete
8
11/20/2012
Importing Changes into WinPRISM:
WinPRISM can import the file containing these Verba price changes. To do this, users
will access the Price Change module in WinPRISM, and will chose the “VERBA Import
Price Change Queue” option under the hammer, which will allow WinPRISM to import
these prices.
First, users will be asked to choose the campus and term for which the price change file
will be imported.
Next, users will need to choose the source file which contains the price changes. This
will be the file exported from the Verba site. Click the ellipses next to ‘Source File’ and
choose the proper file. When finished, click OK.
These changes, then, are written to the Verba Price Change Queue, available under the
hammer in the Price Changes module. From this point forward, the process is exactly the
same as if the store has WebPrism. See ‘Deciding on Price Changes in WinPRISM’
above for more information.
Verba Compete
9
11/20/2012
End of Term
At the end of the term, you may decide to revoke all price changes done in WinPRISM,
in order to ‘reset’ your system for the next term.
To import prices to review:
To change all prices of books changed through the Verba interface, users will need to go
to the hammer in the Price Changes module, and choose ‘VERBA Reset Price Change
Queue’.
A dialog will display, asking users to choose which campus and period for which to reset
prices:
When ‘OK’ is pressed, a dialog will display to confirm the choice.
This is ONLY asking if you wish to pull the changes into the queue. This will NOT
change those prices, but merely pull them into the queue for viewing.
Verba Compete
10
11/20/2012
A dialog displays, confirming the changes have been pulled into the queue.
To view proposed changes:
These proposed changes, then, are written to the Verba Price Change Queue, available
under the hammer in the Price Changes module.
The VERBA Price Change Queue will show the following information:
1. Process Price Change Flag
2. Location
3. Term
4. N/U
5. ISBN
6. Description
7. SKU
8. Current Retail
9. Current Item Cost Margin
10. Current Acct Cost Margin
11. Retail Difference
12. Item Cost
13. Acct Cost
14. Proposed Retail
15. Proposed Item Cost Margin
16. Proposed Acct Cost Margin
17. SOH
18. Rental Qty
19. Bd/Ed/Cp
Verba Compete
11
11/20/2012
Verba Compete
12
11/20/2012
At the bottom of the screen, there are several options:
At this point, users will need to decide whether or not to accept the price changes listed,
which will change all Verba altered prices back to the retail at which the item was listed
prior to the FIRST Verba change. To check all items in the list to be changed, choose
‘Check/Uncheck All Items’. Conversely, users can pick and choose which titles to
update by checking the ‘Process Price Changes’ box in the grid.
If deciding to update prices, one will need to decide if, when changing a new/used title,
the alternative title should also be changed. If so, check either ‘Update New Prices from
Used Prices’ or ‘Update Used Prices from New Prices’.
Reporting for Price Changes:
Once users have chosen their options, they can run the report, process the changes, or exit
without making changes. To run a report, choose ‘VERBA Price Chg Queue Report’.
This report shows a comparison of titles, and will show what prices changes will occur.
Changing Prices in WinPRISM:
When finished, to make the price changes, users will choose Process Price Changes. A
dialog will appear, asking if the user wants to Process Changes.
Verba Compete
13
11/20/2012
This will change the Item Maintenance Retail price of all items selected in the grid.
When finished, the system will display:
A markup (markup cancellation) will be recorded in the stock ledger for this change.
NOTE: These Verba price changes will ignore the WPAdmin settings “Update Used
Prices from New Prices” and “Update New Price from Used Prices”. The corresponding
New or Used textbook price for each checked item in the list will only be changed in
conjunction with the Verba price change boxes at the bottom of the screen if one of these
checkboxes is checked in this dialog. If the user leaves the default and does not check
either box in the Verba Price Change Queue dialog, the corresponding New or Used
textbook price will not be changed along with the Verba price change regardless of the
WPAdmin settings. Also, if the store has the parameter “Round prices using Store
Information parameters” checked in System Parameters, this option will be ignored and
prices will never be rounded for these price changes.
Verba Compete
14
11/20/2012