Sales Systems Upgraded for Sharing Information
Article published in FUNDfire.com on May 9th, 2006

By Jay Cooper

The latest updates to software systems for sales teams and proposal writers are designed to improve how those teams share information to create the best pitch books and responses to Requests for Proposals (RFPs). Sharing company information is critical because it ensures accuracy, allows sales teams to answer client questions right away and makes both sales teams and proposal writers more efficient.

“The kinds of questions and the number of questions we’re getting from plan sponsors are more complex and numerous so you need the questions all catalogued in one place instead of having to look all over the place to retrieve them,” explains Ann Freeman, the assistant v.p. of marketing for Franklin Portfolio Associates.

Software systems designed for proposal writers or sales teams have already created systems that allow those teams to go to their lap-tops and pull up the most relevant slides for a new sales pitch or the best answer to a specific question on an RFP. But at least three different companies have recently upgraded their software with improvements focused on sharing information. Managers are demanding communication improvements because it makes both their RFP and sales teams more efficient. “These types of software systems allow groups in other parts of the world access to the same information even though they’re in different time zones,” Freeman says.

Cataloguing information and making it available to everyone also keeps proposal writers from having to go to other parts of the business several different times to ask someone the same question. It also keeps the sales person from having to call the proposal writing desk to ask a question a client had after a given presentation, explains John Laurino, the CEO of Proposal Software. He claims he talked to one client who says the proposal writing desk used to get 30 calls a day from the sales team. “When you’re working on building a proposal you get into a groove,” Laurino explains. “It’s not just the time of the phone call that slows you down, but you don’t start working at the same speed you did when you were working before.”

Laurino’s company created PMAPS, a software system designed to help proposal writers more than a decade ago. The company will release the 10th generation of PMAPS in June and one of the main improvements is that its central library with shared information for proposal writers is now available on a Web site, instead of just existing on the company’s own network. “Now they can be anywhere in the world, log onto the Web site and log in and retrieve the information they need,” Laurino says. He claims this has particular implications for the sales teams. If they get asked a question from a client at dinner one night, for instance, “they can go into breakfast the next morning and have the answer to that question.”

PMAPS is not the only system improving the pool of information shared by proposal writing and sales teams. The Sant Corporation just released a new version of its Sant Suite software, Sant Suite 7.2, last November. The new version contains a search item called Pro Search, which allows anyone in the company to search contact content within proposals. That content can be screened to make sure that things such as improper legal information do not go out to clients. Pro Search is only $295 per user. Before the addition of Pro Search, managers using the Sant Suite had to purchase RFP Master to search through proposals, which costs $1,100 per user.

Another new addition to the Sant Suite is Presentation Builder, which stores pitch book slides for sales teams conducting Power Point presentations. Both systems were created because more personnel at asset management firms have to pitch in and help with the proposal process, explains Brian Vass, the v.p. of marketing for Sant. “We’re really seeing a trend in this industry that more RFPs are being issued. Sales people in the field are getting more RFIs and RFPs on the spot and the proposal teams are also seeing a larger volume of RFPs. We need to make sure there is a corporate knowledge base available. We need them to have access to the right, approved content,” Vass says.

Xinnovation is another tech company making changes. Previously, the XiDocs system gave sales teams a central Web-based library to share information for pitch books and customize presentations based on the type and individual needs of a potential client. This quarter they will add a new component called the RFP Solution that allows both sales and proposal writers to share information together. Future changes will also focus on improving the way information is shared. “We’ll increase the level of intelligence in which someone can navigate through an ever-increasing library and get to the right information at the right time,” says Eric Peterson, the COO at Xinnovation.

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