What Akoonu Custom Data Manager Enables
Salesforce Custom Forecasting Data is a legitimately useful feature. It’s also one of the hardest-to-actually-use features in the forecasting surface, because the documented way to load and manage the data is Data Loader with a CSV keyed on User IDs and Forecast Type IDs.
Akoonu Custom Data Manager is the layer that makes it practical. If you’ve read what Salesforce Custom Forecasting Data is and what teams use it for, this post is about the gap between “this data can live in Salesforce” and “a human can actually maintain it.”
The problem CDM solves
Salesforce gives you the data model and the permission structure. What it doesn’t give you is:
- A UI to edit values in place
- A way to bulk-update without DataLoader
- Import that doesn’t require Salesforce IDs
- A fiscal-year copy or reset
- Rollups the calculated-column feature doesn’t support
- Any view of the data outside the forecast page itself
So RevOps teams that want to use Custom Forecasting Data face a choice: hire a Salesforce admin to run Data Loader every time a number changes, or put the data in a spreadsheet and not use the feature. Most pick the spreadsheet. The feature goes unused.
What Custom Data Manager gives you
Inline editing, like a spreadsheet
Click a cell. Change the number. Tab to the next one. The same keyboard-driven rhythm you already use in Excel, applied to values stored on the Forecasting Custom Data object in Salesforce.
No Data Loader job. No re-import. The change is live, saved, rolled up, and visible to everyone in the hierarchy.
Multi-select bulk updates
Select a row. Select a range. Select every rep on a team. Apply a change to all of them at once.
Reorg mid-quarter? A whole region’s stretch goals need to shift? Don’t open a CSV. Select the rows, make the change, move on.
Guided import — no IDs required
Custom Data Manager’s import flow generates the right template for the forecasting type and custom field you picked. Download it, fill in the rep names and the numbers, upload.
No User IDs. No Forecast Type IDs. No Period Start Date in ISO format. No Territory ID lookups. The editor handles the mapping for you.
For RevOps teams without a dedicated admin, this is the difference between the feature exists and the feature gets used.
Fiscal-year copy
Starting a new fiscal year? Copy last year’s values (stretch targets, prior-year actuals, whatever you’re carrying forward) into the new year as a starting point. Then edit from there.
Without this, you’re exporting, modifying dates, re-importing. With it, it’s a menu item.
Data download and delete-all
Export the current values for a field to a file for finance review or as a backup. Clear out all the values for a field and fiscal year to start fresh before loading the approved numbers. Both are menu items, not database operations.
Rollups that actually work
Salesforce’s calculated columns don’t participate in rollups. Custom Data Manager does. Load stretch goals at the rep level; see them roll up to team, region, org — automatically, on the same hierarchy as the forecast itself. No separate math.
Same muscle as Quota Manager
If you already use Akoonu Quota Manager, you already know Custom Data Manager. It’s the same interface — same hierarchy panel, same editing model, same import and export, same fiscal year selector. The only difference is what number you’re editing.
That means the learning curve is zero. The person who loads quota also loads stretch goals, prior-year actuals, and the budget number, in the same tool, in the same sitting.
Where custom data shows up outside the editor
The editor is one half of the job. The other half is making sure the numbers you load actually show up where people make decisions.
Workbench views
Custom fields are available as columns in Workbench view builder. Build a view that shows quota, stretch, forecast, and variance-to-stretch side by side. Save it. Share it.
Scenarios
Custom data values can be referenced in Scenario Planning calculations. Want to model what if every rep hits stretch instead of quota? That’s a scenario, not a spreadsheet exercise.
Oonu
Oonu, Akoonu’s AI chat, understands your custom fields the same way it understands quota. “Who’s above stretch this quarter?” “Show me the reps whose forecast is below their prior-year actuals.” Plain-language questions, answered on live Salesforce data.
Forecasting submissions
When managers submit their forecast, the stretch and plan numbers are visible as context next to commit and best case. The submission conversation gets grounded in the full number set, not just quota.
The net effect
Salesforce Custom Forecasting Data is a good idea that most teams never operationalize because the maintenance cost is too high.
Custom Data Manager drops that cost to near zero. If you can edit a spreadsheet, you can maintain the feature. If you can import quotas, you can import stretch goals.
And because it’s part of Akoonu, the numbers you load aren’t trapped in an editor. They show up in views, scenarios, AI answers, and submission workflows — anywhere a forecast conversation happens.
Getting started
Custom Data Manager ships with Quota Manager and with RevWorks Basic and RevWorks AI. There’s no separate SKU — if you have Quota, you have this.
The first thing to do is pick one number to load. Stretch goals are the most common starting point, because the value is immediate and the list of targets already exists somewhere (usually a spreadsheet from SKO).
Define the field. Run the guided import. Watch it show up on the forecast page. Then pick the next one.
Ready to see it on your Salesforce data? Schedule a demo and we’ll walk through Custom Data Manager with your forecasting hierarchy.
