Your Sales Ops Using CPQ Automation: A business’s sales arm has to battle on an ever-changing playing field.
Issues such as a complex market landscape to increasing customer demands lead to many businesses needing to find more improved solutions in their sales operations. Statista has reported that 57.2% of Millenials would pay more for configured, personalized goods as opposed to just 7.6% that said they would not.
Luckily for organizations across the globe, the advancement of technology has led to tools that can enhance their sales operation and give the customer a much-improved experience. This can be found in CPQ solutions, which are used by sales teams for retailers and manufacturers.
CPQ is a tool commonly used by sales teams and customer services to create fast, accurate quotes for complex and configurable products and solutions. Using CPQ software, you can input all the variables and data into one place to get the best possible price that also generates the most profit for a business.
A sales team may need to implement CPQ automation for many reasons, such as having customizable products with a huge amount of configurations available. CPQ allows a customer the ability to have a personalized buying journey or even a self-purchasing path too.
CPQ can give sales operations with a global outlook a vast amount of data to spread across their regional teams. CRM tools often fall short and have a limited effect, whereas CPQs solutions can extend this. Companies can continue the CRM steps with a quotation process, making the whole process fluid and smooth as opposed to the rigidness of CRM-only.
CPQ automation can take a sales operation to the next level when used correctly – here are 5 ways that CPQ can improve your sales ops:
Business-wide collaboration
CPQ automation allows sales teams to work together with other business channels and work collaboratively. CPQ gives organizations the ability to share data and information, giving a level of transparency and cohesion that can allow different verticals and teams to work collaboratively. A good example of this can be found with a customer support team using instant sales data to provide a customer with a tailored solution and response. This transparency also gives an organization the ability to stand behind a unified brand voice.
CPQ automation also involves the complete business to create sales solutions for customers by using every department that can be leveraged (legal, marketing, etc). The data gathered from automated CPQ also allows different teams to figure out patterns and trends in the market, to come to a solution that maximizes revenue for the business.
Enhanced CRM success
CPQ solutions often come with compatibility with CRM, allowing the potential to increase its efficiency and profitability. CPQ users often see that the automation combined with the CRM increases the resulting success of sales, also helping sales teams reach maximum productivity.
CRM is a crucial arm of most businesses in their way, and with CPQ integration it can be enhanced and strengthen customer relationships. CPQ paired with CRM gives your sales operations a higher level of insight, the ability to do more selling and to get a higher level of success when closing.
Higher levels of customer trust
When CPQ is automatically creating speedy and fair quotations, it is also cutting down customer wait time. Automated CPQ that creates fast and accurate prices will lead to a higher level of customer trust in a brand.
Customers will always trust a business more when they are being charged fairly for a product or solution but also having their time valued. When these two factors are taken into account, automated CPQ can result in a much higher level of customer trust in a brand.
Improved sales efficiency
Automated CPQ can aid a business through the vast amount of time it saves through its quotation process. Instead of a sales worker having to manually jot down quotes for each potential customer, a CPQ can rapidly create accurate and personalized quotes.
Automated CPQ also eliminates the risk of any potential human error made by someone on the sales team, which could put the potential deal in jeopardy. A successfully implemented CPQ solution can automatically provide a sales team with the best prices possible, taking the efficiency of the department to the next level.
The use of CPQ can give the sales team a huge amount of insights, data, and metrics. They can show a sales team the success of different strategies, and how each department is contributing to the entire cycle of a customer’s buying journey and these can unlock greater success.
Reduced lost time lack of productivity
A strong business is always looking for ways to keep productivity high and limit wasted time by employees. This is the same for a sales department, who can be given the previously mentioned through an automated CPQ solution. A strong understanding of the entire sales process in one place can give a salesperson the best possible options for the customer, strengthening that relationship between buyer and business.
CPQ negates the need for sales workers to do anything but sell to the potential buyer, speeding up productivity and cutting the wasted time that would have otherwise been spent on training, admin, or other things – this time saved can be refocused on closing deals and maintaining customer relationships.
The benefits of CPQ for a sales team can result in a huge period of growth for a business, leading to scaling upward and a sales team that will be infinitely more successful and efficient. Implementing a CPQ solution can have benefits that are incredibly valuable for a business.
Whether it is enhancing the brand, reducing overheads, empowering each salesperson, or just improving the accuracy and response times of a sales team, automated CPQ can take a sales operation to a whole new level, scaling a business and increasing the revenue too.
It is undeniable that in today’s incredibly competitive landscape, a sales operation needs a CPQ automation solution to compete and help the entire business thrive.
