A sales opportunity is a qualified prospect with a demonstrated need, a plausible buying path, and a clear next step. The distinction matters: a lead may fit your market, but an opportunity has enough evidence and momentum to justify focused sales effort.
Our sales team uses Process Street to turn that evidence into consistent action. Process Street is a Compliance Operations Platform with Docs and Ops capability areas plus built-in AI, so teams can document the playbook, run the work, capture decisions, and maintain an audit-ready record in one product.
In this article, I will show how our account executives use structured workflows to identify sales opportunities, move qualified prospects through the sales cycle, and complete the handoffs that follow a signed deal.
- A day in the life of a Process Street Account Executive
- Where checklists fit into the sales cycle
- How our account executives use sales checklists
- Six more sales processes for capturing and closing opportunities
A day in the life of a Process Street Account Executive
Our account executives meet with prospects and customers every day to understand their goals, demonstrate how Process Street can help, and guide the buying process. They work closely with sales leadership, sales operations, and sales development representatives (SDRs).
SDRs create and qualify early interest, then book meetings for account executives. Account executives also receive direct demo requests and develop opportunities through demand generation and outbound campaigns. Much of an AE’s day is spent in discovery calls, demos, follow-ups, and internal coordination.
A structured workflow keeps that activity focused. It prompts the rep to capture the prospect’s need, business impact, stakeholders, timing, and agreed next step. For larger opportunities, the AE can demonstrate a relevant workflow, tailor it to the prospect’s operating model, and involve the right specialists without losing context.
The result is a shared qualification standard. Reps can distinguish an interested lead from a genuine sales opportunity and give managers a clearer view of deal quality, risk, and next actions.
A standard day begins with SDR follow-up, meeting confirmation, and a review of scheduled calls. Prospects can also book a demonstration directly after submitting a request. The account executive prepares for each conversation by reviewing the account, the source of interest, and any information already captured by the SDR.
During calls, the AE uses a discovery workflow to keep the conversation centered on the prospect rather than on a generic product tour. The workflow helps the rep ask about the current operation, where work breaks down, what the problem costs, and who needs to be involved in a decision. If the opportunity is a good fit, the rep documents an agreed next action before the call ends.
For a larger deal, the AE may build or adapt an example process during the demonstration. This makes the evaluation concrete: the prospect can see how forms capture information, how conditional logic changes the path, how assignments direct work, and how approvals create control. That demonstration also gives the AE useful evidence about the prospect’s requirements.
Communication between SDRs, AEs, sales operations, Customer Success, and sales leadership is essential throughout the day. A workflow gives each group a consistent view of what has happened and what is due next. It reduces the risk that commitments disappear into personal notes, an email thread, or an incomplete CRM field.
Where checklists fit into the sales cycle
Our account executives move opportunities through five practical stages. Process Street workflows complement Salesforce by giving reps the detailed steps, forms, approvals, and handoffs needed at each stage. A workflow run link can be launched from the relevant CRM record, keeping opportunity data and execution connected.
This is one way sales automation software improves pipeline discipline: it removes repetitive coordination while preserving the judgment required to qualify and advance a deal.
Process Street improves the way information is captured at key points in the sales cycle. For many daily recurring processes, our account executives work inside Salesforce. Workflow run links can be embedded in the relevant account or opportunity record, connecting the two applications and reducing the number of places a rep must search. Clicking a run link can automatically generate the appropriate workflow and carry known information into it.
That connection is valuable because the detailed operating process rarely belongs in a single CRM field. Salesforce remains the system for the pipeline record, while the workflow presents the questions, tasks, approvals, and conditional paths needed to complete the work. The rep can concentrate on the customer conversation and still follow the team’s standard procedure.
Stage 1: Sales discovery
Discovery establishes whether a prospect has a problem worth solving and whether Process Street can create meaningful value. The AE researches the account, asks qualification questions, identifies the desired future state, and records the next step.
Key processes: discovery calls, product demonstrations, stakeholder mapping, and trial-extension requests when more evaluation time is justified.
The aim is to ask key qualifying questions and answer the questions the prospect has. Good discovery is proactive without being prescriptive. The AE should understand the gap between the current state and the desired future state, then determine whether Process Street can help close that gap. One or more demonstrations may be appropriate when different teams have distinct use cases.
