July 28, 2022

The 6 best quoting and invoicing software features for service businesses

Payaca quotes on blue and yellow background with title text

Quoting and invoicing can be a bit of a trial. Designing a quote often takes time and may end up looking a bit underwhelming when presented to a customer.

The last thing you want to be doing is wasting time drawing up documents when you really want to be focused on delivering your best service. The good news is, the answer is already out there.

In 2022 there are many products and providers who are offering the best in quoting software and CRM solutions, meaning you can say goodbye to completing tedious tasks and crappy quotes.

Quoting software offers so many amazing benefits to your service business. But if you’ve not yet heard of the software or you're new to the technology, we recommend checking out our blog on what is quoting software, to get a full explanation of the benefits and how it can help you grow your business.

In this post, we are going to explore some of the 6 best features quoting and invoicing software can provide you and how the software can help your business grow.

So let's get into it, what are the 6 best quoting and invoicing software features for service businesses?

Premium quality quotes that impress customers

This may seem like a simple feature to include, but of all the features on this list, the quality of your quote is arguably the most important.

Customers can be fickle, they respond to information that is presented in an aesthetically pleasing way and are far more likely to value your product if it looks impressive. In fact, evidence shows that 86% of customers are willing to pay more for a great customer experience.

infographic displaying customer icons 80% coloured in

This means when designing quotes and invoices, the ability to make something that looks good goes a long way.

With the best quoting software you can achieve this very easily.

Payaca is leading the way on this front, offering the ability to create highly customised quotes that can be edited to your preference.

From unique product images included within the quote to personalised branding and logos that your customers can see, this form of digital quoting allows you to stand out and impress your customers.

Instant quote to invoice conversion

When it comes to time-saving, this feature might be number one.

Before digital quoting software entered the market, designing quotes and invoices was a two-part job. First, you had to prepare the quote and then you had to do it all over again for the invoice.

With quoting and invoicing software that’s no longer an issue.

Say goodbye to wasted hours at your desk, with quote to invoice conversion you can change your quote into an invoice in just one click.

This feature is straightforward. First, you design the quote within the quoting software CRM, including all the details, images and customisations you want to use. Once the quote has been sent and approved by the customer and the job is complete, you can click a button and the information used to create the quote will be reformatted into an invoice.

This saves you so much time and allows you to impress your customers as you appear super slick and organised while delivering high-quality invoices.

What's more, quote conversion isn’t where the benefits end. When combined with automations you can save even more time by setting many of your processes to complete automatically.

Automated processes

Although not strictly a quoting feature, this is still an awesome capability that can save you so much time.

Almost any quoting software provider will offer more than just straight quoting and invoicing. Most quoting CRMs provide full job management capabilities as part of their software. Within those capabilities, you will have access to automations.

The ability to automate processes is one of the most popular features that service business leaders look for.

Simply put, automations allow you to progress your work and complete processes automatically.

For quoting and invoicing, this might mean creating triggers, so that once a job is marked as complete, your customers are automatically sent an invoice converted straight from your quote.

You can also automate many more processes within your business such as job reminders for repeat work and text and email responses that streamline customer communications.

The ability to win repeat business is particularly valuable, as by doing this you’re more likely to earn more from your customers. In fact, studies show that existing customers are likely to spend 31% more than new customers.

Just by using automations, you can keep your customers coming back for repeat jobs, which means you will make more money. This is especially true when integrated with optional extras and multiple-choice items.

Optional extras and multiple-choice items

These two features are some of the most powerful features available to you when you start using quoting and invoicing software.

Both work by using upselling and cross-selling techniques to generate more revenue from every customer.

They work by providing your customers with the option to spend more on each sale.

When you design your digital quote, alongside the primary items and products you are offering, you can also include optional additional items your customer can choose to add to their order.

This means your customers can see how they can add more to their order and receive a better end product.

You can also achieve this by offering your customers premium upgrades.

Within the quote, customers are able to see better quality alternatives that they can upgrade to. For example, rather than purchasing a cheap boiler, they may decide that a more expensive premium quality boiler is a better choice.

This form of sales is known to be incredibly effective leading to sales increasing from 10% to 30%.

3 rockets increasing in size

These features have double benefits for your business, as not only are you able to get more high-value sales from each customer, but you’re also able to provide your customer with better quality products, which reflects well on your business.

Create quotes on the go

One of the limitations of paper quotes is that they’re only accessible from your office or on a computer. With digital quotes and invoices, you have total flexibility and full portability, delivered through a mobile app.

With a mobile quoting app you are able to generate quotes and invoices on the go and in the field.

Rather than having to delay in getting the relevant information over to your customers, quoting apps allow you to generate quotes from ready-prepared templates and deliver them to your customers on the spot.

What’s more, the mobile app allows you to upload job receipts and take payments right away. This means it’s far easier to follow up on a job and make sure you receive a payment, rather than letting it drag on.

With a mobile app, your whole business is made mobile, allowing you to bring all your job tools with you in the field.

Instant card payments

For a long time getting paid was a complicated and difficult process that could lead to late payments and frustrated customers. Bank transfers in particular appear clunky and unprofessional.

With the latest quoting software the service industry is catching up. Payaca’s quoting software is a great example. They provide the ability to offer instant payments that are integrated directly into the quote.

Customers can easily input their card details and make payments directly from the quote or invoice, simply by clicking the pay button at the bottom of the page. Customers can even use google or apple pay, making the payment experience very simple for customers

The whole process is automatically tracked and recorded so that you know that the payment is made and an automatic receipt is sent to the customer to record the sale.

This ability to provide payment capabilities that match the experiences customers are used to when interacting with other industries is incredibly valuable. By using this feature, customer satisfaction is raised while you benefit from more reliable and timely payments.

Final thoughts

Upgrading to tquoting oftware will have a substantial impact on how you run your service business, making it more efficient than ever before.

In this blog, we have outlined six of the best features available to you and some of the positive impacts they can have. However, the benefits of using the right quoting software far exceed the 6 features we have covered in this post.

If you are interested in finding out more and want to discover some of the other benefits that are available with this software, then check out the Payaca website.

Payaca is the market-leading quoting and invoicing software in the UK offering multiple features designed to make running your service business easier for you. Don’t take our word for it, have a look for yourself.

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