As a service-based business, you face unique challenges when it comes to quoting. In particular, unlike product-based sales, your service proposals must account for resource availability, custom deliverables, and often complex billing structures. Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ) solutions come in here, but even then, not all of them are created equal.
Below, you’ll discover how to close the gap between your sales and service with Certinia’s CPQ tools.
The Problem With the “Contact Us for a Quote” Model
Service-based businesses have long defaulted to the “Contact us for a quote” approach, and though it can be attributed to lots of conversions, the reality is that it has probably cost you just as many, if not more.
That’s primarily because the model, as a whole, is filled with friction. Even if someone is genuinely interested in your solutions, they won’t want to waste time obtaining a custom quote only to discover that your offer is way out of their budget.
CPQ solutions retrofitted for service businesses’ needs can bridge the gap. You can provide customers with relatively accurate cost estimates while also reiterating that those costs will rise if the need for additional services or customization arises. In doing so, you’ll have hooked them in, provided transparent pricing based on their information, and opened the door for deeper conversations.
The Power of Integrated CPQ
An integrated CPQ solution for service-based organizations will connect their sales teams directly to delivery and finance operations. In turn, teams can generate accurate, real-time proposals that reflect current project capacity, rate cards, and service offerings instead of quoting based on assumptions or outdated templates.
Leading CPQ technologies can provide highly accurate quotes based on information from prospective customers. These leads can even build different quotes using CPQ tools and experimenting with the packages you provide to unlock the most bang for their buck. That will save your team time while empowering consumers to find the right combination of services for them.
Key Capabilities to Look For
When exploring CPQ solutions, you should look for the following features:
- Dynamic Resource Forecasting: Enable smarter proposals by aligning available resources and skills with service timelines
- Rules-Based Pricing Models: Tailor quotes using predefined business logic
- Template and Approval Automation: Eliminate manual errors with standardized templates and built-in approval workflows
- Sales-to-Delivery Handoff: Auto-generate project plans and kickoff tasks when deals close
Handing off your CPQ data is key to minimizing friction in the customer journey. You don’t want eager customers to have to repeatedly re-enter information, so pass along quote data to your sales team so they can follow up with personalized offers.
Real-World Impacts of CPQ
When you integrate CPQ into your project management and billing systems, you can accomplish the following:
- Improve deal velocity with faster, more accurate quotes
- Reduce friction between sales and delivery
- Improve profitability
The key is to align your sales and delivery teams to reduce friction in the customer journey and provide leads with fast and accurate quotes.
Aligning Sales and Delivery
The breakdown between what was sold and what was delivered creates unhappy customers and margin erosion. An integrated CPQ system will allow your sales and delivery teams to work together to build better customer journeys, resulting in happier customers, less churn, and a steady cash flow.
Deliver Dynamic Quotes with Certinia
Certinia delivers a service estimation solution built natively within the Salesforce platform and provides accurate estimates with unprecedented speed. However, to fully unlock the power of Certinia, you need the right implementation partner. Enter Singularity Consulting.
Our experts can help you identify the ideal combination of Certinia technologies for your business. With Singularity Consulting, you’ll enjoy a faster deployment journey and more substantial ROI, and our team will be with you before, during, and after the implementation process. Contact us today to schedule a consultation.