Stage 2: Early evaluation/consideration
The prospect is deciding whether the product fits their needs. The AE supports that decision with relevant demonstrations, answers, and evidence while identifying everyone who influences the purchase.
Key processes: demos, call requests, meeting preparation, mutual action planning, and multi-stakeholder follow-up.
At this point, interest alone is not enough to justify a confident forecast. The AE looks for evidence that the prospect is testing assumptions, bringing other stakeholders into the conversation, and allocating time to the evaluation. A shared action plan can make the buying path explicit and surface missing decision-makers early.
Stage 3: Active evaluation
The prospect is investing time in a deeper evaluation. The AE stays available, resolves questions, revisits the proposal where necessary, and makes sure commitments are visible to both teams.
Key processes: proposal development, follow-up, internal updates, security or compliance reviews, and evaluation checkpoints.
The customer is now doing more of the work themselves. They may configure an example workflow, compare options, seek internal feedback, or validate security and compliance requirements. The AE should be available to resolve confusion and connect the prospect with the right specialist, but should not manufacture progress that is not present.
Stage 4: Negotiation
Buyer and seller work toward terms that meet both sides’ requirements. Pricing or contract changes should follow an approved path so the rep can move quickly without bypassing commercial controls.
Key processes: proposal revisions, discount approval, plan changes, legal review, and final commercial sign-off.
Negotiation works best when the AE can explain which terms are flexible, which require approval, and what each side must do to reach agreement. Standard request paths prevent informal promises and make the commercial history visible. The workflow should capture the requested change, the reason, the decision-maker, and the final approved terms.
Stage 5: Closing the deal
Closing converts the agreed terms into a complete, reliable handoff. The AE confirms the signed agreement, records key deal data, and alerts the teams responsible for onboarding and delivery.
Our Slack automation can share the completion event with the appropriate channel. These celebratory “Bang the Gong” moments recognize the people involved while the workflow preserves the operational record behind the announcement.
Key processes: deal closure, signed-document storage, approvals, customer handoff, and team communication.
A signed agreement is not the end of the operating process. The sales team still needs to confirm account details, attach the accepted proposal, identify implementation contacts, and transfer the customer’s goals to the team responsible for onboarding. Completing those steps in a workflow makes the handoff dependable and gives the new customer a more coherent start.
How our account executives use sales checklists to make their job easier
Our internal sales workflows reflect the way our team operates, so they are not public templates. They demonstrate how a documented playbook can become an executable workflow with assignments, conditional paths, approvals, integrations, and a reliable record of every decision.
Automatically processing Stripe requests using our Stripe Request checklist
Commercial requests such as trial extensions, upgrades, plan changes, and discounts need both speed and control. An AE launches the workflow from Salesforce, and the relevant account details can populate the request automatically.
Conditional logic shows only the tasks required for that request type. A trial extension can follow one path while a formal plan change follows another, all within the same controlled workflow.
The workflow gives sales a clear way to request a change, routes work to the correct owner, records approvals, and notifies Customer Success when action is required. Leaders can see that the commercial rules were followed without slowing the rep down.
Main workflow benefits
- Salespeople can request a billing, plan, discount, coupon, or trial change without needing direct ownership of the billing system.
- Launching the workflow from the CRM can populate account and opportunity information automatically, saving time and reducing transcription errors.
- Customer Success receives a clear guide to the work required on the back end and can see the approved commercial context.
- Sales leaders can verify that the appropriate review and approval tasks were completed.
The commercial request workflow can be used near the start of the sales process when a prospect needs more evaluation time, or near the end when formal changes are based on an approved proposal. Keeping both cases in one workflow makes it easier to maintain the business rules while conditional logic presents only the steps that apply.
Conditional logic adapts the workflow to each unique use case. Selecting a trial extension can reveal the questions and approval path for that request, while selecting a contract or plan change presents a different sequence of tasks. The person completing the workflow does not have to interpret a long document or decide which instructions to ignore.
Automatic assignments and notifications also clarify ownership. Sales can submit the commercial context, Customer Success can complete the required back-end action, and leadership can review exceptions. When the necessary steps are completed, the relevant people can be notified in Slack. This provides visibility across teams without giving every participant access to every underlying system.
