Advertiser Platforms
Article | March 4, 2024
Optimizing the sales funnel with advanced quote management systems enhances pricing accuracy and customer satisfaction. Learn about the top QMS software providers that promise high profit and sales.
Contents
1. Introduction to QMS
2. Quote-to-Cash: Optimizing the Sales Funnel
2.1. Mapping the Customer Journey
2.2. Streamlining the Quote-to-Cash Process
2.3. Measuring and Managing Sales Performance
3. How Advanced Tools and Technologies Shape Quote Management
4. Best Quote Management Software Providers
4.1. Zilliant
4.2. Tacton
4.3. Paddle
4.4. Peak
4.5. Impact Analytics
4.6. Upstream
4.7. Proposify
4.8. Loopio
4.9. Simpleview
4.10. Configura
5. Final Thoughts
1. Introduction to QMS
Quote management systems (QMS) are integral to optimizing the quote-to-cash (Q2C) process within the sales funnel. The incorporation of advanced intelligent technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, predictive analytics, and data visualization, contemporary QMS enhance the efficiency and accuracy of quote generation for a streamlined user experience. These systems allow for precise pricing strategies tailored to real-time market conditions and customer-specific variables, thereby improving customer satisfaction. Consequently, businesses can adapt swiftly to market dynamics and customer needs, maximizing revenue and operational efficiency.
The system further streamlines workflows by automating routine tasks, reducing manual errors, and accelerating the quote management process.
Quote-to-Cash: Optimizing the Sales Funnel
The sales funnel optimization is crucial for maximizing revenue and enhancing customer satisfaction. A key component of this optimization is the quote-to-cash (Q2C) process, which encompasses the end-to-end activities, from quoting a product or service to realizing revenue.
Advanced tools and technologies have significantly transformed quote management, facilitating precise, efficient operations for businesses. Leveraging intelligence technologies like AI, ML, predictive analytics, and data analytics for data visualization, modern quote management systems can analyze historical data and customer behavior to generate highly accurate and personalized quotes. This capability accelerates the quoting process and enhances the accuracy of pricing strategies, ensuring that quotes reflect real-time market conditions and customer-specific factors. Additionally, these technologies enable dynamic pricing models, allowing businesses to adjust prices based on demand fluctuations, competitor pricing, and other relevant variables, thereby augmenting revenue.
Furthermore, the integration of cloud-based platforms and advanced analytics has revolutionized the accessibility and scalability of quote management for professionals. Cloud technology ensures that the quote data is centralized, secure, and easily accessible from any location, supporting remote work environments and improving collaboration across different departments. Similarly, advanced analytics tools provide deep insights into quote performance, customer preferences, and sales acceleration trends, empowering businesses to make data-driven decisions. These insights can lead to more strategic pricing, improved customer satisfaction, and enhanced performance in the market.
1.1 Mapping the Customer Journey
The first step in optimizing the quote-to-cash process within the sales funnel is mapping the customer journey. This involves understanding every touchpoint where customers interact with the business, from initial interest to final purchase and beyond. Mapping these touchpoints allows companies to identify critical moments where targeted interventions can increase conversion rates and enhance customer satisfaction.
Effective customer journey mapping within the Q2C process includes:
Capturing interest through marketing efforts and initial inquiries
Tailoring quotes based on customer needs and specifications
Refining quotes and terms to meet customer expectations and company capabilities
Final agreement on the quote and terms
Fulfilling the order as agreed
Ensuring accurate and timely billing and collection
1.2 Streamlining the Quote-to-Cash Process
Streamlining the Q2C process requires the integration of technology, strategic processes, and organizational alignment. Automation plays a pivotal role here, reducing manual errors and increasing efficiency. For instance, CPQ software can automate the quote generation process, ensuring that sales teams produce accurate and optimized quotes quickly.
