Introduction

A deal is a sales opportunity that you pursue with a person or a business. To monitor a deal’s progress, you create a sales pipeline and assign it to the deal. The sales stages of a pipeline represent a deal’s lifecycle.

Every deal may not follow the same sales process. For instance, B2B and B2C sales processes can be different. So, you might need to create separate sales pipelines for both. To aid in this process, Vtiger CRM allows you to create multiple pipelines. You can also track a deal’s lifecycle with the help of pipelines. Now let us learn how.
 

Configuring a Sales Pipeline

A sales pipeline consists of different stages that a deal moves along until its closure. You must be an Admin user to create a sales pipeline in Vtiger CRM.

Follow these steps to navigate to the Pipelines page:

1. Log in to your CRM account.
2. Click the User Menu on the top right corner of the screen.
3. Click Settings.
4. Look for the Marketing & Sales section.
5. Click Pipeline & Stages.

On this page, you will see the Standard pipeline that Vtiger CRM provides by default. You can either edit the pipeline or create a new one to comply with your sales process.

Follow these steps to create a sales pipeline:

1. Click the +Add Pipeline button.
2. Select or enter the following information - 
   1. Pipeline name
   2. Who can assign the pipeline to deals
   3. Description of the pipeline
3. Click the +Add Sales Stage button to add new sales stages to the pipeline.
4. Select or enter the following information -
   1. Sales stage name
   2. Probability (It represents a deal’s progress percentage)
   3. Who can assign the sales stage to deals
   4. Color to differentiate between sales stages
5. Click Save.

After you create a sales pipeline, you can assign it to deals and track their lifecycle. 

Assigning a Pipeline to a Deal 

You can assign a sales pipeline while:

• Creating a deal
• Editing a deal

You must also select a sales stage while assigning the pipeline.
To learn about creating a deal, click here.

Follow these steps to assign a pipeline to a deal:

1. Log in to your CRM account.
2. Click the Main Menu.
3. Go to Sales.
4. Click Deals.
5. Open a deal.
6. Click the Edit icon on the top right.
7. Look for the Pipeline field.
8. Select a pipeline from the drop-down.
9. Look for the Sales Stage field.
10. Select a sales stage from the picklist.

Changing a Deal Pipeline 

You might need to change a deal’s pipeline if your sales process changes. You can do it in two ways:

• From the Kanban View
• From the Summary View

1. Log in to your CRM account.
2. Click the Main Menu.
3. Go to Sales.
4. Click Deals.
5. Click the Kanban View icon beside the +New Deal button.
6. Hold and drag a deal. You will see the Change Pipeline option at the bottom of the page. Drag and drop the deal on the option.
7. Select the new pipeline from the Pipeline drop-down.
8. Select the new sales stage from the Sales Stage picklist.
9. Specify the Probability (optional).
10. Click Apply.

The deal adopts the new pipeline and sales stage.

1. Log in to your CRM account.
2. Click the Main Menu.
3. Go to Sales.
4. Click Deals.
5. Open a deal. You will land on its Summary View.
6. Click the current pipeline name shown on a bar at the top of the Summary View.
7. Select the new pipeline from the Pipeline drop-down.
8. Select the new sales stage from the Sales Stage picklist.
9. Specify the Probability (optional).
10. Click Apply.

Monitoring a Deal’s Lifecycle

You can get insights into how your deals progress using multiple Vtiger features. 

• Journey Tasks: Journey tasks are the activities that sales representatives must perform in each sales stage of a deal. When you complete a journey task, you move the deal one step forward. You can monitor a deal’s progress in terms of journey tasks using the Tasks tab on a deal’s Summary View. 
• Kanban View: The Kanban View groups deals based on sales stages. You can see how a deal progresses through its sales stages by looking at the Kanban View.
• Summary View: You can see a deal’s current sales stage on its Summary View. You can also find the following metrics when you hover over the sale stage -
  • How long the deal has been in the current sales stage -for example, 12 H (Hours) or 12 M (Minutes)
  • The overall age of the deal. For example, 23 D (Days).