| IT Vendor
Gains $9 million in Additional Revenues
Through Improved Pricing and More Productive
Sales Force |
|
| Business Challenges |
 |
Sales lost because IT system inadequate
for producing competitive quotes quickly |
|
Lost margin because pricing quotes
not standardized according to business
rules |
| Results |
|
$9 million in additional revenues
through improved pricing, more productive
sales force |
|
| "CTE's concentrated
workshop process and the rapid deployment
of these two software applications will
help us win new sales in highly competitive
situations and insure that we maximize
our profits on each sale. With our company's
sales nearing $1 billion, it is vital
for our extended field force to have
reliable, accurate, and instantaneous
information. The software solutions
that we develop with CTE will give us
the data we need to improve customer
service, increase revenue, and make
our sales force more effective. Because
of CTE's expertise and proven software
tools, we expect to implement this valuable
solution in just 15 weeks, the shortest
enterprise application development time
I've seen." |
|
A large supplier of IT products
and services to government customers did
not have a sales support system that enabled
its field sales reps to quickly produce
competitive and error-free quotes. Often,
sales reps would lower prices without applying
systematic business rules, resulting in
lost margin and lost sales.
This Virginia-based IT solutions company
participated in CTE's Cambridge Executive
Workshop (CEW) to quickly develop a prototype
solution to improve their ability to win
profitable sales. The CEW enabled the company
to develop a business solution linked with
advanced technology to consolidate information
among disparate departments that influenced
sales, speed the process of creating competitive
sales proposals, and insure that price quotes
offered the best margins. Consequently,
the firm has been able to increase its sales
win ratio and gain more than $9 million
in additional annual revenues. |
| Business Challenges |
After nearly 20 years of providing
public sector companies with IT solutions,
this IT provider found increasingly
that its sales proposals were not
competitive or fast enough to win
sales. Multiple departments within
the company touched the sales process
that included contracts, acquisitions,
sales, pricing, and other issues.
However, the sales support system
was not set up to facilitate fast
responses throughout the firm to produce
proposals that would reach customers
in time for the buying decision. The
company sells products and services
under a variety of contracts and selling
prices are based on numerous factors
that include issues such as competitor
pricing, quantity discounts, customer
relationship, and more. Sales reps
were unable to consistently optimize
margin because of the high level of
complexity and manual operations throughout
the sales process.
As a company generating $900 million
in sales last year, the company wanted
to solve its business problem and
turned to CTE to help find the solution. |
|
CTE Solution |
The company participated
in CTE's three-week Cambridge Executive
Workshop (CEW), during which they
developed prototype solutions to address
the sales proposal problems.
The CEW is a powerful, collaborative
forum where CTE works with Fortune
1000 firms and governments, bringing
together executives, managers, end
users, and other stakeholders to move
new ideas to fruition. During the
CEW, CTE specialists in business solutions
and technology work with clients to: |
|
Generate new, high-impact ideas using
CTE's "left and right hand"
framework; |
|
Identify "lazy assets"
that can benefit from new technologies
and improved processes; |
|
Tap MIT and Harvard resources to
drive a strategic, problem-solving approach; |
|
Create a compelling,
complete business case with quantitative
and qualitative benefits. |
One of the key issues facing the company
was that any technology solution had
to be rapid and open, allowing for access
to the existing legacy customer information
system and a planned migration to a
new system. |
Because
of the compressed three-week period
of the CEWs, the IT vendor was able
to quickly: |
|
Develop architectures for flexible
solutions; |
|
Create custom prototypes of the solutions; |
|
Provide a framework for Rapid Application
Development (RAD); and |
|
Develop a deployment
roadmap to quickly capture maximum business
benefits. |
| During two of the
CEW workshops, the firm and CTE developed
prototypes of the Contract Selection
Module and the Pricing Recommendation
Module. Together, these two enterprise
applications will provide information
to allow sales reps to quickly create
competitive sales proposals and quotes
and optimize the firm's margins and
the selling probability. Following
the CEWs, the company moved into CTE's
Rapid Application Development (RAD)
phase, a 15-week program designed
to accelerate deployment of enterprise
IT solutions.
Through the CEW, the company was
able to: |
|
Develop an architecture enabling
consolidation of data in disparate systems
with flexibility for the changing business
environment; |
|
Create custom prototypes of the two
solutions; |
|
Provide a framework for Rapid Application
Development (RAD); and |
|
Develop a deployment
roadmap to quickly capture maximum business
benefits. |
| The Contract Selection
Module will generate a suggested contract
for quote, based on those the customer
is eligible to purchase, then recommend
which contract offers the highest margin
to the company and the highest sales
probability. The Pricing Recommendation
Module will list a recommended price,
based on input from the sales rep on
competitor information, historical sales
margins for the manufacturer/product
line in question, and customer information.
Both modules will remove the chance
for pricing errors from the selling
process. |
|
Solution Benefits |
By creating these
two technology solutions, the company
is providing its sales reps and other
company departments with the tools
necessary for efficient and competitive
quote creation. It is allowing sales
reps to respond to requests for quotes
much faster, and with a proposal that
will meet customer needs and provide
the firm with the best margins. The
team working with CTE believes that
approximately $9 million in new revenues
will result from the deployment of
these two modules, providing the company
with the additional revenue gains
sought by the company. Company executives
were enthusiastic about the programs
and rolled immediately into the deployment
phase, so that the company could begin
to see the programs working in just
15 weeks. |
|