Other aspects of streamlining include:
Using customer relationship management systems to maintain detailed records of customer interactions, preferences, and history and supporting personalized and consistent communication
Speeding up contract signings and approvals with digital tools, reducing the time from quote approval to cash collection
Connecting the Q2C process with enterprise resource planning systems to ensure seamless data flow and improve visibility across finance, sales, and operations
1.3 Measuring and Managing Sales Performance
Optimizing the sales funnel also involves continuous measurement and management of sales performance. In this regard, the key performance indicators (KPIs) for the Q2C process might include:
Quote Conversion Rate: The percentage of quotes that successfully convert into sales
Customer Acquisition Cost: The cost related to the acquisition of a new customer through the sales funnel
Customer Satisfaction and Retention Rates: Measures of how satisfied customers are with the purchasing process and their likelihood to return
2. How Advanced Tools and Technologies Shape Quote Management
Incorporating advanced quote management software has made generating and managing quotes easier. The next-gen solutions, such as AI-driven algorithms and machine learning models, facilitate the analysis of extensive datasets, enabling businesses to generate highly customized and competitive quotes in real time. These technologies further allow for the automation of complex pricing strategies, considering many factors such as market trends, competitor pricing, customer purchasing history, and real-time demand fluctuations. By leveraging predictive analytics, businesses can anticipate customer needs more accurately, improving the conversion rates and ensuring optimized profitability.
3. Best Quote Management Software Providers
Some of the top quote management software companies that help businesses optimize their sales funnel include:
3.1 Zilliant
Zilliant is a prominent leader in cloud-native pricing, CPQ, and revenue optimization software, focused on transforming business pricing processes. With decades of experience addressing complex B2B pricing and sales challenges, the company leverages advanced AI and data science to enhance price management and optimization, revenue intelligence, and e-Commerce.
Zilliant is renowned for its high ROI solutions, demonstrated through powerful customer endorsements from various industry leaders. Looking to the future, Zilliant continues to drive innovation in pricing science and customer engagement strategies, providing a comprehensive suite of services to optimize pricing and sales efficiency for manufacturing and distribution sectors. Its commitment to partnership and customer success is evident in its collaborative approach and continuous support in adoption strategies.
3.2 Tacton
Tacton is a leading SaaS provider specializing in CPQ solutions specifically designed for industrial manufacturers. With over 25 years of manufacturing expertise, Tacton's state-of-the-art configuration engine rapidly streamlines complex product configurations into accurate quotes, enhancing operational efficiency and increasing sales volume.
Recognized as a leader in the CPQ space by Gartner and G2, Tacton supports easy integration with existing digital landscapes, including PLM, CAD, PIM, and ERP systems. The platform simplifies the selling process through guided selling and needs-based configuration. It further provides powerful visualization and augmented reality features that allow customers to see real-time configurations.
3.3 Paddle
Paddle is a comprehensive SaaS-based payment infrastructure provider that specializes in streamlining billing operations for software businesses. As a merchant of record, Paddle manages to complete the payment stack and take on the responsibilities of relationship maintenance with payment providers, global sales tax handling, and revenue reconciliation across different billing and payment methods.
Its suite of products includes Billing, which offers an all-in-one solution for digital product payments and subscription management; ProfitWell Metrics for precise, free revenue reporting; Price Intelligently for a data-driven pricing strategy; and Retain, which automatically recovers failed payments to enhance customer retention.
3.4 Peak
Peak is an advanced AI platform provider designed to significantly enhance business growth, profitability, and operational efficiency by optimizing essential functions such as inventory management and product pricing. Tailored for businesses of all sizes, from million to billion-dollar enterprises, Peak ensures optimal stock levels and competitive pricing, backed by an AI performance guarantee that consistently meets service levels.
Recent innovations include the launch of Co:Driver, a generative AI product and the introduction of a performance guarantee that bolsters business confidence in AI adoption. Peak's comprehensive support structure and its ability to interconnect decisions across business functions further empower companies to harness AI effectively, inducing substantial improvements in decision-making and business performance.
