Manage your sales pipeline better to build your business

Manage your sales pipeline better to build your business

From the time a business acquires a lead, up until they close a deal - either won or lost, it is essential that they keep track of all the stages within the sales pipeline and ensure a smooth flow between them.

So what is this Sales Pipeline?
It is nothing but a systematic method that one follows to navigate between multiple stages through which a sales prospect goes - from becoming a lead to becoming a customer - and a sales pipeline helps you determine where exactly your opportunities are. Besides, it also outlines the actions that you need to perform in order to convert a prospect into a customer.

Stages in a Sales Pipeline?

There are multiple stages every sales team has, including tasks such as gathering leads and qualifying them:

1. Prospecting
It is the process by which companies attract prospects into their customer database in the hope of nurturing them through a sales process and converting them into customers. They therefore make effort to generate an interest in the prospects towards their products and services. There are various sources through which you can generate leads. Some of them include trade shows, email campaigns, social media, webforms, etc.

2. Nurturing and Qualifying
Once you have generated prospects, you will need to ensure that they are the right fit for your business. Therefore, you will need to qualify them and manage them. This is a crucial step in a sales process as it helps you prioritise the promising leads and keep them at the top of your to-do list.
3. Set Meetings and define prospect's needs
Now, in order to get to know your prospects better, or in other words, understand their requirements, better, you need to set up a meeting with them. After interacting with them on several occasions, you need to tailor your proposal to address their needs. So basically, it is crucial that you articulate how your products or services can help solve their problems.

4. Negotiate and close deal
You have done your job of understanding your prospect's needs and built a solid relationship with them. While some may be ready to purchase your products or services, in the case of other prospects, you may have to address further concerns - all of which will eventually help you provide your customers with exactly what they are looking for. After these terms and conditions are finalized, you will be in a position to close the deal - either in success or otherwise.

While most companies differ in terms of their method for follow-up, and stages in the sales pipeline. the top-level stages continue to remain the same for all.
They are:
  • Prospecting
  • Qualification
  • Proposal 
  • Closing
Benefits of a Sales Pipeline

1. Get a better understanding of the sales process
2. More efficient sales strategy
3. A better understanding of the position of each lead in the sales funnel
4. Less time spent in closing deals.

Manage your Sales Pipeline with Zoho CRM

Now that you have understood the concept of a sales pipeline and its stages, imagine managing the same without a central process in place. Defining the stages in the sales pipeline and tracking the progress in the sales process could be extremely challenging. With the help of a software like Zoho CRM, therefore, you can:
  1. Define stages in a sales pipeline
    It is crucial to define the stages in your sales pipeline early on in order to have a strong sales process as sales reps in your company will know in advance what is expected of them in order to take the lead forward through the sales pipeline and finally close the deal. This can be achieved by customising/adding values in stage field within the Deals module in Zoho CRM. For instance, imagine you run a magazine publication. You do not require some of the default values within the stage field, such as Value Proposition or Proposal. You can therefore customise or delete these fields to meet your requirements.

  2. Track your deals
    It is crucial to track your deals to get an idea of the entire progress of your deal and avoid any further errors and make better decisions in terms of your way forward. Also, it is crucial to keep track of all updates in order to avoid missing out on any vital information.

    a) Historical analysis will help you avoid repeating mistakes that may have caused you to lose deals in the past. Therefore analysing your sales stage history in Zoho CRM is crucial as it will give you the number of potentials in each stage for a specific time period.

    b) Another method of tracking your sales pipeline within Zoho CRM is by creating reports and dashboards. You will be able to track your sales trends, marketing campaigns, team performance, etc. with the help of these reports.

    c) With multiple deals within your software, trying to view each of them to determine their status could prove to be quite taxing. However, within Zoho CRM, you can view your deals in a single view with the help of kanban view. It will display the data in an organised manner.

  3. Identify priority deals to focus on

    a) If you want to locate deals that are priority (for instance, deals that are closing this month), you can use advanced filters, which is a powerful search tool that can help you extract necessary information in no time. In this case, therefore, you will be able to quickly locate deals that fit your criteria (deals that are priority) and then you can immediately follow-up on them.

    b) On the other hand, if you want the system to suggest deals that you need to prioritise, you can use Zia, Zoho CRM's data intelligence tool. Based on the trend, she will predict for you those deals that are most likely to be won. This will give you a better understanding of what to focus on. In fact, she will create a view - breaking up your deals into those which are likely to be won, lost, or those which could go either way. This will help you shift your focus onto those deals that require your attention. 

