Once Upon a Sales Meeting!

Once Upon a Sales Meeting!



It was an awkward silence in the meeting room "Uproar." John Kowalski, the new sales manager, was not happy with the team's performance. After scribbling something in the notepad, he decided to break the silence,

John: I cannot believe you guys have been working like this. No reports, delusional forecasting, random targets, and no eye on the ball.

Kevin: We followed Richard's orders.

John: Well, Richard is not here anymore, is he?

John walked up to the whiteboard, and wrote in big bold letters: "TARGET - $50 MILLION". He then turned around to see the poker faces of his 6-member team and asked, "Thoughts?"

Kevin: Our last year target was $15 million, and yet we missed that by 20%. This new target of $50 million is almost four times what we did last year. Do you think it is practical?

John: Kevin, we make software for salons and spas. That's a 3-billion dollar industry. I'm asking you to capture less than 2% of that industry. Now, you tell me if that is impractical.

Kristin: But John, with the same team of 6, we'd need a magic wand to achieve that target.

John: Wand, not sure. Magic, well yes. We certainly need the magic of proper planning and reporting. We need to analyze relevant data and make strategies. What does our sales pipeline look like today?

Kristin: I can quickly check the CRM and let you know.

John: Please do.

Kristin (reading from CRM): We have 135 open deals as of today.

John: And what stages are they in?

Kristin: 93 cold, and 42 hot

John: Is that it? What about more granular stages? Those in the demo stage, or proposal stage for instance?

Team looked blank. John decided to continue.

John: Anyway, can you tell me who among you has the highest probability of topping the closures this month?

Kristin: That would be Kevin.

John: Kevin, how much is in your pipeline right now?

Kevin: I am about to close a 200,000 dollar deal, and have few more follow-ups to do.

John: Could you give me your sales forecasting for this month based on conversion probability?

Kevin: Well, if you give me sometime, I could pull that for you.

John did not know how to react. Perhaps, he was expecting more numbers from a team that brought 12 million in sales the previous year.

John: It's alright, Kevin. Team, let me show you how we are going to keep track of our leads and prospective deals going forward.

John projects the following image on screen:




John (continues): We'll have five primary deal stages - New (or cold leads); Talking (or showing interest); Meeting (or Demo); Proposal (or Quote); and finally Closed Won or Lost. This is how we'll prepare our sales pipeline. We'll also map probability percentages in these five stages based on our previous record. If we capture the appropriate data into our CRM in time, we can pull other important reports as well. Let me show you another example. 



Conversion or Sales Funnel report is essential find out where our leads leak in the process, and then tighten the gap. Sales Funnel reports can also be pulled by regions, or lead owners. These are some useful metrics that we could use to streamline our approach. For instance, if we see a low conversion rate for some of you, I can work closely with you to help analyze and improve.. Any questions?

Kristin: John, few of my clients take too long to close and that affects my targets for that particular quarter. Can we also do something to reduce the conversion time?

John: That is an excellent question. It is important to learn about sales cycle time or velocity so that we can set realistic targets for everyone of you. Also, shorter sales cycles would mean more ROI for our team.

Kevin: John, I like to take time with my clients and build relationships with them. That is important because if they like the product and service, they are going to renew their subscription every month, for a longer period. 

John: That's a great point, Kevin. Thank you for bringing this up. To monitor this, let's follow two more metrics - Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR), and Customer Lifetime Value (CLV). 
John walks up to the white board and starts writing MRR formula. 

Net MRR = MRR at the beginning of the month + MRR gained from new customers for the month + MRR change gained from upgrading customers for the month - MRR change lost from downgrading customers for the month - MRR Churn from the month

John (continues): Recurring revenue is the lifeblood of any SaaS business. It’s what makes building a SaaS so appealing. You do not have to worry about one-off sales that may or may not return. If you have a solid product ,and like Kevin mentioned,, build a good relationship with clients, they automatically return for renewal. While new subscriptions validate our sales efforts, the Churn rate l lets us know where we went wrong. 

Kristin: What about Customer Lifetime Value?

John: Customer Lifetime Value is simply the total revenue we make from a single customer over the whole period of relationship with that customer. It's an important metric as it costs less to keep existing customers than it does to acquire new ones, so increasing the value of your existing customers is a great way to drive growth. Marketing team would be interested in this metric as well, as they compare this with Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC), to calculate ROI.

