Teams around the world have transitioned to remote. Processes have moved into the cloud. And for prospects, the what, why, when, and how of buying has transformed.
As business proposal experts, we like to think we know a thing or two about closing deals. But right now, it’s safe to say the state of proposals has changed in a big way.
We’re far from having all the answers on how best to navigate this new normal. But, we have identified 6 tips and trends to help you and your team work win from home. Here’s how you can put them into action.
Including a brief, personalized video welcome message at the top of proposals is a great way for reps to build trust and rapport with a potential buyer. Not only does video content put faces behind the deal, it can also:
In short, proposals with embedded video have an undeniable edge over the flat, one-dimensional documents from the competition.
Esignatures increase proposal close rates by 3.4x (proposals also close 32% faster). Proposify’s online signatures make it easy for prospects to add their legally-binding signature quickly, right in the browser, from any device, to your sales docs.
And for reps? Gone are the days of reps cobbling together multiple standalone tools to create, send, track, and esign documents. With Proposify, adding signature lines or initial boxes to proposals becomes a simple part of the doc creation workflow. Not sure who needs to sign? Not a problem. Placeholder signatures let prospects forward your proposals to a signee unknown to you.
With the state of the world right now, every deal and every dollar counts. Connect your Stripe account to your proposals so reps can request a deposit or payment-in-full from a new account as soon as they sign off.
Not only are they set up for success from the start, your reps will spend less time chasing new clients over important details—like securing payment—and more time getting down to business.
For sales leaders, the sudden transition to remote has prompted a rethink of many processes we often take for granted. Like remaining adequately caffeinated without the office coffee machine. And, just as importantly, maintaining oversight over the docs reps are sending.
Solution? We can’t help with the coffee situation, but as to the latter: Use Proposify to set up roles and permissions and recreate your approval workflow in the cloud.
Reps can get approved proposals out faster, and sales leaders can be confident their docs are consistently error-free and on-brand as well as on time.
If your prospect has a question while they’re reviewing a proposal, the faster it gets answered, the better the chances of closing the deal.
Proposify allows prospects to leave comments right on the proposal, and our real-time chat integration lets them reach out directly to your sales reps without leaving the proposal.
By staying in close communication where it counts, concerns get addressed immediately, meaning deals will never go cold, and your close rate will always be red hot.
We know what’s now. Leads are down. Forecasts are a mess. Timelines are pushed, and deals that just a few short weeks ago were well on track to closing are now uncertain.
But it doesn’t do well to dwell, and uncertainty now doesn’t mean deals that’ve gone quiet will stay that way. Your reps need to be ready to act when things turn around.
Proposal metrics and notifications inform sales reps the moment a dormant deal starts showing signs of activity. These vital insights, like when a prospect opens a proposal after a period of inactivity, notify reps when to follow up on a deal that’s gone cold.