The Importance of Tracking Lost and Qualified Out Deals

Table of Contents

What is a Qualified Out Deal?

Qualified Out refers to deals that have been deliberately disqualified early in the sales process either by you or the buyer. While we tend to think of any deal that isn’t won as a bad thing, it can actually be good. When we qualify out deals early in the sales process it means we don’t waste our time on deals that have no real potential to close. 

What is a Lost Deal?

If a Qualified Out deal is one that is disqualified early in the sales process, then a lost deal is one that is qualified early in the sales process, but ultimately does not result in a successful sale. This begs the question:

What is a Qualified Deal?

In B2B sales, a qualified deal or opportunity typically refers to a potential business deal or sales opportunity that has been assessed and determined to have a good likelihood of conversion into a customer. The process of qualifying an opportunity involves the evaluation of various factors to ensure that the potential customer is a good fit for the products or services being offered, and that there is a genuine need and interest. This evaluation criteria is something that your Sales team must decide on as part of your sales process. For more information on sales process and deal stages, check out our previous post, 4 Powerful Ways to Supercharge Your B2B CRM Deal Stages.

Loss to Competition or to No Decision?

After we establish that a deal is qualified based on our deal stages, but is now lost, we want to understand why.  Losses generally occur for two main reasons: a loss to competition or a loss to a no decision (i.e. the prospect decided to buy from no one). 

Why Is this Important?

When you mark a deal as lost or qualified out, it also helps to track the reason so you can identify areas for improvement and gain insights into customer objections or market challenges. I recommend that you create a field to track this data. Lost, qualified out, and even won opportunities are due to a variety of factors. However, we boil them down to 5 essentials:

5 Reasons Why Deals Close

1. Price

The cost of your offering may be why you won, lost, or qualified out your opportunity. If price is presented too soon before value is established, it’s easy for this to be the reason for a deal being quickly qualified out. While your offering may be what the customer needs, which is what helped you to qualify a deal and proceed forward with it, a high price tag could be far more than someone’s budget allows even if value was established. Price can also win you a deal if you’re cheaper than the competition, and that’s what’s important to the customer.

2. Product

In a lost or qualified out situation, your product may not fit the prospect’s needs. If a deal is won, perhaps it’s because your product was far superior to the competition.

3. Service

It’s possible that a prospect needs a vendor that offers 24/7 service in English, Spanish, and Chinese. Just as product can win, lose, or qualify out a deal, so too can service.

4. Sales

While few would admit this, sometimes the reason for a lost deal is due to the selling process. Perhaps the rep pushes to close the deal before the buyer is ready. Perhaps the rep has their VP join the call and they do something to irk the customer. Wins are often due to a rep’s skill and a great sales process, but a loss can be on them as well.

5. Relationship

Sometimes prospects like to do business with people they know and with whom they have a rapport and trust. This alone likely won’t win or lose you a deal, but it can be a major factor, which shouldn’t be discounted.

Wrap Up 

Think about your business and the reasons as to why deals are won, lost, or qualified out. Add those reasons to a “Deal Close Reason” field and start to capture that data as soon as possible. While a closed deal is almost never just one of these 5 reasons, our goal is to understand the primary reason. When we distinguish between lost and qualified out, we can properly analyze and learn from failures and allocate resources more efficiently in the future towards opportunities with real promise.