Although this thought isn’t completely wrong, unstructured sales processes often lead to chaos and untrackable deals. In contrast, a structured sales process gives more benefits, including better organization (for client onboarding and communication), improved sales forecasting, and faster deal closing time.

In this sales guide, we’ll explore the structured sales process, its benefits, and how to implement it by creating solid sales pipeline management.

What Is a Structured Sales Process?

A structured sales process is a workflow, a series of steps your sales team follows, taking them from initial contact to a closed deal. This is especially important if you aim for consistent, year-over-year gains from your sales team.

How Does a Structured Sales Process Look Like?

The structured sales process varies depending on the company or industry. Each stage in your sales pipeline management has steps that move a prospect from lead to customer. Here are the steps in a typical sales process.

1. Prospecting and first contact

Sales reps and/or marketing receive a prospect’s contact information. They gather initial data (e.g., name, address, phone, problem, need, budget, timeframe). This general data flows naturally into qualification.

2. Prospect qualification

In this step, you verify that your prospect (a.) can buy your product or service at the price point you’ve set and (b.) they value your product or service enough to pay for it; they’re willing to pay for your help.

3. Prospect assessment

The prospect works with you to identify their need. You propose an initial solution to their problem, based on the data they’ve shared with you. You give them important details—budget, timeframe, milestones, results, etc.

4. Sales pitch or demo

If this is applicable, you give your clients a taste; you show them how you’ll address their problem. It’s a close simulation, showing them what they can expect from you.

5. Quote or proposal

This is a formalized outline listing who does what, what it costs, what will be delivered when, and what your customer will get. It’s a crucial step that should come with specific requirements. It takes time for you to create a proposal. You shouldn’t simply offer this to any prospect who asks. It should be an option provided to qualified candidates with clear purchase intent. They shouldn’t receive a quote or proposal if they’re unwilling to do that.

6. Objections

If you have a structured sales process, you have a list of your customers’ objections. You have an in-depth understanding of their concerns as well as their desires, goals, fears, and frustrations. You have risk reversals in place (e.g., guarantees, warranties, incentives, etc.) to relieve their concerns.

With a structured sales process, you can teach your sales reps how to defuse customer objections instead of arguing with, minimizing, invalidating, or devaluing their objections.

7. Deal closing

You know what needs to be present at closing (e.g., budget confirmation, invoice/payment request, deposits, signed agreements, etc.). You have a list of closing techniques your sales reps can use. Your sales reps know when to use these closing techniques and how to apply them. Sales reps have received decision-maker approval, payment, or financing options (e.g., check, ACH, financing, etc.).

8. Client onboarding and upselling

Sales reps know how to onboard new clients or are skilled at handing the client off to an account manager. They know which products are a relevant fit for clients. Your sales reps have a list of products and services you can use for cross-, down-, and upselling opportunities.

The Benefits of a Structured Sales Process for Project-Driven Companies

Why would I need a structured sales process anyway? My project-driven business (e.g., construction, manufacturing, distribution, etc.) has done fine without a formalized process. What do I have to get from a structured sales process?

If you have a sales process in place and it’s working well, it’s easy to take for granted. If you don’t have a sales process and you’re struggling, it’s easy to be skeptical. How will this make a difference? Let’s take a look.

With a structured sales process, you can gain the following benefits:

A. Identify sales-ready prospects

At a given moment, only 3% of your prospects are ready to buy. Who are they? Are they subscribers, fans, or followers? Have they requested a quote or proposal? With a structured sales process, you can identify the prospects who are ready to buy now.

B. Disqualify poor candidates

your sales process will identify the prospects who are sales-ready. Those who aren’t generally fall into the following categories: (1.) 7% plan on making a change, (2.) around 30% have a need but they’re not ready to buy, (3.) 30% don’t have a need, (4.) and 30% will never buy from your company (even if they have a need). Candidates in the third and fourth categories shouldn’t receive a significant amount of your attention.

C. Close deals properly

Do you need your sales reps to do specific things before closing the deal? Do you need a deposit or earnest money? Do clients need to sign an agreement before the deal is closed? What happens after the deal is complete? You’ll need to properly define the criteria you have set for your deals and the procedure you’d like your sales reps to follow.

D. Make data-driven decisions

If you know the metrics that matter to your business, you can check sales rep performance against those metrics. Key sales and performance metrics (e.g., Average Revenue Per Customer, MRR per sales rep, CLTV, etc.) are helpful metrics you can use to make data-driven decisions.

For example, if your revenue per rep is falling, you know there’s a global problem that sales managers need to address. However, if revenue per rep falls for 3 or 4 reps, you know individual reps need attention.

E. Build strong client relationships

One of the hardest things to do is to build a strong relationship with the right people. You probably don’t want your sales reps to build relationships with predatory customers, perpetual tire kickers, or time wasters. You do want to create a strong relationship with the customers who genuinely need your help.

A structured sales process gives your reps the know-how and specific steps they need to follow; it’s how you build genuine give-and-take relationships with the right people.

F. Create a repeatable process

You can do two very important things with a structured process: (1.) Find areas of your sales process that aren’t working or need improvement and fix them. (2.) Verify that your sales reps are doing the work that’s needed to close a deal. This repeatable process is essential. When problems arise, you can use a repeatable process to determine whether the problem is with your system, sales rep, or customer.

Project management sales is labor-intensive. It tends to be a complex engagement with lots of moving parts. If you need to deliver a consistent customer experience and achieve repeatable results, you need a structured sales process. Need to scale your business, hire more employees, and grow the business? Want to sell your company in the future? Your sales process is an important must-have.

Okay then, how do you create a structured sales process?

How to Create a Structured Sales Process for Construction and Other Project-Driven Businesses

Structured sales processes aren’t difficult to create. They just require some upfront work. Follow these six steps to maximize the results.

Step 1. Define Your Deal Stages

Remember the basic deal stages we mentioned in the “What is a structured sales process” earlier? You can use this as a template to help you get started.

You’ll want to ask the following questions as you define and work with each deal stage.

• What do prospects have to do to get to this deal stage?
• What steps should sales reps follow to guide prospects through this deal stage?
• What must prospects do to get to the next deal stage?
• Which metrics and KPIs are important in this deal stage?

Take the time to define each deal stage carefully. It’s always good to start with a detailed and comprehensive overview of each deal stage. You can always trim or refine things as needed.

Step 2. Create a Framework for Disqualifying Leads

You’ll need to define a sales-qualified lead (SQL) properly. An SQL has been:

• Vetted by your marketing team
• Vetted by your sales team
• Demonstrated a willingness and ability to buy
• Meets your specific qualification criteria (e.g., budget, authority, need, timeframe, and terms)

How do you decide on qualification criteria? Look at your best customers. These are the customers you’d fight to keep. What makes these customers so special to you? For instance:

• Do they spend more than your average customer?
• Is the purchase frequency or the average order value higher?
• Do they treat you like a trusted advisor?
• Do they pay on time?

You’ll need to determine which qualification criteria are most important. It takes some time, but doing this upfront work produces incredible rewards later. You’ll know:

• Which sales and marketing channels are best for your business
• You know who you’re looking for, so you’ll be able to purchase leads at a steep discount
• Your return on ad spend (ROAS) will be consistently higher
• You’ll learn how to market and promote your business to active buyers who are drawn to you

Once you know who you’re looking for, you’ll need to sort customers into buckets. If they’re active buyers, you sell to them. If they’re buyers-in-waiting, you nurture them. Not interested? You refer them to a competitor.

Step 3. Use a CRM as Your Single Source of Truth

CRMs manage your sales pipeline. With a CRM, you can track interactions, automate follow-up, manage leads, automate sales processes, manage your team, and handle contracts.

Then there’s integrations. If you’re using your CRM as your single source of truth, you’ll want to integrate the tools you already use. These tools include: accounting software, email providers, customer support (e.g., HelpScout), phone/dialer integration (e.g., RingCentral), and more.

