Lead-to-Win: Optimizing the Last Mile of the Sales Cycle

Lead-to-Win 2012
Managing People, Process and Technology to Optimize the Last Mile of the
Sales Cycle
March 2012
Peter Ostrow

Lead-to-Win 2012: Managing People, Process and Technology to Optimize the
Last Mile of the Sales Cycle
Page 2
© 2012 Aberdeen Group. Telephone: 617 854 5200
www.aberdeen.com Fax: 617 723 7897
Executive Summary
Contemporary technology tools hold significant promise for better sales
team performance in 2012, as top-performing selling teams search to reduce
their sales cycles and increase their win / loss “batting average.” Companies
that fail to keep up with the Best-in-Class, on the other hand, will find
themselves struck in the difficult selling environment of the economic
recession, with a restricted ability to close deals at the bottom of the
customer acquisition funnel.
Best-in-Class Performance
In October and November 2011, Aberdeen surveyed 295 end-user
organizations about their sales effectiveness practices. Aberdeen used the
following three key performance criteria to distinguish the selling organizations
within Best-in-Class companies:
• 92% average overall team attainment of sales quota in the last measured
year, compared with 56% among Industry Average firms and 13% within
Laggard companies
• 10.7% average year-over year increase in average number of proposals,
quotes or RFP responses delivered to customers/prospects, per sales
rep, per month, versus a 3.4% increase for Industry Average firms and a
4.2% decline among Laggards
• 4.2% improvement in (reduction of) the average sales cycle, versus a
1.3% improvement for the Industry Average and a 3.0% worsening of
(increase in) the cycle time among Laggard respondents
Competitive Maturity Assessment
Survey results show that the firms enjoying Best-in-Class performance share
several common characteristics, including:
• 88% have legal compliance ensured by pre-approved quotes, NDA’s,
proposals or contracts
• 71% have executive-level sponsorship for initiatives aimed at
shortening the sales cycle
Required Actions
In addition to the specific recommendations in Chapter Three of this
report, to achieve Best-in-Class performance, companies must:
• Reduce friction in this “last mile” of the sales cycle by ensuring that
process and technology initiatives are focused on shrinking the
average sales cycle, as well as on winning more deals
• Evaluate the ROI of configure / price / quote, contract management,
electronic signature, CRM, and content management solutions
Research Benchmark
Aberdeen’s Research
Benchmarks provide an
in-depth and comprehensive
look into process, procedure,
methodologies, and
technologies with best practice
identification and actionable
recommendations
This document is the result of primary research performed by Aberdeen Group. Aberdeen Group's methodologies provide for objective fact-based research and
represent the best analysis available at the time of publication. Unless otherwise noted, the entire contents of this publication are copyrighted by Aberdeen Group, Inc.
and may not be reproduced, distributed, archived, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written consent by Aberdeen Group, Inc.
“The number one change I am
trying to implement is to get
sales management to recognize
that the customer buying
process is different than when
we started 10 years ago.”
~ Daniel Sise, Director of
Business Development, Laser
Technology

Page 3
Table of Contents
Executive Summary.......................................................................................................2
Best-in-Class Performance.....................................................................................2
Competitive Maturity Assessment.......................................................................2
Required Actions......................................................................................................2
Chapter One: Benchmarking the Best-in-Class....................................................4
The Maturity Class Framework............................................................................5
The Best-in-Class PACE Model............................................................................6
Best-in-Class Strategies...........................................................................................6
Chapter Two: Benchmarking Requirements for Success...................................9
Capabilities and Enablers......................................................................................10
Chapter Three: Required Actions.........................................................................18
Laggard Steps to Success......................................................................................18
Industry Average Steps to Success ....................................................................18
Best-in-Class Steps to Success............................................................................19
Appendix A: Research Methodology.....................................................................21
Appendix B: Related Aberdeen Research............................................................23
Figures
Figure 1: Business Pressures Creating Sales Process Friction............................4
Figure 2: Best-in-Class Strategic Actions.................................................................7
Figure 3: Additional Best-in-Class Achievements: Current Performance .....11
Figure 4: Sales Funnel Management Effectiveness by Best-in-Class.................12
Figure 5: Sales Contract Accuracy by Best-in-Class...........................................13
Figure 6: Critical Lead-to-Win Enablers by Best-in-Class .................................15
Figure 7: Sales Tools Managed without IT, by Best-in-Class ............................16
Figure 8: Bottom-of-Funnel Sales Effectiveness by Best-in-Class.....................17
Figure 9: Lead-to-Win Budgets on the Rise..........................................................20
Tables
Table 1: Top Performers Earn Best-in-Class Status..............................................5
Table 2: The Best-in-Class PACE Framework .......................................................6
Table 3: The Competitive Framework.....................................................................9
Table 4: The PACE Framework Key......................................................................22
Table 5: The Competitive Framework Key..........................................................22
Table 6: The Relationship Between PACE and the Competitive Framework......22

