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Sales funnels (or pipelines) are a list of prospects you are currently working on and hope to close. These funnels may include the names of decision makers, the proposed products and services, the anticipated close date, the percentage chance that the sale will actually close, expected revenue, etc.

With the onslaught of software to help with funnel management (i.e., Sales Force Automation, Customer Relationship Management and Enterprise Resource Planning) the amount of data that is being collected from salespeople is getting out of hand in some cases. Salespeople are being asked to input huge amounts of information to these systems that are basically sales funnels on steroids. I should know; I’ve lived with several of these systems and have mixed feelings about them. Salespeople, I have felt your pain.

The first big ugly secret about these systems is that only a limited amount of this sales funnel information is ever used. The reason for this is because of the second big ugly secret; salespeople can’t see the ROI for the time it takes to input the plethora of data. As a result they make up entries to satisfy the system and save time; thus the data can be unreliable and meaningless. And now for the third big ugly secret. Depending on the size, features and options, companies can invest millions of dollars on these systems; so they find themselves in the we-have-too-much-invested-in-this-to-abandon-it mode.

The fourth and biggest ugly secret is that many implementations are not successful. The guesstimates on the amount of unsuccessful implementations go as high as 90%. The amount of cognitive dissonance for companies that install these things and aren’t pleased with the results must be unreal. “We have invested tons of money and time on this and we know it works so we expect our sales professionals to use it. They should be thanking us for this great sales tool! It will revolutionize how we go to market!” Right.

I’m a big believer in automating everything possible and removing selling obstacles from salespeople. Sales force automation tools and their related products can and do benefit sales organizations around the globe. However, and this is a big “however,” before jumping in it is critical that your company determine exactly what funnel information needs to be gathered and will actually be used. Next, an ROI analysis needs to be performed that will measure the benefits against the opportunity costs for the sales force and your organization as a whole. Here’s an idea for management that virtually none do when implementing sales force automation; talk to your salespeople before buying anything. You don’t always have to buy the Boeing 747 model of the software. Sometimes less is actually more.

To be sure, there are successful implementations of this kind of software. They are ones that are well thought out in relation to ROI, where the amount of information being gathered from salespeople is realistic and there is a real need for the information.

Tags: Tools

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