By Steven Coles, CPP.APMP, Customer Success Manager
There’s no denying that the way businesses buy and sell has shifted dramatically over the last few years. Some bid teams and proposals centres are at the vanguard of this shift, while others often struggle to keep pace in a role that’s undervalued and underfunded—even in otherwise progressive sales organisations.
At next week’s APMP UK conference, I’m looking forward to helping bid and proposal professionals prepare for more strategic conversations about how they can best support their companies. With a 360-degree view into the firm, bid managers are often in a unique position to deliver valuable insight and perspectives on how to improve business development efforts.
In “How to Automate Proposals & Influence People,” we will discuss how to combine people, process, and technology to help large global sales teams increase the volume, velocity, consistency and quality of sales proposals. We will explore how to extend marketing value propositions and go-to-market themes that help to win RFPs to a larger team through innovative use of proposal automation technology— with great results and a valuable new stream of business intelligence.
Firms can no longer afford to ignore the impact of technology on the buyer’s journey and, critically, its influence on the seller’s capacity to adopt and adapt whilst maintaining client-focus. In a panel session, “Technology in Bidding and Buying,” four of us with different experience and perspectives in the bidding and purchasing process will explore how technology has changed our roles and how we envision the future. We’ll discuss:
- Technology’s role in the proposal or pitch
- Overcoming implementation challenges for sales, purchasing, or proposal automation
- Mapping out an internal technical landscape that remains fit for purpose
- Technologies of interest to buyers—the best areas for organisations to direct funding.
If you’re attending APMP UK’s 2017 conference, I sincerely hope we’ll have the opportunity to connect.