Requirements: Forecast Insights require Bulk API Access. User mailboxes need to be connected to sync to Ebsta. Learn more about mailbox connection: User Management
Forecasting is a vital responsibility for every sales team. It has to be as accurate as possible because it serves as a tool for future business planning. However, many sales teams struggle to consistently predict their forecast because they’re still relying on ‘gut feeling’ and don’t have the information they need to make decisions or prioritize efforts that will positively impact their pipeline.
To improve the accuracy of your forecast, decisions need to be based on the genuine likelihood of those deals to close. This is why we have created Deal Score, a tangible way to make those decisions based on the data in your CRM, rather than making baseless assumptions.
Our Deal Score metric analyzes your pipeline in real-time to predict your forecast and individual Opportunity health. By benchmarking historical performance and analysing deal signals including engagement, relationships, stage, age and Opportunity trends, Ebsta delivers a score between 1-99 against every Opportunity. Along with positive and negative factors, sales reps have the actionable insights they need to close more deals faster and Managers have an excellent gauge on how teams and reps are performing and can identify which deals to prioritise when coaching for success.
How is Deal Score calculated?
Ebsta analyzes thousands of deal signals and benchmarks historical performance to present a real-time Deal Score against each opportunity. These include:
- Engagement - Do you have a high enough Engagement Score?
- Relationships - Do you have relationships with enough stakeholders?
- Momentum - Has there been activity in the last 7 days?
- Planning - Do you have a future task or meeting scheduled?
- Stage - Is the deal progressing?
- Opportunity Trends - Has the stage, close date or value changed?
- Age - Has the deal been too long in stage or has it got enough time to close?
Deal Score vs. Weighted Forecast
The Deal Score is superior to the traditional Weighted Forecast (Stage-Based Forecasting) as it considers a multitude of factors, rather than relying on an arbitrary Stage. The Deal Score adds a new dimension to how you understand your pipeline health as it analyzes numerous factors and considers their weighting based on historical success.
Example 1 - Deal Score identifying risk
Opportunity ACME is at Stage 8. By the book, it would be weighted at 80%. However, Ebsta highlights the opportunity is suffering from low engagement, too few relationships, being too long in stage and negative trends. Instead, it scores it at 37. Now, a manager can spot late stage risk and, with Ebsta’s insights, prioritize efforts to reduce risk faster.
Example 2 - Deal Score identifying opportunity
Opportunity HODL is at Stage 2. By the book, it would be weighted at 20%. However, Ebsta highlights the opportunity is benefiting from high engagement, multi-threading, positive trends and quick progression through the first stage. Instead, Ebsta scores it at 47. Now a manager can spot early pipeline potential and, with Ebsta’s insights, prioritize efforts to accelerate this opportunity to the latter stages of the sales cycle.