The customer has signed the quote. The salesperson moves the card to the "Won" column and goes to lunch. Three weeks later the installer rings from site: a pergola post is meant to stand exactly where the terrace drains. The brief doesn't mention it.
The "Won" column is fine. The salesperson earned that lunch. What isn't fine is that in made-to-order work the sale hasn't finished at that moment. The customer didn't buy something off a shelf. They bought a promise that what's in the quote will one day stand on their terrace.
The sales process of a made-to-order manufacturer has six phases: enquiry, brief, indicative quote, site survey, firm quote with order, and production with installation. The signature only comes in the fifth. The process ends at installation, and each phase has to hand the same brief to the next.
What a process that stops at the "Won" column costs
When a firm's sale stops at the signature, the rest of the job has no owner. It shows in these places:
- The survey changes the price after signing. The customer signed a quote from an e-mail, the technician finds a wall that isn't square, and the salesperson rings about an extra charge. The customer remembers one thing: the price changed.
- Production reads what somebody wrote. "As we discussed" is not a dimension. A colleague from production asks the salesperson, who goes looking for the e-mail.
- After signing, silence. For weeks the customer doesn't know what's happening. They ring the salesperson, who is busy with new enquiries and rings production.
- Installation finds out what should have been known earlier. A narrow side gate, no power supply for the lighting, a base that won't hold the anchors. The customer doesn't pay for the second trip.
- Nobody uses the handover. A finished job is the best moment for a photo and a reference. The neighbour has been studying the new pergola over the fence since morning.
Nobody is making a mistake here. The salesperson is after a signature, production a date, the installer a finished job. Everyone does their part, and nobody stands between the parts.
Why the textbook sales process doesn't fit made-to-order
The usual sales model has these steps: prospecting, first contact, needs analysis, presenting the solution, handling objections, closing and after-sales care. For a pergola, a fence or a sauna it fails in three places:
- The customer comes to you. A pergola maker doesn't usually ring strangers. The process starts with a message saying "how much is it?", and the first job is to get dimensions out of it.
- The price has two versions. You can give an indicative one from the price list's rules, and a firm one only after the survey. Between them stands a person with a tape measure.
- The goods don't exist yet. Production starts after signing. The promise in the quote is only kept at installation.
That's why the process has six phases. Each has an output, and the next one can't start without it.
The six phases of a made-to-order sales process
1. Enquiry: what the customer wants, and where
The customer gets in touch through a form, by phone or from a configurator. The salesperson finds out which product it is and where it will stand.
Output: a contact, a product and a site.
2. Brief: dimensions you can calculate from
Model, dimensions, mounting, colour, extras and a rough budget. This is where you decide whether the job makes sense. If the budget and the brief don't meet, better to find out now than after a drive to the site.
Output: a brief a price can be calculated from.
3. Indicative quote: a number before the technician
A price from the price list's rules and a sentence on what could still change. The customer knows whether they're in the right budget, and surveys go to people who actually want one. How to prepare it without a wait is covered in How to cut quote turnaround time.
Output: an indicative price and a list of what the survey has to check.
4. Site survey: the brief meets the site
The technician checks dimensions, base, wall, access and connections. Every change against the brief is recorded on the job. Nobody in production opens the notebook in the van.
Output: verified dimensions, site photos and a list of changes.
5. Firm quote and order: this is where it's signed
The price after the survey, validity, the date and what the price leaves out. The customer signs exactly what will be made. The brief is locked here, and any later change is an addendum with a new price and date.
Output: a confirmed brief and a date.
6. Production and installation: this is where the sale ends
Production gets a brief it can read without the salesperson. What belongs in it is described in A bill of materials isn't extra work. The customer knows the date without ringing, and the installer knows what needs to be in the van. At handover the customer confirms the finished work, and the firm asks for a photo and a reference.
Output: a job handed over and a reference.
Where a configurator helps and where a CRM does
Phases 1 to 3 can be shortened. The customer enters dimensions and options in the configurator themselves, the configurator checks the rules within the agreed scope and calculates the price from your price list. The enquiry and the brief are created together. If you show the price, an indicative figure comes with them.
A configurator doesn't replace the survey. Somebody has to see the terrace's fall and the state of the wall on site.
Phases 4 to 6 depend on whether the brief stays in one place. A configuration can be saved to treede CRM with the specification, the contact and a link to the design. During implementation, we set up which fields the site survey fills in, and we confirm other fields and steps at deployment. What that record should hold is covered in CRM for made-to-order manufacturers. If you already have a CRM or ERP, we design the integration individually around its interface.
Four numbers that show where the process leaks
Your own figures from recent jobs are enough, with no outside average:
- Time from enquiry to indicative quote. It shows how long the customer waits for a first number.
- Share of surveys that end in an order. A low share means the technician is visiting people who don't yet know the price.
- Gap between the indicative and the firm price. A wide gap means the price list's rules don't cover what's found on site.
- Number of second trips to installation. Each one is a question that should have been asked at the survey.
When to skip the six phases
Not every firm needs them. In these situations a simpler routine is fine:
- You sell ready-made models with no custom dimensions. There's nothing to measure, and the firm price is the list price. An order is enough.
- One person sells, measures and installs. The brief has nowhere to get lost, because nobody hands it to anybody. Written phases would only be extra paper.
- You receive the brief finished by a designer. On supplies to building firms and in public tenders, the customer sets the routine and somebody else does the first phases.
If you didn't recognise yourself in any of these, carry on.
A five-minute test: where jobs get lost
Open your last finished job and answer four questions:
- Can you say which phase every open job is in? If it takes a phone call to find out, the phases live in people's heads.
- Can production read the brief without the salesperson? If not, the brief lives in their inbox.
- Does the invoice differ from the first quote, and do you know why? If nobody can explain it, the survey has nowhere to write.
- Who answers the customer after signing? If the answer is "everybody", nobody does.
The first step takes five minutes and doesn't need us: write down the six phases and, beside each one, who is responsible for it. A blank line is where your jobs get lost.
What the survey checks for each product
The phases stay the same. What has to be seen on site changes:
- Pergolas and shelters: wall or freestanding, base, anchoring, drainage and power for lighting.
- Fences and gates: plot boundaries, the fall of the ground, corners and the place for the gate.
- Verandas and conservatories: the house wall, height under the windows, base and drainage.
- Garden buildings and saunas: foundations, delivery access and connections.
- Windows, doors and shading: the opening, the reveals and the controls.
The full list of 305 product types is in the configurator catalogue.
What it looks like in practice
For Moja Pergola the configuration passes from the configurator into the CRM, where the team prepares quotes and manages every deal. The system now brings in hundreds of enquiries a month, and 16% of them became installations. That is the result of the whole path, not of the configurator alone.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a sales process and a sales pipeline?
The process is the routine: the same phases for every job. The pipeline is the state: how many jobs are in which phase right now. A pipeline with no written process shows columns that mean something different to each person.
When should you ask for a deposit?
Usually at the order, after the survey and before production. The brief is confirmed at that point and you're starting to buy material. The amount is your firm's commercial decision.
Do you need a CRM for a sales process?
Not always. With a few jobs a month, a spreadsheet with six columns is enough. A CRM starts to make sense when several people hand jobs to each other and the brief has to be searchable.
What now
And the "Won" column? Keep it. Just move it past installation. The salesperson can still have lunch before that.
If your brief gets lost between phases, start where it's created. See what a configurator with treede CRM costs.
