You're trying to prioritize sales opportunities. How do you use logical reasoning to do it right?

1 Identify your criteria

The first step of logical reasoning is to define the criteria that you will use to evaluate your sales opportunities. These criteria should reflect your goals, resources, and market. For instance, you may take into account revenue potential, closing probability, decision timeline, customer fit, and relationship status. Revenue potential evaluates how much money can be made from the opportunity, while closing probability assesses the likelihood of closing the deal. Additionally, decision timeline indicates when the customer will make a decision. Customer fit measures how well the customer matches your ideal buyer profile and relationship status determines the strength of your rapport with the customer.

2 Gather your data

The second step of logical reasoning is to collect the data necessary to measure sales opportunities against criteria. Various sources of data, such as CRM systems, sales reports, customer feedback, and observations should be used to gather as much relevant and reliable data as possible. However, it is important to be aware of the limitations and biases of the data. For example, incomplete data may not provide all the information needed to assess an opportunity, while inaccurate data may be outdated or incorrect. Additionally, subjective data may be based on assumptions, opinions, or emotions.

3 Analyze your data

The third step of logical reasoning is to analyze your data and compare your sales opportunities based on your criteria. You can use various tools and methods for this, such as scoring models, ranking systems, matrices, or charts. Aim to be as objective and consistent as possible while remaining flexible and adaptable to changing situations. For example, you could score each opportunity by assigning numerical values to criteria and calculating the total score. The higher the score, the higher the priority. Additionally, you can rank opportunities from highest to lowest priority based on criteria and group them into categories like hot, warm, or cold. Visualizing opportunities on a graph or matrix based on two or more criteria is also helpful - for instance, the BANT matrix which stands for Budget, Authority, Need, and Timing.

4 Act on your data

The fourth and final step of logical reasoning is to act on your data and execute your sales strategy based on your priorities. Allocating time, energy, and resources is essential, so you should focus on the opportunities with the highest value, urgency, and fit. Additionally, you should monitor your results and feedback and adjust your actions and priorities as needed. For instance, nurturing high-priority opportunities by providing value-added information, qualifying low-priority opportunities by verifying their interest, needs, and readiness, and reviewing the pipeline periodically to update data and reevaluate priorities based on performance and market changes are all important steps.