Clear definitions of the terms that matter in B2B sales - written for founders and revenue leaders, not textbooks.
GTM Strategy
ICP (Ideal Customer Profile)
A precise, evidence-based description of the company type most likely to buy, realise value quickly, and renew — defined by firmographic, technographic, and situational criteria.
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Go-to-Market Strategy
The plan that defines who a company sells to, how it communicates value, what channels it uses to reach buyers, and how the sales motion converts pipeline to revenue.
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B2B Sales
B2B sales is the process of selling products or services from one business to another — typically involving longer cycles, multiple stakeholders and higher deal values than consumer sales.
GTM Strategy
Product-Market Fit
The point at which a product reliably solves a problem that a defined set of customers will pay for. A prerequisite for scalable sales hiring in most circumstances.
GTM Strategy
Account-Based Selling
A go-to-market approach where sales and marketing align on a defined list of target accounts and coordinate outreach, content, and engagement around those specific companies.
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Qualification
MEDDPICC
A structured sales qualification framework used to assess deal control and buyer readiness across eight dimensions: Metrics, Economic Buyer, Decision Criteria, Decision Process, and more.
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Economic Buyer
The individual within a prospect organisation who holds ultimate budget authority and the power to approve a purchase — distinct from the project sponsor or day-to-day champion.
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Sales Qualified Lead
A prospect confirmed as a genuine opportunity through defined qualification criteria — the point at which marketing hands off to sales.
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Sales Qualification
The process of determining whether a prospect has the problem, authority, budget and urgency to buy — and whether the opportunity is worth the time and resource required to win it.
Qualification
BANT
A qualification framework that evaluates Budget, Authority, Need, and Timeline to determine whether a prospect is worth pursuing further.
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Qualification
Buying Committee
The group of individuals inside a prospect organisation who collectively influence, evaluate, or approve a purchasing decision.
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Sales Process
Sales Cycle
The time from first qualified engagement to closed-won — a measure of process efficiency, buyer control, and deal qualification quality in B2B sales.
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Discovery Call
A structured sales conversation designed to uncover the buyer's business problem, quantify its impact, and establish whether the conditions for a deal exist.
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Sales Playbook
A documented, stage-gated framework that defines what sellers should do, ask, and evidence at each point in the pipeline — raising the floor of deal execution.
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Pipeline Hygiene
The discipline of maintaining accurate, current, and evidence-based CRM data — ensuring stages, close dates, and deal health reflect buyer reality rather than seller confidence.
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CRM Stages
The defined pipeline milestones a deal moves through from qualification to close — most powerful when based on buyer evidence rather than seller activity.
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Sales Method
A structured approach to managing sales conversations and advancing opportunities, defining how reps qualify prospects, handle objections, and guide buyers through a decision.
Sales Process
Journey Sell
A sales approach used when the product is not yet complete or the category is not yet defined. Sells the future state and a mutual commitment to build towards it, rather than a finished specification.
Sales Process
Business Case
The document or argument that quantifies the commercial value of solving a problem — used by champions to justify investment internally and build urgency.
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Sales Process
Guided Selling
A structured approach where the seller takes the buyer through a defined sequence of questions, insights, and steps rather than reacting to whatever the buyer raises.
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Sales Process
Sales Process
The repeatable sequence of stages, activities, and exit criteria that define how a seller moves an opportunity from first contact to close.
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Sales Process
Proof of Concept
A time-boxed technical or commercial trial that lets a buyer validate a solution in their own environment before committing to a full purchase.
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Sales Process
Value Proposition
A clear statement of the specific outcomes a product or service delivers for a defined customer segment — why they should choose it over alternatives.
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Pipeline & Forecast
Revenue Gap
The measurable difference between a company's revenue target, its forecast, and what actually closes — caused by upstream system failures rather than individual effort.
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Win Rate
The percentage of qualified opportunities that close as won — the single clearest signal of sales system health in a B2B company.
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Pipeline Coverage
The ratio of total pipeline value to revenue target for a given period — a leading indicator of whether a team has enough qualified opportunity to hit its number.
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Forecast Accuracy
The closeness of a revenue forecast to actual closed revenue for a period — the most visible output of pipeline quality, qualification discipline, and management rigour.
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Deal Velocity
The speed at which deals move through the pipeline from stage to stage — a function of ICP fit, buyer engagement quality, and the strength of the commercial case.
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NRR
A metric that measures the percentage of recurring revenue retained from existing customers over a period, including expansion, contraction, and churn.