3.5 Impact Analytics
Impact Analytics is a pioneering provider of AI-powered SaaS solutions designed to optimize decision-making across the retail, grocery, CPG, and supply chain sectors. The company transforms vast amounts of data into actionable insights with its advanced AI platform, significantly enhancing various aspects of business operations such as demand planning, supply chain management, merchandising, and pricing & promotions.
The platform includes specialized solutions like PriceSmart for unified life cycle pricing, TradeSmart for trade promotion planning, and AuditSmart, an advanced RPA bot for high-quality audits. Trusted by leading global retailers, Impact Analytics has demonstrated substantial business impacts, including an 8% lift in gross margins, 99% product availability on shelves, and significant reductions in work hours, clearance inventory, and wastage, culminating in annual savings of $1 billion for its clients. The company prides itself on its configurable solutions, resolute commitment to innovation, and ability to deliver tangible results within weeks, serving as a leader in retail AI solutions.
3.6 Upstream
Upstream is a leading global provider of mobile marketing automation solutions, specializing in driving digital growth with innovative customer acquisition through attractive quotes and engagement strategies across all mobile channels. The company boasts a substantial global reach with a consumer reach of over 1.2 billion and 3.1 billion monthly interactions, supported by a robust network of 370+ advertisers and the execution of 4000 ad experiences.
Upstream's Grow platform, recognized for its robust lead optimization and interaction capabilities, leverages proprietary predictive technology and expert marketing strategies to deliver unparalleled results, including a 12x ROI for e-commerce platforms. Dedicated to enhancing mobile operator efficiencies and increasing e-commerce sales, Upstream employs cutting-edge MarTech tools for event-driven campaigns, identity resolution, and ad fraud security to ensure high performance and minimal errors.
3.7 Proposify
Proposify is a leading proposal software provider designed to streamline and enhance the sales document process for B2B services globally. Proposify addresses common issues associated with traditional document creation tools like Word and PowerPoint, such as high error rates, lack of brand consistency, and poor visibility into proposal engagement. The software provider simplifies the creation of proposals through a centralized content library that includes templates, snippets, and a design editor, enabling sales teams to quickly produce error-free, professional-looking documents.
Proposify also offers advanced features such as interactive pricing, e-signatures, and a metrics dashboard that provides detailed insights into proposal views and engagement, helping businesses close deals more effectively. Its integration capabilities with CRMs and other tools ensure that sales processes are seamlessly connected and efficient. With a strong focus on customer success, Proposify offers personalized onboarding services to help businesses optimize their proposal workflows and achieve significant time savings.
3.8 Loopio
Loopio is a leading RFP response management software company that transforms the response process for RFPs, RFIs, DDQs, and security questionnaires by enhancing collaboration, streamlining operations, and ultimately helping businesses secure more deals. Recognized for its user-friendly interface and robust functionality, Loopio garnered multiple G2 awards in 2024, including Best Results and Easiest to Use in the Enterprise category.
Loopio’s integration with platforms enhance workflow efficiency, making vital information accessible within existing CRM systems. This integration, along with expert-vetted content and automatic updates, ensures that responses are quick, accurate, and compliant with current standards and practices. Its AI-driven content library centralizes knowledge, enabling fast, accurate responses and significantly reducing response times, which has led to measurable increase in efficiency and win rates among users.
3.9 Simpleview
Simpleview is a prominent provider of digital marketing and site management solutions for quote management and is tailored for destination marketing organizations (DMOs). With products like Simpleview CMS and CRM, the company offers a fully integrated platform that enhances the online presence and operational efficiency of tourism entities from small towns to large countries. Simpleview's services include website design, branding, SEO, and paid media strategies, all created to attract visitors and win bids for events and conventions.
Additionally, the company's Online Booking & Referral Engine and Email Marketing & Automation tools help DMOs increase engagement and revenue through direct bookings and effective communication. Simpleview also incorporates user-generated content and advanced data analytics to foster community engagement and provide actionable insights.