    What are your thoughts on effective sales follow up? Share your questions and opinions by commenting below. Also, feel free to suggest topics for discussion in the CRM Admins Chat Room. 


    Access your files securely from anywhere



      Zoho Campaigns Resources

            Zoho Developer Community

                Bootcamp
                Community
                Pricing
                Webinars
                What's New
                Integrations
                Contact Support
                Contact Sales

                  Zoho Survey Resources
                    Features
                    Survey Templates
                    Integrations
                    Community
                    iOS Mobile Surveys
                    Pricing
                    Android Mobile Surveys
                    Insurvey Blogs
                    Insight Blogs
                    Tips & Tricks






                                  Latest Feature Updates


                                      Zoho Desk Resources

                                      • Desk Community Learning Series


                                      • Digest


                                      • Functions


                                      • Meetups


                                      • Kbase


                                      • Resources


                                      • Glossary


                                      • Desk Marketplace


                                      • MVP Corner


                                      • Word of the Day




                                          Zoho Marketing Automation
                                            Zoho SalesIQ Resources


                                                  Manage your brands on social media
                                                  Access Zoho Social

                                                    Zoho Pagesense Resources


                                                        Zoho TeamInbox Resources

                                                          Zoho DataPrep Resources



                                                            Zoho CRM Plus Resources

                                                              Zoho Books Resources


                                                                Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                                                                  Zoho Projects Resources


                                                                    Zoho Sprints Resources


                                                                      Qntrl Resources


                                                                        Zoho Creator Resources



                                                                            Zoho CRM Resources

                                                                            • CRM Community Learning Series

                                                                              CRM Community Learning Series


                                                                            • Kaizen

                                                                              Kaizen

                                                                            • Functions

                                                                              Functions

                                                                            • Meetups

                                                                              Meetups

                                                                            • Kbase

                                                                              Kbase

                                                                            • Resources

                                                                              Resources

                                                                            • Digest

                                                                              Digest

                                                                            • CRM Marketplace

                                                                              CRM Marketplace

                                                                            • MVP Corner

                                                                              MVP Corner





                                                                                Design. Discuss. Deliver.

                                                                                Create visually engaging stories with Zoho Show.

                                                                                Get Started Now


                                                                                  Zoho Show Resources


                                                                                    Zoho Writer Writer

                                                                                    Get Started. Write Away!

                                                                                    Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                                                                                      Zoho CRM コンテンツ






                                                                                        Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


                                                                                            ご検討中の方





                                                                                                  • Recent Topics

                                                                                                  • Fixed asset management

                                                                                                    I want to know if there is any individual module for fixed assets management

                                                                                                  • Input GST Reversal for damaged goods

                                                                                                    In our line of business, some items are damaged and we are doing inventory adjustments to remove them from stock. However, as per GST guidelines, there is a specific rule that we have to reverse Input GST availed for such items and needs to be reported

                                                                                                  • Introducing Record Summary: smarter insights at your fingertips

                                                                                                    Hello everyone, Building on the recent launch of Zoho's in-house Zia Large Language Model (Zia LLM)—a major milestone in Zoho CRM’s AI capabilities—we’re excited to introduce the Record Summary feature. This powerful addition makes use of Zia LLM to simplify

                                                                                                  • No longer get Cliq notifications on phone if app not started

                                                                                                    On Android, I used to get notifications on my phone whether I was in the app, or it was started. Then about a month ago, I stopped seeing notifications on my phone UNLESS I had already started the app. So if I reboot my phone, and never start the app,

                                                                                                  • Error AS101 when adding new email alias

                                                                                                    Hi, I am trying to add apple@(mydomain).com The error AS101 is shown while I try to add the alias.

                                                                                                  • Deluge script to add Mail Task

                                                                                                    Has anyone out there created a custom function to create a Zoho Mail task? I'd be interested in hearing how you accomplished it. Sample code is appreciated!