Understanding CLV/CAC generally helps marketers unlock additional budget for their programs. For instance, it can help them determine whether they should be allowed to spend more on acquiring larger customers who'll likely stick around longer and pay more in their lifetime. This is what an “allowable CAC” represents. Allowable CAC is the maximum acceptable amount to pay for a customer. It's essentially a cap marketing team pre-negotiate with the finance team. They can justify a higher allowable CAC if CLV is higher.

Kevin: Sorry to return to where we started, John, but how are we going to divide the 50 million dollar target among ourselves.

John: All the reports, analysis and metrics that we spoke about, will help us set our goals and targets. Let's pull out all those reports from our CRM and come back for our next meeting tomorrow. We'll sit together and work out a target sales plan for each of us according to the insights we gain from reports. Sounds good?

All: Yes John

John: Alright then, see you. Hopefully, I'd get to hear from George, Lisa, Rajesh and Peter as well tomorrow, and not just Kevin and Kristin.

Everyone laughs and leaves the room. John left with a satisfied smile, as he believed he gave his team 50-million reasons to trust the sales reports and work with a plan.

    • Sticky Posts

    • As Sales Person, Here are my New Year Resolutions. What are Yours?

      Being a salesperson, I keep learning from my mistakes and have noted a few changes that I need to make in my approach. I take these resolutions going into 2021, hoping to keep it going for as long as possible :) 1. I will not say "Yes, our product has

    • Once Upon a Sales Meeting!

      It was an awkward silence in the meeting room "Uproar." John Kowalski, the new sales manager, was not happy with the team's performance. After scribbling something in the notepad, he decided to break the silence, John: I cannot believe you guys have been working like this. No reports, delusional forecasting, random targets, and no eye on the ball. Kevin: We followed Richard's orders. John: Well, Richard is not here anymore, is he? John walked up to the whiteboard, and wrote in big bold letters: "TARGET

    Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


      • Recent Topics

      • DYK 14: Create Tasks with AI

        Did you know AI can suggest tasks within your Zoho Projects portal? Breaking a project into clear, actionable work items takes time and manual effort. Especially when the same team handles both planning and execution. AI task suggestions in Zoho Projects

      • #11 Nithya's First Overseas Client

        Nithya designs for clients in three countries and has never met any of them. Her first overseas invoice took a full evening. The second took four minutes. The difference was not a clever tax trick. She stopped treating every international customer as

      • Other languages in Schedulers (Zoho Books)

        Hello everyone, currently we have create functions in other languages, like nodejs etc but on schedulers we can use only deluge.. Are other languages on schedulers roll out? Kind regards, Sakis Oikonomou

      • New in Office Integrator: Extract data from images into your spreadsheet

        Hi users, We are pleased to introduce the Data from Picture feature in Zoho Office Integrator's spreadsheet editor. It intelligently detects and organizes text and numbers from any image into structured cells using OCR. With this feature, users can turn

      • Edit PDFs using Zoho PDF Editor

        Hello users, In a previous article, we covered the organizing capabilities of Zoho PDF Editor. Here, we'll provide a quick recap of its editing features, including a few new additions. A few highlights of Zoho PDF Editor's editing capabilities: Add and

      • Partner with HDFC And Sbi Bank.

        Hdfc and sbi both are very popular bank if zoho books become partner with this banks then many of the zoho books users will benefit premium features of partnered banks.

      • Multiple subscription plan line items in Zoho Billing quotes

        I run an IT company and sell a lot of licences. A client might have multiple subscription plans including software licences in different categories. A client might have Microsoft licences, antivirus licences, web hosting and maintenance package services.

      • Mail Merge templates in Sandbox

        Rolled out for all DCs Hello everyone, You can now create and test Mail Merge templates directly in Sandbox, making it easier to validate document generation without affecting your live organization. Why this matters Mail Merge templates are often used

      • Zoho Books | Product updates | October 2026

        Hello users, October brings a range of new features and enhancements to Zoho Books, designed to simplify compliance, streamline accounting workflows, and improve inventory management. From the launch of the Nigeria Edition and France’s e-invoicing capabilities

      • Dashboard Table of “My New Work Orders” Changes View

        Hi FSM Team, We noticed an inconsistency with the Dashboard Table of “My New Work Orders.” Initially, the table is configured to use the “My New Work Orders” view. When we go to the Home page, the table displays a different set of records. When we return

      • Tips & Tricks #6 | Zoho Vault: Audita actividad, Gestiona accesos, Comparte credenciales & mucho más.

