Quosal at SMB Nation Fall 2010.
Frank
Oct 222010
Sep 202010
Look at that chart.
That, according to Wired magazine’s Danger Room blog, is the Pentagon’s craziest PowerPoint slide.
It’s the The “Integrated Acquisitions Technology and Logistics Life Cycle Management” diagram, which purportedly describes the Pentagon’s process for developing, testing and acquiring new gear.
Stare long enough, and you’ll start to see why it takes a decade for the Defense Department to buy a tanker plane, or why Marines are still reading Web pages with Internet Explorer 6.
I recall a previous project of mine that involved seven different companies, each with its own agenda. I sat down and committed the project’s approval process to a PowerPoint slide, which I humorously titled “How a Bill Becomes a Law.” At the time, it was the ugliest thing I’d ever seen, with flow-chart lines going everywhere. But of course it was nothing compared to that Pentagon slide.
Does anything in your business resemble it?
We talk a lot about “personal productivity” and “lifehacking,” but we don’t spend enough time on company productivity, measured by the time it takes to turn a quote into an order, and how many steps are involved. And think about the steps it takes for a customer who wants to buy your product to get back to you. Print the quote. Sign the quote. Scan the quote. Get the scan into an email. Write the email. Send the email. Every step representing a moment where the customer can reconsider their decision.
Quosal and Quosal for ACT! will help you streamline this process, making it easy for your sales staff to get your approval, and Order Porter will make it even easier for your customers to say “Yes.”
But it’s all going to come down to you. How many flow chart lines can you delete from your process?
Sep 032010
What does it mean to be “seamless?” In business software, we talk about a seamless integration, a seamless experience or a seamless workflow.
At Quosal, we’re constantly striving for seamless. We’re always looking for ways to remove the interruptions. It’s at the core of our experience. Quosal can turn quotes into ConnectWise service tickets. Quosal for ACT! can work independently of ACT! — you don’t need to remember to start one and then the other. Quosal saves everything in the background — there are no save buttons or error prompts asking you “do you want to save your changes?”
Let’s put some more stakes in the ground.
You should go from point A to point B without noticeable obstructions. There is no “point A-point-five.”
You shouldn’t have to start over when you move from one channel to the next. Everything contiguous.
The user should be thinking about the problem and not the tool. Carpenters drive nails — swinging a hammer is beside the point.
The system should have multiple component parts and interact with multiple systems — and the user should neither notice nor care.
Finally, here’s what seamless isn’t.
Seamless doesn’t mean I change my process to match your software. Don’t ask me to change to avoid your interruption of service. Providing a seamless experience doesn’t mean you force everyone to wear togas.
Do you feel that you have a good understanding of the value of your quote and proposal processes to your company? Is it something you’ve really thought about?
I’m going to challenge those who might answer “yes.” The first challenge: You probably haven’t thought about it that much. The second challenge: You’ve probably dramatically underestimated that value.
The value of these processes is direct, daily and in some cases, virtually inestimable, as they enable and unblock the growth of an organization. They relate directly to the image of your organization — the customer perception of professionalism and quality. The accuracy of quotes and proposals leads to good, win/win business. Overall organizational productivity can be dramatically and positively improved.
All of this can be worth tens or hundreds of thousands to a company, yet some are unwilling to invest as little as the price of a laptop and a few hours of time, while others may purchase the lowest-priced solution to save a few hundred dollars.
What is the right investment?
There are three investments you should consider when improving the infrastructure of your organization in the area of quote and proposal automation.
1. The investment in your quoting platform and tools.
2. The investment of *your time* in full and proper implementation of that platform.
3. The investment in professional services that gets you all the way there, cost effectively. Being cost-effective also means an appropriate and effective use of your own time.
We work with many companies that really need (and would greatly benefit from) investment in all three areas, but invest in only one, or perhaps two. This will not lead to maximum ROI, and may not even lead to basic success.
Under-investment in your quote and proposal automation can negatively impact your business for years to come, since most of us tend to live with mistakes far longer than we should.
Aug 272010
Selected tweets by Quosal and our partners and friends …
#SaaS deployment of #Quosal quoting makes sense for multi-office, virtual co’s; Cloud data is secure, accessible www.quosal.com #ConnectWise
QuosalMan — Kent McNall
Aug 19
On holiday, London this week…that’s a long flight from SEA…drizzly English weather. London is a great city. Notoriously bad vacationer
QuosalMan — Kent McNall
Aug 22
Very excited to see ACCs interested in #Quosal. Their input is so valuable. One look at #OrderPorter and they’re hooked.
