1. CONFIGURE multiple product combinations and bundles, based on how you wish to sell them. This way, every possible configuration is already saved in the system, and so, when it's time for you to send a quote to a customer, you do not have to take the time and effort to manually put the combinations together. You can choose the products or bundles pre-configured, straight away, upfront — no hassles.
2. Fix the PRICE for each product or product bundle, along with discounts and taxes as applicable. You can create price rules in the system, which facilitate dynamic pricing. That is, you can dictate the price of an item when sold as a single unit, or when sold in combination with other product bundles. You can also configure which products should be added as freebies depending on the product combinations selected, as applicable to your company. The CPQ system also provides different pricing models to choose from including flat or slab based pricing, direct discount and volume based discounts, among other options. This way, as you list products in your quote, the corresponding price values change dynamically based on your price configurations.
3. Create an extensively customized, accurate QUOTE using the product and price configurations in the system. Quote creation is therefore made efficient, quick and free of mistakes.

Why is CPQ required? What problems does a CPQ system solve?

1. Manual efforts: If your sales teams are currently preparing quotes manually— that is, for every customer, they look up a template, fill the line items and fill the prices themselves, manually, then this is quite an obvious reason for delays. It's time to switch to a CPQ system.
   
   
2. Legacy systems: You may be using a Legacy CPQ system, which cannot meet your current changing needs. You are likely run into delays because of an application that is most likely outdated— in that case it's time to switch to a cloud-based efficient CPQ application. This new application would be intuitive, user-friendly and designed to solve current as well as future challenges, so you are sorted.
   
   
3. Erroneous details and misinformation: When a company has just started out, everyone knows everyone else and people multi-task. At such a juncture, some practices may have worked, because the size of the company, the volume of sales and the products offered — all of these could be small. However, as a company evolves, so should their processes. While the company has expanded, but the processes have not improved, it leads to inefficiency and gives room for errors. For instance, information about addition of products, increase in prices, and discount details should be transparent across the organization. If, like during "old times", an email regarding revision of prices for a product is sent to only the "key people", then there is no efficient process in place. Sales people are bound to make mistakes because the details may or may not have reached them on time. It's very important to put an efficient process in place and document it. Otherwise it could lead to inaccuracy in quotes– because of which it goes back and forth and needs to be reviewed multiple times, which in turn causes undue delays.
   
   
4. Red-tape: Stringent rules introduced to improve the quote management process are ironically at risk of becoming road blocks instead. For instance, there could be a rule that orders have to be approved by the manufacturing department to ensure stock availability. Or that multiple sales managers must sign off on the quote. While these rules are created with the intention of ensuring accuracy of quotes, the fact that it involves too many pairs of eyes invariably delays the whole process, and in the end, companies run the risk of losing the customers they tried hard to secure.
   
   
5. Making promises that cannot be kept: If the sales teams are not kept in the loop of key factors such as changing trends across the organization, addition or removal of products, acceptable discounts and the like, they are likely to make elaborate claims to customers in order to win a deal. When a sales person sends the customer a quote that promises claims way beyond what a company can offer, it costs them dearly. So it's important that sales teams are kept abreast of the latest prices, product lines, acceptable discounts and order availability so that they quote only what is realistically possible.
   

1. A CPQ system allows you to configure product bundles, so that all the possible combinations are pre-set.
   
2. Price rules in a CPQ system helps you accommodate dynamic pricing, which is the order of the day in product sale.
3. There are several templates to choose from, so you can make a highly customized quote.

Who is the CPQ solution ideal for?

1. You deal with the sale of a wide range of products.
2. You offer products in combination with services. Example, mobile phone sales and repair.
3. You would like to accelerate the generation of quotes in your business, regardless of products or services.
4. You are using a CRM system, however, the options for bespoke quote creation are limited.

How does a CPQ system fit with a CRM?