AgilePoint: closing enterprises 5x faster with Docfield
AgilePoint, a Business Process Management and Low-Code Development Platform, was looking for ways to optimise their sales process. As they are helping customers around the globe, sales negotiations and contract discussions soaked uptime and energy from sales, legal and procurement departments. They turned to Docfield for advice and changed their sales process for the better.
AgilePoint was growing steadily year after year, but Hans Hantson, Business Development Director, was ready for more. In his search for sales optimisation he stumbled upon Docfield’s intelligent document management software. In times like these, businesses need to work smarter, not harder. This could be the perfect answer to Hans’ search for faster workflows and efficient worldwide collaboration.
Three sales bottlenecks
“We dove right in together with Docfield exploring different possibilities. We detected three main bottlenecks in the current sales process: communication, direction and collaboration”, Hans Hantson explains.
- Inefficient communication
A sales contract was shared with the client and what always followed was a never ending chain of emails, phone calls, text messages, meetings, … for weeks on end. This endless back-and-forth communication about every tiny iteration could stall negotiations for weeks, if not months. - Lack of direction
Next up negotiations, again, for weeks. Sometimes even about parts that were not open for discussion. When sharing a contract in a Word or PDF format, other parties were, unintentionally, invited to start commenting on every clause in the document. - Asynchronous collaboration
And finally sales had to collaborate with internal procurement and legal teams. Again sending the contract in Word or PDF format waiting for changes and comments from their part.
It’s safe to say all parties could save heaps of time if they could all collaborate on the same contract in real-time. Enter Docfield!
Accelerating the sales process
“After defining the flaws in our sales process, the real work started. We didn’t waste any more time and started testing Docfield’s software right away! Before we even realised it, we were up and running throughout different teams.”, Hans continues.
The onboarding process was initiated very quickly. The intuitive product design principles make the deployment of the tool relatively easy for anyone who is digitally savvy. Once completed (as far as possible, as onboarding is a never-ending process), the road to a more efficient sales process at AgilePoint was wide open!
Communication
Different workflow management functionalities were introduced. Document owners can now assign ownership per contract phase, set deadlines and even automate notifications to all relevant stakeholders. On top of that, all templates and documents support comments to minimise communication outside of the document.
Direction
Different roles can be assigned to different stakeholders. Contract Creators, for example, can now dictate which parts of the contract can be changed by the sales teams or their clients, while locking-down other parts of the contract.
“The conversations with our clients have completely changed. From now on we let the contract channel the discussion. Docfield's user interface instinctively guides the meeting by showing what can be edited. And more importantly, what cannot be changed and is therefore not up for discussion. This alone is saving AgilePoint countless hours by preventing unproductive discussions.”, the satisfied Business Development Manager clarifies.
Collaboration
Sales teams, legal departments, procurement and even clients can all work in Docfield simultaneously and in real-time. While descriptions in the templates let all document users know exactly what is expected of them, when and where.
Legal colleagues only have to review the parts that are open for change. This boosts efficiency and reduces the review time per contract significantly. While version management makes sure that the responsible parties never miss any track changes and accidentally approve erroneous clauses.
Reducing time and errors per contract
Hans continues: “Since we’ve been using Docfield, we are saving up to 80% time on contract discussions with enterprise clients. All parties communicate in Docfield synchronously and efficiently. This limits errors as we are never sharing wrong versions again. Our sales process has changed dramatically.”
AgilePoint and Docfield will keep on working closely together as they highly value customers’ feedback. Innovative product updates are developed for and with customers. An in-app guide for onboarding, user interface improvements and collaboration updates were launched recently for a better customer experience.
Customer interview
Hans Hantson, Senior Director of Innovation and Business Development at AgilePoint EMEA, explains how AgilePoint uses Docfield to accelerate its sales processes.
