Admin
Your sales process
Set up the stages a deal moves through, with how long each usually takes, what to collect and what has to be true to move on. Start from a template or import stages from Salesforce.
Your sales process is the list of stages every deal in your workspace moves through, from first call to close. Goose shows these stages on every deal, and checks each deal against the stage's exit criteria after its calls.
To open it, go to the account menu at the bottom of the left rail, choose Settings, then Sales Process. It has three tabs:
- Stages: your stages. This page covers them.
- CRM map: where an admin links the workspace to Salesforce and pairs its stages with yours.
- Methodology: the sales methodology Goose scores deals against, such as MEDDPICC. See Pick a sales methodology.
Only admins and the owner can change anything here. Everyone else sees the page read-only, with Read only. Ask an admin or owner to change the sales process. at the top.
What a stage holds
On the Stages tab, each stage is a row, numbered in order. Press a stage's name to open it in a panel at the side.
A stage has:
- Stage name, such as "Discovery". This is the only thing it must have.
- Color, to tell stages apart on the deal and in the pipeline.
- Typical duration (optional): how long a deal usually spends here, written however you like, such as "~1 week".
- Information collected at this stage: what the rep should capture before the deal moves on, such as "Budget range" or "Champion". Type one in Add a field… and press Add.
- Exit criteria to advance: a checklist of what has to be true before the deal moves to the next stage. Type one in Add a criterion… and press Add.
Press Save changes to keep your edits, or Cancel to drop them.
The row on the Stages tab shows the same things: the typical duration (or No typical duration), what it Collects, and what it should Advance when.
Link exit criteria to your methodology
Next to each exit criterion is a menu that starts at Not linked. Pick one of your methodology's dimensions there, such as Economic buyer, to link them.
Linking is what lets Goose check the criterion. After each call, Goose scores the deal against your methodology. A linked criterion is met when the deal has evidence for its dimension. A criterion you leave unlinked shows on the deal as Not linked — not assessed, and doesn't count either way.
If no methodology is picked yet, the menu reads Select a methodology first.
To see how criteria show up on a deal, and how they affect the Advance button, see Move a deal forward.
Where the rest shows up
Typical duration and the information collected are guidance for your team. They show on the Stages tab, and Ask Gus can read them when it answers a question about a deal. Goose doesn't check them on deals the way it checks exit criteria.
Start from a template
With no stages yet, the tab says No stages yet. Press Start from template, pick one, and press Use template. The window lists the stages each template loads before you choose.
| Template | Stages |
|---|---|
| B2B SaaS | Discovery, Qualify, Evaluate, Propose, Negotiate, Closed Won |
| Enterprise | Discovery, Qualify, Evaluate, Security & legal review, Procurement, Negotiate, Closed Won, Closed Lost |
| Transactional | Lead, Demo, Proposal, Closed Won, Closed Lost |
| Product-led | Signup, Activated, Team, Paid, Expansion |
| Services | Intake, Scoping, Statement of work, Negotiate, Kickoff |
Each template stage comes with a typical duration, and most with fields to collect and exit criteria too. Change any of them afterward.
To swap the stages you have for a template, press Replace with template…, pick one, and press Replace. Every stage you have now is deleted first. Deals keep their stage name. If the template has a stage with the same name, those deals land in it. Others show their old stage name, with no number, until you move them. This can't be undone.
Add, change, reorder or delete stages
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Add stage opens an empty stage. Fill it in and press Create stage. New stages go at the end.
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To change a stage, press its name.
Renaming a stage doesn't rename it on deals. Deals in that stage keep the old name until you move them. Changes of capitals or spacing are fine; any other rename leaves those deals unmatched. If the workspace is linked to Salesforce, check that stage's pairing on the CRM map tab again.
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To change the order, drag a stage by its handle, or open its ⋯ menu and choose Move up or Move down. Goose says Stage order saved. Moving a stage changes its number on every deal, for example 3. Evaluate becomes 2. Evaluate. Deals stay in the same stage.
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To delete a stage, open its ⋯ menu and choose Delete stage, then Delete stage again to confirm. Deals in that stage keep showing its name, with no number and nothing highlighted on their stage track, until you move them to another stage. This can't be undone.
Changes save as you make them. There's no separate Save for the list.
Import stages from Salesforce
If your sales process already lives in Salesforce, you can bring its stages across instead of typing them.
- Connect your own Salesforce login first, on the CRM map tab. Until you do, Import from Salesforce is grayed out, and hovering over it says so.
- On the Stages tab, press Import from Salesforce. Goose lists the active opportunity stages from your Salesforce, with each one's win probability.
- Choose the stages to bring in. Open stages start ticked. Stages marked Closed, and any marked Already added because you have a stage with that name, start unticked. You can still tick them.
- Press Import with the number of stages, for example Import 5 stages.
Imported stages are added at the end of your list, in Salesforce's order. They bring their names only: add the typical duration, fields and exit criteria yourself.
Importing stages doesn't link your workspace to Salesforce. That happens on the CRM map tab.
Won and lost stages
A stage whose name includes "Closed Won" or "Closed Lost" shows a Won or Lost tag on the Stages tab. If it has no exit criteria, it reads Terminal stage where the criteria would be. The tag only follows the name. In a workspace linked to Salesforce, the CRM map decides which stages close a deal, as described below.
Moving an open deal into a closing stage closes it. Goose marks the deal won or lost, sets its close date, and takes it out of your open pipeline. Which stages close a deal depends on whether the workspace is linked to Salesforce:
- Not linked to Salesforce: any stage whose name includes "Closed Won" or "Closed Lost".
- Linked to Salesforce: the CRM map decides. Its Won and Lost rows each name a Salesforce stage. One of your stages closes deals when it's paired with the Salesforce stage chosen in the Won or Lost row. A stage you haven't paired counts only if its name is exactly the Salesforce stage's name.
Before the move, the stage picker warns This also marks the deal won. (or lost). When the Salesforce sync changes a deal's stage, Goose takes won or lost from Salesforce instead. See Win, lose or reopen a deal.
On the CRM map tab, after your own stages, Goose lists two more rows, Won and Lost, and asks you to confirm which Salesforce stage each one means. In a linked workspace, these two rows decide which of your stages close a deal: the stage you pair with the Salesforce stage in the Won row marks deals won, and the one paired with the Lost row marks them lost. You don't need won and lost stages of your own to link Salesforce.
Fiscal year
Under the stages, Fiscal year starts in sets the month your fiscal year begins. Goose uses it for the quarters on your deals. It saves as soon as you pick.
Common snags
- Everything is grayed out. You're not an admin or the owner. Ask one of them to make the change.
- Import from Salesforce is grayed out. Your own Salesforce login isn't connected yet. Connect it on the CRM map tab.
- "Your Salesforce connection expired." Reconnect Salesforce in Settings › Integrations, then import again.
- "No active stages found." Your Salesforce has no active opportunity stages to import.
- A deal shows a stage that's no longer in your list. Its stage was renamed, deleted or replaced. Hover the stage and it says Stage is not in your configured pipeline. Open the deal and pick one of your current stages on its stage track.
- Two stages have the same name. You ticked a stage marked Already added when importing. Deals only ever show in the first one. Delete the extra stage.
- Goose says "Imported 3, but 2 couldn't be added". Some stages didn't import. Import again and tick only the missing ones.
- Replace with template stopped part-way. Some stages were deleted before the error. Delete what's left, then use Start from template.
- A criterion always reads Not linked — not assessed. Open the stage and link the criterion to one of your methodology's dimensions.