Page 4
Chapter One:
Benchmarking the Best-in-Class
Sales opportunities represent a net-new customer potentially spending for
the first time, or an existing account that may buy again, or be up-sold or
cross-sold into new products or services. Once a sales lead or opportunity
is officially “in the pipeline,” the typical field or channel sales representative
or “closer” has every motivation to move the opportunity through the sales
cycle as quickly as possible, hopefully to a positive outcome. A successful
sale results in incentive compensation, quota achievement, professional
pride and even promotional opportunities for sales professionals who
consistently meet or beat their quota. Still, the potential barriers to a quick,
decisive “win” can be many: complex pricing negotiations, detailed product
configurations, gaps in communications, insufficient access to internal
resources, competitive bids, and even trigger-shy prospects or customers.
Aberdeen’s research shows that lead conversion efficiency is the top
pressure creating friction in this vital and complex sales cycle (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Business Pressures Creating Sales Process Friction
48%
29%
26% 26% 24%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
We don’t
convert
enough
leads
to sales
Insufficient
visibility into/
control of
sales pipeline
Lost efficiency
“re-inventing
the wheel” in
contract or
proposal
creation
Our average
deal size
is too
small
Our cost
of sales
is too
high
n = 295
PercentageofRespondents
All companies48%
29%
26% 26% 24%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
We don’t
convert
enough
leads
to sales
Insufficient
visibility into/
control of
sales pipeline
Lost efficiency
“re-inventing
the wheel” in
contract or
proposal
creation
Our average
deal size
is too
small
Our cost
of sales
is too
high
n = 295
All companies
Source: Aberdeen Group, November 2011
Converting more leads to sales is a common theme in Aberdeen’s research
into both Sales and Marketing Effectiveness, and both lines of business tend
to agree on the importance of making the conversion process more
efficient. In Aberdeen’s benchmark study on Sales and Marketing Alignment:
The New Power Couple (December 2011), the leading business goal among
385 survey respondents was increasing top-line revenue – a refreshing
aspiration to see among primarily marketing-oriented survey respondents–
at 65%, followed by improving the quality of leads provided to sales (38%)
and improving up-sell / cross-sell opportunities (23%). Only 21% of
companies indicated that sending more leads from marketing to sales, i.e.
quantity over quality, was a goal associated with better sales / marketing
alignment. The lesson of the current research is to reduce friction in the
process of converting better quality leads, more quickly and profitably, into

Page 5
closed sales deals. The additional business pressures cited in Figure 1
complement this idea of maximizing “deal velocity;” companies recognize
the need for better visibility, efficiency and cost containment as components
of successful sales operations.
The Maturity Class Framework
Aberdeen used three key performance criteria to distinguish the Best-in-
Class sales organization respondents from Industry Average and Laggard
organizations:
• Current average overall team attainment of annual sales quota
• Year-over- change in the average number of proposals, quotes or
RFP responses delivered to customers/prospects, per sales rep, per
month
• Year-over-year change in average sales cycle – in which a decline or
shortening of the cycle represents a positive trend
Organizations with top performance based on these criteria earned Best-in-
Class status, as described in Table 1. For additional details on the Aberdeen
Maturity Class Framework, see Table 5, The Competitive Framework Key,
in Appendix A.
Table 1: Top Performers Earn Best-in-Class Status
Definition of
Maturity Class
Mean Class Performance
Best-in-Class:
Top 20%
of aggregate
performance scorers
 92% average overall sales team attainment of annual quota
 10.7% average year-over year increase in average number
of proposals, quotes or RFP responses delivered to
customers/prospects, per sales rep, per month; 68%
showed improvement
 4.2% average year-over-year improvement in (reduction of)
average sales cycle; 39% showed improvement
Industry Average:
Middle 50%
of aggregate
performance scorers
 3.4% average year-over year increase in average number of
proposals, quotes or RFP responses delivered to
showed improvement
 1.3% average year-over-year worsening (growth) in
Laggard:
Bottom 30%
of aggregate
performance scorers
 4.2% average year-over year decrease in average number
of proposals, quotes or RFP responses delivered to
showed improvement
 3.0% average year-over-year worsening (growth) in
“Make sure your system flags
the status of quotes (i.e.
pending signature, signed, billing
approval, etc.) so there's no
question as to their status.”
~ Stelios Valavanis, Founder
and President, onShore
Networks

Page 6
Now, let’s take a deeper look at how the best sales performers manage
their people, processes, services, and technology to consistently out-
perform the competition around these metrics.
The Best-in-Class PACE Model
Achieving corporate goals with best practices in sales effectiveness requires
a combination of strategic actions, organizational capabilities, and enabling
technologies and services summarized in Table 2.
Table 2: The Best-in-Class PACE Framework
Pressures Actions Capabilities Enablers
 We don’t convert
enough leads to
sales
 Our average deal
size or contract
value is too small
 Our cost of sales
is too high
 Maximize up-sell /
cross-sell to
existing customers
 Improve our
understanding of
prospect /
customer buying
behaviors
 Ensure that
customers/prospec
ts can measure the
value of their
product or
solution
 Automated reminders of critical
customer expiration or renewal dates
 Executive-level sponsorship for
initiatives aimed at shortening the
sales cycle
 Replication of “A players” by
identifying and sharing their winning
documentation
 Centralized repository for sales
proposals or contracts
 Defined metrics for analyzing the sales
productivity impact of changes in our
sales cycle
 Incentive/ comp management
 CRM/SFA
 Sales forecasting/ analytics
 Lead management
 Web analytics/ visitor tracking
 Sales intelligence
 Sales performance management
(SPM)
 Sales contract management
 Electronic/digital signature
 Video for sales/ marketing
 Content management (incl. sales
playbooks)
Best-in-Class Strategies
In response to the pressures above, the Best-in-Class are creating an
environment more conducive to sales effectiveness, and then using these
practices to achieve better business results
Figure 2 displays the most popular strategies Best-in-Class companies use to
improve sales effectiveness around the “last mile” of the sales process
(companies could select their top-two). By more than a two-to-one margin
over other companies, these top performers indicate that better up-selling
and cross-selling was a key business strategy. Aberdeen research published
in Leveraging the 360 Degree Customer View to Maximize Up-Sell and Cross-Sell
Potential (September 2011) explored this business imperative in depth,
finding that Best-in-Class companies (evaluated by customer retention rate
and annual improvements in team sales quota attainment and reducing the
sales cycle) showcased in their ability to maximize the “share of wallet”
among their customers. In addition to creating a more efficient single view
of their prospects and customers, these top performers used sales proposal
/ quote configurator solutions more frequently than Laggards (54% to 43%),
along with sales contract management software (48% vs. 46%) and CRM
plug-ins to enable content management (29% vs. 26%). In the context of the
current research, the opportunity to use these technology enablers to
support up-selling and cross-selling existing customers into fresh and

