Sales Prospects vs. Opportunities

“What I really count on and what I project on my pipeline report are two different things.”

“What do they want me to do? Sell or enter data into a report?”
Have you heard these excuses from your salespeople? How about this line from managers: “I take the team’s pipeline report and select out what I really think will close and use that as my forecast.” In order to build a successful deal flow, sales managers should track early stages of sales opportunities as well as your sales people’s prospects who are likely to close soon.
1. Track all activities
While closing a sale is of paramount importance, it takes very little of the salesperson’s time compared to the time needed to find the right people (decision makers, influencers, etc) and their accurate contact details. Yet, typical pipeline reports only have fields for closing, presenting, etc and no fields for prospecting, networking, lead generation, etc. In addition, have your salespeople track the earlier stages of the sales process for key targeted accounts. This way you both know where each prospect stands, even if they are still at the earliest stages of the sales cycle. Tracking the names of target companies, the name (and contact details) of the decision maker(s), and if and when your salesperson made contact, you will be able to help your sales people build a better pipeline. Tracking a salesperson’s ability to reach and qualify these decision makers and begin, grow and maintain a relationship with them is an essential diagnostic for sales managers. With this information, the manager can provide relevant marketing support, training, mentoring and other forms of help.

2. Keep your pipeline objective.

Sales prospects should be categorized so that you can see (A) who your sales people recently met but not yet presented, (B) who they are scheduled to present to and (C) who they have recently presented and are now awaiting a decision. After one sales cycle, downgrade prospects that have not moved up in category to an earlier stage. For example, if a sales person presented, but hasn’t closed the sale in one sales cycle, downgrade that prospect to category B. If prospects do not advance from category A, call them “opportunities” instead of prospects to reflect the sales efforts, but recognize that since they have not yet moved forward they are likely not ready to buy.

3. Identify what changed from last week.

Indicate what prospects have been added or moved within the last week. This will help you clearly separate new items as well as items that are one week away from “aging out” of its particular category. Without the attention to time in the pipeline, prospects may never leave a category. Instead, the pipeline keeps growing, and the revenue totals keep getting bigger and the forecasts become increasingly inaccurate.