Configure, Price, Quote: How to become resilient, profitable, and sustainable

Companies today need to be more flexible, innovative, and resilient than ever before. Technologies like Configure, Price, Quote that make things easier for sellers and buyers alike can make all the difference for long-term business success.

Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ), which accelerates the sales cycle and improves customer experience, is key to the intelligent enterprise. Advanced, AI-powered CPQ provides fuels a digital transformation that can help companies be more resilient, profitable, and sustainable.

Let’s take a closer look at CPQ benefits, from both the buyer and seller perspective.

Configure, Price, Quote: Speed and simplicity

Customers expect more from the companies they do business with – a trend that the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated. They want personalized engagement, convenience, and above all, speed. In fact, data shows that B2B buyers often choose the vendor that’s first to produce a quote.

AI-enabled CPQ empowers sellers to meet customer needs by helping them deliver fast, accurate quotes. Sellers are guided by optimized product configurations and dynamic pricing recommendations, so they can understand buyers better and engage more effectively with them. With pre-approved discounts, sellers and buyers can avoid long, drawn-out negotiations, which speeds the sales cycle.

A CPQ system that’s connected to a commerce system can enable self-service, providing customers with another option to quickly fulfill their needs. In modern B2B sales, an omnichannel strategy is essential, and the CPQ serves as a single source of pricing and product data across direct sales, resellers, distributors, and e-commerce.

Altogether, CPQ bridges the gap between sellers and customers, removing friction for customers and enabling sellers to deliver the best outcomes.

Empowering sales with Configure, Price, Quote 

From the seller’s perspective, CPQ helps drive revenue growth, even in an economy marked by much uncertainty.

By streamlining the sales process through automation, the technology equips sales reps to be more effective, increasing sales productivity and win rates. Freed from manual, time-consuming processes, salespeople can focus on identifying and meeting customer needs.

Here’s how CPQ benefits the sales team:

1. Onboarding: CPQ helps new sales reps get up to speed quickly – a key benefit, especially as organizations deal with increased churn due to market disruption. Intelligent CPQ removes the guesswork for new salespeople, and provides them with an easy-to-use tool so they can deliver value faster.
2. Accuracy: Configuration rules ensure sales reps offer the right products – something that can be challenging to do, particularly in manufacturing environments where they are hundreds of products with thousands of possible combinations.
3. Upsell & cross-sell guidance: Using machine learning, CPQ provides appropriate upsell and cross-sell recommendations; salespeople can increase their deal size and be confident that they’re not leaving money on the table. At the same time, the pre-approved discounts ensure corporate margins are protected.
4. Monetization: CPQ also helps sellers support new monetization models, including subscription services, custom bundles, and usage-based pricing.

Bottom line: CPQ transforms sales, improving both the sales and customer experience to close deals faster, increase revenue, and boost profitability.

CPQ software: Resilience for the long haul

By digitizing sales with CPQ, organizations become more agile and efficient, building the resiliency needed to survive — and thrive — in rapidly changing market conditions.

Moreover, a CPQ system that’s integrated with CRM and ERP provides clear visibility across the enterprise to further improve customer experience. For example, ERP integration can share real-time inventory levels to set delivery expectations and/or real-time pricing considerations.

Insight into inventory and product sourcing can help both buyers and sellers reach their sustainability goals. A CPQ rules engine can include configuration options in the event a required part is sourced from a supplier that doesn’t meet a company’s sustainability objectives.

Increased visibility across the business helps inform corporate strategy: No more decision making in a vacuum. Finance has a complete audit trail, pricing teams can make data-driven decisions, and with all the quote details, sales can better support deals.

By becoming an intelligent enterprise with Configure, Price, Quote, a company builds a foundation that can drive growth for years to come.