Page 7
enhanced spend is a wise strategy, particularly if we subscribe to the popular
sales maxim that “it costs far less to keep an existing customer spending,
than to find a new customer to allocate budget to us.”
Figure 2: Best-in-Class Strategic Actions
29%29%
49%
57%
27%
33%
37%
28%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Maximize
up-sell/
cross-sell
Better
understand
buying
behavior
Influence
sales
prospects
at a more
senior
level
Ensure
ability for
customers
to
measure
ROI
n = 295
Best-in-Class All Others
29%29%
49%
57%
27%
33%
37%
28%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Maximize
up-sell/
cross-sell
Better
understand
buying
behavior
Influence
sales
prospects
at a more
senior
level
Ensure
ability for
customers
to
measure
ROI
n = 295
Best-in-Class All Others
Respondents are also trying to “better understand buying behavior” among
prospects and customers in order to improve sales effectiveness at the
bottom of the funnel. This behavior is also more popular among the Best-
in-Class than other firms, by a 32% margin (49% vs. 37% selecting this as a
top-two action). Much as marketing / sales alignment is supported by a
marketing team’s ability to better identify, communicate with, and intrigue
prospective buyers based on optimally satisfying their business needs, so too
can the sales team use elements of the opportunity management cycle to
link this kind of knowledge to better quota attainment results. As we will
see in the next chapter, when the sales team has a better understanding of
buyer behavior, supported by a more frictionless process, all parties in the
buyer-seller relationship benefit. By using seamless sales contract
management that identifies customer requirements faster, configure / price /
quote (CPQ) deployments that take into account a buyer’s specific product
/ solution needs, and customer-centric content management solutions,
contemporary sales teams can achieve the results demonstrated by their
top-performing peers, colleagues and competitors.
“There is need for all
departments to be on the same
page with regards to product
offering and customer
relationship management, so as
to increase project/sales wins
and ROI.”
~ Robert Munjanganja,
Executive Director,; Business
Development and Stakeholder
Engagements, Macbeth Trading

Page 8
Case Study — AAA
AAA is a leading provider of auto, insurance, travel and financial services,
based in the U.S, and serving more than 50 million customers (both
businesses and consumers) across the country. AAA NCNU is the division
serving customers across Northern California, Nevada and Utah. The
company was concerned about the economic instability's potential impact
on its average deal size, in addition to other challenges regarding its cross-
sell and up-sell effectiveness and its sales pipeline. To address these
pressures, it focused on sales process automation. “We’ve decided to
replace most of our manual sales processes with more automatic processes
in order to improve our sales productivity at each stage of the selling cycle
and help our sales reps continually move deals through the funnel,” says
Melissa Felder, VP of Sales Operations at AAA NCNU.
One of the building blocks of AAA NCNU’s sales productivity initiative was
implementing a new CRM system on April 2010. Previously, the company
was using an in-house program to manage its selling activities, and it was
struggling with visibility into crucial information such as sales volume and the
number of opportunities at each stage of the sales cycle. “With the
implementation of our new CRM system, we can now easily access our sales
volume and average deal size, and identify opportunities to better manage
leads at each sales stage, explains Felder.”
Another key component of AAA NCNU’s sales productivity initiative is the
workflow to manage its contracts and sales collateral. When the customer
signs a contract, the company automatically uploads that contract to a
centralized document repository system, where it can track all records
based on customer information. In regards to the impact of technology on
their sales productivity efforts, Felder notes: “We’re increasingly doing
more business in the digital format and technologies such as electronic
signature are immensely helpful in speeding our sales processes.”
AAA NCNU’s sales productivity programs have demonstrated their impact;
the company has improved key sales effectiveness indicators, including
average deal size and quota attainment results, despite the impact of
economic instability. In addition, it has improved its customer retention /
renewal rates. “Looking forward, we’re constantly aiming to streamline our
sales processes for continuous improvement in results of our efforts at each
stage of the sales cycle,” concludes Felder.

Page 9
Chapter Two:
Benchmarking Requirements for Success
Effective sales operations deployments play a critical role in an
organization's ability to turn the strategies identified above into profit. The
following sections discuss how top performers distinguish themselves from
other companies through implementing capabilities and enablers that
support sales effectiveness, particularly around the final stages of sale funnel
management.
Aberdeen Group analyzed the aggregated metrics of surveyed companies to
determine whether their performance ranked as Best-in-Class, Industry
Average, or Laggard. In addition to having common performance levels, each
class also shared characteristics in five key categories: (1) process (the
approaches they take to execute daily operations); (2) organization
(corporate focus and collaboration among stakeholders); (3) knowledge
management (contextualizing data and exposing it to key stakeholders); (4)
technology/service (the selection of the appropriate tools and the effective
deployment of those tools); and (5) performance management (the
ability of the organization to measure its results to improve its business).
These characteristics (identified in Table 3) serve as a guideline for best
practices, and correlate directly with Best-in-Class performance across the
key metrics.
Table 3: The Competitive Framework
Best-in-Class Average Laggards
Process
Automated reminders of critical customer expiration or renewal dates
58% 52% 47%
Organization
Legal compliance ensured by pre-approved quotes, NDA’s, proposals or
contracts
88% 76% 68%
Executive-level sponsorship for initiatives aimed at shortening the sales cycle
71% 57% 52%
Replication of “A players” by identifying and sharing their winning
documentation
56% 42% 38%
Knowledge
Centralized repository for sales proposals or contracts
83% 76% 67%
Fast Facts
√ Answering the question,
“Which single metric is the
most important
measurement of how sales
technologies impact your
company’s performance?,”
63% of the Best-in-Class
indicated “revenue growth,”
compared to 55% among the
Industry Average and 40% of
Laggards.
√ Corporate revenue grew on
an annualized basis by 17.7%
for the Best-in-Class, 4.4%
for the Industry Average,
and dropped by 2.1% among
Laggard companies.

