The Sales Process: From Customer Inquiry to a Paid Invoice

When people hear the term "sales process", they often imagine a quotation followed by an invoice. In reality, it's a chain of connected steps. And it's exactly between these steps where businesses lose the most time and money.

What should a price quote look like?

You've probably received several price quotes in your life as a customer and have chosen the one or several of them which you eventually converted into an order. Now, you find yourself on the opposite side. Now, you're the one creating a price quote for your customer and of course, you're trying to win.

How is order composed?

Sales order is an order recieved from our cusomer. The format of the sales order has elements similar to a price quote or invoice. But there are certain specific details that are worth mentioning. Above all, these are the dates.

When is it better to lose a price quote?

When is it better no to win? When the entire business case with its future possible additions isn't profitable. If we have to sell something to one customer at a loss and at the same time I will not benefit from it in the future, there is no point in doing that.

Price request

When creating a price quote, we often encounter a problem that we don't know the price at which our supplier will deliver the given goods / services. How is it possible? Quite simple. Supplier gives us a standard price list, but what if the customer orders e.g. 1000 pcs?

Purchase order for supplier

When ordering from our supplier, keep in mind the dates and price. Many companies do not include purchase prices in their purchase orders. They are either afraid that they do not have them updated in the system, or they hope that they will receive from the supplier better than those they expect.