Sales via SI 2017 – Maximizing Foundational Features

Whether you’ve been in sales in our industry or not, you’ve probably encountered at least some aspect of the sales process with your team.  From initial contact with a prospective client to actually receiving that first payment, there are any number of items or details that can be mishandled without a defined structure or process in place.  As a prior integrator for over 20 years, I can attest to numerous instances of lost or discarded email addresses and transposed phone number digits on handwritten notes.  Finding yourself without this vital client information is not a place any dealer wants to be.

And, as valuable as these leads and their related information are, dealers should not count on these handwritten notes of their staff or other team members alone to document the critical details related to prospective clients.  This is where SI 2017 comes in – by offering the much needed framework to support your internal sales process.

While not only providing product, project, design, and project management details, SI 2017 also offers users the opportunity to store details about the sales process and even share those with other team members or the prospective client themselves.

Let’s look at that process and how SI achieves this:

• Once you have the prospective client’s information.
  Right here, from the very start, you can launch SI 2017 and start entering the key details of the client’s contact info by creating a “Client” profile entry.

 

As you can see, SI 2017 offers multiple data fields and areas where critical client contact information can not only be stored but also harnessed for utilization during the sales cycle.

Once these details are entered in SI 2017, users can then engage directly with the client via creating calendar appointments for future site visits or sending emails to confirm project details.

By doing this right within the SI 2017 software, users can quickly interface with their prospect and send company contact information before ending the initial call. This is very important so that potential clients, not only realize the power of your team’s software and market presence, but also so that these early, vital details regarding a prospective client’s information are clearly and precisely recorded for future use.

Also important in these early steps before actually meeting with the client, is gathering as much info about the project as possible.  One of my standard practices was to request copies of any plans or other design elements related to the upcoming project so that I could get a head start on putting together resources for my upcoming client meeting.  If these items were not available, I would request a room or location list and at least an initial idea of the client’s expectations or “ideal” solution.

• The sales process now begins.
  Once you have the project specifics from your initial phone call or site visit with your prospect, the creation of an SI project solidifies those details into your design solution. And since you’ve already created the client in our database, you’re one step ahead of the game.

You don’t even have to leave the Client Explorer in order to launch SI’s New Project Wizard.

Simply click “Project” above the “Create” section of Client Explorer to do so.

• Your project is created. Next step – get the proposal in your client’s hands.
  Now that you’ve got something for a prospect to review, SI makes it easier than ever via the “Customer Portal”.

Embedded within each project in SI, the “Customer Portal” allows you to, not only share a bid or proposal with your client, but also to share other files associated with the project such as annotated drawings, scope of work details, contract provisions, or perhaps even an initial timeline of the installation schedule.

Any files associated with the project can be loaded into the “Customer Portal” for your client’s review by just clicking the “Add Files” option.  You can then simply browse to the files you want to share and upload them to the “cloud”.

• You’ve shared your project…now what?
  The great benefit yielded here via SI 2017’s “Customer Portal” is twofold.  First, your client now has the flexibility to review the related project documents at their convenience.  Second, you, as the dealer, will be notified via email anytime your client enters the cloud and then you can see what documents they’ve actually reviewed.  (See picture below here for an example of the email you will receive.)

This is a powerful advance in the presentation of proposals and related project documents.  Gone are the days of simply sending an email and then following up with a voice mail only to receive silence in return as you await some kind of response from your prospective client.  Even using a “read receipt request” for your emails will not let you know if your email or attached files were truly “read”.  The affirmative response simply means your email was opened.

Documents that have been opened in the “Customer Portal” will have an “eye” symbol next to them indicating they’ve been viewed.

 

Now you can engage in your sales follow-up protocol with your prospective client.   And SI 2017 is a software platform that can do just that.  Via SI 2017’s interface with Outlook for further calendar appointments/reminders and by publishing revisions and/or “change orders” directly to the “Customer Portal” for review, you can pursue project commitment with a contract deposit.

It’s the understanding of how to utilize and maximize SI 2017 that will help set you apart from other dealers and ultimately enable greater success as you refine and improve your sales process from initial lead discovery to initial project deposit payment.

And this entire process will be greatly enhanced, streamlined, and further refined with the newly released Mobile Quote 2.0 app!