August 23rd, 2009 by Brian Cors
Quite often, folks who are not very familiar with SalesDoc Architect tell us that their CRM (customer relationship management) software solution can generate proposals. If by “proposals” you mean the ability to generate a pricing schedule (perhaps with a fancy header) based on a list of products and services that you manually select then yes, many CRM solutions can “generate” proposals.
But if you are looking to auto-configure solutions (rather than picking products and services manually, one-by-one), or auto-generate descriptive, illustrative proposals that win more deals, or even create statements of work that set customer expectations and prevent “scope creep”, then CRM alone is not the answer.
As our clients can attest, SalesDoc Architect is a great complement to CRM. Both solutions are required for companies seeking best-in-class performance. That’s why we’ve created integrations between SalesDoc Architect and CRM solutions (especially Tigerpaw’s CRM+ solution, the leading end-to-end CRM solution for the telephony and IT reseller markets) to make it easier for both solutions to work together.
Why is SalesDoc Architect such a great complement to CRM solutions? Because it provides capabilities not available in CRM, owing mostly to three distinguishing features of SalesDoc Architect:
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June 19th, 2009 by Brian Cors
Several months ago, we added the ability to import contact (and other) data into SalesDoc Architect from any CRM or contact management application that can generate a mail-merged Word document. This capability eliminates the need to re-key data, saving time and reducing re-keying errors.
Together with Tigerpaw Software, we are pleased to announce the joint development of functionality that enables you to push configuration data (part numbers, quantities, pricing, etc.) from SalesDoc Architect into Tigerpaw’s CRM+ business management software application. Now you can use the combination of CorsPro’s SalesDoc Architect and Tigerpaw’s CRM+ solutions to…
- Manage customer relationships with CRM+
- Configure turnkey solutions with SalesDoc Architect Generate customized proposals, statements of work and other documents with SalesDoc Architect.
- Generate sales orders, initiate billing, manage inventory, schedule service orders (and more!) with CRM+
…all without having to re-key any data back and forth between the two applications.
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May 11th, 2009 by Brian Cors
We are pleased to announce the availability of software that enables you to pull data from almost any CRM or contact management solution and push it into SalesDoc Architect™. This not only includes contact information, but can also include other data that can be used by SalesDoc Architect to drive solution configurations, pricing and proposal content (see also our article on this topic).
As long as your CRM or contact management solution can merge data into a Microsoft Word document, the new Word2SalesDoc Architect integration can grab that data and push it into SalesDoc Architect. Moreover, you can push that data into any named range of any configuration tab within SalesDoc Architect, and SalesDoc Architect will automatically bring the required target tabs into your SalesDoc Architect file.
The most obvious benefit of the Word2SalesDoc Architect integration is that it eliminates the need to re-type contact information into SalesDoc Architect, saving you time and reducing typing errors.
The more revolutionary benefit is that you can use this data to drive your configurations, proposal content and statement of work content based on rules that you set up within SalesDoc Architect. As mentioned in “The Benefits of Driving Proposals from Your CRM Solution” on the Productivity Edge, you can drive configurations, pricing and proposal/SOW content based on data such as vertical market (e.g., hospitality, financial services, etc.) that is stored in your CRM or contact management solution.
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March 7th, 2009 by Brian Cors
You’re finally tracking detailed customer information in your CRM or contact management solution that tells you everything you need to know about each of your customers and prospects. Now wouldn’t it be great if you could actually use that data to drive the content in your proposals?
I’m excited to announce that we’ve just created software that pulls data out of virtually any CRM or contact management system and into our automated proposal generation solution, SalesDoc Architect™. Any information that you can get out of your CRM or contact management system and into a merged Word document can be forwarded into SalesDoc Architect.
The most obvious benefit of this new integration is that users don’t have to re-type the contact information that resides in the CRM solution. This not only saves time, but it also reduces typing errors and increases the accuracy and quality of each proposal.
Pumping contact information from your CRM system into your proposals is just the tip of the iceberg, however. You can actually use this information to drive proposal and statement of work (SOW) content automatically, meaning proposal content is auto-selected based on that data.
