Use the Sales Pipeline

The Sales Pipeline has three views: the Pipeline board of deals, the Team view with one row per salesperson, and Trends. This page covers each, and how to move a deal from one stage to the next.

8 min readYou need: View access to Sales Pipeline; Edit on Leads or Enquiries to move dealsBefore you start: a few leads or enquiries saved

Video coming soon: Tour of the Sales Pipeline

Go to Biz View › Sales Pipeline. The tab shows only for roles that have access. Above the board are three buttons, Pipeline, Team and Trends. Trends shows only if your role has View on Reports or on Sales Reports.

The board

The board has seven columns: New, Contacted, Qualified, In Discussion, Quoted, Won and Lost. See the stages and the forecast for what each holds. A column with nothing in it says "No deals". The board always shows all seven.

The column header

Each column header shows the stage name, the number of deals, the total value, and the weighted value in teal. The weighted value is the total times the stage's chance of winning. Hover a figure to see "Total value" or "Weighted value".

The Won and Lost columns show only deals that reached that stage recently. Use the closed-deals list at the top right of the board to choose Last 30 days, Last 90 days (the starting choice), Last 180 days, Last 12 months or Backend default (90 days). It changes only those two columns.

A deal card

Each card is one lead or one enquiry.

• A small Lead or Enquiry tag, with a coloured edge: blue for a lead, amber for an enquiry.
• The title, and under it the value in large type.
• A follow-up line. It shows Follow-up and the date of the earliest pending follow-up, or Overdue in red when that date has passed. With no follow-up, it shows Schedule follow-up if your role can create follow-ups.
• The owner's initial and name, or Unassigned, and the deal's ID.
• Close and the expected close date, when there is one.
• A red Stale tag when the expected close date or the next follow-up date has passed. A closed deal is never stale. The tag is hidden when the red Overdue follow-up line already shows.

Click a card to open the lead or enquiry in a new browser tab, so the board stays where it was. You need View on Leads or Enquiries to open it.

To add a follow-up, click Schedule follow-up, or the small + beside an existing follow-up date. A follow-up form opens for that deal. When you save it, the card's date updates. See Follow-ups.

Lots of deals

Each column loads up to 50 deals. When a column holds more, a button says Load 12 more (with the real number). Click it to load another 50 deals in every column, up to 200. Past 200, the column says "+N more" and you narrow the board with search and filters.

The refresh button at the right of the toolbar reloads the board. The board does not refresh by itself.

Move a deal

Drag a card by the grip that appears at its top right when you point at it, and drop it on another column. While you drag, the columns you may drop on are outlined and the others fade. You need Edit on Leads to drag a lead, and Edit on Enquiries to drag an enquiry. Without it there is no grip.

Move	What happens
Lead to another lead stage (New, Contacted, Qualified), forward or back	Saved at once
Lead to In Discussion	The Convert to enquiry box opens
Lead to Lost	The Mark as lost box opens
Lead to Quoted or Won	Not allowed. Convert it first
Enquiry to another open stage (In Discussion, Quoted), forward or back	Saved at once
Enquiry to Won	Saved at once
Enquiry to Lost	The Mark as lost box opens
Enquiry back to a lead stage	Not allowed
Anything out of Won or Lost	Not allowed. Closed deals stay closed

A saved move shows at once. If it fails, the card returns to where it was and an error message says why. If someone else moved the deal first, you see "Stage changed since the board was loaded. Please refresh and try again." Click refresh, then try again.

When you move a deal to an open stage and it has no pending follow-up, Bizconnekt creates one for you. It is titled "Next action:" followed by the deal's name, is due in 3 days, and is assigned to the deal's owner. A deal that already has a pending follow-up keeps it.

Video coming soon: Move a deal to the next stage

Convert a lead to an enquiry

1. Drag a lead card onto In Discussion. The Convert to enquiry box opens, saying the lead "becomes a new enquiry".
2. Check Enquiry title. It is filled with the lead's title and is required.
3. Check Estimated value and Expected close. They are filled from the lead when it has them. Both are optional.
4. Click Convert. You see "Lead converted to enquiry".

The new enquiry has the title, value and close date from the box, the same owner as the lead, and its source set to Other. It is not linked to an existing customer. It appears in In Discussion. The lead is marked Converted and leaves the board, so the deal is counted once. You need Create on Enquiries for this step. Without it, the move fails with an error message.

You can drop a lead from New, Contacted or Qualified onto In Discussion.

Mark a deal lost

1. Drag the card onto Lost. The Mark as lost box opens.
2. Type the Reason for loss. It is required and holds up to 500 characters.
3. Click Mark lost, or Cancel to leave the deal where it is.

The reason is kept on the deal.

Search and filter

The toolbar sits above the columns.

Control	What it does
Search deals…	Finds deals whose title, ID or owner name contains what you type
All owners	Lists the owners of the deals now loaded. Pick one to see only their deals
Min value	Shows only deals worth at least this much
Sort list	Orders the cards inside each column: Default order (soonest expected close first, and newest first in Won and Lost), Value: high → low, Close date: soonest, Name: A → Z
My deals	Only deals you own
Closing this week	Deals with an expected close date in the coming days. Check the Close date on a card for a deal closing today
Stale	Only deals tagged Stale
No next action	Only deals with no pending follow-up
Clear	Appears when anything is filtering. Clears search, owner, minimum and preset

Click a preset again to switch it off. One preset is active at a time. Your last preset and your choice of board or grid are remembered on this computer, so the board may open already filtered. The preset button shows highlighted when it is on.

