Appropriate Key Performance Indexes For Your Sales Funnel

By Joost Williamson


Appropriate determination of your sales channel metrics will have a immense impact on the strategies that you use to increase deals.. Determining which key performance indicators to use and the amount of time between measurements will have a giant impact on the data collected and the resulting tactics.

Apart from of the KPI's that you prefer to use, the performance of your deals cycle should be periodically measured against a benchmark and monitored for change. With the help of these measures it becomes much easier to know just efficiently your channel is performing and whether there is a problem which if present can then be rectified at the earliest.

Amongst the different deals channel metrics that are to be used to uncover the efficiency of the channel, funnel value is an significant one. It refers to the potential value of the entire deal in a channel and in fact it also represents the value of future sales. Because it includes future values, the funnel value allows you to evaluate the long-term profit potential of a sales prospect or client.

When measuring the performance of a deals cycle, it would be ideal if every facet of the funnel were tracked; in truth, sometimes it is not possible to assign each and every value. In order to arrive at a more realistic funnel value it is necessary to weigh each deal by itself, especially in regard to its chances of completion. To get the correct channel value and in case of doubt, then the deals that are placed at the start of your deals conduit must be given a lighter weight as compared to those deals that are close to being completed.

Additional metrics that are measured in sales funnels are arrival rates, conversion rates and flow rates.. The arrival rate simply refers to the total number of deals that are going through the channel over a given period. This rate allows you to assess the rate at which prospects are acquired into the sales funnel and subsequently converted. These numbers can then be made use of in order to estimate the amount of sales effort that is required and the figures can also be used to estimate the amount of cash flow required.

Conversion rate is another one of the more important sales funnel metrics. The conversion rate evaluates the number of potential deals that have actually closed. This figure is used to quantify how profitable a particular qualifying in process as well as sales process is. Conversion rates vary, however, industry benchmarks aid in determining the effectiveness of a particular deals process.

Another key metric is the flow rate. This channel metric is defined as the amount of time a typical deal remains in the sales funnel. Generally the flow rate is not a precise number, but instead has a minimum or maximum for a given deals opportunity. Like the other metrics, benchmarks for flow rates in a given industry may be available.

When checking this particular rate, it is more than likely that you will be able to identify many a deal that have been stuck in the channel and such deals are known as stuck deals. Such deals ought to be taken out and dealt with individually.




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