Creating an offer

QuoteNode’s offer creator is more than a form with line items. It is the operational center where customer context, catalog pricing, template choices, shipping, and sharing all come together.

This guide explains the actual workflow supported by the application today.

Start with the right entry point

There are two common ways to begin:

• start a new draft from Offers,
• start from a selected price-list workflow when you already know the pricing context.

The second path matters because QuoteNode can preserve catalog context when a quote is created from a price-list surface. That reduces context switching and keeps the commercial scope clearer from the first step.

Step 1 - Choose the audience

The creator supports more than a simple “pick one customer” model.

You can prepare an offer for:

• a specific existing customer,
• a newly created customer added inline,
• an open audience workflow when the offer is not tied to a single customer at draft time.

For customer-targeted offers, QuoteNode lets you search by company, contact, or tax identifiers. If needed, you can also add the customer without leaving the offer flow.

Step 2 - Select the contact and validity

Once the customer is selected, choose the contact person that should appear in the commercial context of the offer.

This is useful when:

• the company has multiple stakeholders,
• a sales representative wants the document addressed correctly,
• the public link and email should clearly match the intended recipient.

At this stage you also set:

• validity date,
• internal notes that stay inside the team.

Internal notes are not customer-facing. They do not appear in emails, PDFs, or public links.

Step 3 - Set commercial defaults for the draft

Before adding items, configure the commercial baseline of the document.

QuoteNode supports:

• offer currency,
• price display mode,
• global percentage discount or fixed discount amount,
• template family selection,
• shipping approach.

This matters because QuoteNode is not just collecting item rows. It is preparing a client-facing commercial artifact that may need a different price mode, a different template family, or a different shipping policy than the workspace default.

Step 4 - Add items from the catalog

For most offers, the core of the document comes from the product catalog.

When you add a catalog product, QuoteNode can pull in:

• product name,
• SKU,
• description,
• unit,
• VAT context,
• images where configured,
• pricing already adjusted by catalog and customer logic.

If the draft was started from a price-list context, that commercial scope can stay visible inside the creator.

Step 5 - Add custom items when needed

Not every quote line belongs to the reusable catalog.

QuoteNode supports custom items for:

• one-off services,
• temporary deliverables,
• bespoke work,
• commercially unique line items that should not become standard products.

This lets the team stay inside one draft workflow without forcing catalog cleanup first.

Step 6 - Add bundles for recurring packages

QuoteNode also supports bundles.

Bundles are useful when a recurring commercial package should add several products in one step. Instead of searching and inserting each component manually, the operator can resolve the bundle and add its items into the draft together.

This is especially useful for starter packs, standard service packages, or frequently repeated combinations of hardware and service lines.

Step 7 - Organize the quote with sections

Offers can be structured into sections rather than shown as one flat item list.

This is useful for:

• separating equipment from services,
• splitting implementation from recurring support,
• grouping optional items or add-ons,
• keeping longer technical quotes readable.

Sections also help later because they shape how the customer experiences the document in PDFs and public-link views.

Step 8 - Review totals, discounts, and shipping

QuoteNode supports both line-level and draft-level commercial adjustments.

During review, the operator can work with:

• line quantity and overrides,
• line discounts,
• global draft discount,
• shipping policy,
• calculated shipping options for saved drafts.

Shipping is not treated as an afterthought. The product supports both starter delivery policies and calculated options when item data allows it.

Step 9 - Save, preview, and prepare customer-facing output

After the draft is commercially correct, save it and move into the customer-facing preparation flow.

From there, QuoteNode supports:

• PDF generation,
• public-link generation,
• in-app email sending when SMTP is configured.

The template family and document settings chosen earlier now matter because they directly affect what the customer sees.

Public links and no-email mode

QuoteNode can work even when workspace email delivery is intentionally disabled.

In that mode, the operator can still:

• generate a public link,
• generate a PDF,
• copy ready-to-share content,
• mark the offer as sent only when it has actually been shared outside the app.

This is important for teams that need quoting workflows before SMTP is approved or that prefer sharing offers through other channels.

What happens when the offer is sent

Once an offer is sent, QuoteNode creates an immutable snapshot of the document state used for client-facing output and lifecycle tracking.

That snapshot preserves what was actually offered at that moment, including pricing and presentation context. It is the basis for later PDF rendering, auditability, and offer lifecycle history.

Reuse workflows after the first draft

Offer creation does not stop at “new draft”.

QuoteNode also supports reuse patterns such as:

• clone,
• use as template,
• extend validity through a new draft,
• renew from the current catalog,
• resolve renewal conflicts when a previously quoted catalog item is no longer safely renewable.

These flows matter because repeat quoting is usually where real operational speed is gained.

Related articles

• Managing price lists
• Editing offer templates
• How public offer links work
• Offer Lifecycle