If your sales pipeline feels more like a leaky faucet than a revenue engine, you’re not alone. Most teams collect mountains of data but struggle to turn it into real, practical changes. This guide is for folks who want to use Derrickapp analytics to actually improve their sales process—not just stare at pretty dashboards.
Whether you're the head of sales, a founder wearing too many hats, or the CRM skeptic in the room, this is for you. I'll walk through no-nonsense steps to get insights that matter, spot what’s broken, and fix it—without getting lost in the weeds.
1. Get Your Data in Order
Before you can trust any analytics, you need clean, consistent data. Derrickapp (derrick-app.html) can only work with what you give it—garbage in, garbage out.
What you need to do: - Audit your fields: Make sure stages, deal values, and close dates are being filled in every time. If reps are skipping stuff, your reports will be Swiss cheese. - Standardize pipeline stages: If “Negotiation” means something different to each rep, you’ll never get reliable analytics. - Ditch the clutter: Remove unused fields, ancient stages, or “test” deals. They just muddy the waters.
Pro tip: Have your team review a few recent deals together. If you can’t all agree what stage they’re in, your definitions need work.
2. Start With the Right Metrics
Derrickapp throws a lot of numbers at you. Most don’t matter. Focus on what actually helps you make decisions:
- Pipeline Velocity: How fast are deals moving, and where do they get stuck?
- Conversion Rates: What percent of deals move from one stage to the next?
- Deal Size Trends: Are you chasing bigger deals, or just more deals?
- Activity Metrics: Are reps making enough calls, meetings, or emails to fill the top of the funnel?
Ignore: - Vanity stats (number of notes, “engagement scores” with no clear meaning, etc.) - Data that’s always the same (e.g., if your average deal size never changes, stop obsessing over it)
3. Map Your Pipeline (and Spot the Bottlenecks)
Now it’s time to look at your actual pipeline in Derrickapp. Head to the analytics dashboard and filter by whatever matters most—team, product, quarter, etc.
Look for: - Where deals pile up: If 60% of deals sit in “Proposal” for weeks, something’s off. - Drop-off points: Which stage loses the most deals? That’s usually your biggest lever. - Outliers: Are there “zombie” deals that have been open forever? Clean them out so you see the real picture.
Pro tip: Don’t just stare at the funnel chart—click in and look at actual deals. Sometimes a single big deal can skew the numbers.
4. Dig Into Activity and Attribution
Derrickapp tracks calls, emails, demos, and more. But the goal isn’t to micromanage reps—it’s to find what actually moves deals forward.
How to use it: - Compare activity levels for won vs. lost deals. Are you under-investing at certain stages? - See which activities correlate to wins. Maybe demos aren’t helping as much as you thought, but follow-up emails are. - Identify reps who consistently outperform. What are they doing differently? Share their methods.
Watch out for: - Chasing activity for activity’s sake. 100 calls that go nowhere don’t help. - Blaming low activity without context—sometimes the problem is lead quality, not effort.
5. Set Up Simple, Real-Time Dashboards
Don’t let analytics become another thing you check once a quarter. In Derrickapp, set up dashboards that show only your top 3-5 metrics. Share them with your team—transparency makes it easier to spot problems early.
What to include: - Pipeline by stage (with aging) - Weekly/monthly win rates - Key activity counts (calls, meetings, etc.) - Forecast vs. actual
Skip: - Endless lists of “open” deals that never close - Charts nobody understands (if you have to explain it every week, it’s not helping)
6. Run Experiments and Track the Impact
Here’s where most teams drop the ball: they see a problem, try to fix it, then never check if it worked. Use Derrickapp’s analytics to actually measure changes.
Examples: - If you change your pitch deck, does your Proposal-to-Closed rate improve? - If you add a new qualification stage, does it reduce time wasted on bad leads? - If you push for more follow-ups, do deals move faster—or do they just get annoyed?
How to do it: - Set a baseline: Note your current metrics before making changes. - Make one change at a time. - Track the same metrics weekly for at least a month. - If nothing moves, try something else. (Don’t be precious—most experiments fail.)
7. Use Custom Reports Sparingly
Derrickapp lets you build all kinds of custom reports. That’s great—if you know what you’re looking for. Avoid getting lost in endless filtering.
When custom reports help: - Testing a hypothesis (e.g., “Are deals from LinkedIn closing faster?”) - Checking on a specific team or product line
When to skip: - Building reports “just in case” someone asks for them - Tracking things you never act on (if you haven’t made a decision based on a metric in 3 months, kill it)
8. Keep Feedback Loops Tight
Analytics don’t mean squat if the team ignores them. Make pipeline reviews a regular habit—weekly is best, even if it’s just 15 minutes.
How to do it: - Look at the same dashboards together - Talk about where things are stuck - Ask reps what’s getting in their way—sometimes the data misses the human story
Pro tip: Celebrate small wins. If someone cleared out old deals or fixed data quality, that’s progress.
9. Don’t Chase Perfection
No analytics tool—including Derrickapp—will magically fix your sales pipeline. The key is to keep things simple, review regularly, and focus on action.
- You’ll never have “perfect” data. That’s fine—just aim for “good enough.”
- Most insights are obvious in hindsight. Don’t overthink it.
- If a metric isn’t helping you make decisions, drop it.
Final Thoughts
Sales analytics only help if you actually use them. Start small, focus on the basics, and review what matters every week. Derrickapp can highlight what’s working and what isn’t, but it won’t do the hard work for you. That’s on you and your team. Keep it simple, keep talking, and keep trying new things. You’ll get better results—and waste less time chasing your tail.