Manage Leads successfully with Odoo CRM

Getting new leads constantly is the key to continuous success of a business. As a lead is the first step to a future business deal. When a client contacts a company and asks about a service or product that the company offers, then this client is considered a lead. This lead may turn into a business opportunity. Leads generation and its management are essential for any company seeking future scale and success. 

For example, if you are running a business and you got an enquiry regarding your product, this enquiry is a lead. By following-up this lead through email, calling or through a meeting, will make a possibility of business with the client. Thus the lead becomes an opportunity and further sales procedures are followed by this. So with the proper analysis and management of the initial step, a ‘lead’ ensures the progress of the business.

Pre-stages of sales

The Pre-stages of sales differ from business to business according to their domain of work. The different stages before the sale include:

1) Lead generation 

2) Follow up on the lead through mediums like call/email 

3) Arranging a meeting for discussion

4) Sending Quotation

Of course the main aim of these steps is to turn the leads into successful business deals.

Odoo, which is one of the best ERP systems in the market, can help you a lot in lead generation. Odoo with the various modules it offers such as, CRM, Sales, and marketing automation plays a great role in attracting new leads and turning them into happy clients. 

So, let us see how Odoo can help in creating leads, and how the lead is managed in Odoo 13.

So first install the Sales module and Odoo CRM module from Odoo Apps store. 

In the CRM module, you can create leads, convert them to opportunities, and once the opportunity is won, a sales quotation can be made from it.

When CRM opens, you can see the pipeline of current leads at various stages. Go to CRM> Configuration > Settings > CRM > Enable Leads.

Now an option ‘Lead’ appears in the taskbar. One can create leads directly from CRM and leads can be generated through email as well.

A lead is created by the salesperson from CRM itself, CRM > Leads > Create. This will open a lead creation form as shown below.

Insert details like the lead's name and the likelihood of this lead to become an opportunity. Also, add details of the company for whom this lead is generated by the salesperson, including Company's name, Address, Contact Name, Email, Job Description, Contact numbers, Website, Language, Salesperson and Sales team. Also you can set priority and tags to the lead according to its importance.

Under internal notes, one can add notes, if needed, for communication within the firm. At extra info tab, one can add tracking details. For example: From which campaign this lead generation came from and the relevant details.

Click on "save" once all info is entered. Thus lead is created.

Now we want to create an opportunity from this lead.

By clicking on CONVERT TO OPPORTUNITY, lead can be converted to an opportunity.

An opportunity is the next stage of the lead, which has more possibility to become a sales order in the future. When we click on CONVERT TO OPPORTUNITY another wizard opens as below.

Here we can change or assign the responsible salesperson for this opportunity. Sometimes the new lead generated can be merged with an existing opportunity. They can be configured using ‘Conversion Action’. Either the new lead can be converted to a separate opportunity or can be merged with an existing one.

Also, this opportunity can be linked to a customer by creating a new customer, an existing customer or not linking it to anyone. Click on CREATE OPPORTUNITY. Thus the lead becomes an opportunity

From this point the possibility for making a business deal is easier and the opportunity is now put in the pipeline. Go to CRM > Sales > Pipelines. You can find the created opportunity in the pipeline.

One can schedule activity for the opportunity and according to the progress of discussion, the pipeline stages are changed from new to qualified/Proposition/Won. You can change the pipeline stages by simply drag and drop procedure. The pipeline stages are the stages through which the opportunity moves from its initial stage ‘new’ to ’won’ stage.

At every stage in the pipeline, you can schedule meetings and quotations if needed. Also, the responsible person can mark the opportunity as won or lost from any stage of the pipeline itself.

Once the salesperson marks the opportunity as lost by clicking MARK LOST, he\she must write down the reasons too.

If the salesperson marks the opportunity as won by clicking MARK WON, the next step will be sending quotations, confirming the sale and making the payment. 

When the quotation is sent to the client, and once it is approved by the client, we can create a sale order and later invoice as well.

Lead Analysis

The workflow of a lead is shown below. Once the leads are converted to an opportunity, it is brought into a user-defined pipeline. There different activities like email, meeting or call can be scheduled. Depending on those procedures, it may go to a lost or won state. 

For the lost state, the reason for losing should be mentioned and for the won state, the quotation will be sent to the client. On approval from the client-side, confirm the sale and make payment accordingly.

Odoo provides lead analysis tools such as Reporting, 

CRM > Reporting >Leads.

The analysis report on the lead is shown below.

We can use filters and ‘Group by’ options to customize this report. Also, you can have views like dashboard view, pivot view, graph view, list view etc.

In short, Odoo with its multiple and varied modules in general and Customer Relationship Management (CRM)  in particular helps you to generate new leads constantly, and manage them properly and thus ensure success and prosperity of your business.

For any question or inquiry about Customer Relationship Management or any other module of Odoo ERP, Boraq Group is always at your service, and will answer any inquiries you may have. You can contact us at info@boraq-group.com

Keywords: leads, opportunity, Odoo, customer relationship management (CRM), Boraq Group, ERP.