Quosal_Frank — Frank Rogan
Aug 25
Congratulations to Sage for going gold with ACT! 2011! Big success with many exciting features. #quosal #actbysage #sageact
Quosal_Frank — Frank Rogan
Aug 26
ConnectWise IT Nation 2010 Update! Lots of breakouts… we’re sold out but you can still get on the waitlist http://ow.ly/2vkiI #ITN2010
ConnectWise
Aug 26
ConnectWise Wins award at XChange Americas – XCellence in Partner Growth http://ow.ly/2vWCz
ConnectWise
Aug 27
Six Great Reasons to Be Excited About Sage ACT! 2011 Smart Tasks (Part II) – Guest Blog by Len Kamerman #SageACT http://ht.ly/18KKRs
ACTbySage
Aug 27
Aug 122010
What does a dating site like OKCupid have to do with quotes and proposals? Plenty.
OKTrends is the official blog of OKCupid, and they must have a fantastic team of statisticians. Its fascinating stuff for stats geeks like me, who play fantasy football and eagerly debate whether Chipper Jones will make it into the Hall of Fame. He’s a lock. But I digress.
Don’t Be Ugly By Accident! was OKTrends recent blog post sharing its findings on the snap judgments based on a person’s photograph, and then compared the “yes/no” snap judgment against several variables — the time of day each picture was taken, shutter speed, depth of field, etc., which can be cribbed from EXIF data included in the digital files taken by most modern cameras.
What’d they learn?
If you want more dates, take better pictures of yourself. Don’t use a camera phone. Using a flash adds seven years to your perceived age. Make sure you’re the center of attention. Take pictures with good lighting.
In other words, don’t be ugly by accident. The little details pay big dividends.
“Technique can make or break your photograph, and the right decisions can get you more dates.”
So, again, what does that have to do with quotes and proposals? Just as technique can make or break your photograph, your technique with quotes and proposals can make or break your sale.
Etilize allows you to include product photos and specifications. People like to buy things they can see. If they can visualize your product, they can visualize how it will fit into their lives and their businesses, and they’ll be more likely to make a purchase.
Order Porter allows you to include video-based content. It could be a video of your product in action. Or a video of yourself going over the proposal in detail, or even simply thanking the customer for the opportunity to win their business. People buy from people.
Quosal and Microsoft Word can be used together to create true, repeatable, multi-section proposals.
Don’t be ugly by accident. Deliver attractive, accurate, and high-quality on purpose.
Former journalists, like me, gravitate toward Copyblogger, a fantastic blog about all things words, and specifically, copywriting tips for marketing success. Quotes and proposals are by definition things with words, so there’s a lot that can be gleaned from Copyblogger.
Former journalists, like me, are also suckers for lists. Say “top 10” anything, and we’ll read it. You can see why Copyblogger’s “101 Ways to Make More Sales Online,” caught my eye. In fact, “put a number in the headline” is one of the 101 Ways.
But what really made me sit up and take notice was how Quosal fit into those 101 suggestions.
Let prospects know they’re buying from a human being.
Honestly, this is the very reason behind Order Porter’s personal video feature. People tend to buy things from people. You are not a vending machine, so your quote or proposal document should not act like one. Adding a personal video to your quote – even just to say “thanks” — and delivering it through Order Porter is a great way to make one more memorable impression on your customer.
Tell a story about how you solved this problem for yourself before you started selling the solution to others.
Quosal CEO Kent McNall loves telling the story about how Quosal got started when, in one of Kent’s past businesses, a lack of a good quoting tool led directly to a salesman’s six-figure mistake. Knowledge Transfer is a key problem Quosal solves.
Make sure you’ve described your product or service in enough detail. If it’s physical, give the dimensions and some great photos. … Don’t assume your prospects already know any details — spell everything out.
Include a photograph of what you’re selling, if you can.
It’s for this very reason that Quosal works with Etilize, allowing you to smoothly include product details and product photographs into your quotes and proposals. Quosal + Etilize is a powerful, powerful combination.
Put your photo on your sales page. Human beings are hard-wired to connect to faces. If prospects can see you, it’s easier for them to trust you.
Not only does Quosal recognize this as a fundamental truth, we built this feature right into the application – an optional space for a personal photo is built right in, ready to go.
Does the prospect know everything he needs to know in order to make this purchase? What questions might still be on his mind? How can you educate him to make him more confident about his decision to buy?