Pipeline & Forecast
Commit
A forecast category in which a rep or manager declares high confidence that a deal will close within the current period, typically used alongside Best Case and Pipeline categories.
Pipeline & Forecast
Pipeline
The set of active sales opportunities tracked through the revenue cycle, showing what is in progress, at what stage, and what's expected to close.
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Pipeline & Forecast
Deal Inspection
A structured review of an individual opportunity to assess its health, buyer engagement, forecast confidence, and next steps.
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Pipeline & Forecast
Deal Stall
A point in the sales process where an opportunity stops progressing — no engagement, no next step, no momentum forward.
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Pipeline & Forecast
No Decision
An outcome where a buying organisation evaluates a solution but chooses not to purchase — not a loss to a competitor, but a failure to act.
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Revenue Operations
Revenue Operations
The operational function that aligns sales, marketing, and customer success through shared systems, definitions, and data — making revenue generation inspectable and repeatable.
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CRM Hygiene
The discipline of keeping CRM data accurate, complete, and up to date so that pipeline reporting, forecasting, and sales activity reflect reality.
Revenue Operations
Land and Expand
A go-to-market motion where you win an initial contract with a subset of a buyer's organisation, then grow the relationship over time.
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Revenue Operations
QBR
Quarterly Business Review — a structured meeting to assess performance, review pipeline health, and align on the next quarter's plan.
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Revenue Operations
Sales Capacity Planning
The process of modelling how many sellers you need, at what ramp stage, to reliably hit a given revenue target.
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Revenue Operations
Sales Enablement
The function responsible for equipping sellers with the content, training, tools, and process knowledge to execute effectively.
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Revenue Operations
Win/Loss Analysis
A structured review of closed-won and closed-lost deals to identify patterns, improve the sales process, and sharpen the ICP.
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Buyer Engagement
Mutual Action Plan
A shared, time-bound document agreed between buyer and seller that maps every step required for the deal to close — including internal milestones, sign-offs, and paper process.
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Champion
An internal buyer contact who has both the influence to drive a purchase decision and the motivation to do so — the most important relationship in a complex B2B sale.
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Multi-Threading
The practice of building multiple relationships across different stakeholders and functions within a prospect account — reducing deal risk and ensuring no single contact controls the outcome.
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Status Quo Bias
The buyer's tendency to favour doing nothing over making a change — even when the cost of inaction is visible. One of the most common reasons deals stall or are lost to no decision.
Buyer Engagement
Cost of Inaction
What a buyer continues to lose by not making a decision — the revenue, efficiency or risk that compounds the longer they delay. Making this concrete is often what moves a stalled deal.
Buyer Engagement
Buying Group
The collection of individuals within a buying organisation who influence, evaluate, or approve a purchase decision, each with different priorities and levels of authority.
Buyer Engagement
Cold Outreach
Prospecting activity directed at buyers who have had no prior relationship with the seller — typically via email, phone, or LinkedIn.
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Buyer Engagement
Executive Sponsor
A senior stakeholder on the buyer side who has the authority, budget, and motivation to drive a purchase decision forward.
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Buyer Engagement
Objection Handling
The skill of responding to buyer concerns in a way that maintains momentum without dismissing or steamrolling their hesitation.
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Buyer Engagement
Commercial Negotiation
The final stage of a deal where pricing, terms, and contract details are agreed between buyer and seller.
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Sales Leadership
Sales Operating Cadence
The recurring set of pipeline reviews, deal clinics, forecast calls, and coaching rituals that keep a sales team operating to a standard rather than reacting to circumstances.
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Founder-Led Selling
The phase of a business where the founder is the primary or sole salesperson, typically characterised by high conversion rates driven by passion, network access, and direct product knowledge.
Sales Leadership
Sales Rubric
A behaviour-based evaluation framework used to assess salespeople during hiring and ongoing performance management. Focuses on observable working behaviours rather than claimed competencies.
Sales Leadership
Ramp Period
The time between a salesperson's start date and the point at which they are expected to carry and close a full quota. Typically three to six months in a startup environment.
Sales Leadership
AE (Account Executive)
A salesperson responsible for the full sales cycle from prospecting or inbound qualification through to close. In a startup, often the first sales hire and frequently also responsible for pipeline generation.
Sales Leadership
SDR
Sales Development Representative — a role focused on outbound prospecting and generating qualified pipeline for account executives.
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Sales Leadership
Ramp Time
The period it takes a newly hired seller to become fully productive — measured in time to first deal or time to full quota.
