It clarifies the prices of products and services that a seller offers, demonstrating that you understand what your prospect needs. In addition, it protects a business from potential risks and losses from errors in legally-binding conditions.

So, producing well-considered quotes reflecting effective pricing strategies is instrumental in winning deals. In fact, a report by McKinsey affirms that pricing is the most powerful lever that can drive a firm's operating margins. 

However, improving the effectiveness of the quoting process can be challenging for enterprises. In this article, we will discuss three of the top tactics to improve a company's quoting productivity and accuracy. 

First, let's understand the key challenges that companies face when quoting.

Key Challenges in the Quoting Process 

1. Errors in Manual Processes

There are various components to the quote process, such as navigating continuously updated spreadsheets, complex configuration formulas, clunky SKU bundles, customisation options, dynamic shipping fees and product price lists. 

Tracking customer demands and manually working on these aspects can result in pricing errors. Inconsistent and inaccurate quotes need to be reworked. This can impact the sales team's efficiency.  

2. Slow Internal Approvals 

Sales reps often require approvals from multiple stakeholders before offering a deal. For instance, they may need a sales team manager to review package deal complexities or require permission from the finance department to sign off on a promotion or discount. 

Sending emails requesting permission to offer a discount might not elicit a quick response. This practice slows down the quote-to-close process and impacts the chances of buyer approval. 

3. Lengthy Deployment Time for Technology Investments

Empowering the sales team with cutting-edge technology is crucial to boost productivity. However, deploying code-heavy, complex tools often takes several months to implement. 

In these scenarios, the sales team may find that by the time it's all integrated, the data or logic in use is outdated, leading to poor adoption and negative ROI. 

Tips to Improve Your Firm's Quoting Productivity and Accuracy 

1. Create a Library of Resources

Your sales team needs to engage with prospects and identify their pain points to produce accurate quotes. 

For this, they should understand customers' personas, the product's USP, and additional services offered by the firm inside out. These insights can help them create personalised quotes. However, this can be challenging, especially when interacting with prospective customers in real-time. 

That's where a sales enablement solution, such as a knowledge base, can help.  

A knowledge management solution can help you create a library of resources. This centralised repository can equip your sales team with valuable insights into the sales process and help close deals successfully. 

Pro Tip: Count on Guru's knowledge management solution for sales enablement. 

Available as a browser extension, Slack bot, or web application, Guru can support your sales team with business know-how. It allows businesses to create data-driven sales assets, including buyers' personas, pain points, pricing strategies, and other helpful resources.

Leveraging these content assets during customer interactions can help your team respond faster and more accurately. 

David Aronica, Director of Business Development at Splash, a leading event solution provider firm, vouches for this software. "It's really important for reps to know which knowledge is verified and up-to-date, so they know what's safe to share with prospects. This is super easy to do in Guru," he says.

2. Streamline the Quote Creation Process

Complex sales environments in enterprises can result in lengthy sales cycles. 

As we discussed, handling extensive business-related information, manually creating proposals, and getting them verified by supervisors is draining, especially in companies that offer tailored products and services. 

In some instances, sales reps may not even consider sharing quotes with prospects in the investigative phase because of these complexities. This practice can impact pipelines in the long term.

The solution? Provide your sales team with a robust CPQ solution to streamline quote creation. 

Pro Tip: Count on DealHub's enterprise CPQ. This state-of-the-art CPQ solution enables teams to generate accurate and professional quotes, thereby empowering sales reps to create a more convertible funnel and build credibility in the market. 

With this tool, you can eliminate the pressing challenge of slow internal approvals. Dealhub enterprise CPQ automates workflow approval by building complex pricing parameters into formulas and establishing discount "guard rails." 

For instance, if a rule is set that the gross margin needs to be 40%, the sales reps simply won't be able to generate a price quote that breaks this rule. With guard rails in place, companies can ensure that product pricing, configurations, and discounts adhere to their policy, are error-free, and automate sales approval workflows.

What's more, unlike legacy CPQ solutions that require several months or a year for implementation, DealHub CPQ takes only three weeks. 

It requires no coding to be fully operational. Configure business rules, plug in your product's pricing, and start quoting. Admins can even make their adjustments on the fly, with no coding required. In addition, their team provides hand-holding during and after onboarding for a seamless experience. 

SourceScrub, a data service provider, witnessed a 94% reduction in time to share quotes by deploying Dealhub CPQ. Michael Nguyen, SourceScrub’s Senior Manager of Sales Operations, says, "DealHub makes for one fluid sales motion. It saves time and money and increases the productivity and efficiency of our sales team."

3. Implement a CRM to Manage Customer Interactions

Tracking customer interactions can help your team stay on top of sales negotiations, manage quote requests, schedule follow-ups, and more. In short, customer interactions can serve as valuable data assets and help you offer personalised customer experiences. 

Research from Adobe reveals that offering personalised customer experiences is pivotal to customer retention.

Deploying a cutting-edge customer relationship management system (CRM) can help you achieve this goal. 

Pro Tip: Implement Zoho customer relationship management software. This software eliminates silos in customer information by organising it in a centralised location for everyone to view. 

Right from the customer's name, phone number, email, interactions on quotes, pipeline status, and more, access everything with a few clicks. Leverage this information and create informed follow-ups before quote expiration.

Agappe, a renowned in vitro diagnostic firm, implemented Zoho CRM and experienced an 80% rise in productivity. 

Summing Up

Accurate quotes are vital to establishing new customer relationships and increasing the efficiency of the sales funnel. 

The tactics and SaaS tools shared in this post can help your sales team streamline the quoting process. 

Leverage them to resolve friction points, build a loyal customer base, and maximise your company's revenue.