1. Commerce
  2. Best Practices for Commerce Websites
  3. Customize with Workflows

Customize with Workflows

In interactions with customers through your Commerce website, you can customize their experience using SuiteFlow (workflows), included as part of SuiteCloud. Review the following information to learn more:

Introduction to Workflows

SuiteCloud includes several tools for customizing NetSuite. SuiteScript and SuiteFlow are both used for automating business processes. Although SuiteScript allows for more in-depth customization, SuiteFlow offers the advantage of using a graphical user interface, so no scripting is required.

SuiteFlow creates workflows, automated business processes, which manipulate standard or custom records. With workflows, you can define multiple stages and then conditional actions that manipulate the record based on your set criteria.

Workflows are useful when customizing simple business processes. For example, if you need to trigger an email when a first record is modified, then a workflow would be useful.

Another advantage of workflows is that they can built and maintained even if you have no scripting experience. Although no scripting is required, it is still necessary to understand logic concepts, saved searches, and business mapping.

To learn more, see SuiteFlow (Workflow).

Workflow Use Cases

You should use workflows for the use cases noted in the following table:

Area

Examples

Approval Management

  • Sales orders

  • Estimates/quotes

Record Transformation

  • Quote to sales order

Field Data Modification

  • Mandatory/non-mandatory

  • Set field value

  • Hide/unhide fields

Activity Scheduling

  • Marketing messages

  • Conditional/mass update of records

  • Automatic notifications

Workflows are best when the planned customization utilizes a simple trigger/action mechanism or if-then process logic.

For more complex customizations, use SuiteScript if you need:

  • More power, flexibility, or application coverage

  • To perform complex logic or calculations

  • To process large volumes of data

To learn more, see SuiteScript.

Workflow Basics

To customize your NetSuite account with workflows, first enable SuiteFlow in your account.

To enable SuiteFlow:

  1. Go to Setup > Company > Enable Features > SuiteCloud.

  2. In the SuiteCloud tab, check the SuiteFlow box.

  3. Click Save.

Note:

Set the user’s role with permission to use Suiteflow. For access to all SuiteFlow functionality, use the Administrator role. For more information about the Administrator role, see The Administrator Role.

After SuiteFlow is enabled, you can add new workflows.

To add a new workflow:

  1. Go to Customization > Workflow > Workflows > New.

  2. Fill in the fields as required for your customization.

  3. Click Save.

Note:

NetSuite provides workflow templates that cover common scenarios, such as sales order and purchase order approvals.

Workflows contain many different elements including record types, events, and actions. The following table provides a general overview.

Element

Description

Base record​

The primary record type affected by the workflow​

States​

The stages or statuses of the record within the business process​

Triggers​

Events that occur during the process that start the workflow

Actions​

Tasks that are to be performed after they are triggered​

Transitions​

States to move the record to​

Conditions

Requirements that must be met for the workflow to initiate, or for an action/transition to run​

Custom fields​

Variables that are used in workflows, actions, and transitions​

Revisions​

A list of changes made to the workflow or its children​

To learn more, see Working with Workflows.

Related Topics

General Notices