More and more companies implement Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ) solutions. These applications are clever tools that allow sales teams to produce detailed and accurate sales quotes for their customers.
Many software providers offer some sort of CPQ solution. If you are already using Salesforce, you probably know their CPQ solution.
CPQ systems are like any other systems. The better the data they process, the better you will benefit from your system. Your CPQ system will work best with accurate and reliable product data. CPQ needs accurate product information to work optimally.
However, product-related data is often stored in a company's Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. In order to feed their CPQ application with all relevant data, companies need to get this information from the ERP system. Data integration is the key.
WHAT IS CPQ AND HOW DO YOU BENEFIT?
Selling is a key process in most companies. In many industries, competition is tough and sales teams are under strong pressure. Sales reps around the world need to be able to seize any sales opportunities. They must be able to respond swiftly to any cross selling and upselling opportunities.
In order to respond quickly to customer requests, sales teams must have all product and price information at their finger tips. With this information, they have to come up with the best price, as fast as possible.
This is why many companies decide to support their sales reps with "guided selling" tools, also known as CPQ. A CPQ software (Configure, Price, Quote) is a sales tool for companies to quickly and accurately generate quotes for orders. CPQ applications are also known as "quote-to-cash" solutions because they cover the entire quote to cash process.
By implementing Salesforce CPQ, sales cycles and sales processes become more effective and more competitive. It improves the sales quoting process and allows organizations to accurately price their product and services. As a result, they increase win rate and deal size.
These CPQ applications need customer, product and pricing information. Therefore, they work in tandem with other data sources such as CRM and ERP solutions.
Read also: Data security: does data integration put your data at risk?
SALESFORCE CPQ INTEGRATION
Salesforce offers a CPQ solution as a part of their offering. Salesforce CPQ is hosted within the Salesforce Sales Cloud platform. By using Salesforce CPQ, sales teams are given the ability to configure products matching their customers' needs and requirements. They can then apply pricing and various discounts before sending quotes or proposals to their clients.
This automation considerably improve business processes. The optimization is especially strong with Salesforce CPQ as it is fully integrated with Salesforce CRM. This means that the quote to cash (QTC) process can be done from within Salesforce.
What happens if you do not store all product and pricing information in Salesforce? What if you store it in your ERP solution instead? You need to get this data from your ERP into Salesforce in order to feed your CPQ application.
It can easily done with a simple data integration solution such as RapidiOnline. By getting the product and pricing information from your ERP into CPQ, you will get even larger benefits.
HOW TO INTEGRATE SALESFORCE CPQ WITH YOUR ERP
How should you build their data process flow of product and pricing information between salesforce.com and their ERP system? Many companies have doubts
Most of the time, CPQ - ERP integration is built around the following principles:
- Product master data is most often created and maintained in the ERP system. This is because there is additional data in the ERP system needed to make the correct postings.
- Product price is also typically maintained in the ERP system with the discount structure on items or customers - or both.
- When Salesforce CPQ and your ERP are integrated, products are automatically synchronized between the ERP Salesforce. If you are using RapidiOnline as your data integration tool, the discount groups in the ERP are converted automatically by the data integration to price books in Salesforce (CRM).
- The basic product and pricing information is sourcing the logic you have configured in Salesforce CPQ. This means that you are guided in Salesforce through selecting the right products. You can optimize your commercial pricing to setup the discount and pricing rules you want to apply.
- The quote and the pricing from Salesforce CPQ can be converted and transferred to become an order in the ERP system. And it includes the competitive pricing and products configured/selected in Salesforce CPQ.
Your processes might require a different setup, which is also possible with RapidiOnline.
Salesforce CPQ can easily be integrated with ERP solutions such as Microsoft Dynamics (AX, NAV, GP, 365 Business Central and 365 for Finance & Operations). Data integration platform like RapidiOnline require no programming.
With RapidiOnline, this entire data synchronization process can be setup and automated with best practice integration templates as the starting point. It can also be done real time. It is fast, robust, flexible and secure.
Read how to evaluate your options about Salesforce - ERP integration
What should your salesforce.com - Microsoft Dynamics integration look like?
About the author
Henning Lund
With over 25 years’ experience in strategically propelling businesses forward, Henning is considered a business development entrepreneur with a passion for transforming businesses, sales and marketing operations through out-of-the-box thinking, concepts building and process automation to improve overall performance and scalability.
