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This is a general guide. Not all features may be available to you. Please contact your Salesforce Admin for further details.
A. Introduction
The SalesChoice product suite, available on the Salesforce App Exchange, is a Cloud-Based Sales Analytics solution that uses predictive and prescriptive analytics to provide high accuracy predictions and insights for each of your sales opportunities, and helps you get the most out of your Salesforce CRM system.
The Product Suite offers three different solutions to aid in your Salesforce analytics needs:
SalesChoice Insight Engine™: Predictive Sales Analytics is the base product that makes use of a host of AI/ML algorithms to analyze current and historical sales data to make predictions about future sales life outcomes and new opportunities.
SalesChoice Insight Engine™: Prescriptive Sales Analytics, a product add-on, combines the findings of descriptive, inquisitive and predictive analytics to find actionable insights into how you can improve the performance of your sales cycles.
SalesChoice Insight Engine™: Data Quality is a recent addition to SalesChoice cloud based analytics product suite, and offers a real time snapshot of how complete the data is across the dataset in every single field relevant to the client business model, for each user of Salesforce in the team. This helps provide real-time coaching and increase Salesforce adoption within the team.
SalesChoice Product Suite together use Predictive and Prescriptive techniques to transform your company’s Sales Data to identify risks and opportunities and increase your likelihood of success, using advanced machine learning methods.
SalesChoice Product Demo: You can access and download the detailed product video here: https://global.gotomeeting.com/play/recording/6e873c2f4cf93c4e4155ecb23f9f4efb97fb66acc5ae1db9d5d357d03a26aa47
B. Getting Started with SalesChoice Insight EngineTM
The SalesChoice Insight EngineTM has three components under its Manager Module: Dashboard, Graphs and Accuracy.
Important note before use: SalesChoice requires that users self-authorize our App the first time that they visit the SalesChoice tab. This happens through a pop-up window. If the pop-up window does not initiate, please check if your browser is set to block pop-ups.
After this step, please refresh your page again to bring up the SalesChoice Dashboard.
To get started with Insight EngineTM, once the installation of the SalesChoice is done by your Salesforce Admin, you can add it to your Salesforce menu bar by going to the All Tabs section and selecting SalesChoice under the tab options.
Note: If using Salesforce Lightning, you can access all apps by clicking on the 9 dots on left side, and searching for “SalesChoice”. On Salesforce Classic, you will have to click on the ‘+’ sign on the menu bar instead to find the app.
Once the SalesChoice app has been installed on your Salesforce system, you would be good to go and would then see three main components:
• Dashboard: The place to view all the pipeline insights and predictions for opportunities predicted to be won.
• Graphs: The location to view all the interactive visualizations for the predictions and additional insights from historical data.
• Accuracy: Exclusive feature for managers or head of sales departments. This tab helps you monitor the accuracy of predictions made by Insight EngineTM.
C. Dashboard
The SalesChoice dashboard tab for Managers is divided into four major sections:
1. Dashboard Settings
This board allows the manager to reload the SalesChoice tab at different levels throughout the hierarchy of the organization and for different time periods and target/gap totals.
Important: You will need to input your team’s overall target/gap for your territory. This is a key input to run your SalesChoice predictive simulator. A cookie will be created when you input your Target/Gap value for the first time, to remember that value. It will remain in your setting parameters, until you change or reset a different parameter.
The various parts of this board are as follows:
• Date Range: Time period to view prediction for.
• Target/Gap: Sales target or gap for the selected sales hierarchy during the defined period.
• User Role: Dropdown to select the team you want to view predictions for.
• Divisions: Option to one or all if 6 Divisions (Inside Sales Central Canada, Eastern Canada, Western Canada, Sales Effectiveness)
• Type: Option to pick one or all of 2 Opportunity types (Net New and Share of Wallet)
• Include Next Quarter: Option to pull in opportunities from the next adjacent time period if quota is unmet.
• Update: Button to initiate the prediction simulator
2. Date Range Selector – Custom and Relative Date Selector
This is an industry first feature that grants its users the ability to generate predictions across any Custom or Relative time period.
(a) This feature will be available under SalesChoice Dashboard ->Dashboard Settings -> Date Range, as two new options – Custom and Relative.
(b) Custom Date Range
If you select Date Range -> Custom, you would be able to see two new date selectors: Start Date and End Date.
Clicking on any of the () icons, will bring you to the calendar widget, where you can select a particular date.