        ¿Sabías que Zoho Vault puede hacer mucho más por la seguridad de tu equipo? Las contraseñas forman parte del día a día de cualquier persona y organización. Aplicaciones, herramientas internas, cuentas de clientes, servicios externos, plataformas de marketing,

      • Inquiry Regarding Customer Hierarchy & Sub-Customer Creation via Zoho API

        Dear Zoho Support Team, Our mutual client has requested support for implementing the Customer Hierarchy (Parent/Sub-Customer structure) within our existing workflow. At the moment, all invoices are being created in Zoho under the main (parent) customer

      • Which Zoho CRM tasks would you want an AI assistant to handle?

        I’ve started delegating my Zoho CRM work to AI – and many tasks now take me half the time. It has been so useful that we’re now working to make it available to everyone. Instead of clicking through records and tabs, I simply describe what needs to be

      • Introducing MCP for Zoho CommunitySpaces

        Hello everyone, Your AI assistant can now share the community workload with you. Zoho CommunitySpaces supports MCP (Model Context Protocol), so you can link an AI assistant like Claude, ChatGPT, or Cursor to your community and run it through plain language

      • CV-Library: The Newest Source Booster in Zoho Recruit!

        We’ve expanded your sourcing toolkit — CV-Library, one of the UK’s largest and most trusted online job boards, is now available as a Source Booster in Zoho Recruit. This gives recruiters instant access to millions of UK-based candidate profiles, all without

      • Tip 52#: Ways to improve data flexibility using related list

        A related list offers an ideal solution to string related data across entities together. It enables you to pull records from any module or external source and float them as a tab within your project, sprint, epic, work item, or release detail view layout.

      • Search is completely broken for PC

        I go to note, try to search for "mtga" and it shows 702 results (it's a big note), highlights all letters "m" and I can't find anything. Same for "gathering" - it thinkgs I think only for "g". Looking for "zoho" shows as if I searched only for "z". Using

      • Email Blast

        Hi, How do we send an email blast to thousands of customers? The email addresses are not yet saved in Zoho Desk.

      • Zoho ERP | Product updates | September 2026

        Hello users, A new month, a fresh set of updates in Zoho ERP. This month brings Netting, enhancements across our verticals, and more updates to help streamline your everyday work. Explore this month’s updates and see what’s new. Introducing Netting If

      • Introducing Zoho POS for Restaurants

        Hello Community, We’re thrilled to announce the launch of Zoho POS for Restaurants, unveiled at the 30th milestone edition of Zoholics India 2026. Running a restaurant involves multiple teams and workflows. A single table journey, from seating a guest

      • WhatsApp Business Message Pricing Update: Effective October 1, 2026

        Hi everyone, Starting October 1, 2026, Meta is updating how WhatsApp Business messages are charged. This guide explains the new per-message pricing model, how message categories work, and what changes for service messages specifically. How Meta charges

      • Zoho Calendar integration for Bigin

        Hello everyone, We're excited to introduce Zoho Calendar's integration in Bigin! For a while now, users have been able to sync events in Bigin with Google Calendar and Outlook Calendar - but with this new topping, it syncs with Zoho Calendar as well.

      • Does Updating Employee Names and Profile Pictures in Zoho One Automatically Sync Across All Zoho Applications?

        Hi Zoho Team, We are currently using Zoho One in our organization and want to centrally manage employee profile information. As a Zoho One Super Admin, if I update the employee name and profile picture for all users from the Zoho One Admin Panel, will

      • Enhanced shared mailboxes: Dedicated Sent folders, Run-through filters & fresh UI

        Hi everyone, Collaborative communication is the backbone of smooth operations; whether you are handling customer support queries, managing vendor requests, or tracking sales leads. Shared mailboxes in Zoho Mail ensure your team stays on the same page

      • How to Manage Two GST Numbers / Two Companies in a Single Zoho Inventory Organization?