Page 10
Best-in-Class Average Laggards
Enabling
Technology
 96% Incentive/ comp
management
 94% CRM/SFA
 90% Sales forecasting/
analytics
 88% Lead management
 86% Web analytics/
visitor tracking
 82% Sales intelligence
 79% Sales performance
management (SPM)
 76% Sales contract
management
 68% Electronic/digital
signature
 67% Video for sales/
marketing
 43% Content
management (incl. sales
playbooks)
management
 87% CRM/SFA
analytics
visitor tracking
management (SPM)
management
signature
marketing
 35% Content
playbooks)
management
 85% CRM/SFA
analytics
visitor tracking
management (SPM)
management
signature
marketing
 22% Content
playbooks)
Performance
Performance analytics against agreed-to objectives (metrics) are reviewed
regularly
74% 60% 39%
Defined metrics for analyzing the sales productivity impact of changes in our
sales cycle
54% 45% 41%
Capabilities and Enablers
Based on the findings of the Competitive Framework and on interviews with
end users, the Best-in-Class demonstrate that certain corporate capabilities
and technologies can lead to measurable business success in sales
operational management. These deployments help create both the
measurable business results shown in Table 1 above, which were used to
define the Best-in-Class, and additional benefits summarized in Figure 3.
Each of these key performance indicators (KPI’s) is crucial to effective sales
team management:
• Customer renewals are clearly important for any business. With
46% and 66% higher rates than Industry Average and Laggard firms,
the Best-in-Class are essentially “working smarter instead of
harder,” based on the safe assumption that maintaining business is a
more effective way of reaching sales quotas than locating net-new
opportunities. A high customer retention rate does more than
reduce burn-out or industry churn pressures on the sales team; the
sales cycle can be more easily understood, and forecasting accuracy

Page 11
improved, when working with a known commodity – an existing
account – than with a less-familiar first-time buyer. The Best-in-
Class customer retention rate in the 360º Customer View research
referenced above was 91%, compared with 83% and a remarkably
low 10% among Industry Average and Laggard companies.
Figure 3: Additional Best-in-Class Achievements: Current
Performance
17% 19%
83%
76%
40%
57%
47%
26%
50%
0%
15%
30%
45%
60%
75%
90%
Customer
renewal
rate
Reps
achieving
quota
Lead
conversion
rate
n = 295
Best-in-Class Industry Average Laggard
17% 19%
83%
76%
40%
57%
47%
26%
50%
0%
15%
30%
45%
60%
75%
90%
Customer
renewal
rate
Reps
achieving
quota
Lead
conversion
rate
n = 295
• With more than three-quarters of sales reps achieving their annual
sales quota, Best-in-Class companies are significantly reducing the
strain of turnover and under-performance felt by the Industry
Average and Laggard cohorts, who see fewer than one-half and
one-fifth of reps hitting their number respectively. Aberdeen
research published in Sales Performance Management 2012: How the
Best-in-Class Optimize the Front Line to Grow the Bottom Line
(December 2011) demonstrates the high stakes associated with
sales turnover, with a $119,830 average “fully loaded” annual cost of
a field sales professional, and a $35,670 estimated average cost to
replace a single contributor in the same role. The lesson here:
more reps achieving quota is good for everyone involved.
• Finally, the fact that Best-in-Class companies enjoy a lead conversion
rate more than double that of the Laggard performers (40% vs.
19%)—showing that they are more successful at responding to the
top business pressure cited above. The Best-in-Class strategies and
capabilities have led to a direct solution for their biggest problem.
“Become very familiar with
your marketing automation
software and manage the leads
in your sales funnel based on
the trigger events that indicate
buying signs. Build and enforce
the right business processes
between sales and marketing
teams and track performance
of these processes based on
the metrics that matter to your
organization.”
~ Randy Shattuck, Founder,
The Shattuck Group

