Build your own interactive product recommendation system in CRM with Guided Selling.

Build your own interactive product recommendation system in CRM with Guided Selling.

Update: CPQ was a public early access feature from March 2023 — January 2024.
Since February 2024, this is a public feature.

Zoho CRM's in-built CPQ engine now facilitates Guided Selling, a setup in which the CRM system makes tailored and interactive product recommendations based on the unique needs and preferences of each customer, thereby enabling sales people to choose the most relevant products for them and create accurate, tailor-made quotes instantly.

Guided Selling — An overview

Guided Selling — An Overview

The primary goal of any business is to cater to the ever-changing needs and preferences of their wide customer base. This could result in the introduction of new product lines, modification of existing product suites or updates to pricing. While this is a great way to accommodate the demands of your customers, what this also means is you must appreciate and acknowledge the complexity that this could bring about for your sales teams to create accurate, relevant and timely quotes for your customers.

When a customer makes an enquiry and there are over a hundred products to choose from, how does a sales person navigate the existing plethora of product choices and offer the right fit for their customer?

It could become a tedious task and slow down your sales pipeline if a sales person has to refer to a product list every time a quote needs to be tailored for a customer.

Here's where Guided Selling helps. While automated product and price rules in CPQ help you with product combinations, free products and dynamic pricing, Guided Selling goes a step further and helps you with which product to recommend to a customer in the first place. Sales managers can now guide their reps via the CRM system on which among the wide range of solutions suits a customer's needs the best.

Consider the example of Zylker Watches, which offers an exquisite collection of wrist watches and wall clocks. The watches come in all sizes and colors for men, women, and children.


For a customer making an enquiry regarding available options for watches, a sales person may have to navigate various products. The right choice of watch for the customer would depend on a multitude of factors, such as the color, warranty preference, manufacturer, gender, and so many other features of the watch. A sales person in this scenario would be bogged down by the sheer complexity involved in selecting from the myriad choices, and here is where guided selling helps.

In this case, Zylker could construct a Guided Selling flow in CPQ, where all of these factors that influence the choice of the right product can be organized as a questionnaire of sorts for the sales person to answer.
The questions in Zylker's case could be as follows:

So, originally if there were 50 watches available, once you answer each question, you could narrow down from random 50 to relevant top 10 and that makes your selection of products easier. The system now acts as a senior sales consultant trying to prod and help the sales person select the right product by asking a series of "questions".

What's more, since the Guided Selling flow is part of Zoho CRM's in-built CPQ system, you can include not only product-based factors but also other related factors — that is, factors based associated accounts, contacts, vendors and deals (via lookup modules). This takes personalized selling to the next level and helps you build the most accurate and timely quotes.

In the same scenario, let's consider the following factors that are not directly related to the product itself.
— Say the customer prefers a particular watch Vendor only— named Titanix.
— Also, for more likely hits, the sales rep wishes to study and narrow down products previously purchased by customers similar to the one he/she is handling. For example, say the current customer is a student/homemaker. So the sales rep wishes to see which set of wrist watches were previously sold to other customers who were also students/homemakers. This would further narrow down the hunt with more likely hits.

So that leaves us with two additional factors based on two different modules in this case— Vendors and Contacts — which are related to the Products module.

This way, Guided Selling efficiently supplies the much needed sales context to the act of "guiding" a sales rep on identifying the most relevant products for their customers. Similar examples include:

  1. Filtering products that were <<previously sold to Indian customers.>>
    (Input field here will be: Associated Contact Mailing Country is India)
  2. Filtering products associated to <<winning deals.>>
    (Input field here will be: Associated Deal Stage is Closed Won)
  3. Filtering products that were <<previously sold to large enterprises.>>
    (Input field here will be: Associated Account No:of Employees >= 50)
So using related modules, you filter based on additional sales context that is supplied to you by the CRM apart from the straightforward product factors present in the Products module.

In the Guided Selling setup, each question is mapped to a particular "CRM field" as the "Input field". This way, all the sales person needs to do is choose the field value and as they answer each "question", what they are essentially doing is filtering the products further and further and zeroing in on the right products based on their answers or "criteria".

Note that the questions created in this Guided Selling flow involve input fields from both Primary module (Products) and Related modules (Accounts, Contacts, Deals, Vendors). Related modules are typically those that are associated to the primary module via a Lookup field.


To create a Guided Selling flow, all you need to do is create a set of Input Fields and frame your questions to the sales rep. These input fields could be from the primary (Products) module or Related Modules (Contacts, Deals, Accounts and Vendors).

To learn more about creating your own Guided Selling flows, please refer to this Help document. 

Availability and Release Status: 
Guided Selling is available in the Zoho CRM Professional Edition and above. It is live now in all DCs.
Note: CPQ and Guided Selling are available on the Public Early Access* mode. 

