Securitas USA Case Study of Success with ClientPoint

THE SITUATION

To create sales proposals, Securitas North America was first using an internal MS Word sales proposal template they created in-house. They were not satisfied with it so they switched to a commercial proposal creation system offered by a competitor of ClientPoint. For privacy we will label the competitor's system as the “XYZ system.” According to Bill Barthelemy, COO for Securitas North America, the XYZ system was not much better than using a MS Word document and it was very cumbersome. They tried working with the XYZ system for about 18 months, but they were never satisfied with it.

The problems and frustrations caused by using this manual system are as follows:

• The sales team disliked the XYZ proposal creation system. It was cumbersome and difficult to use, and if a person was not an expert at using MS Word, that person would have great difficulty using the XYZ system.
• A second problem with the XYZ system was that because it was so difficult to use, it now took sales people significantly more time to create a sales proposal using it than it took to create a proposal using the company's original in-house proposal template. This decreased the productivity of their sales people and increased frustration.
• Because of the difficulty in using the XYZ system, nearly all of the sales people avoided
  using it and they went back to the old way of creating proposals. Securitas management decided it did not make sense to continue using the XYZ system when their sales team disliked it and avoided using it.

Due to all of the frustration caused by the XYZ system, the management of Securitas North America began searching for a new proposal development and management solution. After participating in several live demos of the ClientPoint business proposal creation and management system, Securitas North America decided it was a solid fit for their business needs.

• The Securitas North America sales team is really pleased at how fast and easy it is to create sales proposals using ClientPoint. They also like how easy it is to customize and personalize proposals. In the past it took them 2-3 hours to create a proposal. Now, with ClientPoint, it takes them less than 30 minutes. This has led to a significant increase in productivity for the Securitas sales team.
• The sales team likes how easy it is to add personalized videos to their proposals as this makes their proposals stand out against competitors and helps them win more new business.
• Securitas North America management is pleased at how ClientPoint has standardized their proposals, making their proposals consistent and accurate in their appearance, content, and message. No longer are sales people “doing their own thing” when creating proposals. All proposals are now consistent with a professional Brand image and message. This helps Securitas stand out from their competitors and win new business.
• Securitas management receives great value from the robust proposal tracking, analytics, and reporting tools offered by ClientPoint in the Proposal Management Center. Bill Barthelemy, COO for Securitas North America states, “To me, your analytics and reporting tools are a real game changer for us. To be able to look at the reports and be able to see at a glance our activity levels by location and exactly how we are doing is extremely valuable and insightful. I also like how we can see all the way down to how much time each of our clients are spending looking at our proposals, down to the page by page level. Another thing that is quite helpful is that with your Proposal Management Center we can monitor the activity of each of our sales people to see how each person is performing and if there are any problems we need to address.”
• Overall, Securitas says that ClientPoint gives them a strong competitive advantage in their marketplace. A proposal made on the ClientPoint system stands out because it is very attractive and it contains multi-media such as personalized video, which makes it more of a living and breathing entity as compared to a static “cut and paste” pdf file, which is the type of proposal that most businesses send to clients. A proposal created on the ClientPoint system feels more alive and it looks like it was created and designed specifically for the client it was sent to. That makes the client feel special because it looks like you spent a lot of time working on the proposal, and that you personalized it and customized it just for them. That is impressive to a client and helps win new business.