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Key Off of Imported Part Numbers to Auto-configure Solutions

March 7th, 2012 by Brian Cors

One of SalesDoc Architect’s greatest benefits is its ability to auto-configure hardware, software, services and output doc content based on other items that have already been configured in the solution. For example, you might want to auto-configure certain peripheral parts (like racks, cables and power strips) when specific types of systems are configured. In the past, this was easily implemented, but it usually took a couple of steps to get there.

Last month, we introduced a new and very simple-to-implement capability that enables clients to auto-configure parts, services and docs based on specific part numbers that have been imported onto the Write-In tab. When might you need to use this capability? One client recently used this approach to configure a rebate when a specific part number was imported from a manufacturer’s configuration tool. Another client used this approach to configure a rectifier when a specific control unit was imported from another manufacturer’s configuration tool.

It’s easy to configure parts, services or docs using this approach. Simply insert a formula with the following syntax into the appropriate quantity or doc selector cell…

=SUMIF(WriteInPart,”[part number]“,WriteInPartQty)

For example, if you want to configure quantity 1 of part number XYZ if the quantity of part number ABC on the Write-In tab is greater than zero, you would type the following formula into the Qty Calcd cell for part XYZ:

= IF(SUMIF(WriteInPart,”ABC”,WriteInPartQty)>0,1,0)

Embracing Change for Significant Sales Gains

February 29th, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

Our latest case study highlights Site Services, Inc. (SSI), a Mitel reseller and solution provider that decided to embrace change and implement SalesDoc Architect in the midst of an extensive Tigerpaw CRM implementation. They elected to do both implementations simultaneously in order to get immediate productivity benefits to their sales process and increase their top and bottom lines. They were able to implement SalesDoc Architect in just three days, with minimal disruption to business, realizing immediate, measurable results! With little time to spend on implementation, SSI took an ’implement first, customize later’ approach with SalesDoc Architect that paid off by helping them achieve a 56% in proposal throughput over a two month time frame, integration with their CRM system, as well as giving them significant savings by reducing costly errors and omissions in the quoting process. Read their story.

When is the Best Time to Implement Automated Proposal Generation?

February 25th, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

The decision to implement a sales productivity tool can really pay off by delivering significant benefits to your business, such as a major reduction in quoting errors, increased efficiency and increased revenues and profits. These benefits certainly sound appealing, but what about all of the other priorities and must-have technologies that you’re considering to move your business forward? Should sales productivity be put on the back burner, or should it be put at the forefront of your 2012 initiatives, alongside some of the major enterprise-wide projects? The answer is…you’ve got to do the math! If the proposed benefits from the tool are high (and quantifiable), implementation and training time are low and you can expect ample support from the vendor, then you can implement quickly and capitalize on immediate benefits, even when more extensive projects or technologies are already in the works.

Consider these items as part of your equation: Read the rest of this entry »

Using Workflow for Manager Approval of Proposals

February 16th, 2012 by Amy Thomas

Are there certain proposals you want to make sure get manager approval before they’re sent to clients? We have several clients who have implemented a workflow feature in SalesDoc Architect that prevents proposals from going out the door with too low of a margin or too high of a discount. Whatever the criteria may be, there is a very easy way to implement this feature within SalesDoc Architect. This is a brief overview of how easy it is to add management approval to your SalesDoc Architect setup:

1) Go to your “raw” MiscProd tab in your CorsPro/Tabs folder and go to any cell in the “hidden section” at the bottom. Once in that cell go up to the Name Box and name that cell range “OutputStatus”.

2) Next, insert an IF/THEN formula into that cell that is similar to the following (highlighted areas should be based on the criteria you would like to use).

Read the rest of this entry »

VoIPMyBiz.com Raises Their Game With SalesDoc Architect

February 9th, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

VoIPMyBiz.com, a division of Axess Communications and an Avaya reseller, was looking for a way to gain efficiencies in their sales process and support sales growth into new product lines and new customer markets. They also wanted to address some familiar issues that many solution providers face: spending too much time proposing small system sales, and needing a tool that could integrate and enhance their existing sales tools and technologies, including CRM and vendor and distributor configuration/pricing tools.

CorsPro’s latest case study describes how by implementing SalesDoc Architect, VoIPMyBiz.com was able to meet these sales challenges and sell more solutions, achieving a 40% growth in revenues in 2011. With their sales game most definitely raised, Brian Thomas, Chief Operating Officer at VoIPMyBiz.com believes that his company is well positioned and ready for new opportunities in 2012. Is your business ready?

Enhanced Proposal Automation for Avaya Enterprise Solutions Added

February 1st, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

We are pleased to announce that enhanced proposal automation functionality has been added to SalesDoc Architect for Avaya’s enterprise product solutions.

