Commercial Sales Pipeline

The commercial sales pipeline provides a dedicated board for tracking commercial and fleet deals through your sales process. Unlike the standard residential pipeline with fixed stages, the commercial pipeline uses fully customizable stages that you define to match your sales workflow. Navigate to Admin > Commercial > Pipeline to open it.

How the Commercial Pipeline Differs from the Residential Pipeline

The standard pipeline at Admin > Pipeline handles all deal types with six fixed columns (Lead/Prospect, Site Visit Scheduled, Proposal Drafted, Proposal Sent, Won, Lost). It works well for residential deals that follow a simple flow.

Commercial deals are different. They involve longer sales cycles, multiple decision-makers, site surveys, multi-option proposals, contract negotiations, and phased rollouts. The commercial pipeline addresses these differences with:

• Custom stages that you define and reorder.
• Win probability per stage for weighted revenue forecasting.
• Stale deal thresholds that flag deals sitting too long in one stage.
• A dedicated activity feed that logs every touchpoint.
• A reminder system for scheduling follow-ups.
• Pipeline analytics that track conversion rates, velocity, and lost deal reasons.

Managing Deal Stages

Configuring Custom Stages

Admins configure pipeline stages at Admin > Commercial > Settings > Stages. This page lets you build a multi-step sales process tailored to your commercial workflow.

Each stage has the following properties:

Example Stage Configuration

A typical commercial cleaning pipeline might use the following stages:

You can create as many stages as your process requires. Most commercial teams use between five and ten active stages plus one or two terminal stages (Won, Lost).

Reordering Stages

Drag stages up or down in the configuration list to change their left-to-right position on the pipeline board. The board instantly reflects the new order.

Deleting a Stage

You can only delete a stage that contains no active deals. If deals exist in a stage you want to remove, move them to another stage first, then delete the empty stage.

Working with the Pipeline Board

Deal Cards

Each card on the board represents one commercial or fleet proposal. Cards display:

• Company name and contact person.
• Proposal type badge -- Commercial Building or Fleet.
• Proposal number (e.g., #CP-1042).
• Deal value in large text for quick scanning.
• Assigned sales rep name or initials.
• Days in stage -- A counter showing how long the deal has been in its current column.
• Stale indicator -- A warning icon that appears when the deal exceeds the stage's stale threshold.
• Reminder badge -- Appears if a follow-up reminder is set for this deal.

Drag and Drop

Click and hold a card to drag it between columns. Releasing the card in a new column updates the deal's stage. Column totals and the forecast panel update immediately.

Moving to a Loss Stage: When you drop a card into a loss stage, a modal prompts you to select a lost reason from a dropdown and add optional notes. This data feeds into your pipeline analytics.

Moving to Won: When you drop a card into the Won stage, the system marks the proposal as accepted and logs the win event with a timestamp.

Filtering and Sorting

Use the filters above the board to narrow the view:

• Type -- Show only Commercial Building proposals, only Fleet proposals, or both.
• Assigned Rep -- Filter by the sales rep assigned to each deal.
• Date Range -- Show only deals created within a specific period.
• Value Range -- Filter by minimum or maximum deal value.

Forecasting

The forecast panel sits above the pipeline board and aggregates your commercial deal data into revenue projections.

Forecast Metrics

How Weighted Value Works

Weighted pipeline value provides a more realistic revenue forecast than simply summing all deal amounts. The calculation is:

Weighted Value = Deal Amount x Stage Win Probability

If your pipeline contains:

• 3 deals worth $40,000 total at "Site Survey Completed" (40% probability) = $16,000 weighted
• 2 deals worth $75,000 total at "Proposal Sent" (60% probability) = $45,000 weighted
• 1 deal worth $30,000 at "Contract Review" (80% probability) = $24,000 weighted

Total weighted pipeline: $85,000

This number is far more actionable than the raw total of $145,000 because it accounts for the reality that not every deal will close.

Setting Accurate Win Probabilities

The forecast is only as good as your win probabilities. Review your actual conversion rates quarterly and update stage probabilities to match. If your "Proposal Sent" stage historically closes 35% of the time, set it to 35%, not 60%.

