As a business’ sales deals become increasingly complex and their customer expectations become more demanding, Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ) software emerges as a key tool to streamline quoting and compress sales cycles.
Many businesses have already embraced CRM systems to track customer engagements, safeguard crucial data, and optimize sales and marketing tasks. CPQ software enhances these capabilities by helping manage intricate sales transactions.
The long-term value of CPQ for businesses
Sales teams frequently encounter challenges in generating timely quotes due to the complexities in products and pricing, which can protract sales cycles and hamper revenue generation. For example, expanding internationally introduces a number of complications for quoting around pricing, currencies, taxes, shipping methods and speed, etc.
CPQ systems simplify the entire quote-to-cash cycle, cutting down on labor and errors, which translates to notable cost reductions. They also facilitate quicker deal completions and boost revenue by improving response times,customer experiences, and competitiveness.
While implementing CPQ involves upfront expenses like software licenses, setup, and training, plus continuous costs for maintenance and support, the rewards can be substantial. Research shows that sales reps take 73% more time to produce a typical quote or proposal when not using CPQ software. Businesses typically see the return on investment within the first few years, with the advantages compounding over time.
Who is using CPQ today?
CPQ is used across industries, proving essential for businesses ranging from manufacturing, to telecommunications, to healthcare and others. In industries such as high-tech and manufacturing, adoption rates are climbing with up to 80% of businesses incorporating CPQ solutions into their operations.
Sales teams are the primary end users, leveraging CPQ to generate accurate quotes quickly. However the benefits of CPQ cascade across numerous parts of the business.
Sales teams will find CPQ systems increasingly indispensable as new capabilities are added. For example, CPQ solutions are beginning to incorporate features like AI-driven pricing optimization and guided selling, and AI-assisted dynamic pricing strategies that adapt to market changes to optimize profitability. Guided selling enhances the customer experience by recommending tailored solutions. Dynamic quoting further accelerates the sales process by allowing real-time quote adjustments.
CPQ solutions are trending towards more intuitive systems with improved natural language processing and machine learning, simplifying user interactions and reducing errors. These kinds of improvements help maximize the long-term return for businesses investing in CPQ.
To learn more about the state of CPQ today and how to optimize the CPQ experience, download our guide: The Complete Guide to Optimizing CPQ.
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