This glossary covers the core concepts of sales process and performance. Use it to align your team on the stages, roles, and motions that move deals from first contact to closed-won and beyond.
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Account Management: The ongoing nurturing, support, and growth of existing customer relationships.
Account Planning: Developing a focused strategy for growing business within a specific account or group of accounts.
BANT: A qualification framework focusing on Budget, Authority, Need, and Timing.
Buyer Persona: A semi-fictional representation of an individual decision maker or user, including their goals, challenges, and preferences.
Champion: An internal advocate within the prospect’s organization who wants your solution to succeed and helps you navigate the deal.
Closing: The set of actions and conversations that secure a final commitment from the customer to move forward.
Conversion Funnel: A series of stages that show how many prospects progress from one step of the process to the next.
Decision Maker: The person or group with the authority to approve a purchase.
Discovery Call: An initial conversation focused on understanding the prospect’s needs, challenges, and goals.
Economic Buyer: The person who ultimately controls the budget and makes the final financial approval.
Expansion: Increasing revenue from existing customers through upsells, cross-sells, or additional services.
Forecasting: Estimating future sales results based on current pipeline, historical performance, and market conditions.
Gatekeeper: A person who controls access to decision makers, such as an assistant or lower-level contact.
Ideal Customer Profile (ICP): A detailed description of the type of company that is the best fit for your product, based on firmographic and behavioral traits.
Lagging Indicators: Metrics that report outcomes after the fact, such as revenue closed or quota attainment.
Leading Indicators: Metrics that predict future outcomes, such as new opportunities created or early-stage pipeline growth.
MEDDIC / MEDDPICC: A complex-sales qualification framework focusing on Metrics, Economic Buyer, Decision Criteria, Decision Process, Identify Pain, and Champion (plus additional elements in variants).
Negotiation: The process of reaching agreement on price, terms, and conditions that work for both buyer and seller.
Objection Handling: The skill and process of addressing concerns or pushback from prospects in a way that keeps the conversation moving forward.
Pilot: A time-bound trial deployment with a subset of users or cases to evaluate results in a real-world environment.
Proof of Concept (POC): A limited, test implementation of a solution used to validate fit, performance, or value before full adoption.
Prospect: A lead that has been qualified as potentially having need, budget, and decision authority.
Qualification: The process of determining whether a lead or opportunity is worth pursuing based on fit, need, and potential value.
Renewal: The process of extending a customer’s contract or subscription at the end of its term.
Sales Activity Metrics: Measures of rep actions, such as calls made, emails sent, meetings held, and demos delivered.
Sales Coaching: Ongoing guidance, feedback, and skill development provided by managers to help reps improve performance.
Sales Enablement: The function and set of activities that provide reps with the content, tools, and training they need to sell effectively.
Sales Funnel: A visual or conceptual model that shows how leads move from awareness to interest, consideration, and purchase.
Sales Methodology: A formalized approach to selling, such as SPIN, Challenger, Solution Selling, or others, that guides rep behavior.
Sales Pipeline: The set of all active opportunities a salesperson or team is currently working, organized by stage.
Sales Process: A repeatable set of stages and activities that guide how leads are converted into customers.
Stakeholder: Anyone in the prospect’s organization who has an interest in the outcome of the buying decision.
Territory Planning: The process of defining how reps will focus their time and effort across accounts, segments, or geographies.
Value Proposition: A clear statement of the benefits your product or service delivers and why it is better or different than alternatives.
Sales Hiring & Recruiting Glossary – https://salesfolks.com/post/sales-hiring-glossary
Sales Compensation & Metrics Glossary – https://salesfolks.com/post/sales-compensation-metrics-glossary
Sales Tech & Tools Glossary – https://salesfolks.com/post/sales-tech-tools-glossary
Glossary of Sales Roles – https://salesfolks.com/post/glossary-of-sales-roles-job-descriptions