How To Lower the Cost of Manufacturing Sales

Cost reduction is an exercise that every manufacturing company encounters. But in the current economy, it plays a vital role in your company's recovery.

Manufacturers are now finding new ways to optimize their businesses and lower costs. Besides transforming the production process, manufacturers can also put the spotlight on their sales process.

Using digital solutions to improve how your manufacturing business sells requires a deep understanding of how it works. Download our Manufacturing Sales Handbook to quickly get up to speed!

That's because the traditional sales process hasn't caught up with other parts of a manufacturer's business. As a result, your sales team only spends about a third of their time actually selling.

How digital lowers manufacturing costs of sales (1)

Digitize sales knowledge to lower costs

In the manufacturing industry, sales reps are spending their time on miscellaneous things. It can be restarting stalled deals, answering simple customer queries, traditional reporting, or manually tracking sales progress.

The most time-consuming task, however, is also the most critical to winning deals. Your sales reps spend a large part of their time collaborating with various parts of the organization—from engineering to sales ops—to create quotations and proposals that make customers happy while preserving precious margins.

It requires a considerable number of man-hours to get the numbers from Excel sheets and ensure they are right.

This process may be the norm, but manufacturers are right to question it: Is the entire process set up to be efficient? Should your sales reps be focusing on adding value for your customers? Or making sure your complex solutions match requirements and are the most competitive?

Without a strategic overhaul to the entire process, your sales challenges, including a long sales cycle and frustrated customers, can pile up.

Reimagine the entire sales process

Many of our customers have begun to recognize this problem and are actively trying to resolve it. The first step is to completely reimagine the sales process from the customers' perspective. It helps your sales organization meet customers at every touchpoint and deliver to their evolving needs.

Next comes the digitalization of this new sales process. At the foundation of your digital sales process is your most crucial manufacturing knowledge and product expertise.

With the help of intelligent automation, it can be readily available so that experienced sales reps can be more efficient, and new additions to the team can start selling right away.

According to a study by McKinsey, almost a third of routine or time-consuming tasks can be automated using digital technology.

Early adopters of sales digitalization reported an increase in:

Customer-facing time
Customer satisfaction
Efficiency of up to 15%
Sales uplift potential of up to 10%.

How digital lowers manufacturing costs of sales

How a digitalized sales process lowers costs

The traditional manufacturing sales process is incredibly complex. This often leads to a sales cycle that is longer than your customers are ready to accept. Every step you take to meet the customers where they are, requires time and resources that add to the total cost of sales.

But with intelligent digital sales, your sales cycle can be shortened to just a few steps. Here is a breakdown of how manufacturers can optimize each stage of the sales process to be much faster and more cost-efficient with a digital solution built for manufacturing.

Quotation and order management

The quotation stage is where customers decide on which manufacturer to work with. Speed and accuracy are of the essence.

Manufacturer challenges

Manual data extraction from ERP
Manual complex solution configuration
Manual administrative tasks
Multiple layers of approvals
Collaboration needs with all stakeholders
Manual calculations (and re-calculations)
Inaccuracies that lead to several corrections and associated costs

How a Digital Sales Platform helps

Fast and viable configuration using real-time ERP data
Automation of manual administrative tasks
Automated approval workflows
Organized collaboration with all stakeholders
Highly accurate cost, pricing, inventory data
Automatically calculated margins and discounts for various simulations

Customer and collaboration management

After your customers come on board, it takes tremendous effort and resources to keep them happy—and spending. Customer retention costs can add up over time. Proactively matching their needs requires transparency and efficiency.

Manufacturer challenges

No visibility into customer order history, requirements, or buying preferences
Outdated communication channels (e.g., fax, calls via customer service hotline, etc.)
Manual compilation of performance metrics can be slow and inaccurate
Inaccuracy negatively impacts production forecasts, pipeline reports, and decision-making
Lost opportunities due to lack of follow-up
Disorganized sales activities and customer engagements
Sales losing track of customers with long sales cycles

How a Digital Sales Platform helps

Dashboard helps sales spot opportunities fast and focus on the right things
Prioritize the most profitable deals instantly with opportunity scoring
360-degree visibility into all customer accounts, history, installed base, and ongoing engagements
Always up-to-date account master data
Instantly reach out to customers with just one click
Make better business decisions with key metrics at your fingertips
Integrated quote management helps generate offers in minutes
Email integration makes customer interaction data instantly available and lets you act directly from Outlook or Gmail
Intelligent discount calculation ensures the highest customer satisfaction with the best possible margins

Aftersales, online sales, and partner management

Your customers expect 24/7 access to your business. Offering online channels is a powerful way to ensure sales is constantly flowing. Customers and partners can easily find the product information they need and kickstart the sales process on their own.

Manufacturer challenges

Siloed management of multiple sales channels
Innovation takes weeks to arrive in the market
Sales are bogged down by requests for information
Aftersales uses up valuable resources of sales organization
Currency exchange due to sales channels in other regions causes margin loss
Outdated prices and product information in catalogs distributed to partners and dealers
Large catalogs are hard to navigate for required products

How a Digital Sales Platform helps

Manage all sales channels from a single platform
Innovations can be instantly available and appropriately marketed for customers, partners, or distributors
Interactive catalogs help customers or partners find and buy products fast
Save on sales resources with self-service
- Solution configuration & inquiries
- Information gathering
- Spare parts & consumables buying
- Order status inquiries
Intelligent recommendations automate cross-selling and up-selling
Integrated customer and quote management capabilities take the entire customer journey online

Conclusion: A tool to supercharge efficiency and performance

A Digital Sales Platform can become an essential part of your manufacturing business. But that doesn't mean it replaces your sales force. It is a powerful tool that helps your sales team supercharge their efficiency and performance.

Lowering the cost of sales is a key factor for manufacturers. However, from a human perspective, the gains are much more significant.

Customers benefit from a streamlined buying process, while your sales reps can focus on what they do best—selling and delivering the extra value that your customers demand.