Summary
Field Groups enable you to organize your fields for each model: identify which are the most important, and group them into categories such as "Revenue Data"
You configure Field Groups as part of Profile Templates (for Previews and Full-Page Profiles), so you can specify which Field Groups display for different types of records (e.g. different types of Companies) or Users (Planhat users - you and your colleagues - e.g. Sales team or CSM team)
Featured Field Groups are always shown in the relevant Profiles/Previews, whereas unfeatured ones can be displayed with a click
You can also configure individual fields to display in a "full width" format
Who is this article for?
This article is particularly relevant to Planhat builders/admins who configure their tenant for their team (e.g. CS Ops)
Article contents
Introduction
"Fields" are properties on data models, containing static/CRM (rather than time-series) data. On the Company model, for example, fields can include Owner, Phase, CSM Score, TAM, Industry, Tier, and so on. Fields can be either system fields (pre-built / default / standard fields) or custom fields (created by you). You can create and edit fields via the "Data" Global Tool for admins.
You'll typically end up with lots of different fields on each model. When you view a record - e.g. a specific Company, such as Apple, or a specific End User, such as Ed Sheeran - via a Preview or a Full-Page Profile, you don't want to be faced with data for every single field, as it would clutter your screen and make it hard to find what you're looking for, especially if it was just one big long list of all fields.
Field Groups are the solution here:
They enable you to organize your fields on each model into multiple different groups (categories), such as "People data", "Revenue data" and "Conversation data"
You can choose which groups of fields to prioritize and show upfront, and which are useful but less of a priority and so show under a "toggle list" equivalent
Field Groups are part of Custom Preview and Full-Page Templates, which are variants that you can automatically apply in different situations - e.g. you could use a particular Template with a particular Field Group when the Company is an SMB Company, or a different Template with a different Field Group when the viewer is part of the Senior Leadership Team
Field Groups are therefore a fantastic way that you can easily organize your data, and personalize your Planhat tenant, making Planhat both very powerful and very easy to use.
The screenshot below shows an example of Field Groups (ringed in green) in a Full-Page Profile for the Company model.
What are Field Groups?
Field Groups are - as the name indicates! - groups of fields, customized by you. If you're a Planhat admin, you define the categories, and choose which fields belong in each, for each Profile/Preview Template for a model.
When you (as a general Planhat user) are looking at a Full-Page Profile or Preview in Planhat, you'll see Field groups within the "Fields" section.
Here's an example in a Company Preview. We've circled the "Fields" section below. Field Groups that are "Featured" are always displayed, such as the "Lifecycle Info" and "Revenue Info" Field Groups below.
To see unfeatured Field Groups, click on "+ Show full list" at the bottom of the "Fields" section (shown in the screenshot above). Doing so will also expand out the featured Field Groups. The example below shows the unfeatured "Key Data" Field Group now visible too.
You can click "- Show less" to return to the original condensed layout.
Here's the same information in the respective Company Full-Page Profile:
Click the image to view it enlarged
And now with unfeatured Field Groups opened up:
Click the image to view it enlarged
Using Field Groups, you can also choose to display particular fields as highlighted "full width" fields on their own.
Why use Field Groups?
Organization
Field Groups are a fantastic way to organize your fields within Previews and Full-Page Profile Templates - grouping chosen fields into sections.
You'll likely have a lot of fields (both system/default and custom) for each data model, and so showing all of them at once, in one big group, would clutter up your view and make it hard to find and understand the important data at a glance.
Having Field Groups means you can:
Only display the most important data in the main view
You can show less important data within Field Groups that are not featured. These are still available in the Preview / Full-Page Profile, but you have to click to expand them, as we pictured earlier in this article
Organize your fields into different categories for easy identification
For example, in a Company Preview / Full-Page Profile, you might have Field Groups for "Key Data", "Conversations" and "Revenue"
Customization
Field Groups are one of the ways you can customize Previews and Full-Page Profiles for each data model. Via different Custom Profile Templates, you can automatically use different layouts in different circumstances. You can think of these as "model variants".
The criteria for each Template can either be based on the User model (this is the Planhat user - i.e. you and your colleagues - so can include criteria such as Role or Team), or the model itself (so this could be Tier or Phase or Status for the Company model, for example).
For instance, a CSM might need to see a different layout - including different Fields Groups - when viewing their Companies compared to when a CEO or CCO etc. wants to have a quick overview of a Company before a key meeting.
In another example, the relevant Field Groups are likely to be different for a current customer versus a churned customer.
How to set up Field Groups
You configure Field Groups in the "Data" Global Tool for admins. You'll see this as its own icon in the top left of the gray bar (at the top of your tenant) if you have pinned it, or otherwise you can access it via the ellipsis.
Field Groups are part of the overall concept of Profiles. They are components of Preview Templates and Full-Page Profile Templates. Click the links to learn more about those topics; in this article, we will focus specifically on the Field Groups element.
Firstly, select the model you want using the column on the left-hand side, and then click on the "Profile" tab
Click the image to view it enlarged
You'll see a list of Profile Templates. This may be simply the Default Profile, or also additional Custom Profile Templates if they have been created for that model in your tenant
Either click on the name of an existing Profile Template to edit it,
or click "+ New Profile" if you would like to create a new Profile Template
Either way, this will open up a modal. Click on the "Field Groups" tab
Click on the "+ Add new Group", and choose between:
Featured - a group of fields that always displays in the Preview / Full-Page Profile
Standard - a group of fields that will be nested under "+ Show full list" in the Preview / Full-Page Profile
Featured Full Width - an individual field that you want to display right across the section in the Preview / Full-Page Profile. This is great for fields that house a lot of data (e.g. a rich text field for comments), or that are particularly important and you want to highlight
Standard Full Width - like "Featured Full Width" above, but nested under "+ Show full list"
(You can always swap afterwards between featured and standard, by clicking on the "Featured" toggle switch, as show below.)
To illustrate the different options, this is what the four options look like when you're configuring the Template:
... and this is what the equivalent Preview would look like:
... and expanded out:
For the normal Field Groups (rather than the "Full Width" fields):
Give the Field Group a name, e.g. "Revenue Data". (You can always change this later if you like)
Click "+ Add Field", and choose whichever fields you would like to add. Just click "+ Add Field" again to add another field into the Field Group
If you've selected a "Full Width", click "+ Add Field" and choose an individual field
Add additional Field Groups as desired
You can move Field Groups up/down (relative to each other) by dragging and dropping them (via the symbol with six dots to the left of each Field Group name)
Press the trash can (rubbish bin) button to remove a Field Group
To ensure that your configured Field Groups are included in a Preview or Full-Page Profile, ensure the "Fields" widget is selected (pictured below)
