With all the talk about the near-mythical power of Chat-GPT, I figured I’d put it to the test and ask it the most important question for businesses these days. And no, that question is not ‘Who is the best Spider-Man?’ (The correct answer to this question is Tobey Maguire.)
How to run revenue like a pro? - This is the question of the hour, folks.
The prompt was typed in and ChatGPT did its magic. I got a list of steps that companies should follow to run revenue like a pro.
Now, let’s see if ChatGPT is actually up to the mark compared with Clari (which, not to brag, is the category leader when it comes to revenue operations).
How to run revenue like a pro: ChatGPT vs. Clari
- ChatGPT suggests starting by setting clear revenue goals. These revenue goals should align with your overall business objectives. This will help you focus your efforts and measure progress over time.
It’s a completely valid suggestion. But ChatGPT is only telling you the surface-level story. It doesn’t tell you what you actually need to do to run revenue. At Clari though, we like to dig deeper.
Yes, you need to align your revenue goals with your business goals, but how do you do that?
At Clari, we can tell you exactly how: By inputting quarterly/monthly quotas from the top level all the way down to the rep level to ensure accountability toward org-wide targets. Clari’s forecast module allows you to do exactly that. Other than accountability, this gives you a way to measure, track, and report on critical revenue metrics like attainment percentages and pipeline coverage ratio targets.
If you are able to make accurate revenue predictions, you have the ability to make all the right decisions for your business.
Which brings us to the next point…
- ChatGPT’s second suggestion for businesses is to track revenue regularly. You should track your revenue regularly to identify trends and patterns. This will allow you to make adjustments to your strategy and stay on track to meet your goals.
Okay, I have to agree, this one hits home. It is critical for businesses to set up regular checkpoints to keep a close eye on revenue. Otherwise, you’re going to miss out on targets which can easily lead to revenue leak.
Clari is purpose-built to help you track revenue. Clari’s Pulse module makes it easy to visualize and identify week-over-week patterns in your business. With metrics that highlight WoW changes in Clari’s AI projection + an indicator of overall pipeline coverage, understanding in-quarter trends is easy!
- “Analyze revenue data”, says ChatGPT next : It’s important to analyze your revenue data to understand where your revenue is coming from and identify opportunities for growth. This may involve segmenting your revenue by product, customer, or channel.
Again, at the surface level this makes complete sense. The amount of data companies have to deal with is overwhelming. But your business can’t survive without it either. So, you need a solution like Clari Analyze.
Waterfall helps sales leaders make sense ofimmense amounts of deal-level data and enables them to ask questions of the business, like “How has my pipeline changed since our last forecast call?” A tedious, day-long sales ops exercise is now reportable within a few clicks. You can quickly understand the specific changes in your pipeline and more importantly, action on the data that is presented.
With Clari, it becomes a matter of clicks rather than a matter of weeks to get actionable insights out of your data.
- ChatGPT’s fourth suggestion is to optimize pricing and sales strategies. This may involve experimenting with different pricing models, testing different sales channels, and refining your marketing messaging.
I agree with ChatGPT here. Triangulating on the right strategy often requires strenuous testing and validation. Understanding pipeline conversion rates and identifying where certain deals may be dropping off is a critical aspect of shoring up revenue leak.
With Clari’s insights, you can spot risks and act on them before it's too late. By inspecting deals and opportunities closely, you can also see where and when you need to put in more effort.
For example, maybe you want to understand the success rate of deals being sourced from a specific marketing campaign. Just filter by lead source or campaign and get instant insight into funnel conversion trends.
It is that easy to look at insights on Clari!
- Lastly, ChatGPT suggests businesses invest in customer retention. It’s more cost-effective to retain existing customers than acquire new ones. So, investing in customer retention strategies can help you maximize revenue over the long-term.
In the current economy especially, it’s more important than ever for businesses to expand their customer base.
Net Dollar Retention has quickly become one of the most important revenue metrics. With CAC (Customer Acquisition Costs) rising, it is crucial to implement rigor around the customer retention and expansion process. Having a clear window into churn, expansion, and renewal predictions is mission critical to long-term success.
Clari’s forecasting insights allow you to remain ahead of customer churn. The customer remains in the front seat for you to keep a close eye on any signals that might cause them to churn.
I have to give it to ChatGPT for coming up with some valuable insights. But as informative as they were, you need to move toward revenue precision, which means that every revenue-critical employee should have visibility into the process. Clari’s revenue platform is specifically built to provide exactly the kind of visibility that will help you achieve precision.