With two-way integration, you can update apps in these categories. Sales, marketing, and support teams will have the necessary intel to close more deals. Your CRM should be a central hub for your sales, marketing, and support teams. The more integrations you add to your CRM, the easier it will be to close more deals.

Why does this matter?

CRMs improve sales forecasting. It shortens sales cycles, enabling you to close deals faster, even when your projects vary in size, scope, or complexity. For example, if you’re offering roofing, siding, and gutter services, you can use your construction CRM to create a construction sales process for each of these three service categories. You can use the metrics we’ve discussed to optimize your sales pipeline management and improve your conversion rate.

Step 4. Create Quote, Proposal, and Pricing Templates

If you’re using proposal tools like Paycove, BidSketch, or JobNimbus, you’ll want to create reusable templates. Your sales reps should be able to create quotes and proposals quickly, with minimal input from management.

Or if your CRM has a built-in instant document generation, like Pipeline CRM’s Instant Docs and eSignature solutions, you can easily create quotes, proposals, and contracts with just a few clicks.

Why is this important? You need to create specific pricing constraints your reps can use. These constraints should function as boundaries that keep your sales reps on track.

Step 5. Train Your Sales Reps

Sales enablement gives your sales reps the leadership, support, technology, content, and processes they need to close more deals consistently. It’s also how you turn 50% of your average performers into elite sales reps. If you’re looking to turn your sales reps into superstar rainmakers, you’ll want to provide them with the following:

1. Sales technology, e.g., your CRM, lead scoring, email, phone, AI, and automation tools).
2. Sales training: this includes both internal and external data. It’s the A to Z information sales reps need to close deals and meet quota.
3. Sales content: This is bottom-of-funnel (BoFu) content that focuses on one thing, closing.
4. Sales support: this is a broad category support that includes training, workflows, escalation, feedback, and tactical support (e.g., your customer wants to modify the terms and conditions of your deal, and you need management guidance/approval).
5. Sales process: superstar sales reps know what to do and when. There’s no confusion about the tasks that need to be done and no wondering about workflows. If you’re using a tool like Pipeline CRM, your sales reps automatically receive the next steps.

Step 6. Set Metrics and KPIs

Which metrics should you use to track sales rep performance? You’ll want to outline the metrics and KPIs that are most important to your business. Here are a few important metrics and KPIs you can use to start.

1. Average Sales Cycle Length
2. Lead Conversion Ratio
3. Win Rate
4. Sales Velocity
5. Opportunity-to-Win Ratio
6. Customer Acquisition Cost Payback Time
7. Lead Response Time
8. Funnel Drop off Rate

Metrics and KPIs aren’t just about numbers. They give quantitative and qualitative insights into your sales process, team performance, and overall business health. If your sales reps know you aren’t monitoring metrics and KPIs, they have no incentive to perform. If they’re underperforming, you’d never know it.

The more detailed you are about your metrics and KPIs, the easier it will be to monitor, improve, and measure your team’s performance.

A Structured Sales Process Is the Key to Business Growth

If you want consistent, year-over-year gains from your sales team, you need a structured sales process. As we’ve seen, a structured sales process is a workflow, a series of steps your sales team follows. These sales processes take your prospects from initial contact to a closed deal.

Each stage in your sales pipeline has a single purpose: to move your prospect from lead to customer. Many companies know these stages, but their steps are often more informal than formal. For many companies, huge sections of their sales process involve sales reps “winging it” or doing their best to figure things out. Not you.

You know how to build a structured sales process for your business. You’ll know which prospects deserve your time and attention with the right approach and a clear focus.

Accurately track multiple sales workflows for your processes, products, and services with Pipeline CRM. Our customizable sales pipeline management allows you to tailor the deal stages, create custom data fields, and generate sales and sales reps’ performance analysis easily.

Learn more about Pipeline CRM sales pipeline management—and when you’re ready to give it a try, sign up here to get started.

Can the sales process be fully automated? Technically, yes. But it shouldn’t be.

Right now, most automation tools aren’t mature enough to handle meaningful sales conversations on their own. And when reps take a set-it-and-forget-it approach, prospects end up buried in cold, contextless emails like this:

This happens when sales reps use automation as a shortcut instead of a tool, leaving connection, nuance, and personalization to bots without ever having a conversation. The worst part is you won’t even know it’s happening. Prospects won’t complain. They’ll quietly disappear, shifting their attention to the reps who get their business.

But here’s the good news: sales automation can work in harmony with human connection. Let’s talk about how to strike that balance.

What is Sales Automation?

Sales automation is the use of technology to streamline and simplify time-consuming sales tasks—so reps can focus on what they do best: selling.

It covers a broad range of tools and workflows designed to automate repetitive processes like data entry, lead scoring, follow-up emails, pipeline tracking, and more. Think of it as your digital sales assistant—quietly handling the busy work in the background.

Common sales automation tools include CRM software, chatbots and live chat integrations, email sequencing tools, lead scoring systems, and AI-powered analytics and insights.

Why do We Need Sales Automation?

Because sales reps are struggling.

They’re overworked and drowning in busy work. A recent survey of 7,700 sales reps across 38 countries found that “Reps spend just 28% of their week actually selling.” They spend the rest of their time on administrative tasks like:

• Researching prospects
• Logging customer data
• Creating proposals and quotes
• Scoring leads
• Attending meetings and training sessions

As it turns out, these are the very same tasks that, if automated, will increase the amount of time sales reps spend closing deals. The more you take off your sales reps’ plates, the more time they spend with qualified prospects.

This is why sales automation is so important—it directly impacts your company’s sales revenue.

Sales Automation or Personalization: What’s More Important?

Achieving a balance between automation and personalization in sales is essential. It’s also rare for most sales teams because they generally lean in one direction or the other.

They either:

• Automate everything: they treat prospecting like a numbers game and focus on optimizing their technology stack. For these teams, it’s less about personalization and more about finding the 3% of prospects ready to buy.
• Prioritize personalization: these sales reps do their best to give their prospects the one-on-one attention they need. It’s labor-intensive work, and it’s especially disappointing for sales reps when prospects choose to go in a different direction.

Both approaches are problematic and highlight the need to balance automation and personalization. First, let’s explore the problems with each extreme.

Where Sales Automation Breaks Down

Sales automation is essential for modern teams—but it’s far from perfect. When used poorly or without the right structure, it can hurt more than help. Here are the biggest reasons sales automation often misses the mark.

1. Automation Isn’t Personal (And Often Pretends to Be)

Automation is not personal, and even worse, in the wrong hands, pretends to be human personable. When this happens, it becomes a blunt tool that sales reps use to increase the quantity of their messaging. Then, as automation scales and personalization decreases, the quality of their messages takes a hit. Conversion rates tumble as messages become generic and robotic. Revenue begins to dry up shortly after that.

2. CRM Disconnect Creates Chaos

Your CRM is the memory center of your marketing—it keeps everyone on the same page. With CRM software, your business’s sales reps, customer service, marketing, and fulfillment units all have access to the same information. For example, if your customer has a bad experience with customer support, your sales reps know that going in. If there’s a CRM disconnect, it means you have silos and turf wars. It also means that various sections of your business are disconnected from the customer because no one shares the customer’s experience.

3. Automation is Not Intuitive

When it comes to automation, two assumptions are common. (1.) This is too hard to figure out; we’ll never get it. (2.) This is easy; we’ll figure this out in no time. Here’s the thing: automation needs guidance. A portion of automation should be automated, meaning some elements should be pre-built for your sales reps. If your sales reps have to set automation up themselves, you must provide them with the guidance and support they need to do it properly.

Why Personalization Isn’t Always the Answer

Personalization is supposed to be the holy grail of modern sales—but even it comes with serious challenges. These three stand out the most.

