Creating a Data-Driven Deal Review Process

In the past, deal reviews relied heavily on seller opinions and anecdotes. Reps would provide their subjective impressions of deal progress and health. Managers would probe based on intuition and experience.

While this approach benefits from human insights, it also leaves ample room for bias, blind spots, and misaligned priorities between reps and managers. Deal assessments get skewed by the instincts and emotions on both sides of the table.

However, as sales technology has advanced, we now have access to rich objective data on buyer actions and engagement. Tools provide metrics like email open rates, content consumption, and Salesforce activity logs.

This data exposes unbiased truths about deal health that human hunches miss. It also enables fact-based coaching instead of vague directives to "work harder".

Unfortunately, many teams have not evolved their deal reviews to incorporate data, despite it now being available. This results in flying blind instead of letting insights guide strategy. A data-driven approach is becoming imperative.

This post will explore ways to incorporate objective data into your deal reviews for more accuracy, transparency, and proactive risk mitigation. Follow these best practices to finally transform reviews from guessing games into insights-driven conversations.

Leverage Quantified Data Like MEDDICC for More Objectivity

One of the easiest ways to inject data into deal reviews is adopting a consistent deal methodology like MEDDIC, MEDDICC, MEDDPICC. MEDDIC introduces crucial objectivity by providing color-coded criteria for rating deal health.

Rather than just sharing opinions, reps quantify details like budget status, decision team, and timeline using a standardized scorecard. This gives managers clear, consistent indicators to compare deals across the pipeline.

Having this quantified data makes reviews much more productive by enabling apples-to-apples deal comparisons. No more trying to read between the lines of reps' vague narratives. You have structured facts to assess deal strength.

Here are some of the key benefits of leveraging methodologies like MEDDIC:

• Provides color-coded criteria for objectively rating deal health
• Quantifies key details of each deal for objective comparison
• Removes subjective opinions and biases from the conversation
• Highlights specific gaps or risks that require diligence
• Aligns reps and managers on what “good” looks like for deal progression

Now reviews can focus on strategies to improve red and yellow areas versus debating deal status. The data provides transparent clarity into true deal strength.

Track Email Open Rates, Site Visits for Buyer Intent Cues

Beyond quantifying deal details, today’s technology also offers visibility into actual buyer actions. Email open rates, website visits, content downloads, and Salesforce activity expose how engaged prospects really are.

This unbiased behavioral data provides invaluable context missing from rep assessments alone. You gain an outside-in view of deal health based on what buyers are actually doing, not just what sellers claim they will do.

Here are some of the key buyer analytics to incorporate:

• Email open and click rates for sales outreach
• Collateral downloads from your content libraries
• Site traffic and pages visited after meetings
• Feature adoption and platform usage intensity
• Milestone achievement based on mutual action plans

While reps provide helpful color about buyer conversations, this unbiased engagement data exposes the tangible steps buyers are taking between meetings. You can instantly see if behavior aligns with rep reports.

When reviews combine rep insights with buyer analytics, you achieve a complete 360 degree view of deal health and momentum. Gut checks get validated or exposed. You can course correct early when data reveals risks.

“Gamify” Mutual Action Plans to Motivate Follow-Through

Mutual action plans enhance visibility into buyer actions during later deal stages. However, traditional MAPs lack data tracking between review conversations.

Gamifying MAPs builds helpful accountability by scoring buyer follow-through on their commitments. You gain data exposing engagement levels between pipeline reviews.

Here is one way to gamify MAPs:

• +1 Point awarded for completing an assigned milestone
• +2 Points for providing quantified data like volumes, budgets etc.
• -1 Point for postponed meetings or missed checkpoints
• Track total points over time as a buyer scorecard

This system motivates buyers to uphold their assignments. Sales leaders gain real-time visibility when buyers hesitate or disengage, prompting interventions.

Gamified MAPs continue the data-driven theme by providing facts regarding buyer skin in the game. You don’t need to wait for anecdotes at the next review. The data exposes who is helping or hurting deal progress.

Use Data to Guide Coaching Conversations

Perhaps most importantly, objective data enables coaching conversations to provide strategic guidance versus generic directives to work harder. Data quickly uncovers potential skill gaps.

For example, reviewing email open rates can expose who needs help crafting compelling subject lines and outreach messaging. Analyzing content consumption shows which collateral resonates or needs reworking.

Beyond exposing development areas, data also helps prioritize coaching focus. For instance, if buyer completed rates on mutual action plans is low across multiple reps, you know ensuring diligent follow-through should be an organization-wide priority.

Here are some examples of how to leverage data for more impactful coaching:

• Share rep email metrics to improve outreach subject lines and content
• Review content access data to guide revisions to collateral
• Assess methodology completion rates to improve discovery diligence
• Document mutual action plan data to build consistency

When reviews provide clear data-driven priorities, your coaching becomes much more targeted and impactful.

Overcome Resistance by Demonstrating Value

While the benefits are clear, adopting more data-driven deal reviews requires change management. Some reps or managers may resist moving from opinions to data.

Here are some strategies for driving buy-in:

• Share examples of risks data would have exposed earlier
• Start slow with non-threatening metrics like email opens
• Provide training on interpreting and applying the data
• Incentivize usage of sales tools generating insights
• Highlight success stories of data uncovering wins

With a gradual rollout and education on the “why”, data-driven reviews become welcomed tools rather than compliance burdens.

Which Metrics Should You Focus On?

With so much data available, it’s important to focus your analysis on metrics that truly expose the health of a deal and relationship.

Here are some of the top engagement metrics to pay attention to:

• Email Response Times: How quickly are they replying to outreach and follow-ups?
• Sales Collateral Consumption: Are they downloading and reviewing content you provide?
• Site Traffic: Do they re-engage your site around key meetings and milestones?
• Feature/Tool Adoption: How deeply are they using your solution post-purchase?
• Milestone Achievement: Are they completing tasks and providing info as committed in MAPs?

Look for connections between changes in these behaviors and deal outcomes to identify the most predictive metrics for your business.

Maintain Discipline with Reviews and Data Tracking

While having data is powerful, you need to maintain discipline around actively analyzing and incorporating insights.

Here are some best practices:

• Regular Cadence: Set consistent meeting schedules to review key deal data.
• Shared Preparation: Reps and managers come ready with insights identified.
• Note Trends: Identify correlations between behaviors and deal outcomes.
• Prompt Action: Use data to drive mutual action plans and tasks.
• Update CRM: Log data and takeaways into system for future reference.

With rigorous discipline, data-driven reviews give your team an unfair advantage in managing risk and capitalizing on opportunities.

Want to Incorporate Data into Your Reviews?

If you want to evolve your deal reviews into productive, insights-driven conversations, schedule a demo of Recapped.

Recapped combines quantified MEDDIC assessments, buyer analytics, and gamified mutual action plans into one platform. Remove blind spots and guesswork from your deal reviews.

Get a Demo to see Recapped in action!

‍