Discovery Call checklist
The Discovery Call workflow helps an AE learn why a prospect is considering Process Street and whether there is a credible opportunity. It prompts concise questions about the current process, the operational impact, the people involved, and the outcome the prospect wants.
The workflow can include battle cards and guidance for less experienced reps while still leaving room for a natural conversation. Captured answers create a consistent opportunity record and help the AE agree on a specific next step.
The Send Email widget can use captured form data to prepare a follow-up message for review and delivery. That reduces manual re-entry and makes it easier to send an accurate recap while the conversation is fresh.
Main workflow benefits
The Discovery Call workflow is designed so a rep can follow it regardless of experience level. Guidance and battle cards provide quick refreshers without turning the call into a script. The questions connect the prospect’s challenges to business impact, success measures, and the people affected by the problem.
The workflow also supports a gap-selling approach. It records the current state, the problem created by that state, and the future state the prospect wants. That information helps the AE evaluate fit, plan a relevant demonstration, and avoid advancing an opportunity simply because the conversation felt positive.
Sales metrics and risk prompts can appear at the right point in the work, while the captured information can be sent to an appropriate Slack channel or synchronized with other systems. The primary use case is the beginning of the sales cycle, when the team needs to learn about the prospect’s needs and decide how the product may help.
The workflow captures questions around each use case, along with challenges, successes, key performance indicators, and financial impact. Presenting that information in one place helps the sales team track progress and understand the potential value of the deal. It also gives a manager more useful material for coaching than a short status label alone.
A discovery workflow should remain short enough to support the call. It is not meant to bog the prospect down with information or consume the entire meeting. The best questions create a clear picture of the present problem and the desired outcome, then help the AE decide whether another demo, a stakeholder conversation, or a proposal is the appropriate next move.
Sales Proposal checklist
The Sales Proposal workflow collects the information required to build an accurate proposal, including scope, user count, commercial terms, and relevant conditions. Permissions help ensure sensitive information is available only to the people who need it.
Before a proposal is sent, the workflow routes it to the appropriate manager for approval. The reviewer can approve, reject, or comment, and the decision remains attached to the workflow record.
Once approved, the proposal can move to e-signature through DocuSign or another connected service. Notifications keep sales and other stakeholders informed without relying on a rep to copy updates between systems.
Main workflow benefits
The proposal workflow provides a controlled place to collect the information required for an accurate offer. It can record the number of users, commercial terms, implementation considerations, and any conditions discussed with the buyer. Because the record is stored with the workflow, the relevant people can access it subject to the permissions applied by the team.
Timely approval is especially important late in the sales cycle. An approval task can be assigned directly to the appropriate manager, who can review the proposal details and approve, reject, or return them with comments. The decision and its context remain visible instead of being buried in a private message.
Assignments, approvals, e-signature, and Slack notifications create a connected sequence from proposal preparation to customer confirmation. The workflow is most useful once the opportunity is qualified and the parties are discussing a specific commercial offer.
Proposal information can be stored in the cloud and accessed by the relevant person from anywhere, subject to permission settings. That is useful when the AE, manager, finance reviewer, and legal contact are working across time zones. Each participant sees the task and context required for their decision rather than relying on a forwarded email chain.
Obtaining the relevant approval in good time is vital for a streamlined operation. An approval task notifies upper management that a review is needed, and task assignments place that work in the correct person’s inbox. Once the review is complete, the manager can give the go-ahead or reject the proposal with comments. The rep receives a clear decision and an audit trail of how it was made.
After approval, the proposal can be sent to the customer for e-signature. When the customer signs, connected systems can record the confirmation and notify the appropriate team members. This establishes a quick communication path between sales and the teams responsible for the next stage.
Deal won checklist
The Deal Won workflow records the information required after signature: customer contacts, the responsible SDR and AE, use case, deal value, number of users, important dates, and the onboarding handoff.
The signed proposal can be uploaded directly to the workflow so the final document and the decisions that produced it remain together.
Approvals and task permissions control access, while captured dates help the team understand sales-cycle length. When the workflow completes, Slack can notify the wider team and celebrate the win.
Main workflow benefits
The Deal Won workflow summarizes and stores the details needed by the teams that take over after signature. That can include the customer’s primary contact, the SDR and AE, the use case, deal value, number of users, proposal status, and important dates such as first contact, demonstration, signature, and payment.