1. Scaling Personalization Is a Struggle

It’s generally viewed as the right approach. Customers prefer; no, they demand personalization. They expect sellers to come to the table clearly, understanding their desires, goals, fears, frustrations, and problems. This expectation is the problem—any time spent on personalization with the wrong prospect is lost revenue.

2. Bad Data Makes Everything Worse

Or worse, the data set you’re relying on is incomplete. Personalization is only as good as the data feeding it. If you have bad data, you’re more likely to send irrelevant or inappropriate recommendations to your customers.

3. Over-Personalization Can Feel Creepy

If personalization depends on AI, the recommendations can be way off course. With AI-driven personalization, context tends to be a problem. When it’s right on the nose, over-personalization feels invasive—prospects wonder if you’re stalking them. How do you know all of this about me? They wonder. When this happens, trust is lost as prospects and customers pull back or move on.

How do You Fix These Problems?

To make automation work with the human touch—not against it—focus on these five principles:

1. Start With Clean, Consistent Data.

Good automation begins with good data. Standardize how you collect, store, and use prospect info. Incomplete or inconsistent data leads to irrelevant messaging and broken personalization.

2. Centralize Everything in Your CRM.

Your CRM should be your team’s single source of truth. Ensure it’s synced with every connected tool so that when customer data changes anywhere, it updates everywhere.

3. Be Relevant, Not Creepy

Personalization works when it’s appropriate. Stick to contextual, surface-level insights—don’t make prospects feel like you’ve been spying on them.

4. Give Reps Automation Playbooks

Don’t assume your team knows how to automate properly. Give clear instructions, templates, and support so reps use automation the way you intended.

5. Pre-Build Key Automation

Set your team up with foundational workflows they can tweak—not build from scratch. That way, they can spend more time selling, not setting things up.

If automation creates friction and personalization is hard to scale, where does that leave us? Somewhere in the messy middle—where the right balance becomes key.

How to Balance Sales Automation with Personalization

Believe it or not, sales automation and personalization can be balanced. You don’t have to sacrifice empathy to scale sales automation. You can communicate with a growing number of prospects, and you can maintain the same human touch you’re applying to your conversations now.

Here’s how you do it.

• Identify automation opportunities. You can automate these routine or repeatable tasks, such as quote and proposal writing, lead qualification, appointment scheduling, email sequences, and customer support requests.
• Map out your automation. Take the time to outline and plan each step and connection in your workflow visually. Define your automated processes completely. Outline your goals, the scope of work, and any required requirements or dependencies.
• Segment customers into groups. Look for commonalities, speak to those commonalities and work with each segment independently. Each segment’s theme should be relevance, context, and value. Every message, every touch point, should hit these three points at a minimum.
• Map out the customer journey. What steps do customers take when they reach out to you for help? Which questions do they ask? What objections do they make? Learn how to personalize sales conversations and use them to create value via the data you collected in the segmentation phase above.
• Build datasets in your CRM. When customers called in last week, what was their experience? Did they get a resolution to their problem? Is their contact information accurate? How did customers feel about your company at the end of the call? Your customer data should be centralized, complete, and accessible to everyone in your company who needs it.
• Show sales reps how to build relationships. At its core, sales pipeline optimization is about relationship building. Relationships are driven by value, fed by communication, and nurtured by listening. Listening can be challenging, especially if your prospects arrive with unrealistic, fuzzy, or implicit expectations. Teach your sales reps how to build, nurture, and maintain relationships with prospects beyond most sellers’ usual “I want money from you” transactional relationship. You’ll need to watch your pipeline, taking note of areas where prospects become confused, stuck, or frustrated.
• Supply sales reps with a mix of AI and templates. Show them how to modify these content pieces quickly so they can connect with prospects and build strong relationships. You can analyze message performance if your email messages are incorporated into your CRM (and they should be).
• Use A/B split tests and analytics. Use your quantitative data to identify the best personalization strategies for your team. Use that data to modify your sales automation processes. Your performance data will give you the clarity you need to improve your automation processes and personalizations.
• Ask customers for feedback. Ask them simple questions about their experiences with you (e.g., did we make you happy? How can we improve our services?) This gives you an inside look at their experience (from their perspective), and it gives you the qualitative data you need to make sense of your customer’s experience.

What Does This Look Like?

Let’s take a look at sales automation with a human touch.

Example #1: AI Assistant to Live Agent

Use a chatbot or AI assistant to initiate conversations with prospects. This is ideal because it allows prospects to gather information in a low-pressure environment. However, once they’re ready to move forward, customers are easily redirected to a live agent or customer support specialist who is ready to help.

This transition should feel easy and natural for the customer.

Example #2: Automated Email Sequences With Human Check-ins

Customers opt-in to a list, request information or ask for a specific resource, and they’re added to your email list. On this list, they receive relevant, contextual, and valuable content. These emails are automatically sent on a schedule (e.g., every three days), but a sales rep checks in once a week to nurture the relationship, offer assistance, answer objections, and look for opportunities to close the sale.

It’s a win/win; customers get the value they need to make a decision, and sales reps nurture leads automatically. These periodic check-ins mean sales reps are ready to close the deal when customers are ready to move forward.

Example #3: Lead Scoring With Manager Review

You can use AI lead scoring tools (e.g., Marketo, Breeze Intelligence, etc.) to qualify prospects. You can then add these customers to segments, sequences, and workflows. Sales managers can then verify that these leads are indeed sales-ready.

Can you see what’s happening?

You can lead with automation, but human touch and personalization can be applied to the back end. The possibilities are endless!

Can the Semi Automated Sales Process Be Fully Automated?

Technically, yes—but it’s not the right move. Without the human touch, automation often misses the mark. Your prospects still want to feel seen and supported. The best sales automation strategies don’t replace people—they enhance them.

You don’t need to choose between efficiency and empathy. When done right, automation delivers relevant, valuable messages while your team builds real relationships with the right prospects. The key is to lead with context, keep personalization appropriate, and always make it easy for prospects to connect with a human when they need to.

Boost Sales Revenue with Pipeline CRM

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This blog will delve into the evolution of Kanban, explore how Kanban-based sales systems can boost team efficiency, and provide a practical example of implementing Kanban within a sales pipeline.

What is Kanban?

Kanban is a versatile method for organizing and managing work, particularly tasks that involve multiple stages or phases. It employs a visual approach using cards and boards to represent work items.

As tasks progress, cards are moved from one column to the next, typically from left to right, signifying their advancement through the workflow. Once a task is completed, its card is moved back to the initial column to start a new cycle or a fresh card is added to begin a new task. This visual representation offers a clear overview of the workflow, progress, and bottlenecks, enabling efficient project management and optimization.

The History of Kanban

The use of Kanban has evolved for different business areas, but the concept stays the same. For what started as a shop signboard, Kanban has transformed into an inventory system, project management system, and more.

Kanban as Shop Signages

In the 1600s, Kanban originated from the Japanese words “Kan” (sign) and “Ban” (board). It was initially used to describe the distinctive signboards that shops in bustling Japanese markets displayed to attract customers. These Kanbans were visually appealing and clearly communicated the shop’s offerings.

Toyota’s Lean Manufacturing Kanban

Toyota, a renowned Japanese automaker, played a pivotal role in extending the application of Kanban beyond its traditional commercial use.

In the 1940s, Toyota faced significant challenges, including poor sales and inefficient manufacturing processes. Taiichi Ohno, an engineer at Toyota, recognized a critical flaw: excessive waste in producing car parts, negatively impacting performance and system throughput.

After visiting an American supermarket, where he observed an efficient card-based system for optimizing inventory, Ohno was inspired to develop a similar approach for Toyota’s manufacturing process. This system, later named Kanban, utilized cards to signal the need for specific products, or the right time to re-manufacture specific car types.

By implementing Kanban, Toyota achieved several benefits: reduced stockpiles, improved workflow efficiency, and enhanced visibility into the production process. The success of Kanban within Toyota paved the way for its integration into the Toyota Production System, a manufacturing philosophy that has become a benchmark for lean practices worldwide.

