5 + 1 reasons why you need CPQ software for your sales force efficiency

What's your customer's first impression when he buys something from you? No matter what way he or she interacts with your company, that first experience sets the expectations which are already high. And making no mistake is crucial at this point. Customers don't want to bother about any details concerning your sales process or complexity of your product catalog. At the same time, your products and bundles may require difficult configurations and dependabilities. Your team must act quickly and accurately and ensure that the customer understands why the price ended up like this. That's why you should check if the solution you opt to allows you:

• Ensure successful quote configurations with no mistakes (no matter how complex bundles' dependencies are);
  
  
• Make configuration process as simple as possible for sales reps;
  
  
• Preconfigure available cross-selling and up-selling items;
  
  
• Your CPQ tool must have an intuitive interface;
  
  
• It must provide coherent options to customers to interact with, a smooth process of making additions and changes, ideally made on the go in real-time.
  

How many of your competitors' business proposals your client will read while you approve yours? Don't make the prospects, your sales reps and yourself wait. A quote or proposal needs to travel flawlessly between all the departments and colleagues who participate in its approval. Sales margin and discount, products, and services offered, and location should be taken into consideration during this process. A long and bureaucratic internal approval process can be catastrophic to the deal. How many of your potential customers quit during this step? How many deals are you losing because your internal processes are not sufficient enough? The approval process is another area that must be automated. Look at a system that allows you:

• Set quote and price approval workflows;
  
  
• Produce approval workflows by criteria you can configure such as margin, discount, or region;
  
  
• Choose client ratings to set a discount.
  

How do sales teams—whether they're local or around the globe—receive information about pricing changes? Many sales teams still use outdated communication channels— spreadsheets, emails, or worse. It's too easy for one person to shift a few digits or miss an email in a torrent of business notices. Out-of-date systems for sharing information brings unnecessary delays. And what about handling promotions? Every customer wants a deal— and it's in your best interest to give him one. But how much profit is lost by offering a bigger deal than necessary to close the sale? Consider the following CPQ features to avoid deal lose:

• Centralized pricing adjustments with flawless team notification;
  
  
• Price changes and discounts enable without IT intervention;
  
  
• Historical pricing data view;
  
  
• Offers are made to the individual or segment by preset rules.
  

When the deal is made, the next step is to ensure your customers receive what was promised in a quote and on the right time. The best way to provide successful order fulfillment is to link all the departments in one system. Salespeople are not always aware of what is actually in inventory or when delivery can be achieved. All the changes in an order, such as adding or removing products, shouldn't throw your system into confusion. Fulfillment should be effective, smooth and unite. Consider these features:

• The ability to see accurate inventory information in real-time;
  
  
• The ability to modify an order on the go if needed;
  
  
• Accurate available-to-promise date derives from every step of the project;
  
  
• Fulfillment should be tracked and the sales team gets alerts for delays.
  

Let the sales team do what they do best - sell. Think about how much of their time they spend selling and how much time they spend on creating proposals? It's really good if they don't use one-size-fits-all templates but it can take half of their time to make a good one. How much will your business succeed if you speed up the workflow and automate all the routine processes? Choose CPQ app that allows to:

• Generate template-based quotes and proposals that can be easily modified for one's needs;
  
  
• Both team members and customers interact with a quote by preset rules;
  
  
• Use drag and drop editor for lightning speed.
  

At this point pros of using a good CPQ solution that covers your needs should be obvious. The systems that allow you to automate your most important business processes can't make sales harder. So don't wait till your potential client will get a gorgeous proposal from your competitor while you are having a hard time generating yours. As a perfect solution we recommend Sculptor CPQ and we'll be happy to discuss its advantages for your business. Just fill out the form below and we make your sales team shine!