(*) Public Early Access — Refers to a the status of a feature that is available for all applicable Editions, however, is subject to changes, improvements and updates as part of continuous development. 

      • Recent Topics

      • Zoho Projects MCP Feedback

        I've started using the MCP connector with Zoho Projects, and the features that exist really do work quite well - I feel this is going to be a major update to the Zoho Ecosystem. In projects a major missing feature is the ability to manage, (especially

      • email template

        How do I create and save an email template

      • Enhancements in Portal User Group creation flow

        Hello everyone, Before introducing new Portal features, here are some changes to the UI of Portals page to improve the user experience. Some tabs and options have been repositioned so that users can better access the functionalities of the feature. From

      • How do I filter contacts by account parameters?

        Need to filter a contact view according to account parameter, eg account type. Without this filter users are overwhelmed with irrelevant contacts. Workaround is to create a custom 'Contact Type' field but this unbearable duplicity as the information already

      • Can I add Conditional merge tags on my Templates?

        Hi I was wondering if I can use Conditional Mail Merge tags inside my Email templates/Quotes etc within the CRM? In spanish and in our business we use gender and academic degree salutations , ie: Dr., Dra., Sr., Srta., so the beginning of an email / letter

      • email moderation issue when email is sent in the name of a mail group

        Symptom: an email that is sent by a mail group moderator in the name of a moderated mail group is held back for approval. Reproduction: Create a moderated mail group with members and moderators. Allow that mails can be sent in the name of the group (extended settings). Send an email to the group as a group moderator, but in the name of the group. This mail is held back for moderation which is unexpected. Expected: A mail sent by group moderator to a moderated group are not held back for moderation

      • blank page after login

        blank page after logging into my email account Thanks you

      • Always display images from this sender – Is this feature available?

        In Zoho mail, I had my "Load external images" setting set to "Ask me", and that's fine. That's the setting I prefer. What's not fine though is I always need to tick "Display now" for each email I get, regardless if I've done that multiple times from several

      • Function #9: Copy attachments of Sales Order to Purchase Order on conversion

        This week, we have written a custom function that automatically copies the attachments uploaded for a sales order to the corresponding purchase order after you convert it. Here's how to configure it in your Zoho Books organization. Custom Function: Hit

      • Free webinar: Security that works: Building resilience for the AI-powered workforce

        Hello there, Did you know that more than 51% of organizations worldwide have experienced one or more security breaches, each costing over $1 million in losses or incident response? In today’s threat landscape, simply playing defense is no longer enough.

      • "Subject" or "Narration"in Customer Statement

        Dear Sir, While creating invoice, we are giving in "Subject" the purpose of invoice. For Example - "GST for the month of Aug 23", IT return FY 22-23", "Consultancy", Internal Audit for May 23". But this subject is not coming in Customer Statement. Only

      • Apply Vendor Credit Automatically

        Hello!!! Is there a way where in we can apply vendor credits automatically on the FIRST OUTSTANDING BILL of the vendor?? We have lots of VENDOR CREDITS ISSUES mostly!!! Applying it manually is a pain for us. Would be great if we have a way to apply the

      • Zoho Notebook Sync problem

        I'm facing a problem with syncing of notebook on android app. It's not syncing. Sometimes it syncs after a day or two.  I created some notes on web notebook but it's not syncing on mobile app. Please help!!!!

      • Apply Vendor Credits Automatically

        We are bulk importing Vendor credits in Zoho Books!!! Is there a way to apply vendor credits automatically to the first UNPAID bill of the Vendor?

      • Cant Save Gauge on Creator Page

        How to Save Gauge on Creator Page see movie https://vimeo.com/1116410860?share=copy#t=0

      • Apply Advance option not shown in report

        We are facing an issue in Zoho Expenses. While approving an Expense Report, the "Apply Advance" option is not appearing under the three dots (More Options). Details: Module: Expense Reports Issue: "Apply Advance" option not visible Status of Report: Awaiting

      • Auto Capitalize First Letter of Words

        Hi I am completely new to ZOHO and am trying to build a database. How can i make it when a address is entered into a form field like this: main st it automatically changes is to show: Main St Thank You

      • Follow-up emails via Workflow Automation not staying in the same thread

        Dear Zoho Support Team, I am currently using Workflow Automation in Zoho Campaigns to send follow-up emails. In my test case, I noticed the following behavior: All emails in the automation have the same subject line. If the follow-up email is sent within

      • Client Script refuses to set an initial value in Subform field

        I tried a very simple, 1 line client script to set a default value in a custom subform field when the "Add Row" button is clicked and the user is entering data. It does not work - can someone tell me why? ZDK documentation suggests this should be doable.