                                                                                                  • Tags with Zapier

                                                                                                    Maybe I'm missing something....I hope so... Using tags for triggers is a key need.  This prevents us from having a ton of different lists. I am trying to find out how to add a tag using zapier when someone makes a purchase....but it doesn't seem to be

                                                                                                  • Send Supervisor Rule Emails Within Ticket Context in Zoho Desk

                                                                                                    Dear Zoho Desk Team, I hope this message finds you well. Currently, emails sent via Supervisor Rules in Zoho Desk are sent outside of the ticket context. As a result, if a client replies to such emails, their response creates a new ticket instead of appending

                                                                                                  • How to apply blueprint on tickets that created from IM module

                                                                                                    Hello, I have an issue applying blueprint on tickets that created from WhatsApp conversation, the tickets matches with the blueprint criteria but still we are not able to put these tickets into the blueprint. I've tried with deferent type of tickets and

                                                                                                  • Function #4: Schedule Customer Statements

                                                                                                    Regularly sending statements to customers is an imperative part of many business processes as it helps foster strong customer relationships and provides timely guidance on payments. While you can generate the statement of accounts and have it sent over

                                                                                                  • Zoho Mail POP & IMAP Server Details

                                                                                                    Hello all! We have been receiving a number of requests regarding the errors while configuring or using Zoho Mail account in POP/ IMAP clients. The server details vary based on your account type and the Datacenter in which your account is setup. Ensure

                                                                                                  • Remove 30-Day Client Reply Restriction on Supervisor Rules in Zoho Desk

                                                                                                    Dear Zoho Desk Team, I hope you're doing well. Currently, Supervisor Rules in Zoho Desk run once every hour but only apply to tickets that have received a customer response within the past 30 days. This restriction creates challenges for us, as we have

                                                                                                  • Paid Support Plans with Automated Billing

                                                                                                    We (like many others, I'm sure) are designing or have paid support plans. Our design involves a given number of support hours in each plan. Here are my questions: 1) Are there any plans to add time-based plans in the Zoho Desk Support Plans feature? The

                                                                                                  • Contacts Don't Always Populate

                                                                                                    I've noticed that some contacts can easily be added to an email when I type their name. Other times, a contact doesn't appear even though I KNOW it is in my contact list. It is possible the ones I loaded from a spreadsheet are not an issue and the ones

                                                                                                  • How to get NSE/BSE Stock Prices in Zoho sheets?

                                                                                                    I've been looking for a function that provides me with the NSE/BSE listed stocks price in Zoho Sheets like GOOGLEFINANCE in Google sheets, but I found none. Please help if there is any way to het stock prices?

                                                                                                  • Tip #5: Setting access rights at the subfolder level

                                                                                                    Hello everyone, We hope you're finding our WorkDrive Tips and Tricks series useful. For today's tip, we'll teach you how to assign higher subfolder permissions to Team Folder members. Team Folders helps you avoid the drawbacks of traditional file sharing.

                                                                                                  • Cannot edit email text in Zoho Form rules

                                                                                                    I have a number of rules set up on a form depending on a user's submission. For some reason, I am no longer able to edit the content of the emails sent out based on those rules. I am invited to "use the advanced editor", but the original text of the email

                                                                                                  • Can multiple agents be assigned to one ticket on purpose?

                                                                                                    Is it possible to assign one ticket to two or more agents at a time? I would like the option to have multiple people working on one ticket so that the same ticket is viewable for those agents on their list of pending tickets. Is something like this currently

                                                                                                  • For security reasons your account has been blocked as you have exceeded the maximum number of requests per minute that can originate from one account.

                                                                                                    Hello Zoho Even if we open 10-15 windows in still we are getting our accounts locked with error " For security reasons your account has been blocked as you have exceeded the maximum number of requests per minute that can originate from one account. "

                                                                                                  • how can I hide this Module?

                                                                                                    Hi everyone, newbie question. how can I hide the "Sales Order" column? when I try I get this message: https://imghostr.com/86395c_p7j

                                                                                                  • Domain verification is in progress... (How long do I need to wait?)

                                                                                                    Trying to setup my first email domain by connecting with GoDaddy. Have been here for quite some time and the screen is not changing. How long should this take?Send DataSend Data

                                                                                                  • How to display profile picture for distribution list?

                                                                                                    I am Admin of a Zoho Mail server and we have distribution lists along with user accounts. I am able to set Profile picture for the users and it shows when the email is sent to another companies. The members of the groups can also send email from those

                                                                                                  • Mail Search Not Working

                                                                                                    Hello, Mail search is not working at all. I've tried Chrome and Mozilla. I can try and search for an exact term, or even an email that is 1st in my email list. All search does is sit and spin, or it comes up with no results. I've also tried it on my android

                                                                                                  • Password should not contain sequential characters

                                                                                                    How can I avoid this? How do I even disable it. On my password policy page, it's all blank, so I don't know why I'm even getting this error now.

                                                                                                  • Same phone number for more than one account.

