Creating a New Quote

Let's Create a Quote

Creating a new quote is easy with MasterQ. Use the lookup button to select the customer from a list and all of the standard information is put into place for you. This includes the default buyer, address, payment terms, FOB & shipping instructions, sales representative, even your standard effective date is pre-filled for you.

Of course, all of these default values can be changed by you.

Never misspell a customer name.

Use the contact lookup button to change the person this quote will be addressed to. All the contacts you have assigned to this customer are displayed for you to select from.

If the contact you choose has a different address than the default address you have set up for the customer, then the contact's address will be used in the quote.

Select the right part... quickly.

Have you ever made a part number error? It's not the end of the world, but it can cause confusion. Picking the right part number is easy with MasterQ.

To add an item to your quote, just select if from the list. Of course you can use MasterQ's powerful tools to sort, filter, arrange and search for the exact item you need.

Recognize pricing conflicts instantly.

When you specify an item to quote, MasterQ will instantly advise you if you have quoted this same item to this particular customer before. You will see when you quoted it, and what price you quoted. And if your customer is a subsidiary of another, MasterQ will tell you about that quote or sale, too.

Standard pricing for a customer by group

In a similar fashion, MasterQ lets you assign categories to your customers and will advise you of current pricing being quoted to that category. For example, you might have a category of OEM-Tier-3, or Distributor-A.

The secret to persuasive, compelling quotes

It's unfortunate, but we've all seen quotes that use unclear abbreviations and seller jargon. Don't assume the buyer will remember what the quote is about. After you leave, your quote is your saleman. It may be reviewed today, but it may sit on the buyer's desk for weeks or longer. It may be passed on to another person. Will your quote be understandable six months from now? Make sure the text in your quote includes sufficient detail to fully explain the benefits of your offering. You may not get another chance.

You only need to create this text once and MasterQ will use it to create all of your future quotes. Perhaps you should include dimensions, electrical requirments, warranty information or links to your website. MasterQ allows for an unlimited amount of text for each item. Make use of it. Be creative.

Research previous quotes, sales, competition and costs.

Knowledge is power. MasterQ gives you the ability to access your corporate knowledge base in an instant.

		View previous quotes for this item to all customers.
		View customers who have purchased this item, listed showing their most recent purchase, quantity and price paid.
		View all prices for various items quoted to this customer.
		View competitive information you have gathered about other suppliers of this item.
		View your current costs.

Including customer part numbers on your quote.

Make it easy for your customer. While not a requirement in most cases, including your customer's part number in your quote can be a real help to the buyer. If MasterQ already knows this customer's item number, it will automatically show it here. If not, you may simply enter it once and MasterQ will use it on future quotes.

You may choose whether or not to include the customer's part number in your quotes if it is available. You may choose where to show it and even the format you prefer to use.

What quantity are you quoting?

MasterQ uses a default quote quantity of your standard pack. You do, afterall, perfer that the customer purchases in whole case quantities, right? But you have total control. You can change this to be any other number.

If your business model does not utilize quantities, you may choose not to include a quantity on your quotes at all.

Is this item available to ship?

Don't get surprised! Current inventories and even current customer orders may be imported into MasterQ giving you an insight into available inventories.

Anything else to consider?

Still need more information? MasterQ lets you define five categories for any type of additional information. This screen shot shows the options of Drawings, Installation instructions, warranty information, certifications, and customer feedback. But you define these to meet your needs and requirements. These buttons link you to files of any type stored on your computer. These could be Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, PDF files, even videos or sound clips. All this information becomes available to MasterQ users at the click of a button.

Don't leave money on the table.

Do you have optional gaskets your customer might consider when installing your widget? Or coffee for your coffee makers? Take a tip from the fast food industry and don't forget to ask your customers if they want "fries" with that happy meal.

MasterQ will remind you to include these additional items automatically or you may choose to only view them on demand.

In either case, MasterQ's "fries" feature will help you remember to quote items your customers need.

Save time issuing identical quotes to multiple customers

Perhaps you're working on a new product launch and need to send an involved quote to several customers... or maybe you're quoting a family of products to every plant for a major customer and need a personalized quote for each buyer. MasterQ can save you time here, too.

After you've built your first quote, press the COPY button and you can paste all the items and pricing into the next quote you build.

Document everything and make it easy to find later

When you're satisfied, press the Create button and MasterQ will build your sales proposal using Microsoft's Word program. When the quote is created, a note is added to the customer's record summarizing the quote. This allows your MasterQ users to quickly access information about this quote in seconds when viewing the customer's record. You may optionally choose to save a similar note in the Part record so you may view all issued quotes for a given part. You may also choose to automatically save similar notes in the sales representative's file or even the customer contact's file. All of this makes it easy to quickly view a quote from anywhere in the MasterQ program.

Your quote is built to your specifications

MasterQ uses the concept of a quote "template" to create your masterpiece. This template is a Word document that may customize to your heart's content. You may include your logo, layout, boiler plate text and additional information. You can set up MasterQ to have each user create quotes using the same template or each user may have their own unique template. (For example, this would allow you to have each user's name appear at below the bottom signature line.) Some users have even scanned in their signature and have that automatically appear on the signature line.

Quote templates use special text "tokens" that are replaced with the actual values from your quote during the creation of your proposal. These allow for very flexible results. You can view a list of these replacement tokens here.

While MasterQ allows you to have simple or elaborate product descriptions and quote layouts, sometimes it still isn't enough. You'll be happy to learn that the finished quote is actually a Word document and you have the final say in how it will appear. Apply special formatting, put in a special note unique to one customer or what ever you need. Then print, convert to PDF, or apply any special capabilities that can be done with Word. When your done, print it, save it or email it.

You can view a sample quote generated in MasterQ here.

Find out how to get MasterQ here!