What is sales forecasting, but educated guessing? Like meteorologists predicting the weather, we can’t collect data from the future, so sales pros use models, estimates, and assumptions to anticipate future outcomes. Like the earth, industry climates change all the time, so those estimates are less reliable the further we get into the future. Yet, most business models heavily rely on new business for long-term growth.
As a sales executive, there’s a lot of pressure to build an effective pipeline of new sales opportunities in the most cost-effective and efficient manner. Of course — as is the case with all things business development — it’s easier said than done. Fortunately, there are a number of ways to generate leads and quickly identify the most profitable sales opportunities. Check out our top three below:
1) Mobile lead generation
Smartphones, tablets, and wearable tech continue to change the way consumers digest information and spend money. According to Statista, mobile accounts for approximately half of web traffic worldwide. In the second quarter of 2022, mobile devices generated 59% of global website traffic, consistently hovering around the 50% mark since the beginning of 2017 before permanently surpassing it in 2020.
It’s safe to say that qualified sales opportunities can be derived from mobile marketing campaigns. Your consumers are comfortable making online purchases and filling out lead-gen forms on their smartphones. If your website, forms, and even internal sales software aren’t optimized for mobile, you’re missing out on countless sales opportunities.
2) Online prospecting tools
Obviously, the internet is an unbeatable resource to identify sales opportunities. However, it’s also a vast universe of misinformation, making going through and compiling correct information a daunting task. There are a variety of solutions that provide everything from contact databases and forecasted sales opportunities to custom lead recs.
At this point, the chances of you missing out on a prospecting opportunity (or seven…) are far greater if your sales team doesn’t have access to time-saving resources and online prospecting tools. Maximize the number of sales opportunities in your pipeline with tools to prospect smarter not harder. What tools does your business use to identify sales opportunities?
3) Multivariate regression analysis
This is a statistical method of sales forecasting. In sales, multiple variables influence the desired output (revenue), and the change in each variable has a corresponding effect on the predicted output. Companies that use multivariate regression are typically more sophisticated and data-driven in their sales approach.
This approach relies heavily on accurate data since it uses these values to analyze previous performance and predict future performance. Sales pros work as analysts who take previous sales activity data and the results of the closed opportunity (won or lost) to review current sales activity data. Then, they plot how likely a given deal is to close-won.