3.10 Configura
Configura is a leading provider of innovative space planning and product configuration software, serving commercial interiors, material handling, and kitchen and bath industries. The company’s flagship software, CET, offers an all-in-one solution for accurate space planning and configuration and isrecognized for its impact on streamlining operations and boosting profitability. This recognition is underscored by Configura's recent accolade, the Best IT Innovation Award at MODEX 2024.
Additionally, Configura fosters a collaborative environment with its Partner Portal, encouraging innovation and success through strategic partnerships. The company also emphasizes education and support through its academy, offering training and webinars to enhance user proficiency with CET. With a global presence and a commitment to innovation, Configura continuously updates its offerings, as demonstrated by recent expansions in its commercial interior product suite.
4. Final Thoughts
Advanced quote management systems are crucial for businesses seeking to optimize their sales funnel and enhance customer satisfaction. As technology evolves, companies must adopt these tools to stay competitive and drive strategic decision-making. Significantly, the future of QMS lies in the continuous advancement of intelligence systems and NLP, along with predictive analytics and data visualization, providing deeper insights into customer behavior and market trends. The incorporation of blockchain technology will further continue to enhance data security and transparency. Likewise, companies must increasingly leverage IoT and real-time data analytics to enable more dynamic and responsive quote management, further optimizing revenue and operational efficiency.
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Advertiser Platforms
Article | January 9, 2024
Search engine optimization is one of the most important subdomains in digital marketing where organisations try to get visitors from search engine ranking pages to their website. The most vague approach by businesses is to just post content on their website, create backlinks of it and expect to rank number one on the targeted keywords. However the reality is that search engines consider a lot of factors in ranking a web page such as website’s loading speed, responsiveness for mobile device compliance, good user experience, rich snippets, keyword frequency in content, interest of visitors in content and then comes in the turn for backlinks and domain authority.
Why SEO is Mandatory for Websites?
SEO requires continuous efforts everyday due to 3 major factors. First is search engines rank the latest content on top most position at first and later on adjust the rankings according to other parameters. The second issue is changes in google’s algorithm bi-yearly which has the tendency to suppress the rankings of all web pages of a website. The third is your competitors who are creating better content to outbeat your website.
We need to understand that a business can put in limited efforts on content marketing and backlinking, depending on their budget. The above mentioned factors are continuously vanishing the results derived from their previously made efforts so the high performance websites, customizations and rich snippet integration to ramp up the performance of complete websites. In one of our previous experiences we have seen web pages jump up from 3rd page of google search to 1st page in a day after deploying a faster version of the website.
The initial journey of SEO can be done placidly with content management systems initially but later on comes the saturation point where to procure more traffic either we have to increase workforce or add more integrations. These integrations are very costly on a content management system for a website with huge user traffic that’s why such businesses should build their custom websites and get access over source code. To do so they can outsource the project to a software development company, hire developers from an offshore company or hire their own in house developers.
One more factor that contributes in converting leads to customers is user experience which can only be improved with tracking user behaviour, user feedback and testing new UI improvements done on the basis of suggestions. The same journey is followed with any new functionality built after users demanded it via feedback.
The above mentioned points suggest the conclusion that high performance websites and technical teams can help businesses to derive exponential growth in traffic if the SEO and technical team work hand in hand.
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Article | December 8, 2020
While brands have dabbled in augmented reality (AR) for years, 2020 marks the tipping point where it’s becoming an integral part of marketing strategy, helping create meaningful and emotional consumer connections.
AR has finally grown up; once infamous for gimmicks such as face filters on social media, it’s now a cross-platform tool to build truly interactive environments, compared to VR which requires a headset to create computer-aided stimuli. The figures tell us that the global market is expected to grow substantially from $13 billion this year to more than $67 billion by 2024. The technology is graduating from being used solely for entertainment to providing real-world value and utility for marketers through immersive and experiential opportunities. So – in the midst of a global pandemic – what makes this the perfect time for AR to come of age, and how can marketers make use of its unique attributes?