        Hi Team, We currently have two separate legal entities: A Proprietorship Firm with its own GSTIN A Private Limited Company with a different GSTIN However, operationally, both companies deal with the same products, and we would like to manage the physical

      • 10/22 15時〜 オンラインもくもく会のお知らせ | Zoho ワークアウト

        ユーザーの皆さま、こんにちは。コミュニティグループの中野です。 10月22日（木）開催の「Zoho ワークアウト」をご案内します。 Zoho ワークアウトは、参加者それぞれが取り組みたいテーマを持ち寄り、ユーザー同士で交流しながら、 設定・検証・運用改善を進めるオンラインの「もくもく会」です。 「試してみたい設定があるけれど、なかなか時間を取れない」 「一人で進めていると、途中で手が止まってしまう」 「他のユーザーの活用方法や工夫を聞いてみたい」 そんな方は、Zoho ワークアウトで一緒に取り組んでみませんか？

      • Reporting tags associated to Project in Zoho books?

        Hi, I know you can add reporting tags to contact, articles and transactions. Is it possible to add reporting tags to Project. We Zoho reports I would be able to generate reports by tags. Sometimes tags for a contact is different for projects (ie Projects

      • Reporting Tags in Profit and Loss Reports Analysis

        Hello Community and Zoho Books Product Team, I would like to highlight a limitation I encountered with Reporting Tags in Zoho Books. Reporting Tags Not Applying to Automated Inventory Journal Postings from Product Invoices. For inventory product invoices,

      • Spam Quarantine: Manage suspicious emails in Zoho Mail

        When an email is quarantined by spam processing, it need not always be blocked right away. Some emails may be marked incorrectly, or may need to be reviewed before a final decision is made. The Spam Quarantine feature in the Zoho Mail Admin Console gives

      • What is the difference between "Reply" and "Public Comment" in a ticket?

        Hey, my company is thinking about switching to Zoho Desk but we do not understand the difference between the "Reply" and the "Public Comment" feature. When should we use which? And why? What is the difference between them? Thank you for your help! Kindest

      • Comments Vs. Replies

        I'm curious as to the difference between a "Reply" and a "Comment" on a ticket. It appears that "Replies" are what's used to determine response time SLA's and there are also used to automatically re-open tickets. I'm just trying to understand the key differences so I can educate both our clientele and our back-end users on which function/feature to use to better improve the ticket lifecycle. If anyone has any insight it would be appreciated. Thanks!

      • What's New in Zoho Inventory | July & August 2026

        Hello users, The July and August 2026 releases bring a range of new features and improvements across the product. From the Nigeria Edition and Super Admin enhancements to Sri Lanka IRD-compliant invoicing, Loyalty Program Management, and improvements

      • Forms data export bug

        The export csv with a password has changed for the worst. It is less secure by not allowing complex passwords. Just last week and the last year (at least) I was able to use a complex, secure password. Export CSV moreover doesn't even work if I use a simple

      • Fax and email questions

        Does Zoho offer faxing capability? If so, how to do it? And, why is has my email inbox stopped in 2019? There are no more emails since then. Also if I delete all of those emails, will they delete it from my gmail account (I'm linked to a gmail email address).

      • Create a single record from multiple images with ICR

        Hello all, Zia's Intelligent Character Recognition can now create a single record from multiple images based on the configured ICR rule. Users can upload up to three images at once, such as an ID, a passport, and a business card, and Zia will extract

      • How to present an Analytic on a CRM dashboard and filter it on loginuser id

        How to present an Analytic on a CRM dashboard and filter it on loginuser id? I want to display an Analytics pivot table (as a widget) on a CRM dashboard and have the pivot filtered on the loginuser. I want additional user-filters available, such as date,

      • CNIL - Suivi de Pixel

        Bonjour à tous, À la suite de la nouvelle recommandation de la CNIL sur les pixels de suivi dans les e-mails, savez-vous si Zoho Campaigns permet : de conditionner le suivi des ouvertures au consentement de chaque contact ; de proposer un lien permettant

      • Setting default From address when replying to request

        At the moment, if I want to reply to a request, the From field has three options, company@zohosupport.com, support@company.zohosupport.com, and support@company.com. The first two are really internal address that should never be seen by the customer and

      • Zoho Payroll: Product Updates - Q3, FY2026

        Over the past quarter, Zoho Payroll has added several updates to make payroll easier to process, configure, and manage. The most notable improvements cover bank integrations, reimbursement support, payslip enhancements, employee exit documentation, payroll

      • Convert OLM to PST on Mac and Windows Using Free Methods

        When your Outlook for Mac data is stored in an OLM file and you want to use it with Outlook for Windows, the simplest approach to transfer your emails and other mailbox information is to convert the OLM file to a PST file. OLM is primarily associated

      • Next Page