The Things Every Seller Must Know About Forecasting | Donald Kelly - 1541

Today’s episode of The Sales Evangelist launches a new series on forecasting! When it comes to forecasting, there are a ton of strategies and tactics you can use to develop a solid background on it. In this episode, Donald discusses the three things you must know about forecasting before starting.

But first, what is forecasting? 

• In essence, it’s your ability to predict what will happen in the future.
• As a sales professional (and especially as a sales manager), you must be able to estimate how your team will perform throughout the week, month, and quarter. 
• Without forecasting, you’ll have no idea if you’ll achieve your sales goals!

Know your data.

• How many calls lead to a conversation, a demo, and, ultimately, a sale? 
• Understanding your sales figures and statistics leads to an accurate forecast.
• Your pipeline is tied directly to your forecast, and if you put inadequate or insufficient data into a forecast, you’ll get bad predictions in the outcome.

Respect the process.

• Some prospects might want to skip conversations and move directly into a demo, a proposal, or a review.
• But are they even worthy of a demo, or will the sale benefit them? If they don’t fit the criteria of a client for your company, you’ll be wasting valuable time.
• Don’t do the demos just because someone is interested; use data-driven forecasting to identify the indicators you need to make that decision. 

You need more than you think you need.

• Even if you’ve done everything perfectly throughout the sales process, a deal still might not close.
• If the data tells you to close forty deals to meet a target, put sixty in your pipeline. Because while they might all close, you can’t guarantee it. 
• The takeaway? You need more prospects and a more robust pipeline than you might initially think. Put extra in now to avoid scrambling at the end of the quarter.

This episode is brought to you in part by LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

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This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

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This episode is brought to you in part by mParticle.

Are you tired of wading through thousands of open sales positions to find the one perfect for you? Well, look no further. mParticle is one of the leading independent customer data platforms out there, and they’re looking for motivated remote sellers (just like yourself.) 

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This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

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Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com