Zoho CRM forecasting is a valuable tool to help you project your sales.. If you are currently using forecasts, please ensure you are aware of the key changes being made.
What is Zoho CRM Forecasting?
Forecasts in Zoho CRM are a way to estimate future sales performance as well as to track your sales growth. Forecasts provide important insights into individual performance and are critical for setting targets at the individual up to the company levels.
Zoho CRM forecasting focuses on the deals module and measures the contribution of both open and closed won deals to sales performance.
Recent Changes to Zoho CRM Forecasts
If you have used forecasts in Zoho CRM before, you will notice that Zoho has recently revamped how forecasts work. Below is a summary of the key changes:
- You can now set multiple and condition based forecasts across different periods – previously you were limited to a single forecast for all deals. The specific amount depends on the version of Zoho CRM you are using
- You can now have two forecast types available to you – Deal Revenue based forecasts (based on currency fields) or Deal Quantity based forecasts (cased on either the count of deals or other custom number fields)
- You can now choose from three different open forecast categories that can be defined within a deal using the Forecast Category field:
- Pipeline
- NEW – Best case – open deals with a high chance of being won
- NEW – Committed – open deals that sales reps commit to winning
- You will now have access to the split of deals when defining targets
- You will now be able to compare forecasts over time and drill down as needed
How Do I Set Up Forecasts in Zoho CRM?
Forecasts is a specific module within Zoho CRM. You will need to go to Setup/Customizations/Modules and Fields and ensure that the Forecasts module is available.
When forecasts are first set up, you must decide if they are built on either roles or territories. In order to build forecasts on territories, you will need to enable Territory Management by going to Setup/Users and Control/Territory Management. Read here to read one of our earlier blogs on Territory Management. In addition, you will have to define the first month of the fiscal year.
When you are getting started with a new forecast in the Forecasts module, you will need to define the parameters:
- Forecast type – Revenue or quantity based
- Forecast Period – Quarterly or monthly
- Forecast Name
- Whether you are forecasting on all or a selected group of deals based on criteria
- Next, you will need to define the targets for each role or territory – all targets will need to roll up to the company target or you will get a warning target split mismatch warning
- Click save after you have defined the targets and the forecast will run based on the deals included in the forecast (i.e., those with close dates within the defined period)
There is a lot more to cover about forecasting in Zoho CRM and we will do this in future blogs. In the meantime, reach out to us for any support on forecasts that you need.
Did you know The Marks Group is offering Zoho CRM Admin training? Check out our Events page to sign up! Also, don’t forget to check out our Zoho Training Video library on our YouTube channel for more assistance with Zoho CRM and many other Zoho products! Feel free to contact us at info@marksgroup.net with any questions or if you need Zoho support. Feel free to comment below. We’d love to hear your thoughts!