This lets you view predictions for opportunities closing between the date range specified by the “Start Date” and “End Date”.
(c) Relative Date Ranges
If you select Date Range-> Relative, you will slider functionality pop up.
This slider comes with a toggle bar, where you can select whether the relative date you want to select is in years, quarters, months, weeks and days.
Eg: Selecting Quarters in the toggle bar, would let you select opportunities between two selected quarters, let’s say between the first and third quarter.
The left hand side slide selection, will show up in the “From:” frame and the right hand slider selection will show up in the “To:” frame.
You can also select the “Use Fiscal Period” CheckBox, to stick to fiscal quarters.
3. Dashboard Stats
This displays the results of the completed sales simulation using the inputs entered in the Dashboard settings board.
The various parts of this board are as follows:
• Target Status: This data point shows whether the selected sales team/individual is “On Target” or “Off Target” in meeting the target (based on the number entered previously in Dashboard Settings). It follows the below mentioned logic:
• If predicted Total Revenue < Target: “Off Target”
• If predicted Total Revenue >= Target: “On Target”
• Current Pipeline: Total Revenue to Target ratio. It indicates what multiple of the Target is the predicted Total Revenue.
• Ideal Pipeline: Given the chosen user role’s average win rate, what should the pipeline ideally be in order to achieve the Target.
• Total Revenue: This is the overall revenue predicted for the chosen user within the chosen time period. It is the SC predicted value of all Open opportunities added to the value of Closed Won opportunities. For context, the little number in grey shows the absolute value of all Open opportunities added to the value of Closed Won opportunities.
• Closed Revenue: The value of opportunities that are Closed Won within the time period selected in Dashboard Settings.
• Predicted Revenue: The SC predicted value of all Open Opportunities marked to close within the chosen time period. For context, the little number in grey shows the total value of all open opportunities in the pipeline with the close date within the chosen time period.
4. Sales Reps
• This is a list of all sales reps/teams that fit into the dashboard settings selection under the chosen user/sales team. If no filter has been set, this table shows the top level of team and reps/teams that roll up to the logged in user.
• The table provides the following information per sales rep:
• Sales Team/Rep: Sales Team Leader or Rep name
• Role: The corresponding DOG code
• #Won: Number of opportunities that have been marked as Closed Won in the chosen time period
• #Lost: Number of opportunities that have been marked as Closed Lost in the chosen time period
• SC Prediction: The total value of revenue predicted from open oppostunities. It is calculated as the sum of the value of each opportunity multiplied by its SC Prediction
• Predicted + Won: The predicted value of all Open opportunities added to the value of all Closed Won opportunities
• Opportunity Rankings (A, B, C): The number of open opportunities in the pipeline within the chosen time period, rated A, B or C respectively, according to the likelihood of them being Closed Won
• #Open: The total number of open opportunities in the pipeline with Close Date within the chosen time period
• The below fields signify the quality breakdown of the sales pipeline of the particular individual or team:
• #A: Number of open “A” opportunities i.e. opportunities the highest probabilities of being Closed Won in the chosen time period, relative to other pipeline opportunities.
• #B: Number of open “B” opportunities i.e. opportunities with debatable or uncertain likelihood of being Closed Won in the chosen time period, relative to other pipeline opportunities.
• #C: Number of open “C” opportunities i.e. opportunities with the lowest probabilities of being Closed Won in the chosen time period, relative to other pipeline opportunities.
• Clicking on a Team Name will drill down to the next level of sub teams and sales reps.
• Clicking on a Sales Rep’s name will bring you to an individual Sales Reps’ dashboard page.
5. Win Rates
The Sales Reps table has a toggle button in the top-right corner to show Win Rates. Switching it on shows the above table, listing the Win Rates in the chosen time period for each team / sales rep listed, by Volume of opportunities as well as the Fiscal $ value of opportunities.
There is also an option to view the win rates trend by month for year-to-date as shown below, in the top-right corner.
Once clicked on it, users can choose to see the monthly win rate trend either by # of transactions or the Fiscal $ value separately by choosing the appropriate option in the top-left corner of the table.
6. All Opportunities
This table shows all your open opportunities (or those of the User Role chosen in Dashboard Settings) that have a Close Date within the chosen time period.
Each column is sortable and filterable. Clicking the down arrow next to each column name will allow you to filter the table by column. To avoid any confusion later, please ensure that you click on ‘Clear All Filters’ once done. If a filter has been applied, the corresponding column header will show in Bold.
