If every problem a handyman faced was a nail, he’d only need a hammer. Just like if every prospect you faced were the same, you’d only need one proposal. But every prospect is different, and so every proposal is different.
This can mean hours of work for each proposal… or minutes if you’re using an automated quoting tool like iQuoteXpress (IQX).
Here are a few tips to building the perfect quote using the perfect quoting tool.
1: Start from scratch… once
The first proposal you write in any vertical market should be the last one you write from the ground up.
With a quoting tool, you can save a proposal as a template and reuse it for future prospects. This doesn’t mean all of it is reused as is—you always modify it to suit your audience—but it does often mean reusing elements that touch on common concerns shared across a market.
For example, if you’re selling solar energy systems to business owners in Phoenix, they likely share similar concerns around local regulations, micro-climate trends, etc. Using a quoting tool to store and share the first proposal you send into this market can make creating the next one a far easier undertaking.
Not only that, but as you send more quotes into a given market, you continue to modify your template as you find what works, inching ever closer to The Perfect Proposal.
@@How a quoting tool ensures you only start from scratch ONCE.@@
2: Your quoting tool as part of a bigger toolbox
The functionality quote management software delivers is often even greater when coupled with customer relationship management software; i.e., when you integrate CPQ and CRM.
Yes, sales automation software like IQX can work perfectly well as a standalone solution, but when made part of a larger CRM system, a quoting tool becomes part of a more holistic sales process, one in which an entire team’s funnel of opportunities is more easily viewed, analyzed, and shared with others.
Part of the advantage comes from the additional features a CRM offers, such as marketing automation systems that can help nurture a former lost opportunity (someone who received a quote but didn’t close) back into a promising prospect (someone ready to receive a new quote for a new project).
3: Track, analyze, report
If you’re like most sales reps, you have many proposals out at any given time, often too many for one person to keep track of. And if you’re a sales manager, the tracking challenges increase exponentially: how can one person track quotes and analyze sales productivity across a team with a dozen or more reps? With a quoting tool.
In addition to letting you track proposal status, sales activity, and more at the macro level, IQX helps you go micro, tracking individual rep productivity in detail. Remember this, though: reporting tools built-in to your online proposal software are not there so a manager can play “gotcha!” They’re there so a manager can say, “How can I help you move this along?”
If you'd like to learn more about this topic or see IQX for yourself with a free demo, contact us.
