“The people are the best thing about working at Qorus,” is a typical expression of employees working at Qorus Software, and a sentiment resonated by customers as well. This is what helped Qorus become the 2017 Microsoft Partner of the Year for Customer Experience.
Since its inception back in 2012, Qorus has been helping organizations create business critical documents more efficiently and accurately. Its software is incredibly powerful, but highly intuitive and easy-to-use. With Qorus, even the most non-technical of users can quickly create accurate, personalized and compliant documents like proposals, contracts, RFPs, pitches, and reports. This Bellevue, Washington based company runs on Microsoft Azure and integrates with Microsoft Office and Office 365 to enhance document productivity. Its award-winning Customer Success team ensures that customers, across all industries, get optimum value from its software.
A Young Entrepreneur Focused Primarily on Customer Satisfaction
The company’s CEO, Ray Meiring, along with two other technology consultants, Lee Child and Stephanie Laurent, were helping a large retailer in Cape Town, South Africa create a system for generating contracts when they saw an opportunity. All companies need to generate documents such as contracts, statements of work, pitches, and proposals. The trio decided to create a software solution that would automate the generation of these documents, and subsequently Qorus was founded.
Over the years, the founders have led Qorus from the front while creating and refining solutions that accelerate the process of creating these business critical documents. Today, Qorus is a global provider of proposal management and document automation software, making sure that your best content is only a click away.
When a Client Proved to be an Inspiration for the Foundation
Ray got his start in tech at a young age. At 11, he was programming computers, and by the time he was in college, he had already completed several tech projects for small companies in Cape Town, South Africa. Passionate about both tech and business, Ray founded his first software development company, Relate Technologies, in 2004.
Ray’s “a-ha” moment didn’t come until 2008, however, when a client came to him with a problem. The client was looking to create a high volume of loan contracts, but the only software available to help with that at the time was outside the client’s budget. “We said we’d build (the software), but we wanted to build it as a project,” Ray recalls. “We wanted to build it and own it.” What Ray and his team ultimately created was the first version of what would become Qorus.
“Cloud technology has been around for many years now, yet the transformational journey to cloud computing and the commercial models that support it is still ongoing. For product companies that were not “born in the cloud” this is a challenging journey that impacts all functions in the company. Qorus has had a great journey so far, adopting a SaaS approach back in 2012. We’ve transformed our company and are now in the position to expand with products, like our Qorus app for Office 365. It can be tricky to navigate this new territory, but we’ve done well with the help of Microsoft and other partners,” Ray adds.
An Employee-Driven Organization
Every Friday afternoon, everyone heads up to the canteen to sample some of Cape Town’s finest craft beers, play a game of pool, and watch cricket. Together, they dial in to catch the frequently organized global stand-ups with colleagues in the US and UK. Besides the above, regular social gatherings like pub quizzes, breakfasts, charity drives, theatre and movie nights, and weekend hikes, are arranged every once in a while.
Geared towards Helping Customers Get Maximum Value
Among the many things that make Qorus unique, its biggest differentiator is its focus on the customer experience. The company’s entire business is geared towards helping customers get maximum value from its solutions. The company’s Customer Success and Support teams always receive positive feedback, and they have won a number of awards, including the Microsoft 2017 Partner of the Year Award for Customer Experience.
“Bootstrap your genesis, get to market as quickly as possible, iterate with your early customers and then expand through aggressive marketing and sales techniques. Once you are convinced that you have a valuable product, move forward decisively,” Ray advises young entrepreneurs.
Expanding Products with a Growing Client Base
Looking ahead, Qorus has big plans to execute. Its products are expanding along with its client base, which is growing rapidly. Qorus will continue to work closely with Microsoft as it helps organizations be more productive by putting their best content at their employees’ fingertips.
“We will continue to grow our relationship with Microsoft, getting input and advice from their development team, sharing knowledge with the partner marketing and influencer community, and aligning future platform development and APIs even more closely with Microsoft technology,” Ray concludes.