Sharing my thoughts on how to qualify leads and forecast target.
Over the years I have successfully used BANT framework across the Waterfall Model of Funnel.
Lets look the stages of
By Stage 5 it will be interesting to see how leads/prospects qualify as an Opportunity. Also funnel mix needs to be considered esp; how many opportunities are cross/up sells and how many are new opportunities .
This will also give a good indication at this stage whether forecasted numbers can be achieved or not. This process will help in validating. Both bottom up and top down approach must be used for validation of forecatsed
Since I don't know
Over the years I have successfully used BANT framework across the Waterfall Model of Funnel.
Lets look the stages of
- Stage 0 (Demand Generation)
- Inquiry - via a demand generation campaign like email/social media/webinar etc or a sales rep. driven
- I'm not sure how you have got these 22 leads
- From here 22 prospects needs to be qualified along with 3 existing qualified leads to be sure
- Stage 1 (Lead Management)
- Awareness - customer says do I have a problem, root problem /or a symptom of a problem
- Exit
criteria - Marketing Captured Lead (MCL) which is data requests like
decisions makers, address, email, employees and other details of an
organisation
- Stage 2 (Lead Management)
- Consideration - mean buyers say I have a problem and a need
- Exit criteria - Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) - BANT 1 can be used to exit to next stage
- Stage 3 (Lead Management)
- Engagement - mapping buyers journey to engage and see if my solution can solve your problem and shall I try it
- Exit criteria - Sales Accepted Lead (SAL) - Tactical exit criteria is BANT 2
- Stage 4 (Opportunity Management)
- Intent - Customer is ready to learn more about it
- Exit criteria - Sales Qualified Lead (SQL) - BANT 3 or 4
- Stage 5
- Sales Opportunity is qualified and identified
- Its at this stage, sales rep starts his/her efforts
By Stage 5 it will be interesting to see how leads/prospects qualify as an Opportunity. Also funnel mix needs to be considered esp; how many opportunities are cross/up sells and how many are new opportunities .
This will also give a good indication at this stage whether forecasted numbers can be achieved or not. This process will help in validating. Both bottom up and top down approach must be used for validation of forecatsed
Since I don't know
- how many leads qualify for Stage 5
- what is a typical size ($TCV) of a deal
- an average time of conversion from Stage 5 onwards to close
- Conversion ratio (say 25%)
