When responding to a request for proposal (RFP), many proposal teams spend countless hours sifting through old documents in a number of files to identify and extract relevant content. Qvidian customer Ellucian, an enterprise resource planning (ERP) company with a mission to enhance productivity and communication for clients in the higher education space, faced this problem, finding that its internal RFP workflows were not as productive, communicative and efficient as they could have been.
Proposal teams and thought leaders throughout the organization wasted many hours searching through file names and keywords to address and answer each question in an RFP, making it difficult to meet deadlines and deliver the final document within a reasonable time period. Not surprisingly, Qvidian’s latest customer survey revealed that 45 percent of respondents’ report receiving RFP content on time as their biggest pain point. Also, with a client base of more than 2,400 institutions across 40 countries, Ellucian needed a system that could organize, manage and automate its content via one central solution so it could be sure that the content used in the final document was the most recent – a major concern for proposal teams. In fact, Qvidian’s customer survey revealed that 55 percent of respondents find that their content libraries are only “somewhat” in sync with the changes within the business and product lineups.
With these roadblocks top of mind, Ellucian decided it was in the company’s best interest to implement Qvidian’s proposal automation capabilities. Upon using the platform, Ellucian users immediately understood how beneficial this technology could be for their workflows. Time spent researching file names, formatting and updating responses and correcting human errors in formatting were virtually cut in half – and proposals that were once perfunctory and basic evolved into personalized, well-written documents that displayed Ellucian’s above average capabilities and assets. As a result, what began as a small group of five RFP users in the Ellucian network soon grew to more than 250 licenses to use the platform across the organization in multiple locations.
The time Ellucian employees gained back from streamlining their RFP process was then redirected to other strategic initiatives throughout their organization so they could better serve both their employees and customers. Ellucian’s experience with Qvidian’s proposal automation solution is a prime example of what matters most in the RFP and proposal industry—having the time and resources to develop persuasive content that wins deals.
For more details on Ellucian’s experience with Qvidian and to get a better understanding of Qvidian’s extensive RFP/proposal automation platform, watch the video below.