Page 12
Figure 4: Sales Funnel Management Effectiveness by Best-in-Class
29%
72%
44%
67%
37%
58%
25%
35%
45%
55%
65%
75%
Rapidly and effectively
responding to RFP’s /
other formal bidding
opportunities from
current / prospective
customers
Avoiding “no-decision” sales
losses, i.e. sale is lost not to
a competitor, but to the
prospect / customer simply
not moving forward
with a purchase
n = 295
Percentageofrespondentsindicating4/5on1-5
scale
29%
72%
44%
67%
37%
58%
25%
35%
45%
55%
65%
75%
Rapidly and effectively
responding to RFP’s /
other formal bidding
opportunities from
current / prospective
customers
Avoiding “no-decision” sales
losses, i.e. sale is lost not to
a competitor, but to the
prospect / customer simply
not moving forward
with a purchase
n = 295
Percentageofrespondentsindicating4/5on1-5
scale
To improve the lead conversion rate, sales leaders should focus on overall
efficiency and reducing the friction within their portion of the corporate
sales cycle. Figure 4 summarizes survey respondents' self-assessments of
their organizations' core competencies; the figure shows the percentage of
each maturity class which indicated they had a high level of performance
(answering 4 or 5 on a 1-5 scale) in certain best practices. The Best-in-
Class believe they are faster and more efficient in reacting to externally-
provided sales opportunities, as well as in raising their sales “batting
average” through fewer no-decision results. But how do the capabilities and
enablers they adopt contribute to these achievements?
Process
The Best-in-Class put more energy than other firms into automated
reminders of critical customer expiration or renewal dates. Aberdeen
research presented in The Extended Sales Enterprise: Channeling Better Results
(April 2011) showcased a Best-in-Class performance group that yielded
better total corporate quota attainment results and annualized lead
conversion rate and deal size growth than other firms. Forty-seven percent
(47%) of these top performers deployed automated renewal / upgrade
notifications for themselves or partners, compared with 35% among
Industry Average firms and 19% of Laggards. Knowing when a contract,
service agreement or other chronologically-defined business relationship is
pre-positioned to end or expire, making all relevant parties aware of the
pending deadline with plenty of advance notice, and maximizing customer
retention by building a process around this predictable event, is a common-
sense capability better understood, and more widely adopted, by the Best-
in-Class.

Page 13
Additional process capabilities adopted by a majority of Best-in-Class
companies include:
• Process for streamlining proposal, contract, quote and / or sales
collateral workflow (72% vs. 59% of all others)
• Process for sales representatives to share 'sales tips' or other best
practices with colleagues (52% vs. 47% of all others)
Organization
Aberdeen's survey measured how much inefficiency plagued respondents'
ability to close and manage customer business effectively, by asking
respondents to indicate how many of their final contracts were subject to
post-sale amending (Figure 5). The majority of firms indicated that they had
fairly manageable processes around corrections, amendments and changes,
which speaks to a generally strong level of performance across the board. The
Best-in-Class, however, are 24% more likely than others (47% vs. 38%) to
claim their contracts were “nearly perfect,” while 21% less likely to indicate
they experienced “regular quality control issues.”
Figure 5: Sales Contract Accuracy by Best-in-Class
47%
38%
12%
3%
38%
46%
10%
5%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Our final
contracts are
nearly perfect,
and rarely
require any
post-sale
adjudication or
amendment
Our final
contracts hold
up well, but we
regularly see
minor quality
control issues
or other
amendments,
post-sales
Our final
contracts often
require
amending after
the sale,
sometimes with
significant
changes
The majority of
our final
contracts are
amended after
the sale is made
n = 295
Best-in-Class All others
47%
38%
12%
3%
38%
46%
10%
5%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Our final
contracts are
nearly perfect,
and rarely
require any
post-sale
adjudication or
amendment
Our final
contracts hold
up well, but we
regularly see
minor quality
control issues
or other
amendments,
post-sales
Our final
contracts often
require
amending after
the sale,
sometimes with
significant
changes
The majority of
our final
contracts are
amended after
the sale is made
n = 295
Best-in-Class All others
Organizations that reap these results are more effective at replication– both
in pre-approved legally compliant documentation, and the sales content within
proposals, quotes and contracts that the best performers on the team are
using to achieve success. The idea of replicating “A players” is sustained by
Aberdeen research within Sales Training 2011: Uncovering How the Best-in-
Class Sustain, Reinforce and Leverage Best Selling Practices (October 2011),
which found that Best-in-Class firms (those with the most reps achieving
quota and yearly improvements in average deal size and lead conversion rate)
“Remember the keys to
pipeline success: Value,
Velocity, Volume, Conversion
and Win Rate.”
~ Mike Bernard, Sales Team
Lead, Hyland Software

Page 14
are more likely than others to identify this approach as a top-three strategic
action (28% vs. 24% among the Industry Average and 21% for Laggards).
Additional organizational capabilities adopted by a majority of Best-in-Class
organizations include:
• Administrator-level control over proposal or contract templates
(76% vs. 69% of all others)
• Managerial and executive visibility into all customer-facing
documentation (70% vs. 66% of all others)
Knowledge Management
In addition to the benefits of marketing / sales alignment described above,
Aberdeen has shown the value of centralizing marketing materials in
Marketing Asset Management: Managing Brand Compliance in Distributed
Marketing Environments (March, 2010). In that report, Best-in-Class
companies achieved better Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI), brand
consistency and reduced time-to-market by deploying library and digital
asset management technologies, as well as a process to disseminate
information on best practices in managing marketing assets to both sales and
marketing teams. In the sales world, a similar capability pays off for
companies more adept at achieving quota. The Best-in-Class are 24% more
likely to adopt sales collateral repositories than Laggard performers.
Indeed, the top corporate strategic action seen in the 360º Customer View
research referenced above, “integrating multiple internal sources of data
into a single view of each customer,” leads to a similar effort in which all
stakeholders – not just sales, but marketing, service and other customer-
touching team members – have role-specific access to the proposals, quotes
and contracts that impact them all.
Additional knowledge management capabilities adopted by a majority of
Best-in-Class organizations include:
• Centralized repository of marketing and product information (84%)
• Centralized repository for sales collateral (71%)
• Guided selling methodology to help sales reps identify the optimal
message and timing at each stage of the sales cycle (52%)
Technology Enablers
While the five enablers associated in this research with lead-to-win success
are not as broadly adopted as those highlighted in Table 3, most are
nevertheless seen as more vital to business operations by the Best-in-Class
than by other firms. Figure 6 shows how often each technology was rated
as a 4 or 5, on a scale from 1 (least important) to 5 (most important) based
on its overall value to corporate sales performance. Respondents
predictably felt that the foundational technologies of customer relationship
management (CRM) or sales force automation (SFA) were important; Best-
in-Class were much more likely than Industry Average and Laggard firms to

