3 Must Measure Metrics for B2B Revenue Leaders

Why This? Who Is It For?

As a B2B SaaS Founder or Revenue Leader or Ops Leader, you're always looking for ways to improve your business performance. The reason we even have "RevOps" as a function is to do just that: Identify & work on areas that will improve revenue generation, profitability, efficiency, etc.

In order to do this effectively, RevOps needs to track certain metrics to understand how the business is performing and identify areas for improvement. We cannot improve what we are not tracking.

Agree?

Well, there is a huge amount amount of metrics that you have to choose from. And you will never have the ability to track them all. How do you know which ones to pick?

We got together with zoë hartsfield & Taylor Lint from Swantide as well as Christian Freese 🏒 from RevPal to help you wade through these waters.

We asked ourselves: If you had to pick only 3 metrics to start with, which ones will give you the most lift and insight out of the gate?

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Metric 1: Conversion Metrics & Deal Cycle Duration

Conversion Metrics track the rate at which leads convert into paying customers at different stages of their Buyer Journey / your Sales Cycle.

Deal Cycle Duration measures the length of time it takes a given lead to progress along those stages.

These two metrics go hand in hand as they both track how leads are moving through your funnel. Improving either one means more revenue at a faster rate.

Tips from our panel (paraphrased)

• Taylor - For Early Stage companies, you want to be tracking this because you are probably experimenting on your GTM processes. You track these metrics to identify what is and isn't working. Its never too early to start at least collecting this data. Its important that teams have a Dashboard showing these metrics that teams are looking at and working on together.
• Christian - It starts at the beginning and getting your GTM teams on the same page. First, make sure your stages are applicable to your business model and that every team has a shared understanding of what these stages mean & what has to happen at each stage.

Once you've tracked these metrics, you can use the data to identify areas for improvement in the sales process. For example, if you find that leads are taking longer than normal to convert into Opportunities, you may need to work with your sales team to make sure you're delivering & quantifying your value in earlier stages.

Metric 2: Renewal Success Rate

Renewal Success Rate measures the percentage of customers who renew their subscriptions or contracts with your business. A high renewal success rate indicates that you are delivering real value to satisfied customers that are willing to continue doing business with you.

Tips from our panel (paraphrased)

• Taylor - If you're selling anything that is recurring, you have to provide value in order to get customers to renew and keep paying. Make sure you are tracking this in your CRM. You can set up a new Opportunity / Deal Type = Renewal and don't forget to relate that Renewal Opportunity / Deal to the Account in question. This makes reporting Lifetime Value much easier. Finance will have to be involved at some point, but your tracking starts at the CRM.
• Christian - Predictability is a big reason why tracking this is important. This is a function base on how happy your clients are. Your Customer Satisfaction effects your Renewal Rate and that Renewal Rate effects your Customer Lifetime Value. Use these metrics to work backwards and discover why clients renew vs why they don't. Also, to improve your product and process.

Once you've got a handle on tracking this, you can use that data to identify areas for improvement in customer retention.

For example, if you find that your renewal success rate is low, you may need to improve your customer support or product offering to increase customer satisfaction.

Metric 3: Sales KPIs + Activity Tracking

RevOps should track sales KPIs and activity not only to understand how the sales team is performing, but to understand how much relative effort / resources it takes to generate a new unit of business.

Sales KPIs measure the performance of the sales team as they work towards the Revenue Targets set by Leadership.

Tips from our panel (paraphrased)

• Taylor - This metric is used to create repeatable sales motion coupled with a predictable pipeline. Every CRO & Head of Sales wants to be able to hit their revenue number and be accurate about that. You need to understand how much input you need to hit that number in order to set goals & comp for your team.  
• Christian - This is the number 1 problem that I’ve seen with orgs, internally. They normally don't set this up until they are more mature. The right time to set this up is debatable, but I think the sooner the better. This is important so that we can work backwards, have accurate sales forecasts, and decide where to allocate resources. 
• Zoe - In Sales we hear a lot that: "Its about outcomes, not inputs..." However, you need the full picture to figure out what's moving the needle. Tracking these things helps you discover what volume will get you to the revenue output that you desire.

Once you've got those Sales KPI Dashboards built, you can start making smart, data driven decisions as it relates to sales activity, capacity planning, and forecasting.

Takeaways

What Now?

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Anyone who wants to learn more about this topic - I think that Swantide's Blog is a great place to start! Check out their article on "6 Key Sales Metrics (And How to Reliably Pull Them From Salesforce)"

Anyone who needs help - Feel free to comment on this article, send me a DM, or reach out via Central Metric's Website.

Thank you for your attention and your intention! See you at the next event.

-Sebastien