The short version
- Pipeline management is three jobs done every week: decide what goes in, move each deal on with a dated next step, and take out what's dead.
- Give every stage an exit rule the buyer has to meet. "I feel good about it" isn't one.
- Work out how much pipeline you need from your own win rate. At 25%, that's four times the target.
- Run a 30-minute review each week on what's new, what moved, what's stuck and what was lost.
- A deal with no next step and no date isn't in the pipeline. Move it out.
What is sales pipeline management?
Your sales pipeline is every open deal, sorted by the step it has reached. Managing it means keeping that list honest: the right deals in it, each one moving, and the dead ones out, so the total tells you what's likely to close and what you still need to find.
A pipeline and a funnel are two views of the same steps. The pipeline is who's at each step today. The funnel is the share that moves from one step to the next. You manage the first and measure the second. The glossary entry on the pipeline has the one-line version.
How to set pipeline stages a deal has to earn
Most pipelines have too many stages, and the stages describe what the rep did instead of what the buyer agreed to. A deal should only move when something is true on the buyer's side. Here's a set of six that fits most small teams:
| Stage | To move on, this has to be true | The usual next step |
|---|---|---|
| New | You know who they are and why they might buy | Book a first meeting |
| First meeting booked | A date is in both calendars | Hold the meeting |
| Need agreed | They've told you the problem, the budget range and who decides | Send a proposal |
| Proposal sent | They have your price and terms in writing | Agree a decision date |
| Decision due | They've named the date they'll decide | Get the yes, or the no |
| Won or lost | They signed, paid or said no | Hand over, or log the reason |
Two rules make the stages work. Every deal has one owner. And every stage change is dated, so you can see how long deals sit where.
Is there enough in your pipeline for next month?
Enough that your win rate turns it into the target. The ratio is called pipeline coverage, and the amount you need is 1 divided by your win rate by value. At a 25% win rate you need 4 times the target. At 33% you need about 3 times.
The sums below use made-up numbers. Say next month's target is $40,000 and your win rate by value over the last 12 weeks is 30%.
- Coverage needed: 1 / 30% = 3.33 times.
- Pipeline needed: $40,000 x 3.33 = $133,333 due to close next month.
- Open pipeline due next month today: $90,000.
- That leaves you short by $133,333 - $90,000 = $43,333.
- At a $5,000 average deal, that gap is $43,333 / $5,000 = 8.7, so 9 new opportunities.
- Spread over the 4.33 weeks of a month, 9 / 4.33 = 2.1, which is about 2 new opportunities a week.
Do this sum for next month. A deal that enters the pipeline today won't close this month if your deals take six weeks, so this month's coverage is mostly fixed already, and the gap you can still close is next month's. The win rate calculator gives you the rate to put in step 1.
How to run a weekly pipeline review in 30 minutes
Hold one review a week on the same day, with the pipeline on screen and each rep's deals sorted by stage, and talk only about what changed since last time.
| Minutes | Block | The question |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 5 | New | What came in this week, and does each one meet the rule for its stage? |
| 5 to 10 | Moved | Which deals moved a stage, and what did the buyer do to move it? |
| 10 to 20 | Stuck | Which deals have no activity in 14 days, a decision date in the past, or no next step? |
| 20 to 25 | Lost | What was lost, and why, in the buyer's words? |
| 25 to 30 | Next week | What's each rep's next step on their three biggest deals, with a date? |
Spend the most time on stuck deals, because that's where the forecast goes wrong. For each one, the rep says what the next step is and when, or the deal comes out. If a single deal needs half an hour of discussion, move it to that rep's one-on-one.
How to keep dead deals out of your pipeline
- Every open deal has a next step and a date. A deal without one moves out until the buyer comes back.
- When a decision date slips, the rep writes down why. After two slips in a row the deal drops a stage.
- Work out how long deals usually sit at each stage, and review anything that has sat there twice as long.
- Log lost deals with the reason in the buyer's words. They say more about your pitch than the won ones do.
- A deal moves on something the buyer did. A good feeling after a call doesn't count.
- Each deal has one owner, because shared deals are the ones nobody chases.
Pipeline metrics worth a weekly look
| Metric | How to work it out | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Coverage | Open pipeline due in the period / target still to close | Whether there's enough to hit the number |
| New opportunities | Deals added this week | Whether next month is being built |
| Stage conversion | Deals that moved to the next stage / deals that entered the stage | Which step is losing the most |
| Days in stage | Average days deals sit at each stage | Where deals stall |
| Average deal size | Revenue won / deals won | Whether discounts are creeping in |
| Win rate | Won / (won + lost) | How good the pipeline really is |
| Sales velocity | (Opportunities x win rate x average deal) / average days to close | Revenue the pipeline produces per day |
Sales velocity puts four of these into one number, which is handy for comparing months. The sales velocity calculator does the sum.
How to forecast from the pipeline without guessing
Weight each deal by your own history instead of the percentage your CRM came with. Over the last 12 weeks, work out what share of deals at each stage went on to win, and multiply each open deal by its stage's share.
Say, with made-up numbers, that 40% of your deals at the proposal stage went on to win, and you have three proposals out at $6,000 each. That's 3 x $6,000 x 40% = $7,200 of expected revenue from that stage. Add up every stage the same way and you have a forecast based on what your pipeline has done before.
Keep a second number beside it: the deals each rep would bet on, called commit. When the weighted forecast and the commit are far apart, one of them is wrong, and the stuck-deals block of the review is where you find out which.
Pipeline management mistakes that cost you the quarter
- Keeping dead deals because the total looks healthy. Coverage of 5 times made of stale deals closes like 1 time.
- Stages named after the rep's activity ("called twice") instead of the buyer's.
- Reviewing every deal every week. Review what changed and what's stuck.
- Forecasting with the CRM's default stage percentages instead of your own.
- Only looking at this month. By the time this month is short, it's too late to add to it.
- Letting deals skip the lost stage. Deals that fade away teach you nothing.
See every deal by stage, and who needs a call today
This guide is free. ActivityTracker, the app we make, is paid. Here's what it does for the pipeline.
- The CRM shows every prospect on a board by stage, with the clients you haven't spoken to lately at the top
- Every message, meeting and note about a prospect sits on their page, with a summary of your last WhatsApp chat
- Follow-ups are typed in one line, dated, and reminded, so each deal's next step turns up on its day
- The funnel shows the rate at each step from appointment to deal, and names the step with the lowest rate
- You can upload the spreadsheet you already keep, and one tap undoes the import if something lands in the wrong place