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Sales Leadership
Quota Attainment
The percentage of a seller's assigned quota achieved in a given period — the primary measure of individual sales performance.
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Revenue Execution
Revenue Execution
Revenue Execution
The discipline of running a repeatable, managed revenue process — from pipeline generation through to close and expansion.
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Revenue Execution
Revenue Execution System
A structured operating system that aligns people, process, and tools to deliver predictable revenue outcomes at scale.
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Revenue Execution
Design Enable Run
Closing Foundry’s three-phase model for installing a Revenue Execution System: design the process, enable the team, run it with discipline.
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Revenue Execution
Closing OS
Closing Foundry’s proprietary Revenue Execution System — a structured operating model for B2B sales teams to deliver consistent, coached deal execution.
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Revenue Execution
Closing OS Install
The structured engagement through which Closing Foundry deploys the Closing OS into a client’s revenue team.
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Revenue Execution
5 Days to Scale
Closing Foundry’s intensive programme for scaling sales teams — delivering process, playbooks, and pipeline discipline in five working days.
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Revenue Execution
Stage Evidence
The observable proof that a deal has genuinely progressed to a new stage — buyer actions, not seller assertions.
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Revenue Execution
Stage Exit Criteria
The specific conditions that must be met before a deal can advance from one stage to the next in a sales process.
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Revenue Execution
Stage Discipline
The practice of rigorously applying stage exit criteria to every deal — preventing artificial pipeline inflation and false forecasts.
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Revenue Execution
Deal Control
The degree to which a seller is driving the pace and direction of a deal — versus reacting to the buyer’s timeline.
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Revenue Execution
Hopecasting
Forecasting based on optimism rather than evidence — inflating pipeline confidence without buyer behaviour to support it.
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Revenue Execution
Pipeline Truth
An accurate, evidence-based view of pipeline — removing deals that are stalled, unqualified, or based on wishful thinking.
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Revenue Execution
CRM Truth
The state of a CRM where deal data reflects reality — accurate stages, next steps, and close dates grounded in buyer evidence.
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Revenue Execution
Buyer Evidence
Concrete signals from a buyer — actions taken, commitments made, engagement demonstrated — that validate genuine deal progression.
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Revenue Execution
Pipeline Slippage
The pattern of forecast deals consistently pushing to future quarters — a signal of weak qualification, poor deal control, or false close dates.
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Revenue Execution
Forecast Call
A structured recurring review where sellers and managers assess pipeline status, forecast accuracy, and actions required to hit the number.
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Revenue Execution
Forecast Confidence
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A seller or manager’s assessed probability that a deal or group of deals will close within the committed timeframe.
Sales Methods
Sales Methods
MEDDIC
A qualification framework: Metrics, Economic Buyer, Decision Criteria, Decision Process, Identify Pain, Champion — used to assess deal viability.
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Sales Methods
Challenger Sale
A sales methodology that teaches sellers to challenge buyer thinking, reframe the problem, and lead with insight rather than open discovery.
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Sales Methods
Gap Selling
A methodology that identifies the gap between a buyer’s current state and desired future state, making the cost of inaction the key lever.
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Sales Methods
Solution Selling
A sales approach centred on diagnosing the buyer’s problem and proposing a tailored solution, rather than leading with product features.
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Sales Methods
SPIN Selling
A questioning framework using four types — Situation, Problem, Implication, Need-payoff — designed to uncover and develop buyer pain.
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Sales Methods
Sandler Selling System
A buyer-centric methodology focused on mutual qualification, pain-first discovery, and avoiding the trap of unpaid consulting.
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Sales Methods
Value-Based Selling
A sales approach that anchors every conversation on the buyer’s business outcomes and return on investment, not product capabilities.
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Sales Methods
Strategic Selling
A methodology by Miller Heiman that maps the full buying organisation — identifying roles, influencers, and the path to a win.
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Sales Methods
Command of the Message
A sales framework for controlling the narrative — defining the problem, the value, and the proof in the buyer’s own language.
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Metrics
Metrics
Average Contract Value
The average value of a signed contract across your customer base — a key input for capacity planning, CAC, and revenue forecasting.
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Metrics
Customer Acquisition Cost
The total cost of acquiring a new customer — including sales, marketing, and onboarding spend — divided by the number of customers won.
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Metrics
Net Revenue Retention
The percentage of recurring revenue retained from existing customers after accounting for expansion, contraction, and churn.
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Metrics
Churn Rate
The percentage of customers or revenue lost in a given period — one of the most critical indicators of product-market fit and customer success.
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