The Ultimate Sales Pipeline Forecasting Template
We don't really make much of a secret of our thoughts towards forecasting, and the need for technology to help it: Missed targets are primarily as a result of bad planning (or at least a bad understanding of the available capacities in a business), rather than bad forecasting. After all - A forecast can only help change the outcome of with what is already in the active, making them entirely reactionary.
They are still however super important to get right, but typically overcomplicated, and so if you prefer to forecast outside of your CRM this will be the spreadsheet template for you.
And if you want something less reactionary, that helps beyond active pipeline? That's where proper capacity planning comes in.
Let's take a look.
No over-complication or robots here, just a statistical approach to reporting. As long as deals are correctly managed, you'll be effectively & accurately reporting.
Make your copy in Google Sheets or download it to Microsoft Excel, add in your opportunities and go!
Using the template
1. Set up targets and sales stages
You'll need to set a plan start date, the start of your fiscal year, so that your quarterly reporting aligns correctly. You'll need to put in the names of your markets, as well as your sales stages, as well as quarterly team revenue targets.
Don't worry if your reps have different revenue targets due to roles, you can always overwrite. You might also want to take a look at our ultimate sales compensation planner to make sure you're appropriately compensating for their targets.
2. Add in your teams
Add in your team members and select their markets - You can still overwrite the annual revenue targets that are imported from step 1, and it will then calculate a monthly equivalent of revenue.
3. Add in current deals
Add in your team members and select their markets - You can still overwrite the annual revenue targets that are imported from step 1, and it will then calculate a monthly equivalent of revenue.
4. Here's your Forecast
The output is split into two parts: an individual rep forecast and a rollup to overall company with frecast by market.
Again, here you can choose views between weighted and unweighted reporting, with views for your overall fiscal year (If you add already closed deals you should get a full view), as well as the next 4 quarters.
You'll notice that your forecast doesn't give much visibility beyond your current sales cycle - if your sale cycles are 3 months, that's going to be as far as you can accurately project.
If you want to look further into the future, you're going to need to look more into future capacity planning, we have both a really neat template as for that, or you can try the future of planning & projection.
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