Kanban in Today’s Business

Kanban has found widespread application in various business and industrial sectors. One prominent example is its influence on Scrum, a popular agile development framework. Another significant application of Kanban is in project management systems, where each task to complete the project is assigned to a card, and as the tasks are completed, they’re moved to the finished stage.

Leveraging Kanban Sales System for Effective Sales Workflows

Recognizing Kanban’s versatility and benefits, many sales teams have successfully adopted this methodology to manage their sales pipelines. The core concept remains consistent: each lead or opportunity is represented by a card that moves through various stages of the sales pipeline, from initial prospect to final outcome (such as deal won, lost, or reengage).

This visual representation of Kanban provides a clear overview of the sales process, offering many sales teams the following benefits:

• Clear visibility of sales pipeline: a Kanban board provides a clear visual representation of the sales pipeline, allowing sales reps to track deals at different stages.
• Improved prioritization: by limiting the number of deals in each stage, sales reps can focus on the most important opportunities and avoid getting overwhelmed.
• Enhanced focus: Kanban helps sales reps prioritize tasks and avoid multitasking, leading to increased focus and productivity.
• Faster deal closure: by identifying bottlenecks and streamlining the sales process, Kanban can help sales teams close deals more quickly.
• Better collaboration: Kanban boards can be used to foster collaboration among sales team members, ensuring that everyone is aligned and working towards a common goal.
• Data-driven insights: by tracking key metrics like cycle time and conversion rates, sales teams can gain valuable insights into their performance and identify areas for improvement.

Examples of a Kanban Sales Process in Pipeline CRM

The benefits of adopting the Kanban sales system are a no-brainer, but how can you apply that to your existing sales workflows? Let us show you by looking at Pipeline CRM’s Kanban sales board.

Deal Organization

As you can see from the screenshot above, the deals (cards) are organized across different sales stages (columns). These sales stages are sequentially arranged from left to right, mirroring the progression of a deal from initial contact to its final outcome. This visual representation facilitates the tracking of deal movement and provides a clear overview of the sales pipeline.

Deal Progression and View Customization

To advance a deal to the next stage, simply drag and drop the corresponding card to the desired stage column. The deal status on each card will be automatically updated to reflect its new position in the pipeline. You can add, edit, or delete sales stages to align with your team’s specific terminology and workflow.

A typical deal flow might include stages such as ‘No Stage > Touchbase > Request for Info > Presentation > Contract Prepared > Won > Lost > or Reengage.’

To further customize the deal cards, you can specify the key information displayed on each card. This enables you to access essential details about each deal quickly. For more advanced analysis, you can filter and sort cards based on various criteria, such as sales rep, deal value, or stage. This helps you prioritize tasks, identify opportunities, and gain valuable insights into your sales pipeline performance.

Moreover, Pipeline CRM’s sales Kanban offers a unique feature that allows you to collapse certain deal stages to maintain a concise view, especially when dealing with lengthy sales pipelines.

By simply clicking on a deal stage name, you can temporarily hide it, reducing visual clutter and focusing on the most relevant stages. To expand the collapsed stage and view its associated deals, simply click on the collapsed stage name again.

Find out more about what Pipeline CRM’s Kanban sales system can do for you and the available customization options.

Get a Clear View of Your Sales with Kanban Pipelines

If you find the traditional spreadsheet view insufficient for managing your sales pipeline, a Kanban-style approach can offer a more visual and intuitive solution. By providing a clear overview of your sales pipeline, you can easily monitor the status of each deal, track the performance of individual sales reps, and gain a comprehensive understanding of your overall sales performance.

Interested to try it out? Sign up to Pipeline CRM today for a 14-day free trial!

In most companies, sales is still an unstructured and highly variable process. As it involves a more people-driven approach, the integration of AI may seem unconventional. However, when implemented through a reliable sales pipeline CRM, it can reshape how your company interacts with customers, improving revenue. 

From processing mountains of customer data to improving sales training, you can use generative AI in CRM to: 

• Make your sales operation more efficient 
• Segment customers and drive better personalization
• Prepare for risks and adjust strategies
• Close leads faster
• Improve customer experience

In short, generative AI in CRM can help your sales team assess, understand and connect with your target market. 

Wondering how? Let’s dive into how your sales team can use generative AI and drive business growth. 

What is Generative AI?

Generative AI is a variant of artificial intelligence that can learn from existing data sets and resources to produce new data. This includes images, videos, audio, code, text, and even simulations. A notable example of generative AI is OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Compared to the more task-specific traditional AI models, generative AI offers more flexibility. It also doesn’t need any operation-specific programming to produce results, allowing almost everyone to leverage this advanced technology in their daily task, including in B2B sales work.

7 Ways Sales Teams Can Use Generative AI to Increase Sales

According to a McKinsey report, 50% of companies adopted AI in at least one business area, sales being one of the three fields with the most revenue effect from it. But how do these companies use generative AI in sales? Let’s find out.

1. Email Writing Tool for Sales with Generative AI

A study shows that salespeople spend 31 hours a month on emailing. That’s more than 4 full working days dedicated to emailing rather than selling.

To cut down on time, you can ask the generative AI tool to write the emails. However, this workflow is still not 100% efficient as you still need to switch between platforms (the AI and the sales CRM software).

To fully leverage the power of AI, why not use an AI email writing feature that is offered within your CRM software? Pipeline CRM, for instance, offers a built-in AI email writing assistant that allows you to write or rewrite emails with just one click. You can select the email purpose (e.g., book a call or say thank you), edit the emails (e.g., more engaging or rephrase it), and even change the text format directly from the Email editor system. See the examples of how to use Pipeline’s CRM AI email writing assistant here.

When you combine this with your customer data, you can easily create different email purposes tailored for each customer segmentation. Such efficiency lets your sales team create personalized outreach emails as soon as leads come into the pipeline.  

Related: Download ready-to-use email templates for cold outreach, demo requests, and follow-up emails in this CRM guide.

2. Sales Forecasting with AI

One notable reason behind falling sales performance may be inaccuracies in sales forecasts. When forecasts are off the mark, it becomes difficult to gauge the true picture of market trends. This leaves your sales team flying blind, unable to effectively scale their operations to meet upcoming demand.

Sales pipeline CRM with generative AI capabilities can ease the process and make your sales forecasting more precise and automated. It can analyze customer responses and historical data and create predictive models. 

Such an artificial intelligence-backed system captures real-time sales data and represents the accurate conditions of the market. You can uncover patterns, trends, and their correlations and recognize demand changes based on seasonality, customer preferences, and the bandwidth of your sales team.

3. Workflow Automation with Generative AI

Performing repetitive tasks like data entry or assessing previous customer interactions takes up significant time for sales teams.

Powered by generative AI, reliable custom CRM software offers sales automation, freeing up your team’s time to focus on tasks that drive conversion. These tools can sync your customer contacts in a single, easy-to-use dashboard, which is extremely helpful for companies scaling their customer base. 

Your sales reps can use natural language prompts to enter the data into the AI tool to analyze the customer interactions and schedule follow-ups with the leads. Then, you can add the action points to your sales pipeline CRM. This will allow your sales reps to refer back to past interactions quickly and personalize sales calls better.

Additionally, you can also leverage the abundant information the generative AI has to generate new leads. For instance, your sales reps aim to target the Manhattan area to sell your cloud-based communication tool. To identify potential customers, they can ask the AI tool to find the top companies in the area. 

4. Lead Scoring with Generative AI

Scoring your leads is important for efficient resource allocation. It measures the lead’s quality and ensures that your sales reps prioritize those most likely to convert.

But as your company grows, so will the number of leads in your pipeline, making manual lead qualification demanding. Plus, traditional lead-scoring methods depend on subjective data points and judgments. It can often lead to inconsistencies and missed business opportunities—and that’s where generative AI comes in. 