      • Emails Are Not Being Delivered to My Inbox

        Hello Zoho Support Team, I am experiencing an issue with my Zoho Mail account. The most important problem is that emails are not being delivered to my inbox. Details: My Zoho Mail address: info@coreforcelife.com What happens: I am not receiving any incoming

      • Help Center IFrame Issue

        I have had a working Help Center on my website using an iframe for a while. But now for some reason the sign in page gets a refused to connect error. Can someone please help. If I go to the url manually it works correclty

      • Comment Templates

        Is it possible to add a template option for comments? We have some agents in the process who's responses require a pre-formatted layout. It would be incredibly handy to have a template for them where they can insert the template and then add their responses

      • [ZohoDesk] Improve Status View with a new editeble kanban view

        A kanban view with more information about the ticket and the contact who created the ticket would be valueble. I would like to edit the fields with the ones i like to see at one glance. Like in CRM where you can edit the canvas view, i would like to edit

      • Adding Markdown text using Zoho Desk API into the Knowledge Base

        Hi Zoho Community members, We currently maintain the documentation of out company in its website. This documentation is written in markdown text format and we would like to add it in Zoho Knowledge Base. Do you know if there is REST API functionality

      • An Exclusive Session for Zoho Desk Users: AI in Zoho Desk

        A Zoho Community Learning Initiative Hello everyone! This is an announcement for Zoho Desk users and anyone exploring Zoho Desk. With every nook and corner buzzing, "AI's here, AI's there," it's the right time for us to take a closer look at how the AI

      • Shared values: From classroom lessons to teaching moments in customer service

        While the world observes Teachers’ Day on October 5, in India, we celebrate a month earlier, on September 5, to mark the birth anniversary of Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a great teacher, renowned scholar, educationist, and advocate for empowerment.

      • Create a list of customers who participated in specific Zoho Backstage events and send them an email via Zoho CRM

        How to create a list of customers who participated in specific Zoho Backstage events and send them an email via Zoho CRM? I was able to do a view in CRM based on customer that registered to an event, but I don't seems to be able to include the filter

      • Zoho Desk blank page

        1. Click Access zoho desk on https://www.zoho.com/desk/ 2. It redirects to https://desk.zoho.com/agent?action=CreatePortal and the page is blank. Edge browser Version 131.0.2903.112 (Official build) (arm64) on MacOS

      • I hate the new user UI with the bar on the left

        How can I reverse this?

      • Question regarding import of previous deals...

        Good afternoon, I'm working on importing some older deal records from an external sheet into the CRM; however, when I manually click "Add New Deal" and enter the pertinent information, the deal isn't appearing when I look at the "Deals" bar on the account's

      • Client Script also planned for Zoho Desk?

        Hello there, I modified something in Zoho CRM the other day and was amazed at the possibilities offered by the "Client Script" feature in conjunction with the ZDK. You can lock any fields on the screen, edit them, you can react to various events (field

      • One person/cell phone to manage multiple accounts

        Hi. I have a personal Free account to keep my own domain/emails. Now I need to create a Business account to my company's own domain, but I have only one mobile phone number I use to everything. How do I do to manage this? Can I manage a Free domain and

      • Tracking KPIs, Goals etc in People

        How are Zoho People users tracking employee targets in People? For example, my marketing assistant has a target of "Collect 10 new customer testimonials every month". I want to record attainment for this target on a monthly basis, then add it to their

      • Zoho Desk: Ticket Owner Agents vs Teams

        Hi Zoho, We would like to explore the possibility of hiding the ‘Agents’ section within the Ticket Owner dropdown, so that we can fully utilise the ‘Teams’ dropdown when assigning tickets. This request comes from the fact that only certain agents and

      • Can not Use Attachment Button on Android Widget

        this always pops up when I touch the attach button on android widget. going to settings, there is no storage permission to be enabled. if I open the app, and access the attach feature there, I can access my storage and upload normally.

      • Announcing new features in Trident for Mac (1.24.0)

        Hello everyone! Trident for macOS (v.1.24.0) is here with interesting features and thoughtful enhancements to redefine the way you plan and manage your calendar events. Here's a quick look at what's new. Create calendar events from emails. In addition

      • Vendor Master Enhancements for Faster Purchase Entry

        I’d like to suggest a few features that will improve accuracy and speed during purchase voucher entry: Automated Item Tax Preference in Vendor Master Add an option to define item tax preference in the vendor master. Once set, this preference should automatically

      • Mass Mail Statistics - Number of unsent emails

        How do I find out which emails were not sent?

      • Est-il possible d'annuler l'envoi d'un mail automatique ?

        Bonjour, Lorsque je refuse un candidat, il reçois un mail dans les 24h pour l'informer que sa candidature n'est pas retenue. J'ai rejeté un candidat par erreur. Savez-vous s'il possible d'annuler l'envoi de ce mail ? Merci d'avance pour votre aide.

      • embed a form in an email

        Hello, how to embed a form in an email that populates Zoho CRM cases? I would like to send emails to a selected audience offering something. In the same email the recipients - if interested - instead of replying to can fill in a Zoho CRM form that creates

      • Next Page