Note: We'll use the term Revenue Cloud in the following article to refer to both CPQ and RCA configuration data.
We need to run the External ID Wizard because to deploy Revenue Cloud components, the Gearset External ID must be present on all RCA objects in both your source and target orgs.
The Revenue Cloud External ID setup process
Initiate the setup wizard from the Salesforce org connections page by clicking the Run external ID setup button on any of your Revenue Cloud org(s).
Gearset will create External IDs and supporting flows for the features and objects you've selected, and apply them to your org as a metadata deployment. These IDs help keep records in sync across orgs and reduce mismatches during deployment of RCA components.
You can see the objects that Gearset will be adding External IDs to before deciding to proceed with the setup. External IDs are added for the selected RCA features and related objects.
The supporting flows ensure IDs remain unique when records are cloned, as otherwise the External ID would be cloned along with the record.
Gearset automatically names the deployment "Gearset External ID setup", and you can add your own notes at this stage as well.
Before the wizard runs you will be able to see what Gearset is going to do - in this case we can see that the wizard will be populating missing External IDs, and doesn't need to create any flows.
Clicking Continue will initiate the automatic three-step process of planning the deployment, adding the IDs and flows and populating the IDs.
Gearset's automatic 3-step external ID setup process
Step 1: We make sure Gearset's external ID field can be added.
Step 2: A metadata deployment is performed to add the Gearset external ID field to your Revenue Cloud and related objects.
Step 3: Gearset populates those external ID fields that were added in step 2. Gearset will derive its external ID from the existing Salesforce record ID.
The deployment success page will confirm the Gearset external ID field has been added successfully.
You can see the objects where External IDs have been added on the "Populated external IDs" tab.
💡 When it comes to deploying new records that have been created after this setup step has finished - Gearset will automatically populate new record IDs at the point of deployment alongside any selected metadata. You will not need to re-run the wizard after creating new records.
After running the wizard you will be able to run a comparison and select Revenue Cloud components for deployment. Next, have a look at How to compare and deploy Revenue Cloud configuration data.