Optimizing the sales process is one of the most significant challenges for sales organizations nowadays. According to Salesforce’s State of Sales Report, salespeople allocate only 34% of their time to selling. 

But where does the rest of their time go? The better part of it is spent drafting proposals and quotations, gathering accurate product information, waiting for verifications, and a host of time-consuming and repetitive tasks. Although it may seem these activities deliver little added value, they are key for business performance and directly affect buying decisions and the customer experience.  

Luckily, CRM solutions keep improving year after year, and today we can find a direct answer to this issue in Salesforce CPQ (Configuration, Price, Quote) software. 

What are the features of Salesforce CPQ?

CPQ tools radically improve sales flow by optimizing and standardizing several complex processes:  

• Pre-programming several sets of rules for customized quotations
• Centralization of information about products and services
• Automatic pricing, including discounts
• Real-time integration of data

How does Salesforce CPQ work and how can it help your business?

If you are looking to improve your sales reps’ performance, Salesforce CPQ is the tool you are looking for. Here’s why:  

Speed

Achieve big-time savings by automating your entire quoting flow. Not only when selecting the right products and services for your customer, but also when it comes to making adjustments, adding products, and getting the quote verified.  

According to Aberdeen Group’s research, CPQ users experienced a 13% decrease in their sales cycle. 

Accuracy

Customer experience is a key factor when it comes to your customers’ buying decisions, and accuracy is another major benefit you can tap into by adopting CPQ. Your sales team will then be able to provide solid, preapproved quotes by having all relevant information at their disposal, including product characteristics and even potential compatibility issues, all collected in one place. 

Centralized information

Meaningful and effective conversations are a key element of the customer journey, and your close ratios may be affected if your customers do not feel engaged during the sales process. One way to avoid this outcome is to ensure your sales team has access to accurate, up-to-date information. Otherwise, all your preparation and processes can be made fruitless – especially in long, complex sales processes. 

For instance, if your team has CPQ you can rest assured that accurate quotes will be delivered swiftly; the real-time quotation database is a great tool to find and explain what is best for each client, helping reps to always deliver exactly what is needed.  

4 takeaways to guide your Salesforce CPQ implementation to success

If you are looking to optimize your sales process and make your reps’ lives easier –and in doing so gain a competitive edge–, then you should undoubtably consider implementing Salesforce CPQ. 

Not sure where to start? You can find an informative guide to a successful implementation here. 

Set goals

As obvious as it may sound, KPIs, goals, and planning will be essential in order to fully grasp the benefits of CPQ. Start by identifying which gains are most important to your company, and which aspects of the sales process you would like to optimize from the very beginning.  

Analyze and enable standard features

Salesforce CPQ is a complex, highly customizable tool. Implementing all its features will take not only expertise but also time and dedication. However, CPQ comes with a set of standard features that can considerably speed up your implementation. 

To get the most out of the tool as soon as possible, a great tactic is to review these features and enable those that may be useful to your sales cycle.  

Prepare your team

With any new digital management tool, you can expect some reluctance from your reps, as they may see it as needlessly adding extra steps to their daily process. For this reason, an important part of the implementation will be changing your people’s mindset. Some useful tactics to achieve this are:  

• Name a manager to head this initiative
• Make your team aware of the benefits and functionalities they will get
• Create walkthroughs and guides, especially for the most common processes

Leverage specialists for full customization

Salesforce CPQ has tons of features and variables that can fully adjust to your company’s sales process. If you want to take advantage of all these features, it is highly likely you will need a specialist to join you for the implementation and training of your team. Inclusion Cloud is ready to allocate remote-working experts for your project, ready to take part in your transformation. 

 
Want expert advice for a successful CPQ implementation? Contact us!