Every lead holds the potential to become a loyal customer. But how do you bridge the gap between initial interest and a closed deal?
Lead conversion in the Salesforce feature empowers you to seamlessly transform promising leads into qualified opportunities, accelerating your sales cycle and boosting revenue.
It is a process in which a lead record is converted into Accounts, Contacts & Opportunities. This conversion happens when a lead is identified as a qualified Sales prospect.
So, let’s explore how lead conversion in Salesforce takes place.
What is Lead Conversion in Salesforce?
Lead conversion in Salesforce is the transformation of a lead into a business client or a customer. Once the leads in Salesforce are converted, they are saved as accounts, contacts, or opportunities.
This conversion means they are now eligible to access your product or service. The progression of your lead in the sales funnel requires an organized lead conversion process in Salesforce. Successful execution of this process can result in efficient sales and an increase in revenue.
Lead Conversion Process in Salesforce
A lead conversion process in Salesforce is initiated when a contact, account, and opportunity are created and populated with the lead’s data. At the same time, you can choose to map the accounts and contacts that are already present in the org or select the option of creating a new one.
However, it is not always necessary to create an opportunity when converting a lead. Once a lead is restored, it cannot be reverted to an unconverted state or modified.
After the conversion, the lead record cannot be viewed or edited as a lead, but it can be viewed in reports as a lead, which means the record is still present. The default record type for the user performing the lead conversion process is selected automatically for documents created in the conversion process. Salesforce does not overwrite existing Account/Contact data on lead conversion.
The data within standard lead fields are automatically transferred to contact/account and opportunity. For the data within custom lead fields to be transferred during lead conversion, the administrator must map the custom lead fields from the field and the relationship of the lead object (Map Lead Fields). The lead field “Converted” is changed from false to true post-conversion.
Note:
A custom lead field can only be mapped to a single field on either contact, account, or opportunity. If the account/contact/opportunity already exists, then
- There is no way to convert a lead to an existing opportunity.
- While converting a lead in Salesforce, the CRM attempts to find an account with the same name as the field “Company” on the lead record. If an account name contains the company’s name, then you will have the option to use the existing record.
- If we attach the lead to an existing account and the lead name matches the name of an existing contact, then you will also have the option to use the existing contact record.
Components of Lead Conversion in Salesforce
Salesforce has several features and functionalities that combine to speed up lead conversion instead of one specialized “tool” for the job. The following is a summary of the essential components of lead conversion in Salesforce.
Custom Fields
The standard Salesforce fields may not capture all the information you need during lead conversion specific to your sales process. Custom fields allow you to tailor your lead and opportunity records to capture additional details relevant to your unique needs. You can create custom fields to capture specific information pertinent to your sales process during lead conversion.
Validation Rules
Data accuracy is essential for smooth sales operations, and validation rules help ensure that the data entered during lead conversion adheres to specific criteria. You can define rules for particular fields, requiring them to be filled in, meet specific formats (e.g., email format for an email address field), or fall within a defined range (e.g., budget range).
Reporting and Analytics
Salesforce offers robust reporting and analytics tools that allow you to gain valuable insights into your lead conversion process. You can utilize these insights to track critical metrics like lead conversion rate, source performance, time to conversion, etc. By tracking your lead conversion rates and analyzing them, you can determine which lead sources or qualification criteria are most successful.
Workflows and Process Builder
These automation tools can automate repetitive tasks during lead conversion, such as assigning leads to the appropriate sales rep based on territory or expertise.
Perform tasks such as triggering email notifications to notify the sales rep about a new opportunity and save time. You can also create tasks or reminders for follow-up activities and minimize errors during the conversion process.
Data Mapping
When converting leads to opportunities, you can map specific data fields from the lead record to the corresponding fields in the opportunity record. This ensures essential information is transferred seamlessly, reducing manual data entry and improving data consistency.
Lead Scoring and Lead Grading in Salesforce
In Salesforce there are two commonly used techniques {lead scoring and lead grading) to qualify leads, determine if a lead is worth passing from your marketing team on to sales.
Lead Scoring
Lead scoring in Salesforce refers to automatically scoring inbound leads with a numerical value to indicate how interested they are in your product or service. By assigning points to the prospect’s actions you identify as the most valuable, like visiting the pricing page or requesting a demo, you can create a score for your leads that will show how active they have been and how high their interest level is.
Lead Grading
Automatically evaluating inbound leads with a letter grade (A—F) based on a number of factors is known as lead grading in Salesforce. Grading leads ensures that the leads being passed from marketing to sales match your company’s ideal customer profile.
Note:
Available with Sales Cloud Einstein, which is available in Performance and Unlimited Editions, and for an extra cost in Enterprise Edition.
