Quote tracking

How do you keep an Excel quote tracker without filling it in by hand?

To keep an Excel quote tracker without filling it in by hand, connect the workbook stored in OneDrive to a Muzau agent. Before each round of follow-ups, it rereads the workbook, follows up one by one on quotes that got no reply, and dates its tracking in a column of its own, without touching yours. It stops as soon as the customer replies or your team marks the quote "Signed". Each follow-up can wait for your approval.

Why a quote tracker is hard to keep by hand

The tracker starts out clean: a number, a customer, an amount, a sent date, a status. Then you have to keep it up: note each follow-up and its date, switch the status to "Signed" the day the customer accepts. These chores come after the meetings, and the tracker ends up telling you which quotes went out, without telling you which ones are waiting for a follow-up.

The quotes that slip are often the ones sent on a busy day. Your team keeps the negotiation, the price and the decision; the one-by-one follow-ups and their trace on each row, the agent takes on.

How the agent goes about it

Input

Your quote tracker: an Excel workbook in OneDrive, a Google Sheet, or an uploaded .xlsx

It does

Rereads the connected workbook before each round, follows up one by one on open quotes, stops at the reply or the "Signed" status

It delivers

A "Muzau follow-up" column where each quote carries the agent's last action, dated

The Excel workbook in OneDrive is reread before each round of follow-ups

An Excel workbook stored in OneDrive connects like a Google Sheet: Muzau rereads it before each round of follow-ups, and a quote added or a status changed is picked up on the next one, with nothing to re-import. An uploaded .xlsx stays a copy. The settings shared by all files (connected or uploaded workbook, drip-feed arrival, green light) are described in customer tracking in Excel.

The tracking is written in a "Muzau follow-up" column

After each round, the agent writes its last action on the quote's row, followed by its date: "message 2 sent", "follow-ups stopped". It writes in a column reserved for it, "Muzau follow-up", and touches none of your columns. To find the right row, it needs a stable reference column, the quote number, and permission to write in the workbook: without them, it writes nothing there.

A signed or accepted quote is no longer followed up

The status stays your column, and the workbook is the source of truth. When someone writes "signed", "accepted" or "won" in it, the row moves to "Settled / accepted" and nothing is followed up any more, no more than on a lost row. "Not signed" stays open, and an unrecognised word leaves the row tracked. Follow-ups also stop as soon as the customer replies, when someone on the team writes to them from the connected inbox, or when they ask not to be contacted.

Quote follow-ups go out at the pace you set

By default, the agent sends a single follow-up, at D+1; when you create the agent, you say how many and on which days, for example D+1, D+4 then D+8. You read each planned follow-up in Manage before it goes out.

The columns and formulas of a quote tracker

With or without an agent, a quote tracker is there to tell you each morning which quote to follow up and which one is settled. One sheet, one row per quote, never one row per customer, and these columns:

• The quote number, unique and never edited: it is what finds the row without error.
• The customer, and the email address of the person who signs, not only the one who asked for the quote.
• The amount excluding tax, in a number cell.
• The sent date and the expiry date, in real date cells: following up before the quote expires gives you a reason to write.
• The status, chosen from a dropdown list: "Sent", "Signed", "Lost". A cell colour cannot be read in a formula. The status says where the customer stands, not what you have done: "followed up" is noted elsewhere.
• For a lost quote, the reason in one word: price, timing, no response. Over time, this column tells you what makes you lose.

TODAY() minus the sent date gives the days elapsed, and conditional formatting highlights the "Sent" quotes older than a week. SUMIF on the status gives the amount pending, COUNTIF on "Signed" the number of quotes won. For the text of each follow-up, see how to follow up on a quote. If it is entering new quotes that is the sticking point, the agent can track them from the copy of their sending: see quotes from the whole team.

What it does not do

• It does not write the status in your workbook: when a quote is signed, someone on the team marks it in the status column, and the workbook is the source of truth.
• It keeps only its last action on each row, dated, not the whole history of follow-ups.
• It calculates neither conversion rate nor signed revenue: those totals stay in your tracker's formulas.

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free Excel quote tracker template?

An empty table is enough, with no template to download: one row per quote, with the number, the customer, the email address of the person who signs, the amount excluding tax, the sent date and a status chosen from a dropdown list. Format the range as a table (Insert, then Table) so that filters and formulas follow new rows.

Excel or Google Sheets: which one to choose for tracking quotes?

Both work, as long as the file is shared online, in OneDrive or Google Drive, and the whole team keeps the same one, not a copy sent by email. A Muzau agent rereads either one before each round of follow-ups; only an uploaded .xlsx stays a copy that does not update by itself.

Which statuses should you use in a quote tracker?

Three statuses are usually enough: "Sent", "Signed" and "Lost", chosen from a dropdown list (Data, then Data Validation) so that everyone writes the same word. A Muzau agent tracking the sheet no longer follows up a "Signed" or "Lost" quote, and a "Sent" quote stays tracked.

How do you track a quote without entering it in a spreadsheet?

Copy the Muzau agent's address on the email that sends the quote, from a company address. It opens a row in its own tracking file (date, customer, subject), sending nothing to anyone, then follows up with the customer if they do not reply. That file can be copied into a Google Sheet or downloaded from its page.

How do you calculate the quote conversion rate in Excel?

Divide the number of signed quotes by the number of quotes that reached a decision over the same period: COUNTIF on "Signed", divided by the sum of COUNTIF on "Signed" and COUNTIF on "Lost". Leave out the quotes still "Sent", otherwise the rate drops with every new quote sent.