Extensive investment in the ecosystem is laying the foundations for AR’s long-awaited, mainstream emergence. Google and Apple’s mobile tech stacks, ARCore and ARKit, mean more than four billion smartphones across the world are already AR compatible, and Google now includes AR in mobile search. In addition, the imminent arrival of 5G will dramatically boost mobile connectivity, enabling developers and content creators to use approximately 100 times the bandwidth of 4G to build a new type of experiential, 3D environment where users can intuitively interact with the people, objects and information around them.
Alongside these tech developments, the global COVID-19 context is inevitably changing consumer needs and behaviors, increasing demand for the virtual, contactless experiences that can be achieved through AR. And in the near future, wearable tech such as AR spectacles will also join the party to propel evolution in the space even faster.
Here are four ways AR can be a game-changer for marketing in 2020:
Enabling product visualization
In a world where consumers order everything from clothes to cars online, marketers can harness AR to help shoppers visualize products in an interactive and immersive way that goes far beyond a static image or video. This could mean experiencing what it’s like to sit inside a dream car, watching AR panoramas unfold through the virtual windscreen, or seeing what a jacket looks like on the actual shopper, without them having to leave the house.
Augmented Reality enables consumers to explore customization options and the unique elements that a product can offer. Brands that utilize the technology witness up to 8x longer dwell times, as giving consumers control over their digital experiences boosts engagement levels. For instance, participants at an AR smartphone launch can virtually see and interact with detailed specifications and features of the device. AR is certainly not restricted to just online browsing – it has a real benefit in the physical world too, for instance helping shoppers in stores discover how and where the product was made, just by scanning a code –subsequently helping move them along their purchase journey.
Future-proofing education and development
AR enables a more sophisticated, discovery-based form of learning. For example, students in a classroom can engage with virtual, 3D objects to help grow their understanding of certain topics. Teaching concepts such as orbits in the solar system can be optimized using AR-powered, interactive models. Additionally, AR allows for the gamification of learning experiences, helping to boost knowledge retention through educational puzzles and treasure hunts.
The learning benefits of AR also extend beyond the classroom. In mechanical fields especially, the technology can train people how to complete tasks by superimposing the end result on the version the trainee is practicing with. Implementing AR in professional development cases has shown significant improvements to learning curves, creativity, and spatial awareness. In fact, according to a study by the National Training Laboratories, “learning by doing” has shown to increase learning retention rates by up to 75% compared to simply listening to a seminar or lecture. By progressing education onto understanding and experiencing, as opposed to reading and writing, AR offers huge benefits across the industry.
Invigorating interactive advertising
Product visualization, along with other attributes of AR, can be used to deliver interactive advertising experiences that truly connect with consumers and boost conversions by 40%. AR ad units drive far more engagement and dwell time than conventional media and can give digital display advertising a new lease of life. What’s more, the real-time interaction between user and ad enables advertisers to effectively measure the impact of their campaigns and optimize accordingly.
Advertisers have cautiously experimented with AR for years but they have largely added minor elements to traditional campaigns simply to ‘tick a box’. To make the most of AR’s capabilities and deliver real engagement, marketers need to take a different strategic approach and put this disruptive technology at the heart of their ad campaigns.
Superseding live events
At a time when social distancing makes live events and product launches problematic, AR can be used to digitally create immersive and emotionally-charged experiences that generate buzz around a brand. In fact, AR improves upon the in-person experience by allowing marketers to scale events beyond the natural boundaries of any physical location and enable hundreds of thousands of participants from all over the world to share the experience simultaneously. This will revolutionize how audiences engage with live music and sports events in particular, enabling unique forms of interaction.
By augmenting the user’s immediate environment with a digital presentation layer, AR allows users to interact with players and performers in a way that is not possible with a traditional passive offline event, and to be true participants rather than simply viewers. AR reduces the need for traditional physical events and paves the way for a new era of participative, immersive and scalable online experiences, with visceral and emotional engagement.
The perfect combination of tech evolution, advanced connectivity and contextual circumstance means this is the year AR really comes into its own. By taking advantage of product visualization, interactive advertising and immersive digital events, brands can leverage AR as a game-changer for marketing in 2020.
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