Page 15
see these technologies as critical. A content management / sales playbook
was the only enabler more likely to be identified as valuable by under-
performing firms than by Best-in-Class firms—possibly due to a still-
uncertain economic climate in which the most successful sales teams have
been required to control costs by asking their marketing counterparts to
own more of the content creation and management function. Fifty-five
percent (55%) of Best-in-Class firms in the Sales and Marketing Alignment
research referenced above believed that the marketing team should own
the lead nurturing process, compared with 46% and 36% of Industry
Average and Laggard companies respectively; more under-performing
companies felt that sales leaders should spend their precious resources on
the nurturing process, which can include the use of content management
and playbooks. Finally, users of content / playbook solutions receive a
measureable benefit—these companies all show annualized improvement in
corporate revenue, lead conversion rate, average deal size, and both team-
and rep-level quota attainment, while non-adopters report average
performance declines in each of these five areas of sales performance
metrics.
Figure 6: Critical Lead-to-Win Enablers by Best-in-Class
33%
21%
40%
22%
86%
45% 42%
27%
24%
69%
34% 33%
38%
22%
63%
10%
30%
50%
70%
90%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Sales
contract
management
Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
n = 295
Percentageofrespondentsindicating
"critical"or"integral"tobusiness
33%
21%
40%
22%
86%
45% 42%
27%
24%
69%
34% 33%
38%
22%
63%
10%
30%
50%
70%
90%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Sales
contract
management
Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
n = 295
"critical"or"integral"tobusiness
Extensive Aberdeen research addresses the other technology enablers
showcased in Table 3, and are indicated in Appendix B below.

Page 16
Technology Insight: Letting the Line of Business Own the Enabler
While many of Aberdeen’s research studies focus on the Information
Technology function with the enterprise, other practices, including Sales
Effectiveness, tend more to the line-of-business (LOB) leader responsible
for achieving business results, regardless of the technologies they employ.
Table 3 shows that technology enablers are crucial to lead-to-win success,
but in Figure 7 we also discover that the most successful sales operations
or leadership team members are less likely to rely on their IT
counterparts for effective technology deployments.
Figure 7: Sales Tools Managed without IT, by Best-in-Class
13%
8%
3%
6%
44%
35% 35%
33%
30%
37%
25% 24%
18% 19%
26%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
Sales
contract
management
n = 295
"minimal"or"zero"ITsupport
13%
8%
3%
6%
44%
35% 35%
33%
30%
37%
25% 24%
18% 19%
26%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
Sales
contract
management
n = 295
"minimal"or"zero"ITsupport
Figure 7 indicates the percentage of respondents in each maturity class
(Best-in-Class, Industry Average and Laggard) who indicate that minimal
or no IT support is involved in their use of each of the five lead-to-win
technology enablers. Given the proliferation of cloud-based technologies
at LOB managers' disposal, and the speed and efficiency required to
successfully reduce selling friction, IT is thus enabled to focus its energies
elsewhere, while sales operations and leadership deploy their own
technologies.
Performance Management
Detailed and objective return-on-investment (ROI) measurements for lead-
to-win sales enablement require mutually-defined and accepted performance
targets. The Best-in-Class are nearly two-times as likely as Laggards not only
to measure sales effectiveness in this area, but to regularly review the metrics
used to do so – “keeping it real” to ensure the yardsticks they use to gauge
success remain relevant. As the saying goes, “you can’t manage what you
don’t measure,” and the Best-in-Class clearly see value in both managing and
measuring sales closers. Regular measurement also helps reinforce behavior

Page 17
(e.g. logging contact records in an SFA), and allows sales managers to adjust
their team’s focus or development efforts as needed, to adapt to the ever-
changing needs of their business. Plus, most Best-in-Class companies
formally define metrics for analyzing the sales productivity impact of changes
in their sales cycle. They understand that sales cycle data alone does not
translate directly to peak performance; rather, they achieve success in a
number of measurable areas around revenue and quota attainment, while
reducing their lead-to-win window.
Figure 8: Bottom-of-Funnel Sales Effectiveness by Best-in-Class
28%
11%
50%
40%
20%
37% 38%
16%
28%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Percent of
quotes
resulting
in orders
<15 days avg.
contract-
requested
to signature
Percent of
sales contracts
signed
electronically
n = 295
28%
11%
50%
40%
20%
37% 38%
16%
28%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Percent of
quotes
resulting
in orders
<15 days avg.
contract-
requested
to signature
Percent of
sales contracts
signed
electronically
n = 295
Figure 8 highlights the Best-in-Class performance results of optimized bottom-of-
funnel sales management: more quotes yielding revenue, shorter time-to-signature
cycles and greater use of electronic signatures.