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December 6th, 2008 by Brian Cors
MarketingSherpa has released a report entitled “Top 10 B-to-B Lead Generation Marketing Mistakes.” This top-10 list is very different from the first one that MarketingSherpa published a couple of years ago. In this day and age of electronic marketing where technology is changing rapidly, that’s not surprising. The game is always changing, and it’s a constant struggle to keep up.
Here is their list:
- Mistake #1: Calling a monthly email newsletter a “nurturing program”
- Mistake #2: Telephoning leads to qualify them…days later
- Mistake #3: Big booths at the big national shows (year after year)
- Mistake #4: Using a free trial or free demo as your mainstay offer
- Mistake #5: Focus on “we, us, our”
- Mistake #6: Stock photos and hard-to-read type
- Mistake #7: Referrals not working
- Mistake #8: Lack of investment in PR
- Mistake #9: Blocking search engine spiders from your best content
- Mistake #10: Time-consuming registration forms
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November 23rd, 2008 by Brian Cors
As they say, variety is the spice of life. When interacting with your target market, variety in the methods and means of communicating with customers and prospects is the spice of successful marketing and, in the end, a catalyst for improving top-line revenues.
This mind map depicts a simplified multi-dimensional approach to communicating and interacting with customers and prospects. This approach uses a variety of methods and media to communicate with a targeted audience, while also providing that audience with a variety of valuable information designed to educate that audience with regard to how you can address their current and future needs.
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August 24th, 2008 by Brian Cors
So you’ve decided that your company needs to take the plunge and invest in a CRM (customer relationship management) application that enables you to share and centrally manage all customer-related information. Now the question is: do you invest in a CRM solution that is installed on one of your servers, or a solution that is hosted on a CRM vendor’s servers and accessed by your users via their web browsers?
If you desire to get up and running quickly, nothing beats the hosted solution. There are numerous benefits that the hosted solution provides:
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July 3rd, 2008 by Brian Cors
In many organizations, there is a resistance from sales people to use CRM (customer relationship management) software tools to track and manage customer contact and interaction information. The most common complaint is that the software has been implemented by management as a means of spying on the activities of the salespeople.
While in some cases this may be true, best-in-class CRM implementations focus first on the needs of the users – not management – and most particularly on the needs of the sales people. Such software can benefit salespeople directly in many ways, enabling them to become more effective and productive in their day-to-day sales activities.
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June 7th, 2008 by Brian Cors
The Aberdeen Group has published an interesting white paper entitled “New Approaches to Sales Methodologies and CRM” that discusses the integration of sales methodologies within CRM (customer relationship management) software solutions.
CRM software has always been a great way of tracking customer contact information, customer interaction activities and sales opportunities. However, in many instances organizations are using CRM software to track this information more as a static snapshot of what has happened in the past.
The Aberdeen Group proposes that by integrating sales methodologies within a CRM solution, the CRM solution becomes more of a “dynamic participant” in the sales process by driving sales people through a shared sales process with defined steps and milestones. They propose two ways in which methodologies can improve sales effectiveness and efficiency: opportunity optimization and sales process optimization.
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February 24th, 2008 by Brian Cors
CRM (customer relationship management) means different things to different people. So it’s appropriate that Paul Greenberg starts out with a chapter proposing several different definitions for the term, all offered by different CRM “gurus” and vendors. Although many of the definitions mention the all-encompassing philosophy of customer relationship management, what Greenberg focuses on for most of the book are CRM software solutions and the vendors that provide them.
CRM at the Speed of Light: Capturing and Keeping Customers in Internet Real Time provides an encyclopedic overview of the CRM software solution industry. Greenberg describes the different components that might comprise a CRM solution, including sales force automation, enterprise marketing automation, analytics/personalization and partnership relationship management (PRM). He then goes into great detail on the “players and the products” for each CRM software component. In many cases, of course, vendors have packaged most – if not all – of the various components into a single CRM suite.
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