What does that mean for our clients who sell Avaya systems? Generating Avaya-based solutions is faster and easier than ever before. Here’s how it works: SalesDoc Architect takes your Avaya configuration (which you can import from the Avaya ASD, EC and EZQuote tools and from the Avaya configuration tools from Catalyst and Jenne) and then auto-configures your labor, peripheral products and other elements – including document content – to generate fully customized, professional sales proposals, scopes of work and other sales documents…all within minutes.

CorsPro offers Avaya content through a monthly subscription service for SalesDoc Architect and includes up-to-date proposal content for these Avaya solutions:

IP Office
Aura
Business Communication Manager
Legacy Nortel product line

Existing SalesDoc Architect clients who subscribe to Avaya proposal content updates received the enhanced functionality and updated content at no additional charge when they downloaded and installed the December 2011 release of SalesDoc Architect. Happy Selling!

SalesDoc Architect on a Mac?

January 25th, 2012 by Amy Thomas

I have been a PC user for the majority of my working life. I have become increasingly familiar with all the usuals – Outlook, Excel, and Word. I could not have done the majority of work in my career without having a PC. Or so I thought…

Once I converted to the iPhone, though, I started to become more and more of an Apple “convert”. The Mac Book Pros were looking better and better to me for everything that we would want to do at home with our children and personal life. So we bit the bullet, dug into our wallets and got a Mac. My first thought was this is crazy, how am I supposed to do work at home with a Mac? My software program, SalesDoc Architect, is completely run on a Windows platform.

But it was such a nice computer and custom built that it was now ours. For six months it sat in my office, used only for occasional internet surfing and downloading pictures. I continued to stick with what I knew and kept using my slow, somewhat archaic Lenovo Thinkpad…until the day that we all dread finally happened. I went to log in from home to do some work on Thinkpad and…nothing. Dead as can be. So now what??? Read the rest of this entry »

Proposing IT Managed Services Just Got Automated

January 19th, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

Proposing IT managed services solutions can be a complex undertaking. Customers want to know every detail – in a format that breaks it down for them to easily understand exactly what they’re getting. Without automation, it can be a struggle each and every time you have to customize a managed services proposal for a prospective client. Not to mention the coordination of the back end processes to make the sale and implementation go smoothly and avoid cost overruns.

We’ve listened to our clients, many of whom are already selling IT managed services. We’ve loaded new content and functionality into SalesDoc Architect to automate the complexities of managed services proposals, from providing mixed payment types to incorporating multiple levels of service by location or within each location. You can also incorporate data from network assessments into proposals, scopes of work and any type of documents that you use in your sales and service delivery processes.

All of this new functionality, combined with SalesDoc Architect’s existing integration with CRM software (including advanced integration for those of you who use Tigerpaw) – and the ability to import parts and pricing from configuration tools from vendors like TechData, Jenne, Ingram Micro and Catalyst – come together into one integrated process to save your business a substantial amount of time, reduce errors and produce better proposals, scopes of work and other sales documents.

I invite you to read our news release on managed services and our latest case study to find out how SalesDoc Architect can improve your ability to quote and propose IT Managed Services solutions.

New Proposal Content Available: Toshiba Surveillance and IP Video

January 11th, 2012 by Hazel Lychak

For all SalesDoc Architect clients who subscribe to Toshiba TSD proposal content, we’ve added new Toshiba content in both the Toshiba and Pro Editions of SalesDoc Architect. Now you can create comprehensive proposals for Toshiba surveillance and IP video solutions that are descriptive, accurate and designed to help you win more deals. CorsPro clients automatically received the new content in the most recent software update of SalesDoc Architect.

If your goal is to successfully sell Toshiba surveillance and IP video solutions, you’ll find the new content a valuable addition to your Toshiba-based system proposals.

Distributor Parts/Pricing Tool Import Functionality Now Available

December 20th, 2011 by Hazel Lychak

We’ve recently added functionality to SalesDoc Architect that enables you to import parts and pricing from Anixter, Catalyst, Ingram Micro, Jenne, ScanSource and Tech Data distributor pricing tools so that you can more easily and efficiently generate proposals and other sales documents for all of your complex solutions. This newest import functionality complements CorsPro’s existing import functions for several telephony manufacturers, including Avaya, Mitel, NEC, ShoreTel and Toshiba.

Once a distributor and/or manufacturer quote is imported, SalesDoc Architect can then auto-configure labor, peripheral products and other elements to round out the complete customer solution, after which various sales documents can be generated.

These new import functions can help to streamline your entire sales process, and can also help you to significantly reduce costly errors by eliminating the need to re-key data at any point in the process.

Existing SalesDoc Architect clients received the import functionality when they downloaded and installed the December 2011 monthly software update for SalesDoc Architect. Please contact us to add any of these import functions to your Import menu.

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