Question

opportunity conversion rate between stages


Hi,

I'd like to build a Funnel conversion report, to track opportunity conversion rate between stages in my pipeline. My goal is to confirm wether the win probability % for each pipeline stage is accurate or not, and to monitor its evolution over time.

 

Could you help me do that please?

Thanks a lot for your help!

Camille


14 replies

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Hi @Camille

Of course, I’d be happy to help you. To clarify, are you:

  1. Looking for the conversion rate of each stage in your pipeline? 
  2. Having every opportunity move through each stage in the pipeline? 

Thank you,

Natalie Stambro

Hi @Natalie from Copper,

Thanks a lot for your reply!

That would be option 1. I want to make sure that the win probability of each stage of my pipeline is accurate so that my sales forecast makes sense, thus I’m looking for the conversion rate between each stage of my pipeline. 

Ideally, I would also track the evolution of these conversion rates over time, and for each team member.

 

Hope that clarifies.

Thanks again for your support.

 

Best,

Camille

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Thank you @Camille! I’m working on a video for you.

Thanks a lot for your help @Natalie from Copper

Much appreciated!

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Hi @Camille Below is a video I created to help define the conversion rate of each stage in your pipeline and how to compare it with the win probability. Please provide feedback or ask any questions so I can ensure you get the correct data you’re looking for. 

 

 

Thank you,

Natalie Stambro

Hi @Natalie from Copper,

Thanks a lot for the video! I did the table as described, but it is not really what I expected. As opportunities move in the sales pipeline from step 1 to step 2… all the way to step Z before we close it, it gives a 0% win rate for all steps except for step Z.

Thus, how can I track the win rate for a given pipeline stage, that is to say the number of won opportunities that have been in stage X over the total number of opportunities that have been in stage X for a given period of time ?

Or else, the number of opps that have moved from stage X to stage X+1 over the total number of opps that have been in stage X for a given period of time.

 

Do you think it would be possible to track this information?

Best,

Camille

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Hi @Camille,

Thank you for your patience while I speak with the greater team on this. 

I do have a potential solution but I’m not sure if it will fit your needs: Reverse engineer to find the lost opportunities % for each stage since all of the won opportunities will be in the final stage of your pipeline. By using the lost percentage we can identify the inverse of what would have moved through each stage in your pipeline. 

Would that be suitable to explore?

Thank you,

Natalie Stambro

Hi @Natalie from Copper,

Indeed, this works well with reverse engineering. Many thanks!

However, would it be possible to make some calculation from that in order to display the conversion rate? I couldn’t find the way.

And would it be possible to monitor the evolution of this metric over time? e.g. what’s the loss ratio (or even better the conversion rate) for each stage, for each quarter over the last 12 months?

→ Line chart spread over time, with a line for each stage

 

Thanks,

Camille

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Hi @Camille,

Thank you for the feedback! OK, I created another video option. Please review this and let me know what you think.

 

If we continue to have further modifications, I recommend us moving our conversation to a DM so we can schedule a quick Google Hangout meeting to talk through this with a screen share. 

I’m looking forward to hearing from you!

Thank you,

Natalie Stambro

Hi Natalie, @Natalie from Copper 

The video tutorials are great-thank you! I’m looking for the same report that was asked by Camille but the last video you shared showed conversion rates lost. Let me know if I misunderstood, but I’m looking for a report exactly as Camille shared. Is this the last column “Lost % Rate”?

What’s the conversion rate from one stage to the next? Ex: conversion rate from qualified to T&E = #%, conversion rate from T&E to Ordering = #% and so forth - through all the stages. Do you have an updated video on how to build this report? 

Thank you,

Cecilia.

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Hi @Cecilia, thanks for posting! Natalie’s not available to respond but I’m happy to help you out.

In her video, the last column represents the loss rate per stage. So if we see 43% in that column, it means that 43% (or 3/7) of the opportunities currently in that stage have been Lost.

Now, I can provide guidance on setting up that conversion-by-stage table. BUT I think there is a bigger question here: what are you trying to get out of the data?

Intuitively, it sounds like you are trying to understand which stage your opportunities are falling through in. For example, are most of your Opps falling out in the T&E stage?

If that is the case, it is much easier to do that based on the Loss Rate by Stage, as shown in Natalie’s previous video. That table gives you a clear view of which Opportunity Stages are performing the best and the worst.

Is there a particular reason you need stage-by-stage conversion as opposed to loss rates by stage? I’ll provide more details on stage-by-stage conversion below, but I think the most important thing is to consider the question above.

 

--

For the conversion rate on a stage-to-stage basis: E.g. if every single deal goes from Qualified to T&E, that stage-to-stage conversion rate would be 100%.

This is doable, but it requires some setup work. This is because the system can only look at where the opportunity is now, not which stages it has gone through. So you’d have to operate under the assumption that each Opportunity has passed through all previous stages to get to the stage it’s at now. And then add up all the Opportunities that have gone through all the previous stages, and then you can calculate the conversion.

That probably sounded complicated, so here’s an example. Let’s say we have a Pipeline with these stages:

  1. Qualified
  2. T&E
  3. Contract Finalized

In order to set up a stage-to-stage conversion, we’d have to create this table:

  # Currently Qualified # Currently T&E # Currently Contract Finalized # Currently (Qualified + T&E) # Currently (T&E + Contract Finalized) $ Currently (Qualified + T&E + Finalized) Qualified → T&E Conversion* T&E → Contract Finalized Conversion**
# Opportunities 50 30 20 (50 + 30) = 80 (30 + 20) = 50 (50 + 30 + 20) = 100 (50 / 100) = 50% (20 / 50) = 40%

* (total number of opps currently in T&E or Contract Finalized) divided by (total number of opps currently in Qualified, T&E, and Contract Finalized)

** (total number of opps currently in Contract Finalized) divided by (total number of opps currently in T&E and Contract Finalized)

 

If your Pipeline is more than three stages, that table would involve more columns and more calculations.

 

If you’re still interested in building this table, I can provide more specific guidance. But definitely think about whether what you need can be achieve through the loss rate by stage, or if it specifically requires conversation rate by stage.

Hey Michelle

The reason so many of us are trying to see the conversion rate from one stage to the next throughout the pipe is because it is a common and expected reporting metric for all startups to their VCs. Rational or not, it’s what is being asked of us:) 

 

Thanks

Hi all,

Totally agree with @Casper16! We definitely need to build a report calculating the conversion rate from one stage to the next throughout the pipe, but still cannot do it using Copper. It’s quite surprising because it’s a very common and standard feature for all CRM.

Plus, when customizing pipeline stages in copper, we can add the “Win Probability %” for each stage. But how are we suppose to guess these figures and base our forecast on that if it is not validated by proper calculation?

 

Thanks a lot for your help!

Camille

@Michelle from Copper @Natalie from Copper Any updates on this? I’m also trying to build similar reporting. This is my KPI: Track conversion rates through each stage of the sales funnel and analyze pertinent data to make recommendations to improve the funnel's performance. It’s really hard to do in Copper and I’m starting to think it’s impossible to structure the data in a way that makes sense for a CEO to glance at and understand.

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