31 Oct
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Salesforce CPQ is something you don’t come up with often. The reason is simple – a name of the product doesn’t say much for a newcomer in the industry. I’ve been in CRM business for over a decade. Back in the days, in 2009, when I started my career in my parents’ business and now, in 2021, even technologically advanced companies still use Excel. Companies strongly rely on their txp technical employee expertise to provide customers with quotes.
When it all started
My parents owned a winter jacket business. Their customers were multi-brand stores, which were looking to order the same product in various colours and sizes. It was a nightmare from conventional business perspective. For each of the salespeople as it was hard to track bestselling products. Every single size and colour variation was tracked as separate SKU. So, I thought there should be a better way.
Why should you read this
Twelve years later, I’m Salesforce consultant. Recently a large construction company that is involved in building material manufacturing approached me with inquiry. They were looking to automating offers sent to customers. The client was looking to replace its sales engineers, who are doing manual quoting for clients every time they discover new potential building site. The company is selling building materials as building systems. In other words, they are putting multiple products together to offer customer complete building solution. This means that every solution for the building involves complicated engineering work to calculate. I offered to use one of the Salesforce CPQ products already available on the market. What I was really surprised about was that company, which is more than 30 years in construction business, doesn’t have a clue on the existence of such automation products. So, I decided to shed some light on the topic, and tried to make life easier for those, who are in a position, where quoting, pricing and configuration is needed.
What is Salesforce CPQ
CPQ stands for Configure, Price, Quote. In other words, it’s a software tool, which helps you to build quick quote with any combination of products. What I love most about modern CPQ software, is that it’s fully compatible with mixing not only products, but also services. Imagine, you are selling roofing systems: they include installation services, maintenance services and physical products which build up the roof. In the past, you would be doing complicated Excel calculations which could take forever before you sent them to the client.
…it’s a software tool, which helps you to build quick quote with any combination of products.
Such process would also imply competent employee involvement. Now, what if, this is happening every day? Say, you are sending one quote a day. It’s twenty quotes a month. Roughly 240 (!!!) quotes per year. Hopefully, it should not be a rocket science for you to calculate how much time and money are wasted on the things which could and should be done more efficient and less costly.
Who needs Salesforce CPQ
Any company involved in business where quoting matters, needs CPQ. Period. Let me mention some real-life examples from my consulting practice, which might help you to make decision towards evaluation of the need of CPQ for your business.
- Construction companies. Just as I mentioned previously, construction business often involves quoting, which includes both – services and tangible products. While mixing the different types of products might be daunting using Excel, CPQ offers convenient tools which help split revenue forecasting and recognition based on product type, billing schedule and more.
- Service companies. Our company is consultancy firm and often we sell products with various billing cycles. Our quotes could include a three-month subscription for our Blondie Care product, annual subscription for the software and one-time fee for a setup. Customers want us to provide the quote as a one pager to them and thanks to the CPQ we are able to do this. It helps us to drive more predictable revenue, and also it gives transparency to our customers on what they are paying for.
- Utility companies. Recently I’ve moved to another city, and I had to rent a flat. Every month I’m getting an invoice for utilities which include electricity, gas, rent and many various positions within one invoice. For me it’s just the bottom line, which has to be paid, but for the company it’s a complicated math and multilevel calculations as it’s splitting costs across multiple tenants. In this case automation is a key to control and efficiency, and this is where Salesforce CPQ is helping a lot.
Conclusion
In the meantime, I’ve mentioned only three examples, but there are virtually millions of companies and use cases out there that might benefit from CPQ Solution. If you’re not sure if the CPQ might help you – don’t hesitate to ask professionals. Our company is implementing CPQ across different industries, so just leave your contact details or give us a call. We’ll guide you through the implementation trail.
Salesforce CPQ is a Configuration, Pricing and Quoting software. It helps you to build better quotes. CPQ could include variations of services and products.
So, let’s sum up things. Salesforce CPQ is a Configuration, Pricing and Quoting software. It helps you to build better quotes. CPQ could include variations of services and products. It dramatically decreases time and costs for simply providing a quote. There are pre-build solutions on the market. If you are involved in a business where quoting matters, evaluate option to implement CPQ software. It could save tones of time and costs.
Secondly, CPQ software could help you win more deals due to timing. More and more customers nowadays expect sales reps to react faster. Fast reaction time not necessarily would give you hundred percent competitive advantage but could give your customer a better impression about the brand. Those tiny, small wins result in more opportunities to be won.
Good luck and better conversion rates for your business!
