I originally wrote this essay for my team in 2019.

I called it the "Weekly Game Plan" and it was the inspiration for this newsletter that you are reading. (although I didn't officially start writing the newsletter until last year).

I was up late reviewing the pipeline, frustrated with team performance and looking for a way to drive more revenue from our pipeline.

This methodology worked 5 years ago and it works just as well today.

Use this game plan if you are looking for a spark to get more from your existing pipeline.

The Problem with Sales Pipeline Management

It's 10 days into the month and you are staring at a mountain in front of you.

Your new ARR quota for this month is $50,000 and you only have $10,324 booked.

1/3 of the month is gone.

Your sales pipeline is full of duds: prospective customers who won't answer the phone, missed product demos, deadbeat leads from the marketing team.

The field looks messy and you don't see a clear path to the end-zone.

You try to use the sales process that your sales leader implemented in your CRM, but the stages of the sales process don't match the stages of your deal.

You look at each opportunity and you can't figure out what the next step should be with your prospect. You need guidance for action and you need it yesterday.

We have all been there before.

You are definitely not alone. Sales managers and sales reps alike have felt the frustration of a messy pipeline.

It's suffocating.

But all hope is not lost, there's a path to success and it is simple.

It is difficult, but it is simple.

Executing an efficient sales pipeline isn't rocket science, but it does requires two things:

1. Discipline

2. Planning

Your sales pipeline is the foundation for your sales success, and getting the right game plan today will set your month, your quarter, and your year in the right direction.

A Simple Pipeline Management Template

Consistent sales execution is not easy for anyone.

Sure you may have a good month, or a good quarter.

A blue bird might come in through the window and get you over your number, but you can't count on that every month.

Consistent execution requires discipline, even when things are going well.

The Weekly Game Plan is a sales pipeline management template that provides a simple way for sales managers and account executives to take control of their sales pipeline and set themselves up for consistent sales success. Executing the Weekly Game Plan is hard and requires discipline, but it is simple.

Download the template here: Weekly Game Plan Template

How does Weekly Game Plan work?

The Weekly Game Plan is a simple methodology for organizing your pipeline for action, it's broken down into five action categories that coincide with the stages of a healthy pipeline.

Every week, run your pipeline from your CRM and apply the Weekly Game Plan spreadsheet.

Organize your pipeline by the five stages and execute from the closest to closing all the way down.

Your goal is to have no orange or red in your pipeline, every deal should be worked and there should be no "junk" in your pipeline.

The image below is a preview of the stages that you will use to organize your pipeline:

THE WEEKLY GAME PLAN

Stage 1: Hot Deal!

You know these opportunities.

If you are a sales rep, you engage with these opportunities often.

If you are a sales manager, these are the ones you and your reps are talking about in your pipeline management meetings.

You are counting on them to come in this month or quarter - they are your "commits".

You need to keep them warm by engaging and ALWAYS making sure you have clear next steps set with the opportunity.

Stage 2: Cooling Off

There's one guaranteed way to make a deal go cold, and that is to leave it without clear next steps on the prospects' calendar and on your calendar.

These used to be Hot Deals! but you have let them cool off. 

You need to re-engage these leads ASAP and get a next step on the calendar. Your pipeline with thank you.

Stage 3: Quicksand

Look at all of the deals that have closed in the last six months, and look at the maximum sales cycle for the fastest 80% of these closed won deals.

For illustration, let's say that 80% of your deals close in 30 days or faster.

If you have any opportunities that have been stuck in a stage for 30 days or more, they better have a very good reason for why they are still in the pipeline.

Stage 4: No Calls

There's no excuse for poor followup, but we all do it.

Any opportunity in your pipeline that hasn't received a phone call in two weeks likely isn't a deal that you can count on to get to your number.

Inactivity is the primary cause of aging pipeline and identifying these opportunities, however uncomfortable, is the first step in fixing the problem.

The next step is to get these prospects on the phone and move the deal forward!

Stage 5: Junk

This is the unacceptable part of your pipeline. The worst opportunities.

A combination of Quicksand and No Calls, these deals are old and they are not being followed up with.

Sales reps keep these in their pipeline because it feels good to see a big number.

The gig is up: stop lying to yourself about the size of your pipeline and start confronting the brutal facts about your reality.

Move them up or move them out, but don't keep Junk in your pipeline.   

How To: Getting the Spreadsheet Ready

Step 1: Build your report in Salesforce and export to excel.

