First of all, what is the meaning of a Sales Pipeline? Widely proven as a best practice, it provides a current overview of sales activities. The sales manager monitors developments in the sales processes and, with the right analyses, coaches each salesperson effectively. The salesperson can immediately see the current sales processes and opportunities - without investing a lot of time in entering information into a system.
In this challenging period, it's indispensable: the sales funnel demands the utmost in proper management.
Who wouldn't want this: a clear view of the progress of acquisition and sales opportunities, or which competitors you're losing orders to? For staff planning, production, or inventory management, it's important to make an up-to-date estimate of expected orders. Post-sales actions can be more efficient, and the (new) customer is served exactly according to the agreement. Due to the clarity about which sales process has dropped out and when, the sales manager creates an overview of the stages for each salesperson: When does the salesperson lose orders? Based on this, targeted coaching is provided to improve order opportunities.
Sales Improvement Group achieved effective change at Van Tongeren-Kennemer. With the use and development of various tools such as a strengths and weaknesses analysis, market descriptions, process and job descriptions, and pipeline management. At Animo Coffee Machines, sales revenue increased after Sales Improvement Group implemented a Sales Pipeline Management system. Sales employees and managers gained insight into the sales process and subsequently worked on improvement.
A Sales Pipeline provides targeted information and leads to more orders. Many organizations have invested in a CRM package or even more extensive software applications. If properly configured, they provide insight into the Sales Pipeline. However, investing in large systems is not necessary.
Implementation can be done with simple software programs like Excel. Initially, an overview of the number of called prospects, first appointments, product presentations, quotes, closing discussions, and orders is sufficient.
Later, this can be refined or expanded to include customer types, types of products or services, and lead times for processes. With a good system, the right analyses can be quickly performed: how many percent of sales processes drop out after the quote? How does this percentage compare to the results of colleagues? Which ones drop out: the smaller ones, the larger ones, or are there other characteristics? Together with their coach or sales manager, the salesperson works on improving skills and percentages.
A salesperson now completes more sales processes with a good result. In addition, the coach or sales manager provides the right tools or skills for a specific stage in the sales process. All parties are more focused on improving sales results, and the funnel is directly measurable for optimization. Or, as one customer said after setting up a Sales Pipeline system: "My salespeople are really focused on their sales processes and ask for support to improve results. With fewer prospects, we get more orders. And we are crisis-resistant."
Yes, I want to know more about how Sales Improvement Group can help me improve the sales results of my organization.