Activity Tracking

Every pipeline interaction is logged in the activity feed, creating a complete timeline for each deal and for the pipeline as a whole.

What Gets Logged

The activity feed records:

• Stage changes -- Who moved the deal, from which stage, to which stage, and when.
• Notes -- Free-text notes added to a deal by any team member.
• Follow-up reminders -- When a reminder was created, when it was completed, and by whom.
• Deal value changes -- Any modifications to the proposal amount.
• Win events -- When a deal closed as won, with the final amount.
• Loss events -- When a deal was lost, including the reason and any notes.
• Proposal actions -- When a proposal was sent, viewed by the customer, or signed.

Using the Activity Feed

The feed is most valuable during team meetings. Filter by date range to review what happened since the last check-in. Use it to:

• Identify deals that have had no activity in the past week.
• Verify that follow-up commitments were honored.
• Review the context around lost deals.
• Celebrate wins and extract lessons from successful closings.

Reminder System

Set follow-up reminders on any deal to ensure timely outreach.

Creating a Reminder

1. Click a deal card on the pipeline board.
2. Select Set Reminder.
3. Configure the reminder:

• Date and time -- When you want to be notified.
• Note -- Context for the follow-up (e.g., "Call back about revised pricing for the parking garage").

1. Click Save.

Managing Reminders

• Reminders appear in your dashboard notifications on the scheduled date.
• Overdue reminders are highlighted with a warning indicator.
• Completed reminders are logged in the activity feed.
• You can edit or cancel a reminder from the deal card.

Pipeline Analytics

The commercial pipeline tracks performance metrics over time. Navigate to Admin > Commercial > Analytics for detailed reports.

Key Metrics

Lost Deal Analysis

When deals move to a loss stage, the system prompts for a reason. Over time, this data reveals patterns that you can act on.

Common lost reasons for commercial cleaning:

• Price too high.
• Went with a competitor.
• Project canceled or postponed.
• No response after multiple follow-ups.
• Scope mismatch.
• Budget not approved.

Review lost reasons monthly. If "price too high" dominates, evaluate whether your pricing is competitive or whether you are targeting the wrong prospects. If "no response" is the top reason, your follow-up cadence may need improvement.

Stage Bottleneck Analysis

Look at stage conversion rates to identify where deals stall. If 80% of deals advance from "Discovery" to "Site Survey" but only 30% advance from "Proposal Sent" to "Negotiation," the bottleneck is clear. Your proposals may need improvement, your pricing may be off, or your follow-up after sending proposals may be insufficient.

Tips

• Set win probabilities based on historical data, not optimism. Accurate probabilities make forecasts actionable.
• Use stale thresholds aggressively. Commercial deals can go quiet without warning. A 14-day stale threshold on "Proposal Sent" ensures you follow up before the deal goes cold.
• Review the forecast weekly. The 30/60/90-day projections help you plan crew scheduling, equipment needs, and cash flow.
• Log lost reasons consistently. Avoid using "Other" when a more specific reason applies. Specific data produces actionable insights.
• Clean the pipeline monthly. Remove or archive deals that are clearly dead but still sitting in active stages. Stale deals inflate your pipeline value and distort forecasts.
• Assign every deal to a specific rep. Unassigned deals get overlooked. Clear ownership drives accountability.

Troubleshooting

Pipeline board is empty

The commercial pipeline only displays commercial building and fleet proposals. Residential estimates appear on the standard pipeline at Admin > Pipeline. Create a commercial proposal at Admin > Commercial > Proposals > New to populate the board.

Stages are not in the correct order

Go to Admin > Commercial > Settings > Stages and drag stages to reorder them. The pipeline board reflects the configured sort order from left to right.

Forecast numbers seem inaccurate

Verify the win probability percentages on each stage. Weighted values depend entirely on these probabilities being realistic. Also check that deal amounts are entered correctly on each proposal.

Activity feed is missing entries

All stage changes and deal actions are logged automatically. If entries appear to be missing, check the date range filter on the activity feed. You may be viewing a narrow time window that excludes older events.

Stale indicators are not appearing

Verify that stale thresholds are configured on each stage at Admin > Commercial > Settings > Stages. A stage with no stale threshold set will never flag deals as stale.