Note: For the purpose of this e-book, we will assume that your team uses the Salesforce CRM.

If you use any CRM, this methodology will still work, but you will need to adjust the instructions for that CRM.

Build an Opportunities report in Salesforce with the following fields

- Opportunity Created Date
- Opportunity Stage
- Opportunity Owner
- Opportunity Name
- Next Step Date
- Next Step Notes
- Last Call Date (or last activity date)
- Stage Duration (or opportunity age)
- Close Date
- Amount

Use the filters to choose all active and open opportunities with close dates this year.

Step 2: Create your Weekly Game Plan document in Google Drive

Access the template here: Weekly Game Plan Template

Hint: Make a copy to your own Google Drive.

Title the document in the following format: “2014.06.10 - Sales Weekly Game Plan”. This will help you separate one week’s game plan from the next week’s game plan.

Adjust the title to represent the current date (should be the Monday of the week).

Step 3: Copy all the data from the Salesforce report into the  Weekly Game Plan Template

Copy all the data from the downloaded spreadsheet.

TIP: don’t just copy all (CTRL+A).

Start with cell A1, hold down CMD+SHFT then click the right arrow, continue to hold CMD+SHFT and click the down arrow.

This should highlight the rightmost cell and the bottom-most cell, and will highlight all of the cells in the middle. Copy this by hitting CMD+C.

‍

Step 4: Paste the data from the exported spreadsheet into the new Weekly Game Plan workbook.

Make sure the columns line up with the headings in row 23.

Creating Your Weekly Game Plan

The spreadsheet should look like this:

Step 1: ID the Quicksand

First make sure the entire data set is filterable by highlighting and clicking the “turn on filter button on the top right.

Sort the data set descending by Stage Duration (column J). For any row that has 30 days or more in Stage Duration, Put “Quicksand” in column A.

* Note that you should adjust this to fit the max age of 80% of your pipeline. Depending on your sales cycle, this could be shorter or longer.

Step 2: ID the No Calls

Sort the data set descending by Last Call Date/Time (Column I). Scroll down to 14 days ago (e.g. two mondays ago). Anything more than 14 days old gets a “no calls” designation in Column B.

‍Step 3: ID Junk‍

Now sort column A descending (Z-A), then column B descending (Z-A). In that order. This will match up all the opps that are both Quicksand and No Calls. This is the junk.

- Change column B for these opps to “Junk”.
- Copy All the Quicksand from Column A to Column B in the appropriate cells.
- Delete all of Column A

Step 4: ID the Cooling Off

- Sort Column G (Next Step Date) ascending (A-Z), then Column B (This week’s Game Plan) ascending, in that order.
- Scroll down to the first empty cell in Column B

- Anything with a next step date AUTOMATICALLY gets a “cooling off” tag in Column B‍

Step 5: ID the Hot Deals!

This should only be deals with a next step date today or in the future. Go through EVERY SINGLE next steps field and read them to determine whether or not they are Hot. Go through quickly, no need to scrutinize over this step. TIP: hide columns C-G while you are going through them, this puts columns B next to column H for easy analysis. Remember to Unhide after you are done.

Here are some examples of Hot Deals:
‍

“closing call at 2:30 CST”
“1/28 demo with Leah @11am CST”
“Demo with James and Partner @ 2:30pm”

Here are some examples of Cooling Off deals with next steps in the future:
‍

“Set up call with Joe @ 8am”
“Call Jeff Richard and schedule demo”
“missed demo - reengage for 3x”
“missed demo - re-engage”
“email to schedule second demo”

In other words, you know it when you see it.

Mark all the Hot Deals, then sort Column B Ascending (A-Z) and mark all the empty cells in Column B with “Cooling Off”

One other note, anything with a close date further than two weeks out mark as “Cooling Off”.‍

Step 6: Organize the data‍

Sort all data by Column B. In Column A, put a 1 next to Hot Deals, 2 next to Cooling Off, 3 for Quicksand, 4 for No Calls, and 5 for Junk. Then sort by Column A.

Highlight all rows in Hot Deals and color them Green. Go down the data set and color code the data. Here are the Colors to use:

Executing the Weekly Game Plan

Now that you have your pipeline organized with the five stages of a healthy pipeline, it’s time to get to work!

Pick up that phone and connect with your prospective customers.

Set next steps, clear out the junk, move deals forward or get them out of your pipeline.

Now that you have combed through your pipeline to see what the truth really is, you can execute your plan and achieve consistent sales execution!