The various columns in the table are as follows:
• Account: Client name the opportunity is associated with
• Opportunity: A sale or a pending deal
• Owner: The sales professional working on the opportunity
• Amount: The value of the opportunity as recorded on Salesforce
• Stage: The stage of an opportunity in the sales pipeline as recorded on Salesforce
• Prediction: The SalesChoice (SC) probability of winning the deal
• Rating: The SalesChoice (SC) quality rating assigned to the opportunity
• FC: The Forecast Category for the opportunity, if recorded on Salesforce
• Close Date: Opportunity close date.
If the estimated age of the opportunity (based on its current close date and the date it was created) is significantly higher or lower than the average age of opportunities of this type in your organization, then the date is flagged in Red. You can hover over it to see the details. This is how we flag Latent or Sandbagged Opportunities.
How is the Quality Rating Assigned?
The SalesChoice quality rating is a relative ranking of opportunities in the division-wide sales pipeline, based on weights calculated using the historical information of similar opportunities and the stage of the opportunity. The ratings then assigned are as follows:
• A: Win – Highest quality opportunities (those with highest probability of reaching the Closed Won stage) in the sales pipeline.
• B: Debatable Outcome – Opportunities that can go either way and have uncertain probability of reaching Closed Won stage in the sales pipeline.
• C: Loss – Lowest quality opportunities (those with lowest probability of reaching the Closed Won stage) in the sales pipeline.
Every opportunity on the table has the option to expand. If you click on the “+” sign, the Playbook can be viewed, which reveals the top drivers influencing the opportunity.
7. Playbook
This is prescriptive insight into the historical Win and Loss factors for similar type of opportunities. The various columns in the table are as follows:
• Win Factors: Factors that are most relevant to determining the outcome of hat particular opportunity. For simplicity, only the top factors in the AI model are shown here. The full list can be viewed in the “Data Completeness” tab under Charts.
• Win Spread: The prescribed range i.e. the range of values that have historically worked for opportunities of this type.
• My Opportunity: The corresponding value in this opportunity for that win factor. It is accompanied by a Green or Yellow sign which indicates whether your corresponding value is within or out of the prescribed range.
8. Opportunity History
The Opportunity History graph helps you see the journey an opportunity has gone through so far. This allows you to track the nature, frequency and impact of changes reps have made to an opportunity and how it has increased/decreased the % score for that opportunity, giving you a better handle on increasing their odds of success with current or future pipeline. The information showing in the table are as follows:
• Graph: Shows how the opportunity’s prediction % score has trended over time.
• What Changed?: Lists all changes (rep-made or automatic) that have occurred in this opporutnity at any one point in time.
Note: The visibility of this feature depends on whether SalesChoice has been allowed permission by your Salesforce Admin to store data in order to map the information on the graph.
D. Graphs
There are four tabs normally available: Forecasting, Indicators, Insights & Data Quality.
1. FORECASTING TAB
• SalesChoice Funnel vs Salesforce Funnel
This is the comparison graph of SalesChoice vs Salesforce revenue predictions against the stage at which the opportunities are
If you hover over the bars, you can see the details, including the stage and SalesChoice/Salesforce expected revenue. You can also select from the controls at the bottom if you want to see just SalesChoice/Salesforce predictions.
• SC Predicted + Won vs. Target
This graph shows what fraction of the entered target/gap has been achieved so far in the time period entered in Dashboard Settings.
• Opportunity Quality Distribution
This graph shows the breakdown of SalesChoice ratings across sales reps and teams. The full pie represents all the opportunities owned by your sales reps, divided in percentages of A, B & C. Clicking on a portion of the graph will drill down into the breakdown of that section. For example, clicking A will show you how the total numbers of A’s are divided among reps or teams.
• $ Won vs $SC Predicted + $ Won
The Y-axis shows the total amount predicted to reach Closed Won stage at the end of the selected time period, including opportunities already there. The X-axis shows the amount already reached to date. The graph displays Sales Reps or Teams as bubbles plotted between what they are predicted to win versus the amount they have won to date. The bubble size varies based on the number of all opportunity pursued or being pursued by the team/rep.
Hovering over or clicking a bubble will initiate a dialogue box with some key stats about that sales rep or team. These include: Team/Sales Rep name, Won amount, Won + Predicted, and Total opportunities pursued (open & closed).
