In Development: Capture, Nurture, and Close Sales Leads Faster on One Page

Project management is a big part of what separates WORK[etc] from other CRMs in the market, but it’s not the only thing we’re focusing on for our next massive update.

Along with the upcoming changes to the Contact and Project Management modules, we’ll also be giving WORK[etc]’s sales lead management software side a million-dollar makeover.

The Leads List and Timeline

We’ve introduced the main concept behind workspaces in our Projects Workspace post: getting your work done on one page, using only one software. We’re doing away with the mindless data dumping that seems to clog up a lot of other CRM apps in the market and bringing the focus back to actually letting our users get their jobs done with minimal fuss.

The upcoming Leads Workspace follows this concept to the letter. As you can see below, the layout is quite similar to that of the Projects Workspace with the first column being the major exception.

Click for full view.

Instead of the Project Tree View in the Projects Workspace, the Leads Workspace’s first column shows an easily-filterable list of leads within the system. You can toggle between leads assigned to you or unassigned ones and further refine the list according to Active, Won, or Lost leads.

Using the leads list, you can also quickly switch between different leads without having to load a new tab or page. This way, you can concentrate on, for example, closing a lead instead of chasing down in which tab that lead is open.

Let’s say you have a webinar lined up for prospective clients. You’ve already made sure that everybody who signed up for the webinar are in WORK[etc] as leads. During the webinar, you may want to check the lead details for the attendees — get an overview of their business, their industry, what services they offer, etc. — to let you add a more personal touch to the whole affair. This in turn may help you turn those leads into actual clients.

The second column houses the Timeline, a running record of all the items associated with the specific lead you select in the first column. All Workspace Timelines share a common characteristic: they can quickly be filtered according to item type, letting you see the items that are important to you with a couple of clicks.

Let’s say you’re following up on a logo design lead. You’ve been communicating back and forth with your contact for the past few days; they’ve even sent some samples of their old logo for a possible rebranding project. Your contact had also asked a few questions which you posted as a discussion attached to the lead so you can get some outside input from the rest of your team.

When you follow up on that lead, you can just click on the relevant items in the lead’s Timeline — like the team discussion you opened to better answer their questions, for example — and immediately get the relevant information you need on the fly.

The Details Column

The third column shows the details of the Lead or item that you have selected in the first or second column. Clicking on the Lead name at the top of the Details column will give you a closer, fullscreen look at that specific lead.

This is particularly useful for sales agents who want to keep their eye on the ball and concentrate only on the details of that one lead while still being able to access everything attached to it with minimal fuss. Here’s what the full view of a lead it looks like:

Click for full view.

Sales Pipeline and Custom Views

The next major tab in the upcoming Leads Workspace is the Sales Pipeline. As with everything in the upcoming update, we didn’t just settle for making the pipeline look better.

All of the data presented in his section of the Sales module is basically the same as what you can see in the current incarnation of WORK[etc]. The big change here is a much more efficient use of screen real estate.

Click for full view.

You’ll notice that details for the different sales processes are now presented horizontally instead of vertically. That sounds like a small change, but it frees you from having to scroll up and down especially when you have a long sales process. Remember the main Workspace concept: all the data you need to work on one page with minimal fuss.

The detail columns can also now be sorted, unlike the current sales funnel. You can also use filters to narrow down the pipeline and get a closer look at your performance sales-wise.

Finally, the Leads Workspace also has its own version of the Custom Views tab. Here, you can quickly create filtered and grouped lists of whichever leads are important to you. The screenshot below, for example, is set so that all leads in the list are grouped by stage, giving you a quick and organized view of where your leads stand and which ones are worth focusing on.

Click for full view.

This is particularly useful for when you’re looking for leads that fit a very specific criteria. For example, you might want to see a list of leads limited to companies based in New York, are at least two days old but not over a week old, and are interested in your SEO and PPC services. Just configure the filters using your criteria and you’ll immediately see a list of leads that fit it.

Want to save this list in case you need to check it again later? Just save your filter settings and you’ll be able to pull up this list with a couple of clicks in the future. As with the current incarnation of WORK[etc], saved filters are a big part of the Workspaces feature and will be very useful whichever module you use the most — whether it’s Projects, Contacts, Sales, or Support.

What are your thoughts on the upcoming Leads Workspace feature? Let us know in the comments section.