Summary
This article covers how to track and manage deals using the Opportunity model. You’ll learn how to organize Fields for pipeline management and forecasting, capture sales insights, and segment opportunities for reporting using Global Filters.
Who is this article for?
Planhat builders/admins who configure their tenant for their team (e.g. CS Ops).
This article is part of the Data Models Course.
Article Contents
Introduction
The Opportunities Model is connected to the Company. It allows you to track new business, upsells and renewals through a pipeline, helping to forecast and capture sales insights. Once an Opportunity is closed/won, it converts into a License.
Key System Fields
We have basic Opportunity Fields such as:
Owner - owner of the opp
Title - title of the opp
Status - status of opp
Sales Stage - the sales stage of the opp
Currency - currency of the opp
ARR / MRR - the ARR or MRR of the opp
Sale (used for non-recurring revenue) - the dollar amount of the opp when it is a one time purchase
Contract Length - length of the contract
Created Date - date opp was created
Expected Close Date - expected close date of the opp
Close Date - opp's close date
Updated Date - the last date the opp was updated
There are a couple technical Fields:
External ID - a text field that contains the Opportunity’s unique identifier, ensuring the Opp data syncs properly with your ERP, database, or wherever the data originates
Source ID - the unique identifier for Opportunities synced with an external CRM (such as Salesforce or HubSpot) ensuring the Opportunities sync properly with Planhat.
Key Custom Fields
On top of the System Fields above, you may want to get more insights into the Opportunity by creating Custom Fields. Here are some we see being useful:
Outreach Type (list) - Call, LinkedIn Message, Email, Sequence, Network, Referral
Involved Contacts (end users) - lists involved contacts in the opp
Decision Maker (end user) - lists DMs involved in the opp
Product (list) - e.g. Product X, Y, Z, etc.
Opportunity Details (rich text) - for additional context / opp details
BANT Fields (i.e. fields for your sales methodology to indicate whether completed or need to do)
Confirmed Budget? (toggle)
Confirmed Authority? (toggle)
Confirmed Need? (toggle)
Confirmed Timeline? (toggle)
Competitors (multipick list) - e.g. Competitor A, B, C, etc.
Is this a CSQL? (toggle) - means it is a CS qualified lead
Is this a MQL? (toggle) - means it is a Marketing qualified lead
A few Fields around Forecasting:
Forecast Category (list) - e.g. Pipeline, Best Case, Commit, Closed, Omitted
Confidence % - to indicate the reps confidence that the deal will close. This also typically will use Color Conditions (e.g. More than 85 is green, Between 60 and 85 is yellow, Less than 60 is red, Has no Value is blue)
Forecast Weighted Amount - a Formula Field which multiplies ARR / MRR by the Confidence %, divided by 100
Lastly, AI Fields. The most basic example could be:
AI Summary - providing a summary of the current state of the Opp
Field Groups
Now that you have an understanding of the Key Fields, let’s look at how to group them in a logical way. This will display those fields in Previews (as well as full page profiles) for Opportunities. We recommend a set up as below:
For more information on Field Groups, take a look at Help Center Article: Field Groups.
Create Form
To ensure your data stays clean, it’s important you make fields mandatory for creation. We recommend the following at a minimum to enable you to manage your Opportunities in the best way.
For an in-depth breakdown on all things Profile related, take a look at our Help Center Article: An introduction to Profiles / Previews, the How-To Library in app, or check out the Dojo course related to Profiles.
Common Global Filters
You may want to create some standard views for your Opportunities, to ensure everyone has the same definition.
Here are some of the most commonly used Global Filters:
By Stage - e.g. Discovery, Demo, Negotiation, etc.
High Confidence Opps
Small Opps
Forecast
For additional information on working with Opportunities, check out this Help Center Article.