A sales pipeline CRM platform integrated with artificial intelligence can assess large volumes of customer data quickly and accurately. It can identify the traits of your best users in granular detail and match your leads with your ideal buyer profile. 

This way, your sales team will only focus on leads most likely to convert, enhancing operational productivity. Your lead-scoring system will improve continuously over time as the AI system learns each time it handles fresher data. 

5. Sentiment Analysis

Understanding customer feedback is essential for any business to survive in the long run, as it helps drive continuous product and service improvements. Sentiment analysis can help companies uncover the most intricate details of each user’s feedback and align their services accordingly. 

Generative AI can accelerate this process by analyzing every customer response in detail. It can detect particular patterns in user complaints and point out the most prevalent customer challenges. This can eliminate roadblocks in the customer journey, enhancing the customer experience. 

Assessing the sentiment behind words in customer reviews also identifies customers at churn risk, giving you enough time to resolve the issue, re-engage, and retain them.

6. Sales Strategy Optimization

In rapidly evolving markets and changing customer needs, even your best strategies today may not drive the same results tomorrow. So, every business must monitor their sales performance and optimize the framework regularly. 

Generative AI can provide real-time market updates on how customers respond to your product and sales techniques. You can automate surveys, run A/B tests, and let artificial intelligence determine which parts of your strategy don’t align with current customer needs. This allows you to make immediate modifications to better cater to customer preferences for higher sales performance. 

7. Sales Training with Generative AI Tools

Applying generative AI lets you tailor coaching experiences for your teams and accommodate different learning styles. You can create sales call simulations for your reps to practice with, which will enhance their ability to adapt quickly to different customer needs and challenges. 

Furthermore, generative AI can identify your sales reps’ strengths and weaknesses. Based on these insights, it can generate customized training modules focused on helping your reps become more well-rounded salespeople. 

You can use artificial intelligence to create automated feedback loops, offering specific pointers on areas of improvement. It can also generate real-time sales performance metrics, enabling your teams to track progress and adjust their approach more effectively. 

Not only that, but using generative AI for sales training is also much more cost effective than traditional training methods. There is no need to create individual training plans for every team. You can use virtual training environments and let your sales teams participate from different locations.

Adopt Generative AI-Powered Custom CRM Software To Boost Your B2B Sales Performance

Although sales is a people-approach action, artificial intelligence can still help in many ways. Here is a rundown on how generative AI can help your sales teams: 

• Custom CRM software with generative AI can help you create personalized content for outreach emails without investing lots of hours.
• Automate tasks, predict customer behavior, create buyer personas, score leads, and forecast accurate sales.
• Dig deep into customer feedback and understand their sentiments.
• Analyze sales strategy and track its performance to create the most effective sales workflow.
• Enhance sales training sessions with AI-generated simulation, virtual training environments, and customized modules.

Seeing these immense benefits, Pipeline CRM integrated the power of generative AI, powered by OpenAI, to create a custom CRM software solution with a built-in AI email assistant. This innovative tool empowers your sales team to craft compelling emails in seconds, leading to faster closing times and freeing up your sales reps to focus on building relationships that matter.

Ready to strengthen your sales team with generative AI and hit and exceed your revenue goals? Choose your Pipeline plan today!

The competition for new customers in the construction business is aggressive and cutthroat. Customers today are educated, demanding, and price-conscious. If you want to nail your construction sales pitch and win new customers, it starts with construction lead management. 

What makes construction lead management so important? How does this improve your sales pitch? This blog will answer these questions and give tips on leveraging CRM data to improve your construction sales performance.

How Construction Leads Quality Impacts Sales Pitches

Let’s take a look at the data. According to Startup Bonsai:

• 53% of marketers spend at least half of their budget on lead generation
• Nurtured leads produce 20% more sales opportunities
• Nurtured leads generate 50% more sales at 33% lower costs

This is all great news. How is any of this a problem? 

In the ‘How to create sales workflows that close deals 3x faster’ blog, I shared research breaking down your lead flow. Here are some key numbers:

1. Only 3% of your prospects are ready to buy at any given moment
2. Another 37% need to be nurtured
3. A whopping 60% are unqualified leads; they’re not willing to buy

If you’re like most construction companies, you’re spending a significant amount of money on your leads and sales processes. However, only 3% of those leads are active buyers.

To overcome these challenges and improve your construction sales process, you’ll need to apply the following:

• disqualify prospects quickly
• identify prospects who need to be nurtured
• identify the prospects who will be the most profitable for your business

How are you supposed to find this out? The easiest and most accurate way is to use a CRM for construction. But, before we go there, let’s learn how to create a solid construction sales pitch.

Construction Sales Process: The Anatomy of a (Successful) Sales Pitch

The Structure of a Construction Sales Pitch

What does a successful construction sales pitch look like? Well, for starters, it’s targeted and relevant. 

Building a successful sales pitch depends on a few important assumptions. They form the building blocks you’ll need to craft a compelling sales pitch that resonates with your construction prospects. Let’s take a look at these assumptions. 

• You know what your prospects want
• You’ve qualified your prospects
• You’ve avoided predatory prospects
• You know which prospects need to be closed or nurtured
• Your construction sales pipeline has the precise workflows you need to win more deals

We can create a successful sales pitch formula if we agree on these assumptions. This sales pitch will have the following elements. 

1. The prospect’s problem or dilemma (e.g., if we don’t fix this now, the cost will triple later)
2. Specific and relevant examples of prospects with the worst-case scenario 
3. Your solution to your prospect’s problem
4. Case studies showing how you solved a prospect’s problem 
5. About your company

This is independent of your quote or proposal. If you’d like to add a quote or proposal to this framework, add it where it makes the most sense. 

Examples of a Construction Sales Pitch

Here’s what a construction sales pitch looks like:

Hi Prospect, 

When we spoke on [date], you mentioned that you were dealing with the following issues: 

• Project delays: You need this project completed within 13 months, no ifs, ands, or buts. If we don’t meet this deadline, we can’t afford to finish the project. However, if we don’t commit to this project, the cost will triple later. 
• Cost overruns: The last time you repaired your roof, the cost was 75% cheaper. Thanks to supply chain issues, all of the other contractors are telling you the cost has increased dramatically by another 33%.
• Meeting expectations: Construction site compliance is an important must-have for our project. Our previous contractor used subcontractors who refused to follow the rules, creating a disaster and unnecessary OSHA violations. 

Follow-up Actions for a Construction Sales Pitch

If things go well, you’ll just acquire a new client for your construction business. But what if things don’t go as planned? What happens if these issues aren’t resolved? Send a follow-up email.

Below, you can find two email options. You can either send one of them, or send both. Don’t forget to send the email telling a bit about your construction company, what you can do for them, and what you’ve accomplished so far.

Email Option 1

Story of ABC Corp.

One of our suppliers shared this story about your competitor, ABC Corp. They’re facing the same challenges outlined here.

Just one difference. 

They didn’t resolve the problem. They procrastinated, and all of the issues you mentioned you’re worried about, your worst fears, came true for them. Their project was delayed by an additional 24 months, leading to a 317% cost overrun. Their project failed to meet expectations, and many of the employees responsible for managing the project lost their jobs. It was a complete and total disaster.

Based on these, here’s what I propose. 

First, we have to meet your 13-month deadline. If we don’t, very bad things will happen. We’re going to restructure your project, focusing exclusively on necessities. Extras or nice-to-haves in your project will be treated as secondary. 

Next, we need to prevent cost overruns. This means maintaining strict financial controls over your project. Aggressively pushing for refunds and credits, using financing, and substituting materials and supplies are all important.

Finally, we’ll prioritize realistic expectations ahead of time. If we’re going to meet your deadline, this means we’ll need to avoid fuzzy, implicit, or unrealistic expectations. We need to focus on slashing and burning expenses across the board to meet XYZ’s 13-month deadline. 

