Vendavo CPQ vs. PROS CPQ

CPQ software plays a critical role in sales management—businesses can quickly and accurately generate quotes by automating the quoting process while significantly reducing manual errors. Once CPQ is in place, businesses have an easier time managing sales cycles, deal tracking, closure, and subsequent billing operations.

PROS Smart CPQ and Vendavo CPQ are both cloud-based CPQ platforms that offer a variety of features designed to help businesses streamline their sales operations. Both options include out-of-the-box features for quickly creating quotes, orders, and pricing information. Each seamlessly operates as an extension of the CRM system to improve data quality, utilization, and quote-to-cash speed.

Vendavo CPQ is built for sales teams involved in complex product sales. Its software services are custom-made to accommodate the demands of some of the world’s largest manufacturers and distributors.

With PROS, businesses can unlock the full potential of their digital and physical sales. Its comprehensive solution offers powerful product catalogs, cutting-edge quote management capabilities, profound market segmentation technology, and personalized price optimization tools designed to optimize your commerce processes.

Vendavo CPQ and PROS CPQ have similar products, but they slightly differ in their approach to CPQ. While Vendavo primarily helps distributors and manufacturers, PROS’ AI engine helps companies that sell consumer products and services to optimize their prices and refine customer segmentation.

Defining Vendavo CPQ

By utilizing Vendavo’s Commercial Excellence platform, multinational B2B corporations can unlock incredible financial value and grow their margins to unprecedented levels. With dynamic customer insights and trends-based pricing strategies, companies see increased sales success and improved customer experiences—both of which directly translate to accelerated revenue growth for sales worldwide.

Vendavo’s cutting-edge analytics and deep industry expertise have achieved an impressive annual margin improvement of more than $2.5 billion for companies in a range of industries, from chemicals to distribution, high-tech, and manufacturing, ensuring that these businesses stay ahead of their competition.

Primary industries Vendavo serves include wholesale distribution, packaging, shipping and logistics, oil and gas, pharmaceutical distribution, building products, aftermarket manufacturing, and medical devices.

Defining PROS CPQ

PROS CPQ (also called PROS Smart CPQ) is an AI-enabled, cloud and on-site software built and delivered on Microsoft Azure. With a full suite of pricing, ordering, and inventory control tools it allows businesses with multi-layered products to manage their inventory, customers, and revenue from one centralized hub.

Advanced product configuration, customer segmentation, and AI-enabled analytics are the main selling points for PROS Smart CPQ. With such powerful reporting and visualization, company stakeholders are able to make the smartest decisions possible about where to invest their marketing and sales resources. Thanks to quote management functions, they can also streamline the entire sales process from start to finish.

Beyond the basics, PROS offers CRM integration with Microsoft Dynamics (among other software). This makes it easy for businesses to ensure that their customer data is always up to date. The software also features automatic bill of materials (BOM) generation, single-view visualizations for pricing and parts lists, and powerful reporting capabilities that make it suitable for manufacturing and engineering industries.

PROS and Vendavo offer many of the same features in their CPQ products. Since they both work for manufacturers, distributors and service providers, their core features are largely the same.

Both offer:

• Catalogs: For product configuration, pricing, and multi-level part selection
• Pricing tools: To set up accurate quotes quickly
• Configuration tools: To make sure products are properly configured for customer orders
• Quoting capabilities: To provide customers with accurate quotes
• Reporting and analytics: To track customer orders, sales trends, and performance metrics

The main differentiator with PROS is its AI engine and machine learning capabilities. Churn forecasting algorithms identify customer segments that are at risk of churning, so companies can intervene to prevent them from leaving. Clustering algorithms help sellers prioritize deals and identify prospects most likely to buy. And predictive pricing algorithms adjust prices for different markets, customers, and products in real-time.

Vendavo offers more tailor-made solutions to the industries it serves. For example, its healthcare, medical device, and pharmaceutical distribution platform enables these sellers, manufacturers, and distributors to navigate complicated and ever-changing laws and regulations.

Here’s a breakdown of each product’s features:

When determining which platform will work best for an organization, company size and type is a critical factor. Since both software solutions serve companies in the manufacturing and distribution sectors, they’re both best suited for complex companies doing upwards of $50M in revenue.

Vendavo works well for companies that have strict compliance laws, like in the healthcare, medical device, and pharmaceutical distribution industries. Its analytics and reporting engines make it easy for these companies to stay on top of their customer data and ensure compliance.

PROS offers many of the same advantages for its customers as Vendavo, but at a straightforward price point. Its real benefit, however, is its customer segmentation and insight capabilities. It helps companies quickly identify potential buyers and prioritize deals, so they can focus their resources on the right opportunities. PROS also offers custom app building, which is worth it for companies with the IT infrastructure to implement it.

To make a decision between Vendavo and PROS CPQ, it’s important to consider the specific needs of your business. Does your company need more robust compliance features? Do you require advanced analytics and machine learning capabilities? Or, are you a smaller business looking for a straightforward solution (other than these two)? Answering these questions should point you in the right direction.

Since CPQ implementation is often long and complicated, customer support plays an influential role in the overall buying decision process.

PROS requires a great deal of setup and implementation support, but the brand also delivers in that regard. It offers plenty of customer support options, including live chat and access to onboarding and implementation specialists. It offers a complete customer support portal as well as a developer portal, so all members of the team can quickly find the help they need.

Vendavo offers three levels of support: customer success, value acceleration, and professional services. These are all tailored to the customer’s individual needs, and include training, configuration support, and even custom development work.

Ultimately, when it comes to customer support, both Vendavo and PROS offer a variety of support options that should be considered when making your final decision.

Pricing plays a critical role in the decision-making process. Vendavo is a more expensive solution than PROS, but pricing remains unclear as it is delivered on a quote basis.

PROS has a quote-based pricing option, but its first two offerings start at $60 and $75 per user per month, respectively. Those per-month prices make PROS CPQ a relatively expensive CPQ option compared to others out there, but it is still cheaper than Salesforce, Oracle, and many other enterprise platforms.

Other prices to factor into the mix that aren’t necessarily part of the CPQ platforms themselves include implementation, custom development, and ongoing support costs. For companies using the Microsoft ecosystem, implementation and ongoing maintenance will be much easier and lower-cost if they use PROS—something Vendavo cannot offer for any of the major tech players.

To better understand pricing, here’s a quick look:

Vendavo CPQ and PROS CPQ are both valuable solutions for manufacturers and distributors in the mid-market ($50M+). Vendavo excels in compliance, analytics, and reporting—all of which will be attractive to companies with strict regulations.

PROS is a less straightforward solution that offers advanced customer segmentation capabilities as well as custom app building. It’s generally cheaper than Vendavo, though a full understanding of its pricing will depend on the individual business and IT infrastructure.

Ultimately, both solutions have their merits, and it’s important to decide which one will be the best fit based on your company’s needs and budget. Analyzing each solution’s features and customer support options plus taking into account implementation times, team training, and ongoing support should help you make an informed decision.

Andrew Parker

Andrew is a professional copywriter with expertise in creating content focused on business-to-business (B2B) software. He conducts research and produces articles that provide valuable insights and information to his readers.

Vendavo CPQ vs. PROS CPQ

• 1Introduction
• 2Product Overview
• 3Product Features
• 4Customer Size
• 5Customer Support
• 6Pricing
• 7Summary
• 8FAQs