Filters work on the deals already loaded. While one is on, the three figures and each column header are recalculated from only the visible deals, the figures say "filtered", and an amber note says the totals are for the loaded deals and not the full pipeline. If nothing matches, the board says "No deals match your filters".

Video coming soon: Find stale deals

The grid

Click the list icon at the top right of the toolbar for the Grid, and the board icon to come back. The grid lists the deals, filtered and sorted the same way, one per row, column by column from New to Lost. It shows only the first 50 deals of each stage and has no Load more, so use search and filters, or the board, to reach the rest. The columns are: Deal (title and ID), Owner, Stage (shown as a code such as IN_DISCUSSION), Value, Close, Next action and Source (Lead or Enquiry, with the Stale tag). Click a row to open the deal in a new tab. You cannot drag in the grid. With nothing to show it says "No deals to show."

The Team view

Click Team. It has three tabs, Pipeline, Activity and Conversion. If a tab cannot load, it shows a Retry link.

Pipeline

One row per salesperson, ranked by open value. Deals with no owner are grouped in one row.

Column	Shows
Rep	The salesperson
Open	Open leads and enquiries they own
Open value	Their value
Weighted	Their value times each stage's chance of winning
Stale	Open deals whose expected close date has passed, in red when above zero
Won and Won value	Enquiries they won in the last 90 days, and their value

This tab does not follow the closed-deals list on the board. Its Won figures always cover the last 90 days.

Activity

One row per person over the last 30 days, ranked by Total: Calls and Meetings logged on leads and enquiries, and Follow-ups done (follow-ups completed in that time). The empty message is "No calls, meetings or completed follow-ups in this window." You also need View on Sales View for this tab.

Conversion

Conversion by rep is meant to show, for each salesperson, the win rate on leads, how many were won out of how many closed, the average time to close, and a confidence label: Not enough data, Directional (about 30 closed deals) or Actionable (about 100). You need View on Reports.

These figures are being fixed. For now this tab shows no win rates, and every salesperson reads Not enough data. The Pipeline and Activity tabs are not affected.

The Trends view

Click Trends. Choose Leads or Enquiries, optionally set a From and To date (by the date the deal was created), and click Refresh.

• Email engagement funnel: how many of your emails were delivered, opened, clicked and viewed, with the open rate, click rate, view rate and click-to-open rate. Opens are indicative only; clicks and views are reliable.
• Why deals are lost: meant to chart the reasons typed in Reason for loss, most common first.
• Win-rate by source: meant to show, for each source, the win rate, closed deals, average time to close and a confidence label. A source with fewer than 30 closed deals is listed under "Not enough data to report", without a win rate.

The win rates and loss reasons are being fixed. For now they do not fill in: sources are listed as "Not enough data to report" and the loss reasons chart is empty. The email funnel works normally.

If there is nothing to show, it says "Not enough data yet". You need View on Reports. If your role has View on Sales Reports only, the Trends button shows but the view may say "Couldn't load engagement trends". In the same way, Activity may say it could not load unless you also have View on Sales View.

On mobile

Sales Pipeline is the fourth screen of the Dashboard tab, next to My Biz, Purchase View and Sales View. Same on iPhone and Android. It is a list for reading and filtering. You cannot move, convert, mark lost or open a deal on the phone, and there is no Team or Trends view. Use the web for those.

• The three figures. Open Pipeline, Weighted Forecast and Open Deals sit at the top, with amounts shortened in the Indian way (K, L, Cr).
• The list. One card per deal, in stage order from New to Lost, with the title, value, ID, owner, stage, close date, follow-up line, Lead or Enquiry, and the Stale tag. It does not show columns.
• Search and filter. Type in Search deals…. Tap the filter button for Filter deals: Minimum value, Owner, Sort by and Closed deals window (30, 90, 180 or 365 days), then Apply, or Reset. The four presets are chips under the search box. A "Filtered view" note and a Clear link show when anything is on.
• More deals. Tap Load more at the foot of the list. It is hidden while a filter is on.
• Refresh. Pull down, or tap the refresh button in the header. A "Last updated" line shows the time. Your last preset is not remembered.

The Android app is on Google Play. The iPhone app is coming soon to the App Store.

Problems and fixes

I cannot drag a card

Your role needs Edit on Leads for a lead and Edit on Enquiries for an enquiry. A deal in Won or Lost cannot be moved. Ask your administrator to change your role.

A column shows no deals, but I know there are some

Your role may lack View on Leads or on Enquiries, so those deals are left out. Won and Lost show only the window chosen in the closed-deals list. Clear any filter, and check a preset is not left on.

The board opens already filtered

Your last preset is remembered. Click it again, or click Clear.

The Team tab says "Couldn't load..."

Activity needs View on Sales View. Conversion and Trends need View on Reports. Ask your administrator.

Related

• Sales Pipeline overview
• Leads and Enquiries
• Follow-ups
• Role permissions

Need help? Contact support at support@bizconnekt.com