[…]

Email Option 2

Case Study: XYZ Inc. comes in $253K under budget

The Overview 

XYZ Inc. needed to finish its roofing project in 13 months. As a property developer, they had several projects on the horizon that they needed to complete. They needed to close the book on this development project so they could begin four new development projects in the pipeline. 

The Problem
A looming recession meant XYZ needed to get its risky development projects out the door. If this project continued past the established deadline, they could lose as much as $334K monthly. Cost overruns with their previous developers meant they were behind schedule and over budget. 

The Solution

When we were hired, our project deadline was six months away. We needed to work within the budget and time constraints XYZ established. A cost overrun would jeopardize XYZ’s four subsequent projects and create a devastating and ongoing financial loss. We instituted strict financial controls to keep costs low. We found creative ways to finish the project in the required timeframe. We prevented a cost overrun by aggressively pushing for refunds on excesses, pushing for credits, using financing where available, and substituting materials and supplies.

The Results

We finished XYZ’s project with one and a half months left. We narrowly avoided a cost overrun after taking the project over from a previous developer. Using the insights we learned from this tough project, we found an additional cost savings of $2.3 million for their four upcoming development/roofing projects. Here’s what Alton James, Project Manager at XYZ Inc., had to say about our work on their project. 

“We came to you guys out of desperation. Our previous contracting team pulled out mid-project. Cost overruns became a very real concern. We weren’t going to be able to finish our project within the 13-month timeline. The financial loss and the employee turnover would have been devastating. When Stacy, your PM, told me you could dig us out of the hole, I laughed.

Four months later, here we are. Our project is actually profitable. That’s just wild.”

[…]

Email Ending

About Your Company

We have a guarantee.

Let us manage your project from A to Z; we’ll come in on time and under budget. Guaranteed, or we’ll pay you 25% of your project price. Our team is among the top 4% of all contractors in North America. Our workers are consistent, highly trained, and certified. Our roofing products come with:

• A 50-year product warranty 
• A 10-year workmanship warranty
• Limited Lifetime warranty on siding 

Here’s the team that will manage your project.

[…]

Now you know how to find and nurture promising leads. The next step is creating a successful construction sales pitch. 

How Pipeline CRM Transforms Your Construction Sales Game

Pipeline CRM helps companies like yours decrease time-to-close, increase productivity by 50% or more, and boost sales by as much as 10x. Don’t take our word for it; let us show you how Pipeline CRM can help you attract, win, and retain customers.

Effortlessly Find Promising, High-Quality Prospects

Which prospects get your attention? 

This is an important question. If you spend your time with 60% of prospects unwilling or unable to buy, any construction sales pitch you present will fail. On the other hand, if you spend time with the 37% of prospects who have a need but aren’t yet ready to buy, your construction sales pitch will also fail.

What does this mean then?

Your salespeople need to spend the majority of their time closing deals. They need to spend their time with the 3% of prospects who are willing and able to buy. That’s great, but who are these people, and how do you find them? Your will CRM tell you. 

If you’re in construction sales, you know customers want a few things: 

• The best contractor their money can buy
• The best service for their money
• The lowest price for their project 
• The fastest turnaround/least disruptions for their project

This is helpful information; if you add these details to Pipeline CRM, you can use these data to segment and disqualify your prospects. This is how you optimize your construction sales pipeline and close more sales.  

Pro tip: This guide explains how to measure lead quality, allowing you to focus more on promising prospects.

Foster Effective Lead Nurturing

What about lead nurturing? The same thing applies here. 

If your prospects respond to content that outlines why your company is the best, you can tailor your offers around that. If they’re looking for the lowest-price contractor (and you want to cater to that), you can segment your prospects that way. Allow your prospects to self-identify. 

This is why good documentation – using your CRM – is important. As prospects make their way through your construction sales pipeline, you’ll find you’re able to determine several things:

1. Whether you need to close or nurture your prospects
2. The anatomy of a sales pitch and closing your prospects
3. How to nurture your sales prospects 

Now you know how to find and nurture promising leads. The next step is creating a successful construction sales pitch. 

CRM Software Feeds a Winning Construction Sales Pitch

General contractors face an uphill battle filled with heavy competition, low margins, and skyrocketing supply costs. Customers today are educated, demanding, and price-conscious. If you want to nail your sales pitch and win new customers, it starts with construction lead management. 

As prospects make their way through your construction sales pipeline, you’ll find you’re able to determine several things:

• Whether you need to close or nurture your prospects
• The anatomy of a sales pitch and closing your prospects
• How to nurture your sales prospects 

This is how you create a compelling construction sales pitch, nail it, and close more sales.

Use the data from your construction CRM to segment and disqualify your prospects.

Pipeline CRM helps construction companies like yours decrease time-to-close and boost productivity. Learn how Rainier Custom Homes reduces the sales cycle by 53%, cutting it from 130 to 62 days with Pipeline CRM. 

Sign up for a 14-day free trial, and see how we can help you attract, win, and retain customers.

Stop getting drowned in accounting work and focus on what matters: sealing deals. Pipeline’s CRM integration with QuickBooks syncs your sales and accounting data seamlessly—streamlining your entire sales process, from deal discovery to closing. No need to switch between tools, as you’ll have all the information you need at your fingertips.

Why Should Sales CRM Software Integrate with QuickBooks?

Before we discuss the detailed features of Pipeline’s CRM with Quickbooks integration, let’s find out the advantages of syncing your CRM and accounting data.

• Accurate and Consistent Data

Your CRM hosts customer information and sales orders, while your accounting software handles invoices and payment details. By integrating both databases, you ensure that the data is consistent, accurate, and clean (no duplicate entries across systems.) This accuracy reduces the risk of discrepancies and errors. Plus, it eliminates the need to add the data to the two systems manually.

• Increased Revenue Opportunities

By merging both customers and their sales details, you’ll gain a complete customer profile. This empowers you to refine your sales approaches through customer segmentation analysis. Additionally, this unified view provides invaluable insights into upselling and cross-selling opportunities. You can easily identify customers who might benefit from additional products or services, boosting your bottom line.

• Streamlined Order-to-Cash Process

In many cases, the sales team is responsible for generating quotes and sales orders. Then, the accounting team turns them into invoices and tracks their status. When CRM and accounting systems are integrated, you ensure that each deal progresses smoothly from quote to payment.

This level of collaboration will eliminate delayed invoicing and give real-time insights into payment status. It will empower your team to address any delays proactively and improve the company’s cash flow.

• Clear Financial Visibility

Profit and loss reporting and revenue forecasts are highly dependent on the quality of your data. By pulling accurate, real-time financial data, you gain up-to-date information about your company’s financial health. This helps you make strategic decisions not only limited to sales strategies but also overall business operations. 

Key Features of Pipeline’s CRM Integration with QuickBooks for Sales Workflows

1. Two-Way QuickBooks CRM Integration for Synced and Up-to-Date Data

As a CRM that integrates with QuickBooks, Pipeline CRM bridges the gap between customer and accounting data. Our seamless bi-directional sync ensures your data moves between platforms in perfect harmony. Add, update, or delete information in either Pipeline CRM or QuickBooks, and the changes will automatically reflect in the other. This ensures that both systems have consistent and up-to-date data without manual intervention.

You can configure the data sync to be one-directional, from QuickBooks to Pipeline or from Pipeline to QuickBooks. You can also disable automatic data transfer completely.

2. View, Create, and Send Multiple Documents from a Single Platform

You can create proposals and invoices using the data pulled from the CRM contact list or sales history. Then, add the products or services and the pricing, and send the proposal via email directly from Pipeline CRM—all without switching between multiple applications.

3. Convert Proposals to Invoices Directly from Pipeline CRM

Once your lead accepts the proposal, convert it into an invoice with a single click. This seamless integration facilitates a faster invoicing process and a smooth customer experience.

