Introduction
How an online quote builder can help your business. When a potential customer requests a quote, speed and accuracy are of the essence, because they are likely to have requested quotes from competitors as well. If a quote takes too long to prepare, the prospect may have already moved on to the next stage with a competitor by the time that the quote arrives on their desk. If a quote is rushed, it may not look very professional and it may contain errors, which could lead to the prospect dismissing the product before the race has even begun.
However, if you allow the prospective customer to not only request a quote online, but to actually build it on online too, then you can generate professional looking quotes in real time and have your company’s outline proposal on the desktop of the prospect before your competitors have even been able to start working in their quotes, which is exactly what an online quote builder does.
What is an online quote builder?
An online quote builder is a workflow based application that allows prospective customers to build their own quotations by selecting predefined options from intuitive and easy to use, web based screens that can be embedded into your website.
The prospective customer is automatically guided through a series of questions and options that will be the same questions that you would have needed to ask to prepare a quote manually. Behind the scenes, the quote builder is using the user’s selections to prepare the quote.
The finished quote can then be viewed on screen immediately or emailed to the user. Depending on the type of business, the prospective customer may also be given the opportunity, there and then, to place an order based upon the quote that has been provided.
The key features of an online quote builder
A quote builder needs to be easy to use and it needs to be able to produce professional looking quotes quickly. Giving your prospective customers access to an online quote builder can dramatically increase the volume of sales leads, while cutting down the amount of time that sales staff are spending preparing quotes manually. Here are some of the main features of an online quote builder.
Enticing landing page
First impressions count, so if you want to speed up the sales cycle and increase conversion rates, a high quality landing page that clearly demonstrates the key features and benefits of your products will be the perfect starting point for the quote building process.
Customizable processes
Every organization’s quotation process is different and every product or service that an organization sells might have a different quotation process, so a quote builder will need to have a customisable workflow system that can be used to build a tailor-made quote process for each product or service.
Intuitive user interface
An online quote builder must be intuitive and easy to use and provide clear prompts and instructions to guide the user through the quote building process. The whole purpose of a quote builder is to make the initial inquiry stage of the sales process faster and simpler, so it is essential that a prospective customer does not find the application unwieldy and difficult to use.
An easy to read summary page
In some industries, a quote can contain many elements and that can make a quote look confusing. A quote builder is a sales tool, so the end result of the process should be an attractive, easy to read summary of the quote that displays all the headline information contained in the quote.
Email quotations
Requiring users to enter their email address will ensure that they receive the quote so that they can review it in detail later. It will also provide a valuable source of email addresses for your prospect email list and allow your sales team to follow up the enquiry.
Integration to marketing lists
To be able to track leads generated and to follow them up, an online quote builder should have easy integration to marketing lists.
The benefits of an online quote builder
An online quote builder can speed up the sales process, generate more leads, save time preparing quotations manually and entice people to make inquiries who may not have otherwise done so.
Conclusion
For many businesses, the preparation of quotes takes up a disproportionate amount of the sales team’s time, especially when those quotes are being prepared for unqualified leads. Allowing a sales prospect to build their own quote online provides the sales team with more time to follow up the increased volume of better qualified leads that the quote builder will generate.