Comments on: Committing to Your Pipeline

By: Arnel Tanyag

Arnel Tanyag — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 17:29:53 +0000

Great Post Doyle! Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.

By: Tibor Shanto

Tibor Shanto — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:46:05 +0000

Hey Doyle,

You know I am a big fan of Touch-Contact-Engage approach, but the method you describe is great. It is hard work, but done right, you can always answer my favourite question: What’s in Your Pipeline?

Tibor

By: Leah Rust

Leah Rust — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:11:47 +0000

I love the thought of having your CRM as your to do list. Wake up, grab coffee, get to your CRM’s dashboard. Working from within a CRM for years has helped me to organize, track, and measure like I never could before I used the tool. Great ideas, thank you. Looking forward to part 3.

Leah Rust
Editor, EyesOnsales.com

By: Emanuel Carpenter

Emanuel Carpenter — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 16:27:26 +0000

Good conversation Doyle.

Building pipelines are nice (what I do all day) but if they are not resulting in new business (what our outside sales team do) they are useless. A lot of us get too excited about having a certain amount of qualified leads in our pipeline and the stages they’re in between cold call and close. I want to see leads that become closed deals and the dollar amount of those deals. That’s the most important metric for me.

Why is 15 leads per week important? How many on average become closed deals?

On the other end of the pipeline, your lead sources are equally important. Are you using your own website to capture leads? What about event attendance, Webinars, joining associations and calling on fellow members, or referrals as it was mentioned in an earlier comment?

By: Hal Alpiar

Hal Alpiar — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:34:42 +0000

Outstanding post, Doyle!

What I do is different from many because my creative business writing services have a very limited resource: me.

So the best thing I can do is to never settle for anything less than getting spectacular results with every effort I make because thrilled customers talk (though some need a nudge!) and that talk sells me and my services all by itself!

Someone happy with website content recently hired me to write a business plan. One of the investors in the business liked what I did and now has commissioned me to write a book.

The thing is I never stop writing website content because that is like Liquid Plumber in my pipeline!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving all!

Best – Hal

By: Craig Klein

Craig Klein — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:58:49 +0000

Great stuff Dolye!

Gunter said it – its hard work and discipline that win the race. Using a CRM in the way you’ve described can help sales people stay disciplined. For most though, they need help setting these goals in the first place.

By: Gunter Wessels

Gunter Wessels — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 05:27:08 +0000

Spot on! Your post highlights the fact that the best sales work is unglamorous hard work.
One twist on this is the scale of the deal. It gets harder when you’re harpooning whales, and the prospecting process is more narrow, so a lot of homework on your target goes a long way toward warming up the cold call. This is very true when you’re dealing with referrals and especially when you’re dealing with existing clients. Do you really know what is going on, and where their priorities are since your last interaction?
20 minutes of research can turn a sputtering client into a fountain of new revenue, plus referrals.

By: mark allen roberts

mark allen roberts — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 05:01:30 +0000

Great Post!

One of the best sources for new contacts is your existing clients…yet most salespeople fail to ask.

Market leaders in sales understand this and are always asking their fans for additional contacts.

Thanks and I will be sharing this post.

Mark Allen Roberts