4. Easily Track, Void, or Delete Data

Pipeline CRM grants access to the accounting data on your QuickBooks account, allowing you to revise or cancel proposals directly from the CRM. Plus, you can easily track the status (draft, sent, or paid) of your proposals and invoices, allowing you to follow up with clients on overdue payments.

5. Configurable Account Permissions for Data Integrity and Security

Allow specific users to create, access, or edit proposals and invoices. For example, only sales managers can finalize and send proposals and invoices, while sales reps can only create and can’t edit after submissions. This fosters a standardized workflow, ensuring data integrity and empowering users to perform their roles effectively.

You can configure account permissions to enable or disable specific users (e.g., basic users) from viewing, creating, and converting estimates and invoices. 

Work Smarter with Pipeline CRM and QuickBooks Two-Way Sync Integration

Break down the data silos between sales and accounting. With Pipeline and QuickBooks CRM integration, you seamlessly merge your QuickBooks sales data with customer details in your CRM. Gain a holistic understanding of your customer profile and sales performance—promoting automated, error-free work that speeds up your sales cycle.

Learn more about our improved Pipeline CRM and Quickbooks integration.

FAQs – Pipeline and QuickBooks CRM Integration

1) What Key Features Do Pipeline CRM and QuickBooks Integration Offer?

As a CRM that integrates with QuickBooks, Pipeline CRM offers the following key features:

• Bi-directional sync of sales and accounting data
• Easily create, send, and track the status of invoices and proposal
• Convert proposals to invoices directly from Pipeline CRM
• Configurable permissions for admins and non-admin users

2) How Do I Integrate QuickBooks with Pipeline CRM?

Here’s how you can integrate Quickbooks with Pipeline CRM:

• Find QuickBooks on the Pipeline CRM App Store and install it
• Log in using your QuickBooks credentials
• Go to Configure > QuickBooks Online API > Connect
• Enter your QuickBooks login details and test the connection
• Go to Settings > Import QuickBooks data 
• Return to the App Store, find QuickBooks, and toggle integration on

See the step-by-step tutorial here. 

3) Is There an Additional Cost for Pipeline CRM and QuickBooks Integration?

No, there isn’t an additional cost for Pipeline CRM and QuickBooks integration. It is included in all plans and available to all Pipeline CRM users. Visit the Pipeline CRM pricing page for a breakdown of our plans.

If you are facing the same problems, Pipeline’s custom CRM solutions are what you need. This tool is built by salespeople for salespeople, just like you. We know your frustrations when it comes to increasing pipeline and streamlining communication. 

Here are how 3 manufacturing companies used Pipeline to do just that:

1. TENMAT

TENMAT is a Manchester-based manufacturing company that develops advanced materials and components for industrial applications. Their product range includes high-performance wear parts and bearings, hard metals, passive fire protection solutions, engineering ceramics, and other high-temperature-resistant materials.

Pre Pipeline CRM Challenges

Firstly, TENMAT needed help scaling its revenue in North America with the same-sized sales team. Then, another challenge was maintaining customer relationships across the entire sales cycle, varying from a few months to up to two years. 

To streamline all that while maintaining a competitive edge, TENMAT was looking for a CRM for manufacturing companies to automate their operation. Marco Kristen, Marketing Director at TENMAT, said they tried to explore Salesforce as an option. However, the platform was “too overwhelming” for them. 

Pipeline CRM Features Used

In their search for a tool with a proven record in the manufacturing industry, the marketing director came across Pipeline. The company hasn’t looked back since. 

Our sales team management feature lets them optimize their sales operations without spending extra cash or manpower on scaling resources. Each sales rep logs in to Pipeline daily to organize tasks, deals, and contacts to stay on track. Our powerful reporting lets them pull up advanced and visual insights as per their needs.

In no time, the TENMAT team could:

• Compare sales performance
• Predict future deals
• Check the progress in hitting the targeted quota
• Identify patterns of successful deals

The team also uses our extensive account customization, which makes our services fit the company’s needs like a glove. Their tech team also has access to Pipeline to generate instant reports on any account they require.

Results 

Adopting our CRM software paid off for TENMAT exponentially. 

The company drove a 20% increase in revenue and a 30% increase in sales through its operations in North America. Besides meeting the sales goals, TENMAT improved its conversion rate by 20% with the same manpower and resources.

Following this success, TENMAT’s Europe branches have also started using Pipeline as their end-to-end CRM solution. Kristen also pointed out how Pipeline CRM made their limited resources more efficient, “As a manager, I see the individual performance, forecasting, and get a quick snapshot of the business including success rates. That helps us make the best business decisions about our data.”

2. Vermeer Southeast

Based in Orlando, Florida, Vermeer Southeast has made its name as a heavy equipment supplier for underground construction as well as in tree care, rental, and landscape industries. Besides covering 10+ locations in the US, this manufacturing company also offers services in countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Cambodia. 

Pre Pipeline CRM Challenges 

After becoming the IT Director of Vermeer Southeast a decade ago, James Jeffcoat found their customer database management system to be chaotic. There was no central repository for him to track all the operations across teams. Every time a local machine faced a glitch, all the customer information got erased. To avoid that, the teams had to back up the data separately, which left a lot of room for error. 

Jeffcoat also stated how they lost years of data for an entire market several times. Plus, the CRM they used charged extra to export data beyond a few limited reports.

Pipeline CRM Features Used

To solve these problems, Jeffcoat needed agile CRM software capable of handling operations across multiple locations under the same platform. He ran an extensive survey among Vermeer managers to see what features they needed. Then, he tested ten different products and chose us due to the functionality under a very affordable Pipeline CRM pricing.  

Vermeer Southeast started using our centralized customer data repository to keep client information organized and accessible across the company. The teams can now handle their deals and enter data on the go using our lead management feature. They can note and prioritize each item in the pipeline, track their daily agenda, and make smarter decisions. Our comprehensive reports let managers stay on top of every sales activity and lead progress in real time without going through the earlier complications. 

Results

Before choosing Pipeline, Jeffcoat spent 25% to 50% time troubleshooting or fixing the old CRM tool. He was either trying to recover lost data or writing custom scripts to export the data without spending extra money. Now, the IT director of Vermeer Southeast spends less than 30 minutes a week accessing any data he needs! 

Our real-time sales insights have significantly reduced the company’s deal closing time. The sales reps can generate reports, identify and call potential customers, and line up appointments in a jiffy.

According to Jeffcoat, Pipeline CRM for manufacturing companies has also helped his team build stronger customer relationships- “We’re not the cheapest option in the market, so we have to give people a reason to go with us.” 

With all the necessary information at their fingertips, Vermeer’s sales team appeals to the customer’s needs and closes deals quickly. 

3. Cornerstone Flooring

Cornerstone Flooring is the United States’ largest single-source high-performance resinous flooring manufacturer and installer. In the 33 years of its operations, the company has earned a solid reputation in the manufacturing industry in the US and Canada. 

Challenges they faced

Cornerstone Flooring was using a Microsoft Dynamics CRM system without proper customizations. Stuck with many unnecessary features, the platform was difficult to navigate, making the operations a “jumbled mess.” 

Pre-Pipeline CRM Challenges 

They needed CRM software that could be customized to their specific needs and fit their budget. So, the company researched different CRM options, finally settling on Pipeline. Our full-service onboarding package cost them less in the first year than they would have spent in a quarter to customize their existing system. 

By using our sales team management feature, they know exactly where they stand and where they need to improve. In addition, automated lead management also enables the sales team to send notes on any areas of improvement, which the team can immediately follow up on. 

The sales team also stated how our reporting feature generates detailed insights, empowering the company’s owner to coach the sales teams more effectively.

Results

Since adopting Pipeline CRM, Cornerstone can now monitor every aspect of sales performance, reporting a 100% increase in data trackability. They also reduced the average time-to-close from 42 days to 24 days. 