Page 18
Chapter Three:
Required Actions
Whether a company is trying to move its performance in sales effectiveness
from Laggard to Industry Average, or Industry Average to Best-in-Class, the
following actions will help spur the necessary performance improvements:
Laggard Steps to Success
• Measure to manage by establishing performance analytics around
lead-to-win processes, and regularly evaluating whether those KPI’s
remain relevant as the business environment changes. Only 39% of
Laggards are establishing and reviewing key sales performance
metrics – such as revenue, lead conversion rate, sales cycle
contraction, deal size, quota attainment – that 60% and 74% of
Industry Average and Best-in-Class companies respectively are
already implementing; this is a crucial action to take among
Laggards.
• Manage contracts to win more often by implementing sales
contract management technologies. Laggards are 24% less likely than
other firms to maximize the daily time spent selling by their team,
and to improve their customers’ experience working with those
personnel. The results the Best-in-Class have achieved around
customer renewal rates, team attainment of quota and lead
conversion rates and, ultimately, the overall sales effectiveness of
the enterprise demonstrate the material value of implementing this
technology.
Industry Average Steps to Success
• Move up the corporate ladder by obtaining executive-level
support for lead-to-win initiatives. While the Industry Average do
this more frequently than Laggards, they trail the Best-in-Class
significantly in obtaining the C-suite’s buy-in. The best practices and
enablers detailed in this research can improve the goals the C-suite
treasures – revenue growth, bigger profit margins, and increased
customer spend.
• Go paperless using electronic signature capture technology – do
you really need your reps waiting by a fax machine for the sales
order? Electronic signature-enabled sales teams are, by definition,
automating a process, eliminating “choke points” in the selling /
closing cycle, and minimizing their non-selling time. While this
enabler is still in its “early days” in terms of absolute adoption (only
26% of companies use it currently), the Best-in-Class use electronic
or digital signatures 36% more often than Industry Average firms.
Fast Facts
√ Best-in-Class companies are
more adept at acquiring new
customers, with 51% of their
yearly revenue obtained
from net-new spenders;
these rates drop to 46% and
43% respectively among
Industry Average and
Laggard companies.
√ The Best-in-Class make
more of an investment in
their field sales force, with
59% of their overall sales
team represented by outside
sellers or account managers.
Among all other companies,
this rate drops to 54%.
√ The expectations of this field
team are higher among the
Best-in-Class, however, who
report an average field sales
quota of $1.29M, compared
to $1.07M among Industry
Average firms and $951k for
Laggards.

Page 19
Best-in-Class Steps to Success
• Integrate CPQ into CRM – ASAP. Behind the acronyms is the
fact that while the top performers lead in integrating configure /
price / quote solutions with the CRM deployment, they are still only
42% likely to do so. The benefits of joining these two technologies
together are many, both for sellers – more streamlined auto-
population of product, contractual and RFP document specifics –
and buyers, who will receive a more accurate, crisper and
professional proposal less likely to go through as many of the kind
of corrective adjustments or iterations that slow the sale and
undermine the credentials of the seller.
Like the Boy Scouts, “be prepared” for crucial bottom-of-funnel
sales activities by enabling the team with sales playbooks and / or
content management solutions with which they can create case-
specific messaging to help seal the deal. While the Best-in-Class
outpace other firms in adoption of this enabler, fewer than half of
them empower their teams with a valuable tool to showcase their
consultative and listening skills to their accounts.
“Ensure that your sales tools
are intuitive and able to help
salespeople identify, qualify,
propose and close sales.”
~ Carolynn Ferris, Director of
Global Sales, Process
Management, Tyco Fire
Protection Products

Page 20
Summary: Continued Investments in “Sealing the Deal”
Analyzing the “last mile” of the sales cycle is all about helping closers, channel
partners and anyone else tasked with “sealing the deal” make the most of the
sales opportunities they are handed. Aberdeen research is rich in content that
helps users of marketing automation, outsourced teleservices bureaus, and even
inside sales teams effectively provide closers with both quality and quantity leads.
Here, the mission is for the sales team expected to move those deals efficiently
to closure, often dealing with cumbersome Requests for Proposal (RFP’s) and
other end-of-cycle barriers, without re-inventing the wheel for each deal.
Figure 9: Lead-to-Win Budgets on the Rise
50%
34%
74%
50%
47%
30%
39%
20%
28%30%
1% 2%
3%
2%
2%
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Sales
contract
management
Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
Percentageofrespondents
indicatingbudgetchange
Increase No change Decrease
n = 295
50%
34%
74%
50%
47%
30%
39%
20%
28%30%
1% 2%
3%
2%
2%
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
CRM or
SFA
CPQ Sales
contract
management
Content
management/
playbooks
Electronic/
digital
signature
Percentageofrespondents
indicatingbudgetchange
Increase No change Decrease
n = 295
In Figure 9, we see that across the board, companies plan to increase spend in
most of the five major technology enabler categories, further demonstrating
their value to companies pursuing better enterprise sales results. By adopting the
best practices of the top performers, end-users can improve velocity, shorten
selling cycles, grow revenue and, perhaps most important to selling professionals
– hit their number.

Page 21
Appendix A:
Research Methodology
During October and November of 2011, Aberdeen examined the use, the
experiences, and the intentions of 295 enterprises using services and
technologies that impact the performance of their sales teams.
Aberdeen supplemented this online survey effort with interviews with select
survey respondents, gathering additional information on strategies and
experiences in managing their sales cycle and their results.
Responding enterprises included the following:
• Job title: The research sample included respondents with the
following job titles: CEO / President (20%), Manager (19%), EVP /
SVP / VP (17%), Director (15%), General Manager/Managing
Director (5%), Consultant (8%) and other (16%).
• Department / function: The research sample included respondents
from the following departments or functions: sales and business
development (50%), corporate management (11%), IT (11%),
marketing (9%), operations (6%), and other (13%).
• Industry: The research sample included respondents exclusively from
software (23%), IT consulting and services (16%), %), industrial
product / equipment manufacturing (11%), telecommunications
equipment / services (7%), health / medical / dental devices &
services (6%), financial services (5%), industrial product/equipment
distribution (6%), Pharmaceuticals / Life Sciences / Biotechnology
(4%), and other (28%).
• Geography: The majority of respondents (76%) were from the
Americas. Remaining respondents were from the EMEA region
(16%) and Asia-Pacific (8%).
• Company size: 12% of respondents were from large enterprises
(annual revenues above US $1 billion); 27% were from midsize
enterprises (annual revenues between $50 million and $1 billion);
and 61% of respondents were from small businesses (annual
revenues of $50 million or less).
• Headcount: 24% of respondents were from large enterprises
(headcount greater than 1,000 employees); 24% were from midsize
enterprises (headcount between 100 and 999 employees); and 52%
of respondents were from small businesses (headcount between 1
and 99 employees).
Study Focus
Responding executives, primarily
in sales management roles,
completed an online survey that
included questions designed to
determine the following:
√ The degree to which “lead-to-
win” activities are deployed in
their organization and the
impact they have on achieving
their business goals
√ The structure, effectiveness
and satisfaction with existing
“lead-to-win” implementations
√ Current and planned use of
“lead-to-win” activities to
achieve desired changes in
average sales cycle, team
attainment of quota
√ The benefits, if any, that have
been derived from “lead-to-
win” initiatives
The study aimed to identify
emerging best practices for
managing sales productivity and
sales cycle, and to provide a
framework by which readers
could assess their own
management capabilities.

