Conga CPQ vs. Velocify by ICE Mortgage Technology

I think the case when I would recommend Conga CPQ is in a legacy org. In that case, the older style and configuration might be more useful, and you are less likely to find yourself forced to upgrade to lightning. If you are already using lightning, or migrating to lightning, then I would only recommend Conga CPQ if the alternative does not support the features you need.

Incentivized

Small businesses who do not need complex reporting and analytics would fit well into the Velocify model. There needs to be specific segments that appeal to this type of CRM, and the best feature is within an added layer--dialer. The ability to turn things around and contact your leads immediately was very beneficial to us, and could prove to be a boon for a small to midsize business.

• The perceived power strength is that it is supposed to contain CPQ, Contract Management, Document generation and template manipulation, and cash/invoice process all in one wrapped package.
• It was developed on the Force.com platform.
• They provide multiple releases of their product per year.

Incentivized

• The prioritized queue allows for management to set contact standards and hold users accountable. It removes all the guess work out of what lead to call next.
• The Dial IQ feature is fantastic for powering through calls and maximizing speed to contact.
• The Shotgun lead distribution puts the lead into the hand of the user that is ready and available to call that lead immediately. No handing off a lead to an originator and hoping they call. This feature allows for the system to notify multiple users simultaneously and first user to press 1 wins the lead. Talk about creating a competitive sales environment!

• Apttus has not completely transitioned from a product suite to a product platform vendor. Upgrades of certain products can have interoperability issues with other products in the Apttus stack. Our pain point here was attempting to use Apttus Xauthor for Excel to get around product line limitations in the Apttus CPQ shopping cart. The ultimate resolution was for us to upgrade and leverage the latest version of CPQ, where pricing callback limitations were addressed by client side processing, rather than the hybrid Xauthor process we tried to use.
• Upgrades in general require significant testing to ensure no unanticipated issues occur. We have a complete Salesforce sandbox dedicated to providing an environment for testing any modifications or upgrades.
• Apttus support model almost requires you to purchase premium support. Given the CPQ system is complex, the level of skilled support available through basic support require you to escalate several times before getting to a resource that can address your issue.

Incentivized

• Velocify would be well served to create a more robust email drip campaign platform.
• Velocify could revamp their dashboards and prioritized views our individuals work out of daily. It's rather overwhelming when working with a lot of leads. Adding interactive graphics - calendars, easy to view alerts, etc would be great. (Big Purple Dot does this well)

Incentivized

It is critical to our sales process. We are not satisfied with all aspects of the product and have gone through many tough experiences with their PS, support, and PD teams -- but we're not unhappy enough to re-build what we're already built

Incentivized

I am sure that we as a company are likely to continue using Velocify. I am not involved in the selection process, but I have not heard any negative feedback and switching programs would more than likely be too much work

Conga CPQ is a great tool but lacks good support and [a] very limited knowledge base which doesn't include day to day errors which users face, thus leading us to support and take more time in turn. Also cart performance can be improved drastically which will enhance the user experience as the user doesn't have to wait for the pricing.

Incentivized

Users can gain a very good understanding of the system quickly. The administrator can use terms that are familiar to their company when setting the system up. Most new administrators error to the side of complexity when setting up the system. With Velocify less is more.

I have not heard of any issue

The system is always up!!

If the system is set up correctly it will be a game changer for your organization.

Tier1/tier 2 support can only handle native functionality. Customizations have to be escalated to developers which aren’t included in the support program.

I go ahead and copy the people I directly worked with on implementation for assistance. I would rate them an 8 for support assistance.

While I didn't speak with the Support team often, they seemed very accepting and reliable. My favorite was the company emails that we would receive whenever something wasn't working correctly so that we would know that it's being worked on, providing a bit of relief to the other employees that were having trouble.

Incentivized

The in-person training if you will is done via GoToMeeting or some other service. I have been told that the moderator goes way too in-depth and too fast.

We attended 5 hours worth of webinars early on.

We had to understand how objects worked to figure out how to structure our data.

I would have liked more in-depth training but it would have been an additional cost

Velocify offers online training via videos and written descriptions of implementation procedures.

Be iterative. Take the opportunity to build a catalog based on how Apttus works well. Learn the tool yourself or use an SI. Take the time to build a configuration / pricing migration tool with X-Author for Excel or roll your own. Stick with OOTB Apttus as any customization will cost you every time a new version is released

Incentivized

If you plan to have more than 20 users on Velocify you should outsource implementation to someone that knows how the system can best be implemented for your business/process flows. If you have fewer proposed users try to use one of the canned levels.

We selected Apttus CPQ over SteelBrick due to the simplicity of SteelBrick's out of the box pricing and ability to customize quoted products. As a global organization with selling a highly configurable products, we felt the ability of Apttus to handle our requirements as standard functionalty rather than a customization was a material difference between the platforms.

Before we went with Velocify, we had Salesforce and Hobson's EMT Connect. Both of these systems were rather expensive and didn't give us exactly what we needed for lead conversion as well as the customization we desired. However, I feel that some of the reasons we went with Velocify were not exactly truthful as we found out during the implementation process or much later that there were things they said that they could do that once we started getting into the weeds with it they weren't able to execute. From a lead conversion and speed to lead standpoint, this is a good product. From a reporting and lifecycle management standpoint, this is a very poor product compared to the other two

The system is fully scaleable both vertically and horizontally across the enterprise.

• The ability to generate engineered configurations that is right by construction has reduced the cycle time of the customer engagement. The fact that we are able to guide the process and end up with a validated bill of material reduces the iterations with the customers.
• As long as the validations rules are correct the generated bill of material is accurate. We are now looking at using Apttus to perform quality checks in our product rules since the tool is able to test different configurations quickly and efficiently.
• Configuration that use to take weeks and consumed valuable engineering resources has been transformed to become a customer facing application that is simple enough for customer to self-service.

• Faster lead conversion lead us to higher potential for "first school wins" philosophy.
• Negative return on time spent maintaining Velocify. Because manual reporting was needed and much had to be done outside of the system, there was a monetary loss of time because of this.
• Predictability was near impossible for us, and the fact that we had to purchase an email automation system because Velocify did not do anything we needed was a negative ROI for our business.