An Overview of Pipeline CRM for Manufacturing Companies

The customer stories are testaments to Pipeline’s reliability as an end-to-end CRM for manufacturing companies. But what more does it offer? And what does the pricing look like? To give you a better understanding, here is an overview of our custom CRM solutions for manufacturing companies: 

Pipeline CRM features

• Multiple sales workflow tracking
• Automatic recurring deals 
• Automated task allocation and real-time status update
• Automated email drip campaigns
• Automated project scheduling and follow-up reminders
• Task prioritization and next-step suggestions
• Performance tracking for the sales team
• AI-powered analytics and reporting 
• Integrations with popular productivity tools, dialers, and more

Pipeline CRM Pricing

• Start plan: $25 per user per month
• Develop plan: $33 per user per month
• Grow plan: $49 per user per month

Pipeline CRM Ratings

• 4.4/5 star rating on G2 (928 reviews) 
• 4.4/5 star rating on Capterra (622 reviews)
• 8.6/10 score on TrustRadius (18 reviews and ratings)
• 4.2 star rating on Gartner (40 reviews)

Impress Customers and Drive Profits with Pipeline CRM

Be it a lack of data organization, inefficient performance monitoring, or customization issues, the above three manufacturing companies were facing challenges despite their years of experience in the field. Opting for Pipeline CRM lets them: 

• Overcome roadblocks
• Improve sales teams’ performance
• Create strong client relationships
• Grow sales 

Want the same for your business? Start your free trial and enjoy the benefits of CRM today!

With the right performance data, you’ll be able to identify your organization’s: 

• High performers: top-performing sales reps or profitable product and service lines that generate a significant amount of your revenue. Top performers produce significant YoY revenue increases. 

• Moderate performers: the sales reps and product or service lines that generate consistent, small-to-moderate YoY increases in revenue. 

• Poor performers: these sales reps and product or service lines produce negative/no growth on a YoY basis. Individuals and items in this category are dead weight; they drag your organization down. 

Sales Performance Reports: Good or Bad for Business? 

Sales reports are an important must-have for your team. 

Your sales reports should give you the data you need to answer specific performance-related questions. As a manager, you’re looking for answers to important questions at the individual, group, and department levels.  

• Who on my team is or is not on track to meet their target?

• Which reps generate the most revenue?

• How many sales reps meet their quota each month?

• What’s the percentage of revenue generated by new business/existing customers?

• Are we on track to hit our goals for each product or service we sell? 

• Which product or service is or isn’t selling?

• How well are my different business lines performing in each of our territories?

• Are we on track to fulfill all current contracts, and where should I focus?

• How long does it take for individual sales reps to close prospects? 

• How much time do sales reps spend selling (versus administrative tasks)?

• How many deals were lost by individual sales reps within a specific time frame? 

You should be able to track your team’s performance metrics, including the types of deals you acquire and their performance across time – or any custom data point you want. If you’re working with a sales CRM, you should be able to create comparison charts.

For example, the types of leads or team members that bring the most revenue or the success of certain deals over their sales lifecycle. This is why your sales reports are essential.

If you’re working with a customizable CRM system, features like Pipeline’s “Performance Pulse” enable you to see your pipeline from every angle.

Use this feature to identify gaps and performance issues or assist with coaching. Use Performance Pulse to track activity, analyze sales rep performance, forecast sales, and get valuable deal insights. 

See how it works

Using Sales Performance Reports to Fuel Growth

With sales reporting, the focus should be on creating reports with practical value. 

Generating lots of custom reports isn’t useful if your sales team fails to act on the data in your report. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the types of reports you can use and why they’re important. 

Personal Reports

These reports are specific to individual sales reps on your team; these reports include the following: 

• Deals won: the number of deals closed successfully by a specific sales rep. The total number of deals closed at the individual, group, and team levels.
  
  How to improve performance: use this report to identify high, moderate, and poor performers. Manage compensation schemes for high performance so the compensation remains strong yet fair. Coach moderate performers so they become high performers and produce consistent gains. Retrain or terminate poor performers. 

• Win ratio: also known as your conversion rate. This measures the number of won deals as a percentage of the total number of closed deals.
  
  How to improve performance: track win ratios over time. If conversion rates trend down for specific sales reps, look for the cause of the problem. If conversion rates hold steady or trend up, search for the cause and options for performance improvement.

• Won deals by source: won deals will be information broken down by source.
  
  How to improve performance: use this report to identify lead sources that generate revenue, are profitable, or have a lower cost per acquisition. Are some sales reps struggling to close deals from a particular source while others see consistent gains? Find out why.

• Lost deals by loss reason: lost deals report broken down by loss reason. This requires honesty on the sales rep’s part, custom tracking via CRM, or both.
  
  How to improve performance: watch for trends; are customers stating that sales reps are unknowledgeable or unhelpful? Retrain your sales reps and work to improve their performance. Are customers stating that the price is out of reach? Work to retrain sales reps or create another option that’s actually helpful for your customers. 

• Deals by stage: all deals are broken down by the stage.
  
  How to improve performance: identify pipeline leaks. Are prospects disappearing right after you send them a quote or proposal? Retrain reps so they spend more time disqualifying rate shoppers or bad prospects upfront. Is our pricing out of reach for prospects? Create more pricing options.
  

• Activity report: a list view of activities completed.
  
  How to improve performance: are sales reps actually selling? How many meetings did they have last week? How many calls or emails did they send out? You’ll want to get a sense of the work that each individual rep is doing. Are they focused on administrative busy work? Or are they working to close the sale?
  

• Activity scoreboard: a high-level overview of users’ total activities and deals won and lost.
  
  How to improve performance: use this high-level overview to match an individual sales rep’s activity level to the final outcome (deal won or lost). 

Trends Over Time and Comparisons 

Each report has three subsections to help you compare trends over time, deal owners, or custom deal types. 

• Trends over time: report on deals over a given timeframe. It allows you to view trends over time.
• Compare owners: this enables you to report and draw comparisons between individual salespeople or teams of salespeople. 
• Compare deal types: this enables you to compare specific types of deals by filtering on custom fields that you track in Pipeline. 

How to improve performance: use trends over time and comparison reports to assess whether performance is improving (or not). There are many ways to use these reports, but the most important takeaway is analyzing whether there’s growth or decline at the individual, group, or team level. 

Use these reports and the custom reports you’ve generated with Performance Pulse to get answers on the following metrics: 

• Conversion rates (per salesperson)

• Total revenue

• The average revenue per customer

• Sales/revenue by lead source

• Number of deals/sales lost to a competitor

• Revenue by market

• Cost of sales

• % of revenue from new vs. existing customers

• Revenue per customer

• Revenue by product

• Revenue per sale

• Churn rate

If you’re doing it right, these metrics will point your attention in the right direction. Start by asking questions about each of these:

• Why is [sales reps’] conversion rate at 53% while everyone else is at 2 – 5%?
• Previous to 2022, our revenue increased by a minimum of 15%; our revenue increased by 40% in 2023. Which sales reps are driving that change? 
• When it comes to upselling, our top three sales reps are ranked at the bottom. Why is that? 
• Our high performers generate 83% of our sales revenue from three of our products. Poor-performing sales reps generate 77% of their revenue across 16 products. 
• Customers who spoke with a poor-performing sales rep ended the relationship with us in four months. Customers who came in via high performers had a CTLV that was 3x our average, and they stayed for 72 months. 

Using sales performance reports to improve individual sales rep performance begins with questions. Great managers rely on these important questions. They work to identify the questions that matter.

Use Sales Performance Reports to Identify and Expose Challenges

Savvy sales teams use sales performance reports to monitor, assess, and improve individual sales rep performance. If they’re handled well, your sales reports will give you all the data you need to answer specific performance-related questions. Get customized sales reports with Pipeline CRM — sign up now to see the tool in action.