This is gold. Thanks for the detail through and the additional layers (SMB, installium). Regarding 'pushed' deals - a metric I started watching was the: "Closed-Won, Previously Lost." In a well qualified sales pipeline, qualified deals slip/push/stall. But if they are qualified, there's a reasonable chance they come back. At one company, our "CW,PL" rate was 67% - meaning - 67% of the closed lost came back and were later closed won. At another company it was 52%. When we shared this with the sales org, it inspired the behavior of "the sooner I close-lost this slipped deal, the sooner I win it" and brought about a virtuous cycle of pipeline hygiene. It was also a nice test on the qualification rigor of the SAL.
Interesting - why was that the case - thats a pretty high win rate on prior closed lost. Were those marked closed lost that you later won:
- closed lost because you had a criteria around "if they can't close in x months', close it out.
- closed lost because they really were not a fit now and your team did a great job of resurrecting the dead / nurturing accounts that were not ready now but became so later?
It was the latter. In both cases, there was market education required and we observed highly qualified ICPs without highly qualified opp criteria (budget, business case) that needed education and help building a business case. So we opened the aperture of the opp criteria to allow great ICPs in, understanding that they would go offline and need nurturing and support until a truly qualified buying opportunity emerged: it was an important playbook that live more in the realm of prospecting than in opportunity management. It was more than an SDR could handle, and ultimately a good relationship building process that also kept our pipeline metrics consistent and predictable. In 'switcher' markets, this may not work as well, but tracking CW,PL may still be an insightful indicator. (Also, days since last contact of CL.)
This is gold. Thanks for the detail through and the additional layers (SMB, installium). Regarding 'pushed' deals - a metric I started watching was the: "Closed-Won, Previously Lost." In a well qualified sales pipeline, qualified deals slip/push/stall. But if they are qualified, there's a reasonable chance they come back. At one company, our "CW,PL" rate was 67% - meaning - 67% of the closed lost came back and were later closed won. At another company it was 52%. When we shared this with the sales org, it inspired the behavior of "the sooner I close-lost this slipped deal, the sooner I win it" and brought about a virtuous cycle of pipeline hygiene. It was also a nice test on the qualification rigor of the SAL.
Thanks Eric.
Interesting - why was that the case - thats a pretty high win rate on prior closed lost. Were those marked closed lost that you later won:
- closed lost because you had a criteria around "if they can't close in x months', close it out.
- closed lost because they really were not a fit now and your team did a great job of resurrecting the dead / nurturing accounts that were not ready now but became so later?
It was the latter. In both cases, there was market education required and we observed highly qualified ICPs without highly qualified opp criteria (budget, business case) that needed education and help building a business case. So we opened the aperture of the opp criteria to allow great ICPs in, understanding that they would go offline and need nurturing and support until a truly qualified buying opportunity emerged: it was an important playbook that live more in the realm of prospecting than in opportunity management. It was more than an SDR could handle, and ultimately a good relationship building process that also kept our pipeline metrics consistent and predictable. In 'switcher' markets, this may not work as well, but tracking CW,PL may still be an insightful indicator. (Also, days since last contact of CL.)