                                                                                                    Hi there, I am a webdeveloper specialising in providing websites, webhosting and email solutions for my customers. I have signed up a number of my customers to Zoho Mail in the past, and a couple of these have grown into a paid package for Zoho CRM. As

                                                                                                  • Is there a live chat for Zoho mail?

                                                                                                    I am having a problem in Zoho mail and would love to live chat with someone instead of email and wait for a response. Is there a function for this? I know there is in CRM but I can't seem to find it in mail... Thank you!

                                                                                                  • Integrating Zoho Desk Instances from two separate organizations

                                                                                                    Is it possible to integrate Zoho Desk with an instance from another organization? For example, creating a ticket in one organization can cause the creation of a ticket in the second organization? Or certain tickets from one organization be viewable by

                                                                                                  • Why does incoming mail inconsistently bounce back from Zoho mail

                                                                                                    On testing our user accounts, we are having problems where mail sent to zoho mail bounces back with errors message that 'relay access denied'. On testing from various accounts (including outlook, gmail and yahoo) mail seems to get through on some occasions

                                                                                                  • Zoho email setup in office365

                                                                                                    When i am trying to setup zoho mail setup using my domain in office365 and it is not working and it says that we couldn't log on to the incoming (IMAP) server and please check your email address and password and try again. I was able to login using my

                                                                                                  • JunkMail rejected

                                                                                                    Hello, we are facing problems sending mails. The IP has been blacklisted. Please, fix it as soon as possible. JunkMail rejected - sender4-op-o12.zoho.com [136.143.188.12]:17291 is in an RBL on rbl.websitewelcome.com, see Blocked - see http://www.spa

                                                                                                  • My emails going to spam folder for hotmail or outlook

                                                                                                    My emails (not spam mails) are going into the spam folder for my customers using hotmail. Gmail and Yahoo users are receiving the emails in their inbox. can you please solve this problem. I read few articles but coudnt find any solution to it. I am testing it by sending a simple text email no pictures nothing at all still it is filtering my emails as spam. Please help I am really loosing time and clients due to this. Thanks

                                                                                                  • Capture hotkeys inside the remote session and allow file exchange via clipboard

                                                                                                    Hi guys, assist is a really good app, and to become great it would be nice to have some features other vendors have in place and we take them for granted. For example, ScreenConnect, TeamViewer and others allow you to send hotkeys via the remote connection,

                                                                                                  • Cannot fetch url with custom extension (sigma - javascript)

                                                                                                    Hello i try to make my first extension with API request, i have two cases 1) this a deluge code attach to a button --> this one works very well response = invokeurl [ url :"my_api_fetch_url" type :GET headers:{"api_key":"myapikey","accept":"application/json","content-type":"application/json"}

                                                                                                  • how to upload the picture and document

                                                                                                    i want to upload the picture and document,would you please told how to upload them?could you told it for each step?

                                                                                                  • Forgot my email management account

                                                                                                    Hello, I am the administrator of ihomemix.com. I can’t remember which email address I used to register the account and then opened the email service for ihomemix. I can’t see the subscription period of my email function when I log in with this account.

                                                                                                  • Add customer to account based on domain name.

                                                                                                    I generate reports based on a the account field, i.e. companyX.  In GoToAssist, my last provider, there was an option to automatically assign new ticket creators to a company (or account) based on their domain name. So for example, if a new employee creates a ticket from @companyx.com, for them to be automatically added to the companyx account would be a huge advantage.  As it stands right now, I have to remember to add them to the account manually.  Often I forget and when generating a report for

                                                                                                  • Facilitate business processes by mandating Kiosks in your Blueprint's transition settings

                                                                                                    Hello everyone, We've made a few enhancements to Kiosk Studio. Blueprints provide a structured and systematic approach to executing business processes, and you can use Kiosks to build custom capabilities to retrieve, collect, and execute actions on CRM

                                                                                                  • Response Violation - Zoho Desk

                                                                                                    Hi Team, I just need an information regarding the zoho desk - Response Violation and how can we avoid the tickets from getting the tickets response violated.

                                                                                                  • I need help in setting up a script that works for my calling service

                                                                                                    Please i need your guidance and expertise in how to go about a particular scripting. You see, we are a call service that assists companies to receive calls for them, i need to create a system in my Zoho CRM whereby i will receive call from my already

                                                                                                  • Zoho CRM Customer Portal Pricing Question

                                                                                                    Hello, I am trying to find out about the pricing for a portal that will be used for the contacts and a custom module. My client needs to use a customer portal for 15k users that will display the contact details and some informations to a linked custom

                                                                                                  • Next Page