• Opportunity Quality Distribution with % Won
The bar graph portion of this visualization shows the breakdown of A, B and C opportunities for each sales rep or team’s funnel. Each series of columns should add up to 100% of that user or team’s opportunities.
2. INDICATORS TAB
• Briefing Book: This view offers additional insight into the current sales funnel, which can be viewed either in terms of opportunity count or opportunity amount. There are normally 2 types of insights available, which can be chosen from the picklist on the right side.
• Sales Stage Name & Opportunity Ranking (A, B, C) – It shows the distribution of different opportunity rankings across the different sales stages. You can view this information by opportunity amount as well as count.
• Account Name & Opportunity Ranking (A, B, C) – It helps identify the importance of different clients according to the number and quality of opportunities from each currently in the funnel. You can view this information by opportunity amount as well as count.
3. DATA QUALITY TAB
Data Completeness: This view shows the relative level of completeness of data for each sales rep across all fields in the database that are relevant to the outcome of deals, on a scale of 0% to 100% colour-coded from Red to Green.
E. Accuracy
This view helps you monitor the accuracy of the predictions made by SalesChoice Insight EngineTM, for all the closed opportunities in your Salesforce system, by comparing the predictions to the actual results.
At the top of the page, we have the following three accuracy graphs:
1. Overall Accuracy of the all the predictions made
2. Accuracy of Closed-Won Predictions
3. Accuracy of Closed-Lost Predictions
These visualizations are followed by the Accuracy Control Manager. This table has the following columns:
• Opportunity: Name of the opportunity closed
• Account: Account to which opportunity belongs
• Predictions: The SC prediction of the opportunities (probability of being Closed Won).
• Outcome: The actual outcome of the opportunity upon closing
• Accurate: Whether the prediction made by Insight Engine about the outcome was correct or incorrect.
• Amount: Revenue earned or lost from the opportunities outcome.
• Close Date: Date the opportunity was closed
• Owner: Sales professional who owns the opportunity.
Closed Opportunity History
Similar to the Opportunity History graph in Dashboard, this graph helps you see the journey a closed opportunity went through. This allows you to track the nature, frequency and impact of changes that reps made to an opportunity, and how it impacted the prediction % score that eventually led to the opportunity’s success or failure.
Note: The visibility of this feature depends on whether SalesChoice has been allowed permission by your Salesforce Admin to store data in order to map the information on the graph.
F. Coaching
SalesChoice’s coaching feature is designed to simplify predictive insights to allow managers and sales reps to focus on the opportunities requiring most attention. They break down the open pipeline (as per the filters chosen earlier) into five buckets:
• Out of Range: These are opportunities with estimated close date out of range of the time taken by similar opportunities.
• Almost There: These are opportunities in the final stage, split by their predicted quality (A/B/C)
• A Opportunities: These are open opportunities marked A as per the chosen filters.
• B Opportunities: These are open opportunities marked B as per the chosen filters.
• C Opportunities: These are open opportunities marked C as per the chosen filters
Click Here to See List: This is a clickable link under each coaching bucket above, which allows the user to directly view the All Opportunities table pre-filtered as per the respective bucket.
G. Benefits
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• Increases top-line revenue growth by 5-10%.
Growth Matters
• Increases top-line revenue growth by 5-10%.
• Shortens your sales cycles by understanding your funnel quality, and drivers of wins and losses.
• Use integrated external market data insights to identify new sales prospects and uncover coverage opportunities (upsell/cross-sell)
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• Predicts outcomes accurately by 85% or more.
Focus Matters
• Predicts outcomes accurately by 85% or more.
• Guides your sales professionals to focus on the best leads and opportunities to increase conversion and win rates.
• Allows management to identify potential losses early and deprioritize.
• Sales Analytics users are 93% more likely to walk away from bad deals (Aberdeen, 2015)
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• Reduces your forecasts risks by 30%-50% by predicting sales more accurately.
Forecasting Matters
• Reduces your forecasts risks by 30%-50% by predicting sales more accurately.
• Analyzes your historical win and loss patterns with other data sources to provide you with more reliable sales forecasts.
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• Enables you to focus your resources on the best sales opportunities.
Resourcing Matters
• Enables you to focus your resources on the best sales opportunities.
• Reduces your sales ramp time by 20%-30%.
• Reduces your cost of sales and improves resource utilization.
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• Big Data leaders: Companies that effectively use predictive analytics to guide decision-making beat out their competitors by an average of nearly 8% CAGR (Source: McKinsey, 2015).
