How to streamline your RFQ process in 5 steps

A practical, step-by-step guide to reducing manual work, accelerating quotation cycles, improving accuracy, and optimizing your procurement workflow for maximum efficiency and visibility.

If you feel like your RFQ process involves too many spreadsheets, too many emails, and not nearly enough sanity… you’re not alone. Procurement and supply chain teams everywhere struggle with the same thing: too many manual tasks slowing everything down. But the good news? Streamlining your RFQ workflow isn’t just possible—it’s actually pretty simple when you break it down.

Here are five practical, impactful steps to help you simplify your Request for Quotation process, improve supplier response rates, and level-up your procurement efficiency.

1. Start With a Centralized Project Hub

The RFQ process often falls apart when information lives in too many places—shared drives, personal folders, email threads, or someone’s laptop from 2014. A centralized project hub gives your team one place to manage BOMs, specs, documentation, materials, and communication.

This means:

• No more chasing files

• No more “version 19_final_FINAL.xlsx”

• Faster handoffs and fewer mistakes

A structured workspace sets the foundation for a clean, repeatable, scalable RFQ workflow.

2. Standardize Your Material Data (Your Future Self Will Thank You)

Before you send anything to suppliers, your materials list should be clean, consistent, and “RFQ-ready.” Standardizing materials dramatically reduces back-and-forth, clarifies expectations, and helps suppliers quote accurately.

To streamline this step:

Use templates for BOM uploads

Automate data extraction from PDFs and Excel files

Tag and categorize materials for easier searching

Better data going out = better quotations coming back.

3. Automate RFQ Creation & Supplier Outreach

Manually writing RFQ emails is one of the great time-sinks of procurement. Multiply that across every project and every supplier, and you’ve got enough hours wasted to power a small country.

Automated RFQ generation solves this by letting you:

Create consistent, professional RFQs instantly

Pull material data directly from your project workspace

Use AI-powered supplier recommendations

Track all requests from one dashboard

It’s faster, cleaner, and more reliable—and suppliers appreciate the clarity.

4. Let AI Handle Quotation Extraction (Seriously, Stop Copy-Pasting)

Copy-pasting pricing from PDFs and emails is not only painful—it’s prone to errors. AI-powered extraction tools can read PDFs, Excel files, and email-based quotations and convert them into clean, structured data.

This step unlocks huge efficiency gains:

• Zero transcription mistakes

• Quotes standardized for easy comparison

• Faster turnaround from quote received → quote analyzed

Suddenly, you’re spending more time evaluating quotes—not cleaning them.

5. Compare Quotations Side-by-Side & Decide with Confidence

Once your data is structured, the magic happens. Side-by-side comparison tools allow you to evaluate pricing, delivery terms, lead times, and quantity breaks at a glance.

This leads to:

• Faster decision-making

• Better cost optimization

• Clear audit trails

• Smoother supplier negotiations

Procurement becomes strategic—not administrative.

Final Thoughts

Streamlining your RFQ process isn’t about shortcuts—it’s about eliminating friction. With the right tools, automation, and structured workflow, your team can move faster, reduce errors, and make smarter sourcing decisions.

Whether you’re managing a few RFQs a month or hundreds across multiple suppliers, these five steps can transform how your procurement team operates—saving time, improving accuracy, and giving you the visibility you’ve always wanted.