One of the most effective ways to get your group using the company’s Zoho database is to use it to generate reports. In the end, a CRM system is nothing more than a good database with detailed information about your customers, prospects, partners and community. Like any database, it will provide important information to help you run your business. If you’re getting a few good reports out of your Zoho database on a consistent basis, then you will find yourself relying on the system more and more, and demanding better and more relevant information from your team.
Of all the reports, the most important one is the pipeline report. It should be the very first report you use as part of your Zoho database and you should be looking at this information frequently—weekly, if not daily. So, what kind of information is important to have on your pipeline report? You must include these ten things:
Who’s responsible
This is the internal person at your company that owns the opportunity. It’s your sales rep. It could also include that person’s sales manager. You may be generating your report for all opportunities or just for certain people.
Probability/stage
This is a critical number. It’s a percentage. For example, a company may have three probability/stages: 50 percent for when a quote is first issued, 80 percent for when a prospect says “yes, we’re moving forward” (because nothing is 100 percent until the check’s in the bank) and 20 percent if a prospect is losing interest.
Contact information
This is straightforward. The name and company of your prospect is usually sufficient. Also helpful is the city and state, in case you want to sort or only show by region.
Date created
This is the date that the opportunity made it on your pipeline report.
Date expected to close
Self-explanatory. Stress the accuracy of this; this date drives projected cash flow.
Value
This is the total value of the deal.
Notes
Anything that’s particular to the deal or the prospect that the team should know about.
Weighted value
This is the total value of the deal multiplied by the probability percentage. The idea here is that when you add up all the weighted values of all the opportunities for a period, you’ll have a working average potential sales for that period. As you get better at doing this, you’ll see how important the probability percentage is.
Last action
This (and next action below) oftentimes is left off of these reports and yet it’s probably the two most important things to include. Why? Because what’s the first and next question you ask when looking at a potential deal. All prospects should have a detailed history of communications so a manager can feel comfortable that the prospect is fully on everyone’s radar and all should have some type of a next action scheduled, because you don’t want anything falling through the cracks.
Next action
See “last action” above.
Get Zoho database help and learn more about Zoho pipeline reports
If you’re thinking of investing in Zoho, it should be a priority to make this your number one deliverable in the first thirty days. Get rid of your spreadsheets, tell your people to do their data entry in the system, and make it clear that you’re going to be using the data from the system to manage your group or company.
It’s also important to ensure you’re setting up your pipeline reports correctly. The Marks Group offers expert-led Zoho training and support on all Zoho apps and products. Contact us at info@marksgroup.net to find out more and check out our YouTube video library!
