Is your business a quoting machine? Do you churn out quotes for anyone who asks? Or are you careful about the opportunities that move to the quote stage? It may seem counterintuitive, but being stricter about who you quote for will result in higher hit rates, less wasted time and increased sales.
For each quote, ask these questions:
- Have we done business with this company before? (If the answer is no, you might want to reconsider or have strong answers for each of the following questions.)
- Has this company purchased this product/service before?
- Have we been working with the technical and user buyer on this RFQ? (Was there an opportunity we have been working/tracking for this RFQ? Or did it just land on our desk to quote?)
- Is my product spec’d in, or is my competitor’s product spec’d in?
- Are they using me as a third bid? What is our track record over the past six to 12 months of quoting this customer? For example, have we have quoted them 10 times with no resulting orders?
Once you put out the quote, how do you follow-up? And are you tracking them? How do you use the data generated by that to look forward with your business? Quote management is a low-hanging opportunity for improvement in most companies.
In particular, a quote follow-up process can result in almost immediate results. Think about it: What would it do for your business if you secured additional business from just 1 out of every 10 quotes that weren’t generating sales before the change? Unfortunately, very few companies we’ve spoken with over the years have been confident their quote follow-up is as great as it could be.
A CRM system is a simple way to tackle quotes head-on to ensure nothing falls through the cracks. Selltis CRM offers a quoting module. Learn more here.