Setting Up Your Sales Process with Sales Stages in Salesforce

What constitutes a sales process?

The sales process entails a structured sequence of actions aimed at turning potential leads into paying customers. It steers sales teams from the first interaction with customers to the ultimate sale, ensuring a methodical strategy for closing deals and satisfying customer requirements.

What do Salesforce Opportunity Stages entail?

Opportunity Stages represent the sequential actions required to complete a sale within your organization, commonly known as the sales process.

Although Salesforce provides default Opportunity Stages, customization is typically necessary to align these stages with your company’s specific sales processes. Instructions on how to customize these stages are provided later in this article.

Below is a sample of fundamental sales stages within Salesforce. Sales representatives advance customers through these stages, engaging in various activities at each step, ultimately leading to either a “Closed Won” or “Closed Lost” Opportunity.

How to Create a Salesforce Sales Process?

A Salesforce sales process enables you to outline the appropriate opportunity stages for each of your sales procedures. Before initiating the creation of your distinct sales processes, it’s essential to ensure that all stages are established.

• Navigate to Setup and search for “Sales Processes,” then select “Sales Processes.”
  
  

• Click on “New” and input the name of your process in the “Sales Process Name” field.
  
  

• Optionally, add a description, then click “Save.”
• Deselect the Opportunity Stages not required for this process using the “Remove” button, and click “Save.”
  
  

How many stages are there in Salesforce?

Salesforce provides 9 default Opportunity Stages (although these can be customized and may vary between organizations):

1. Prospecting
2. Qualification
3. Needs Analysis
4. Value Proposition
5. Id. Decision Makers
6. Perception Analysis
7. Proposal/ Price Quote
8. Negotiation/Review
9. Closed
   • Closed Won
   • Closed Lost
     
     

• Repeat this process for additional sales processes, then view them listed.
  
  

Setting Up Your Sales Process with Sales Stages in Salesforce Video Tutorial

Further

➡️ Salesforce Roles, Profiles, Permission Sets, and Permission Groups
➡️ Set up Case Team Roles in Salesforce