Page 22
Table 4: The PACE Framework Key
Overview
Aberdeen applies a methodology to benchmark research that evaluates the business pressures, actions, capabilities,
and enablers (PACE) that indicate corporate behavior in specific business processes. These terms are defined as
follows:
Pressures — external forces that impact an organization’s market position, competitiveness, or business
operations (e.g., economic, political and regulatory, technology, changing customer preferences, competitive)
Actions — the strategic approaches that an organization takes in response to industry pressures (e.g., align the
corporate business model to leverage industry opportunities, such as product / service strategy, target markets,
financial strategy, go-to-market, and sales strategy)
Capabilities — the business process competencies required to execute corporate strategy (e.g., skilled people,
brand, market positioning, viable products / services, ecosystem partners, financing)
Enablers — the key functionality of technology solutions required to support the organization’s enabling business
practices (e.g., development platform, applications, network connectivity, user interface, training and support,
partner interfaces, data cleansing, and management)
Source: Aberdeen Group, February 2012
Table 5: The Competitive Framework Key
Overview
The Aberdeen Competitive Framework defines enterprises
as falling into one of the following three levels of practices
and performance:
Best-in-Class (20%) — Practices that are the best
currently being employed and are significantly superior to
the Industry Average, and result in the top industry
performance.
Industry Average (50%) — Practices that represent the
average or norm, and result in average industry
performance.
Laggards (30%) — Practices that are significantly behind
the average of the industry, and result in below average
performance.
In the following categories:
Process — What is the scope of process
standardization? What is the efficiency and
effectiveness of this process?
Organization — How is your company currently
organized to manage and optimize this particular
process?
Knowledge — What visibility do you have into key
data and intelligence required to manage this process?
Technology — What level of automation have you
used to support this process? How is this automation
integrated and aligned?
Performance — What do you measure? How
frequently? What’s your actual performance?
Table 6: The Relationship Between PACE and the Competitive Framework
PACE and the Competitive Framework – How They Interact
Aberdeen research indicates that companies that identify the most influential pressures and take the most
transformational and effective actions are most likely to achieve superior performance. The level of competitive
performance that a company achieves is strongly determined by the PACE choices that they make and how well they
execute those decisions.

Page 23
Appendix B:
Related Aberdeen Research
Related Aberdeen research that forms a companion or reference to this
report includes:
• Sales Performance Management 2012: How the Best-in-Class Optimize
the Front Line to Grow the Bottom Line; December 2011
• Sales Training 2011: Uncovering How the Best-in-Class Sustain, Reinforce
and Leverage Best Selling Practices; October 2011
• Leveraging the 360 Degree Customer View to Maximize Up-Sell and
Cross-Sell Potential; September 2011
• Chance Favors the Prepared Mind - Understanding the Science of Sales
Intelligence; July 2011
• Sales Forecasting: How Top Performers Leverage the Past, Visualize the
Present and Improve Their Future Revenue; July 2011
• The Extended Sales Enterprise: Channeling Better Results; April 2011
• Streamlining the Top of the Funnel: How Inside Sales Teams Source,
Qualify and Close Business; February 2011
• Sales Mobility: Quotas Untethered; November 2010
Information on these and any other Aberdeen publications can be found at
www.aberdeen.com.
Author: Peter Ostrow, Vice President and Research Group Director;
Customer Management, Sales Effectiveness
(peter.ostrow@aberdeen.com) LinkedIn Twitter
For more than two decades, Aberdeen's research has been helping corporations worldwide become Best-in-Class.
Having benchmarked the performance of more than 644,000 companies, Aberdeen is uniquely positioned to provide
organizations with the facts that matter — the facts that enable companies to get ahead and drive results. That's why
our research is relied on by more than 2.5 million readers in over 40 countries, 90% of the Fortune 1,000, and 93% of
the Technology 500.
As a Harte-Hanks Company, Aberdeen’s research provides insight and analysis to the Harte-Hanks community of
local, regional, national and international marketing executives. Combined, we help our customers leverage the power
of insight to deliver innovative multichannel marketing programs that drive business-changing results. For additional
information, visit Aberdeen http://www.aberdeen.com or call (617) 854-5200, or to learn more about Harte-Hanks, call
(800) 456-9748 or go to http://www.harte-hanks.com.
This document is the result of primary research performed by Aberdeen Group. Aberdeen Group's methodologies
provide for objective fact-based research and represent the best analysis available at the time of publication. Unless
otherwise noted, the entire contents of this publication are copyrighted by Aberdeen Group, Inc. and may not be
reproduced, distributed, archived, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written consent by
Aberdeen Group, Inc. (2011a)

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