How do I calculate my sales conversion rate?

Keep the original group together

A cohort is a group with a shared starting characteristic. Here it means enquiries received in the same month. Follow those records to a stated date and count which met your outcome rule. Wins from older enquiries belong to their original groups, even when they happen this month.

Write down what counts as a win. An agreed job, a completed job and a first payment are different events. Keep that rule unchanged when comparing groups. A recent group may still be waiting for decisions, so compare groups at a similar age or with comparable time to decide. Show unresolved enquiries alongside the rate.

Pine Joinery's three different March counts

In this fictional example, Pine Joinery receives 40 distinct enquiries in March. By 31 March, ten have become agreed jobs, 20 have ended without a job and ten remain undecided. The March group's observed result is ten wins from 40 enquiries: 25%, with ten still open.

Pine also agrees eight jobs in March from enquiries received in February. It has won 18 jobs during March, but eight do not belong to March's new enquiries. Dividing 18 by 40 gives 45%. That mixes two groups and is not the March group's conversion rate.

Four other February enquiries remain open. The open list on 31 March therefore contains 14 opportunities: ten from March plus four from February. Fourteen open opportunities, 18 March wins and 40 March arrivals are all correct counts. They answer different questions.

This is why the dates matter: follow the same original enquiries before judging how well they converted. The ten unresolved March enquiries may still change that group's result. An agreed job is the chosen outcome here; it does not mean the customer has paid.

• Each enquiry is one distinct opportunity, with no duplicate records or reopened wins.
• The observation date is 31 March. A win means an agreed job, not payment or delivery.
• All values are invented to explain counting. They are not a target conversion rate or evidence about your business.

Try it with your own numbers

An open list does not show the journey

Today's pipeline lists opportunities still being pursued. Dated stage records show how those opportunities moved. Salesforce's pipeline guidance distinguishes stage progression from elapsed sales-cycle time; both answer questions a current list alone cannot answer.

If ten opportunities entered quoting and only four have advanced so far, the other six are not necessarily lost. Some may still be waiting. Check their status and dates. Subtracting today's stage totals cannot reconstruct all earlier movements. Before choosing where to improve, consider the value of the work, waiting time and effort as well as the proportion progressing.

How can growth feel stalled while annual revenue rises?

Two time windows can tell different stories. In a separate fictional studio, the twelve months ending last September contained four quarters of €30,000: €120,000 altogether. The next twelve months contain €40,000, €40,000, €40,000 and €24,000: €144,000. Annual revenue rose by 20%, but the latest July–September quarter fell from €30,000 to €24,000, or 20%.

The studio also recorded 12 new enquiries in July, eight in August and four in September. One job delivered in September had been agreed in June. That one record shows how earlier selling can produce later work. It does not tell us how much of the whole year's revenue came from older enquiries, or prove that fewer enquiries caused the lower quarter.

The owner can therefore report a recent slowdown without contradicting the annual increase. First identify what feels stalled: sales value, job count, enquiries or another aim, and over which dates. Then check dated records, prices and the kinds of jobs sold. These totals alone do not establish the cause, profit, cash received or next quarter's outcome.

Common misconceptions

A monthly wins-to-enquiries ratio always measures conversion.

Only if the wins belong to the enquiry group being measured under the same outcome rule. A period total may include older enquiries.

Anything that has not progressed is lost.

Waiting and confirmed loss are different statuses. Keep unresolved opportunities visible rather than turning them into failures.

Rising annual revenue proves a recent slowdown is impossible.

A longer period can contain strong earlier work and a weaker recent period. Check the measure and dates before deciding the statements conflict.

Follow one group before judging the rate

Choose a small, identifiable group of enquiries. For each one, record its start date, current status and the date it met your agreed outcome rule. State when you checked the group and how many remain open. Before comparing it with another group, check that both had comparable time to decide. If the concern is stalled growth, first name the measure and dates that feel stalled.

Sources

• Google Analytics: Cohort exploration (opens in a new tab)Grouping records by a shared starting characteristic and observing defined subsequent outcomes. Google-specific identity and reporting rules are not applied to the sales example.
• Salesforce Trailhead: Build a Healthy Sales Pipeline (opens in a new tab)The distinction between stage progression and elapsed sales-cycle time. The chapter does not adopt a target rate, sales forecast or automatic ranking of stages.