In today’s increasingly competitive world, professional firms must focus obsessively on maximising their sales opportunities. They must ensure that:
- They invest their sales time, resources and investments in the areas of highest return
- They achieve a regular flow of sales into the company to avoid damaging “boom-bust” cycles
- They are able to rapidly respond to the changing needs of clients and specific opportunities and adapt their sales tactics accordingly
- They can identify and diagnose which areas of their sales approach are working well and which need improvement
- They can accurately track and forecast their sales and take corrective actions where needed
Pipeline Management is a key management tool which has been developed to address these issues – yet many firms fail to implement it effectively, if at all.
Many professional service firms still rely heavily on instinct, guesswork and “seat-of-the-pants” management to control their sales pipelines. As a result, many are trapped in a vicious circle where they over-focus on highly visible areas such as closing late-stage deals, and under-invest in key areas such as early-stage lead generation.
This leads to a further drying up of quality opportunities, a panic-driven focus on closing the few remaining opportunities in the pipeline at all costs, and more neglect of the critical front-end. For small or medium-sized firms – and particularly for sole practitioners – this can be even more crippling, as the key business-winners are often also heavily involved in the execution of sold work – and are easily dragged away from working on filling up the earlier stages of the pipeline.
The issue behind these problems is often the lack of a visible and rigorous sales pipeline management process. It doesn’t have to be complex – but it does have to be done.
To establish effective Pipeline Management processes I will work with your team to analyse, design and implement enhanced business processes covering areas such as:
- Understanding the the business development lifecycle
- Modelling the sales stages for key sales channels
- Setting appropriate targets across the pipeline
- Forecasting sales
- Using the pipeline to guide sales tactics
If you are interested in this service, or feel I may be able to help you with some of the challenges you’re facing, then why not contact me for an informal discussion.
There’s no commitment, and I won’t try to push you into a sale – we’ll just discuss your situation to see if working together might be a good fit.
You can call me on 0161 408 0984 or my mobile 07866 549 984.
Alternatively, you can use the contact form below.
Best Regards,
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