How I improved my quarterly outlook using the ‘Pipeline Shuffle’

One month into the new year, it is time to prepare for serious growth in the next three months. Have a look at the opportunities you are currently working on. What is your forecast? Does it look grim or promising?

What is the result when you select the opportunities you believe you can close confidently and forecast the impact on your performance for the next three months?

If the reality is unsatisfactory, read how the Pipeline Shuffle can catapult you to new heights. I have helped numerous salespeople with this simple exercise. It may take you a half day, but it is well-invested time. Tell your manager that you want to spend this time improving your pipeline’s quality.

You have got to increase your chances to hit your targets. Although new leads may still come your way from your lead generation teams, it is time to take faith into your own hands. How does it work?

Go into your CRM pipeline view and select the non-successful opportunities from the last two years. This is your base, and you will shuffle these opportunities in a non-conventional way to ensure your best cards come out on top.

Here is an example:

Prospect /Customer	Industry Segment	Number of Stakeholders	Change Champion Y/N	Situational Knowledge 1-5	Insights to take action Y/N	Opportunity Value p/m
Name	Fashion	4	Y	4	Y	2k
Name	Fashion	2	Y	2	N	5k
Name	eCommerce	2	Y	5	Y	4k
Name	eCommerce	2	N	3	Y	15k
Name	Life Science & Health Care	3	Y	4	Y	3k
Name	Life Science & Health Care	2	N	2	N	7k
Name	Manufacturing & Engineering	2	Y	2	N	10k
Etc.

Non-Conventional Segmentation

Create six columns next to the prospect company names. 1. Industry segment – 2. # Stakeholders – 3. Change Champion – 4. Situational Knowledge – 5. Insights to take action and 6. Opportunity value.

The first selection is Industry Segment and not Opportunity Value. This may be a surprise because many salespeople traditionally go after the biggest opportunities. Your Pipeline Shuffle strategy should not be based on high rewards because they often turn out to be high-risk opportunities. It makes more sense to analyze first what you know about the prospect and the opportunity (you had); The more you know, the greater your chances are.

Industry segment: Based on your experience, you are more comfortable talking to businesses in specific industries. Look at your top customers on your books; what industries are they in? The chances are that you are more aware of how they operate and what challenges they face. Conversations with prospects in these industries will have more context; you will show more business acumen and be perceived as more credible. You have insightful stories about why your top customers chose you as their partner and how you have helped them grow their business. Rank the industry segments with the one you are most comfortable with on top.

The number of stakeholders: When prospecting, the average number of stakeholders known by sales executives is one or two. As we know, more than six stakeholders are likely involved in buying decisions. We also know that they do not always agree on strategies to grow their business.

They need help with narrowing down their options. Hence, it makes sense to prioritize your opportunities based on the greater number of stakeholders you know; the more stakeholders you know, the greater your chance of getting a foot in the door again.

Buying Clock: Although, as a company, prospects are by definition in Why Change (of their buying process) – this may vary per stakeholder. When you previously met with your primary contact, where was this stakeholder in the buying process? Maybe your contact did like the idea of exploring a change, but other stakeholders thought differently and stalled your opportunity. If you prefer, make a separate column for this.

Change Champion: The bigger the buying team, the more you need Change Champions; these stakeholders promote change when you have left the building (physically or virtually).

• Was your contact compelled to explore change before?
• Can your contact introduce you to another stakeholder?
• Have you ENABLED your change champions? Is this still valid? Verify the current situation.

I recommend making your main contact part of the conversation instead of working around them. Mark the opportunities where you have or had a Change Champion with a Y;

Situational Knowledge: Give the opportunities a score from 1 to 5, depending on how much you know about their situation and challenges. How much do you understand what the prospect does as a business? How do they make money? Who are their competitors? How well do you know what they are trying to achieve as a business? What is their current focus and strategy? What challenges are they dealing with? What topics do they discuss with their Senior Management Teams? What trends have you identified in their industry? Are they working on these to their advantage? Do they turn these trends into new business? What industry challenges are you aware of? Do the stakeholders see similar challenges? Does that make them consider exploring different avenues, options, and suppliers? Questions like these help build greater situational knowledge. My recommendation is to use ChatGPT. Review how AI can help you with this here.

Insights to take action: How can you help the prospect with their challenges? Every business wants to grow, make more profit, and be more competitive. How can you help? Apply the ‘Insights in Your Own Backyard‘;

You can also get great insights from your favourite Customers you have helped. Why do they trust you and your company over competitors? Why did recently-won customers change their business to you? What is working better for them now? What have you improved that took their business to the next level? What strategic advantages did you deliver? There’s a high chance that prospects in similar industries face similar challenges. Can you use similar insights to change the prospect’s perception of their current situation? What risks do you see for their business sticking with their current set-up? If you know and have a great story to share, mark these with a ‘Y.’ Prepare yourself to deliver these insights with impact. Click here to review the effective SHOW-VERIFY-ASK method.

Your Best Cards

The Pipeline Shuffle is a great exercise to determine which non-successful opportunities are worth revisiting. With the prioritized ones bubbling up to the top, you are:

• confident with the industry they are operating in
• already know more than one stakeholder
• have a reasonably good idea of what situation they are in and the challenges they face
• ready to share insights that can trigger their interest in exploring a change in supplier

Does this make sense to you? Enjoy your Pipeline Shuffle. May your best cards come out on top!

Give me a Like if this works for you. I am happy to read your comments, too.

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