You probably already have product brochures, descriptions of your services and various sales sheets. Quosal’s PDF Merge Manager feature makes it easy to include these materials with your quote and proposal documents. No more cobbling together documents – they can be merged into one, smooth-looking professional package.
Can you provide a demonstration of the product or service?
Seth Godin gives us another jumping off point to discuss quoting and proposal management.
It wasn’t the bags of chips that led Frito Lay to domination of the snack business, he says. It wasn’t the Slurpees that made 7-Eleven a success. And it wasn’t the clothes that Zara one of the best known brands in Europe (coming to an American mega-mall near you).
No, the competitive edge for those companies was their management of information about information.
- At the time of its 1965 merger with PepsiCo, Frito Lay had 46 manufacturing plants and 150 distribution centers.
- 7-Eleven has more locations in Japan than anywhere else. Mastery of their supply chain is key.
- Zara needs just two weeks to develop a new product and get it to stores, compared with a six-month industry average. It launches around 10,000 new designs each year.
These are plain-jane businesses. They make stuff to eat, to wear, and own stores where stuff is sold. But they’re backed with tight, tight management of their information.
For example, instead of adopting a strategy of branding and advertisement, like Abercrombie & Fitch, Zara focuses on radical product iteration. If a design doesn’t show sales traction within a week, it’s canceled, and no design lives longer than four weeks in stores, encouraging repeat business. Up until recently, Zara didn’t even advertise.
They pull down about $10 billion a year.
Why is an information management strategy so valuable? Seth Godin:
Because it compounds. A tiny head start in access to this information gives you a huge advantage … Think about how much needs to be sorted, compared, updated and presented to people who want to choose or learn or trade on it. The race to deliver this essential scalable asset isn’t over, it’s just beginning.
Quotes and proposals are information about information — what was the content, how was it presented, what options were available to the customer, how was it received, how was it tracked, how did it connect to everything else in your CRM and inventory systems?
How are you managing this flow of information about information?
We talk a lot about Knowledge Transfer at Quosal, about how business owners can pave the way for their sales staff and unlock growth within their company.
Which brings me to comedy. I’m a huge fan of the funny. In college, I worked at the Improv, and my best friend was a member of the L.A. comedy group The Groundlings.
One of the best sketches I recall from those Sunday shows at the Groundlings centered on a pair of restaurant servers working for a major chain franchise. On a busy night, the pair were swapping secrets on how to use the restaurant’s kludgy, overly complex ordering and inventory system.
“The customer wants extra cheese. What do I do?”“Just relax, OK? All you have to do is insert your key, open a table modifier and do Upcharge 301, Open Food, then do a Manual Hold and Save Settings, and pull your key to create the ticket modifier.”
“Wow. You’re totally smarter than Chili’s.”
Which brings me back to Knowledge Transfer. Your business processes, of which quote and proposal automation is a key component, need to be simple to use. That’s obvious. Certainly simpler than a seven-step process to order extra cheese.
More importantly, though, your processes need to facilitate the transfer of knowledge from, you, the business owner, to all of your people. They are, after all, the ones that are actually taking orders and serving customers.
Be smarter than Chili’s. Don’t get stuck in a situation where your customer experience hinges on tips and tricks passed from salesman to salesman.
Seth Godin is a best-selling author about business and marketing and prolific blogger. He’s one of the best kinds of deep thinkers — someone that shows you something you probably already know, but you’re still left scratching your head, remarking, “I knew that, but why didn’t I think of it, but why didn’t I understand it, why am I not doing it, how can I make that a habit?” Kind of like hearing John Wooden talk about the importance of practice. Sometimes, the fundamentals are so fundamental, you forget about doing them right.
One of Seth’s recent posts struck a nerve with me. In a world full of competition, the guy that wins is the guy that offers something different and useful. On an imaginary island of identical sugar cane growers and sugar cane processors, one stand out:
… In short, he becomes a master of the art of processing and marketing cane. He earns permission, he treats different customers differently and he refuses to act like a faceless factory…
So, what does this have to do with quoting and proposals? Everything! Your quote document is part of the public face of your business. In many cases, it’s the public face. Handled correctly, it’s a competitive edge over the other guy, the one that doesn’t package his goods and services for maximum effect, the one that doesn’t show customers that he will treat them differently and with respect. One of our products, Order Porter, includes a feature to add personalized videos to your quotes and proposals. That would certainly work for our imaginary sugar cane processor … or the financial professional, the IT provider, the real estate agent, etc, — looking to make personal connections with customers.
But … you knew this already, right? Then why do we see the same-old, same-old so often from so many businesses?
