Modern sellers can easily find themselves between a rock and a hard place when trying to balance streamlined, digital eCommerce environments for consumerized buyers with the familiarity and reliability of traditional sales methods.
Configure, price, quote software has provided a solid foundation for such sellers to build upon, allowing them to adapt to paradigm shifts across the market in real time.
As the new wave of consumerized buyers continue to exhibit strong preferences for B2C-style interfaces and self-guided experiences, trying to earn their business without the right CPQ-supported tech stack becomes less and less feasible.
But, while moving to meet discerning buyers where they are, sellers still have a responsibility to incorporate expertise and product advice into their scaffolding.
After all, shoppers can’t be expected to know everything about product inventory, features and configuration options – especially in a market where speed is prioritized. Just because they don’t want to pick up the phone and call a sales rep doesn’t mean they’ll be satisfied with a generic cart. Instead, they need subtle, effective, and digestible guidance through the sales funnel.
The question – how can a digital sales environment architected around CPQ software still accommodate expert advice and personal recommendations typically provided by sales reps?
The answer – with newly enhanced guided selling and message flexibility provided by Logik.io, Commerce Logic Engine.
We’ve held guided selling in high regard from our conception as a company, and have never stopped trying to improve its delivery and functionality.
Our newest round of upgrades brings guided selling to a new level for your buyers and administrators alike, supported by never-before-seen messaging flexibility.
Whether you want to dynamically present bundle recommendations, provide relevant product information, restrict certain order configurations, or otherwise communicate with your customers via guided selling interface, Logik.io allows you to share information flexibly, in modes and locations that optimize user understanding.
Guided Selling: Enhanced
Guided selling is the undeniable key to unlocking a top-tier shopping experience for your buyers.
With guided selling technology, shoppers can provide input in the form of surveys, questionnaires, polls, etc., that the back-end system then spins against preset logic to aid with product discovery.
Based on the rules, recommendations, restrictions or requirements set up for your specific products, and the preferences outlined by the shopper, intelligent recommendations and shopping paths then populate.
Recently, we announced the Logik.io Solving Engine 2.0, which was constructed to facilitate enhanced determination rules, exclusion rules and product actions, along with warning, informational and error types of messages – all of which can be nicely wrapped up in our guided selling technology.
This has brought an unparalleled level of granularity to product isolation, without adding any additional stress or obligation to the buyer themselves.
The strongest guided selling interfaces are solution-, or attribute-based, as compared to product-based. With attribute-based logic like that in Solving Engine 2.0, the buyer doesn’t have to know what product they’re specifically looking for – just what type of problem they’re looking to solve.
Are you giving your buyers a helping hand by incorporating attribute-based configuration into their experience? Our ultimate guide to all things configuration can help you get started, for free – download it now at https://learn.logik.io/configuration-guide.
This form of product discovery utilizes a filter system that removes incongruous inventory from the shopper’s experience, placing them in front of the right options at the right time. Instead of having to use their best judgment to manually parse through the catalog, they are free to engage only with the most optimal solutions.
In product-based systems, your buyers are relegated to shot-in-the-dark search terms, best guesses, and suboptimal final orders they know no better than to submit.
For example, let’s consider a shopper dropping into a furniture retailer’s website. They are new homeowners looking to outfit their backyard with an outdoor dining setup, but have never actually bought from this retailer before.
When they enter the site, they’re presented with a quick questionnaire that asks them about the area they’re looking to furnish – dining room, living room, bedroom or backyard – and a few other points.
In a matter of about 30 seconds, the shopper can answer the questions, land on an optimized page of weather-proof furniture, consider extended warranty options for potential water or sun damage, and review add-on offerings for furniture covers, heaters, delivery and installation services, as well as custom tablecloths and seat cushion coverings.
Without the enhanced guided selling interface, this same shopper would have had to take the time to research individual sets, compare and contrast the materials, and likely wouldn’t have known about the unique warranty or add-on potentials.
Instead, they’re able to see their preferences reflected back to them intelligently and quickly. They don’t have to wonder whether or not they’re missing anything – the system has taken care of that for them. They still have the final say in what they put in their cart and walk away with, but can do so with confidence.
Messaging Flexibility & Use Cases
Logik.io is proud to have myriad message types incorporated within our headless architecture. In the growing absence of direct communication with sales reps, expanding the flexibility and reach of messages has remained a priority.
Informational messages, warnings, and error messages all exist as customizable features within our engine, and can now be further augmented thanks to engineering advances in the following areas:
- Specificity: When it comes to message specificity, our newest release allows you to step outside of pure option availability or one-point if/then hypotheticals. Specificity enhancements allow you to set up good/better/best scenarios with different resulting pathways, providing your buyers with key points to consider. Presenting a multitude of available options lets shoppers hone in on the absolute closest fit for their needs, and translates that data back to system logic that can further optimize the remainder of the funnel.
- Validity: Upgraded validity allows you to utilize specific messages for recommendations and mandatory requirements. Messages with mandatory prescriptions can contain pre-emptive answers to buyer questions, additional product details or rationale, alternative paths forward, and lock adjustable fields until certain conditions are met. Recommendations can coincide with messages of specificity in presenting what the system has identified as the most optimal selection, but still leave agency for the shopper to have the final say in what they choose.
- Location: Did you know that the location of a message on your screen can affect how you engage with it? Now, you can strategically position the location of messages to best support a consumerized user experience. The easier it is for a shopper to interact with your interface, the better of a time they’ll have navigating through and benefitting from its content. Cluster related points around the products they reference, or create a central line of sight by moving dialogue boxes to the corners of your display.
- Help Icons: The more relevant information you can transmit to your buyer, the better. Logik.io’s new help icons create a space for FAQs, embedded media, related links, and product demos to live. Accessible with just a click, these help icons serve as mini resource libraries for buyers, allowing them to satisfy their own curiosity and learn more about what they’re looking at – without having to actually start a conversation with a live agent via chat or call.
- Custom Graphics: Sometimes, folks will judge a book by its cover. That’s why the graphics, colors, formats and overall design schemes comprising your sales ecosystems can, and should, be as unified under your brand as possible. Our architecture has been tweaked to support custom graphic and design elements for your messages and icons. If you’re tired of seeing big, red pop-ups that make your buyers feel like they’re making a mistake, you never have to see that hue again.
Getting set up with Logik.io. Commerce Logic Engine can help you unlock the potential to sell more, sell faster, and maintain less.
Our API-first, headless architecture can accommodate any level of rule complexity, supported by our Matrix Loader technology. Compatible with Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets, the Matrix Loader can create a full configuration for you in less than 5 minutes.
Businesses working out of legacy CPQ systems can benefit from our freshly-launched Lightspeed Migration Program, which utilizes high-speed automation and 1:1 data element mapping to bring you into a Salesforce-centric, Logik.io-augmented ecosystem in a matter of weeks.
And throughout any scale of implementation, our world-class system integration partners are in position to provide you with the support and subject matter expertise you deserve. To learn more about life with Logik.io, check out our guided demo or reach out to our dedicated Sales Team.
