Magnetic lighting configurator: how to prepare your catalogue, rules and partner journey
A guide for manufacturers, importers and distributors of track systems who want to implement a magnetic lighting configurator for customers, installers or a partner network. We explain what product data you need, how to describe the technical rules and how to use the finished bill of materials further along the sales process.
Who a track lighting configurator makes sense for
Companies gain the most when a single kit consists of a dozen or more items and a mistake in one of them holds up installation. A missing corner connector or an underpowered driver only comes to light on site, when the installer calls with a complaint. The configurator moves this check to the selection stage.
Magnetic systems are a special case here. Fixtures clip into the rail without tools and are easy to move around, so customers like to experiment with the number and type of fixtures. Every such change, however, affects the total wattage and the choice of driver – and that is something the customer no longer sees.
An implementation makes even more sense when you sell through several channels at once: an online shop, partner showrooms, electrical wholesalers and interior designers. Each of them needs a correct kit, but not all of them know every system in the catalogue. In the demo above, the customer chooses the mounting and rail colour before picking fixtures, and the configurator immediately corrects combinations that rule each other out and says why – which shows how to narrow down the choice early on.
What product data to prepare
A configurator is only as good as the product attributes it works with. If the catalogue lacks a fixture’s wattage or control type, the rules have nothing to check. Before the project starts, it is worth verifying that at least these fields exist for every item:
| Product group | Key attributes |
|---|---|
| Rails | system, length, colour, mounting type (surface-mounted, recessed, suspended), maximum power load |
| Fixtures | system, wattage, colour temperature (CCT), control type, housing colour, beam angle |
| Connectors and accessories | system, type (straight, corner, power feed, end cap), colour |
| Drivers and controllers | rated power, control type (On/Off, DALI), compatible systems |
Data is rarely complete at the start. During the discovery phase it usually turns out that some attributes exist only in PDF data sheets. Filling them in is work on the manufacturer’s side, but it pays off in every other channel: in the online shop, in partner feeds and in quotes.
Rules in a magnetic lighting configurator: how to describe them
Before a rule goes into the system, it is worth writing it down as a sentence a sales rep can understand. For example: “the total wattage of the fixtures on a track must not exceed the rail’s limit” or “a kit with DALI control requires a DALI controller”. A rule written like this is easy to check with the technical department and easy to test in the finished application. A list of rules written this way also comes in handy later for training new sales reps.
It helps to split the rules into three groups:
- blocking rules, which prevent the kit from being completed (power limit exceeded, missing corner connector),
- warning rules, which inform but do not block (mixed colour temperatures in one room),
- auto-selecting rules, which add items to the bill of materials automatically (a driver with a power reserve, end caps, joiners).
This split also helps you decide what customers can change themselves and what requires consultation with a technical adviser.
You can see an example of auto-selection in the demo: the app itself chooses the smallest driver with a power reserve instead of leaving that decision to the customer. For someone without technical knowledge, this is the most important difference between a magnetic lighting configurator and an ordinary online shop with filters.
Track shape and interface: simple for the customer, precise in the data
Customers think in terms of the shape of the room, not catalogue numbers. That is why a good configurator starts with choosing the track layout (straight line, L, U, rectangle) and its dimensions. Only from that does the app work out how many metres of rail are needed, how many joiners connect the 2 m sections and which connectors to add at the corners.
A live-updating 2D diagram is enough for most enquiries, because it shows the layout and the positions of the fixtures. When you want to show the effect in the room, for example in a showroom or for premium projects, it is worth looking at the variant with 3D visualisation. That is a separate budget decision and does not have to be made in the first phase.
The BOM as the starting point for a quote
The most value comes from what happens to the bill of materials after the customer clicks “Send”. A complete list of items with quantities and an indicative price can instantly become a PDF quote, a CRM entry or a basket in a B2B shop. The sales rep does not retype the kit from an email into the system, but checks and approves a ready-made one.
When selling through partners, pricing becomes an issue. An installer or wholesaler usually has different terms from an end customer, so the configurator can show prices that depend on the logged-in account. This is a good candidate for the second phase of implementation, once you have seen how the tool performs on the manufacturer’s website.
The bill of materials is also valuable to the manufacturer itself. Saved configurations show which systems, colours and colour temperatures customers combine most often, which track lengths dominate and where rule conflicts occur. This is input for planning production, stock and catalogue development that you cannot easily get from invoices alone.
What to watch out for during implementation
- Rules that live only in one person’s head. If the technical knowledge rests with one engineer, schedule sessions with them to write the rules down at the very start of the project.
- No testing on real kits. Past orders make the best test, including those that led to complaints. Run them through the configurator and check whether it catches the errors.
- Promising calculations the tool does not do. The configurator checks compatibility and power, but it is no substitute for a photometric design. It is worth saying so clearly in the interface.
- A catalogue without an owner. New fixtures and price changes must go into the admin panel promptly, otherwise partners will soon stop trusting the bills of materials.
You will find a visual variant of the same pattern in the 3D lighting configurator. We describe how to turn a bill of materials into a finished quote on the digital quoting and calculations page, and how orders are passed on to company systems in the ERP and CRM integrations section.