A file-upload field keeps the accepted proposal with the operating record. Task permissions restrict sensitive information to the right personnel, and an approval can be assigned to sales leadership when a final review is required. The complete record can also support later analysis of sales-cycle length and handoff quality.
Celebration still matters. Once the deal is complete, an automation can post an image or GIF to the sales team’s Slack channel and recognize the people involved. The visible “Bang the Gong” moment builds team spirit, while the workflow underneath it makes sure the less visible operational work was completed.
The deal record is also useful after the celebration. By storing the information in a Process Street workflow, the team can access the agreed details when questions arise and use task permissions to control who can see them. Dates such as first contact, signup, demo, signature, and payment support an estimate of sales-cycle length and help reveal where future deals may stall.
A final approval can be assigned to the VP of Sales or another accountable leader. This step is not a substitute for the commercial approvals that occurred earlier. It confirms that the deal record is complete, the signed proposal is attached, and the customer handoff can proceed with the information promised during the sale.
6 more top sales processes for you to capture and close high-value deals
A strong sales process gives reps a repeatable path from initial interest to a complete handoff. These six templates can help you qualify leads, onboard salespeople, contact prospects, run qualification calls, develop upsell sequences, and close deals.
Repeatability improves more than efficiency. A documented process gives new salespeople a clearer starting point, gives managers a common basis for coaching, and makes forecasts easier to interpret. It also creates a practical feedback loop: when the team learns that a question, approval, or handoff is missing, the workflow can be improved for the next opportunity.
Inbound Sales Lead Discovery Checklist
Use this workflow to decide which leads merit focused attention. A Salesforce integration can launch it when a new signup or lead meets your chosen criteria.
The workflow helps the team sift through early signals, collect relevant account information, and identify the highest-value leads. Clear qualification criteria help reps spend their energy where a productive sales conversation is most likely.
Sales Onboarding Checklist
Give new salespeople a consistent introduction to your product, customers, tools, expectations, and operating standards.
Effective onboarding combines knowledge with practice. Assign learning tasks, introduce the team’s tools, explain company values, and verify that each new hire can apply the sales method before working opportunities independently.
Contact Prospects via Phone and Email
Coordinate phone and email outreach, record each attempt, and make the next action clear.
During discovery, prospects may respond through different channels and at different times. A single workflow keeps outreach attempts, responses, and follow-up dates organized so the next contact is relevant rather than repetitive.
BANT Sales Qualification Call Process
Assess budget, authority, need, and timing while keeping the conversation tied to the prospect’s real buying process.
BANT offers a useful structure, but it should support the conversation rather than replace judgment. Record what is known, identify assumptions, and use the gaps to plan the next question or stakeholder meeting.
Upselling Sequence Email Process
Plan a relevant email sequence that connects an expanded use case to measurable customer value.
An upsell should solve a real customer problem. The sequence helps the team connect additional capability to the customer’s goals, coordinate timing, and avoid sending disconnected messages from multiple people.
Closing The Sale Checklist
Confirm that the agreement, approvals, documentation, and internal handoffs are complete before the opportunity is marked closed.
The final check protects both the forecast and the customer experience. It confirms that the necessary documentation exists, the correct teams have been notified, and the commitments made during the sale are available to the people responsible for delivering them.
How to manage sales opportunities consistently
Start by agreeing on the evidence required to call a lead an opportunity. The criteria should reflect your market and sales motion, but they normally include a defined problem, a plausible use case, stakeholder access, timing, and a next step. Reps should be able to explain why an opportunity qualifies without relying on instinct alone.
Next, map the recurring work around the CRM record. Document what must happen during discovery, demonstrations, trial extensions, proposal creation, approvals, negotiation, and closing. Assign an owner to each task and identify which decisions need management, finance, legal, security, or Customer Success input.
Use conditional logic to keep the process relevant. A small deal should not be forced through every enterprise review, and an enterprise deal should not bypass a required approval because the rep copied a simpler checklist. Different paths can still share one maintained workflow and one reporting structure.
Capture information once and reuse it. Form fields from discovery can populate a follow-up email, support a proposal, or inform the onboarding handoff. Integrations can pass known data between Salesforce, Process Street, Slack, e-signature, and other systems. Automation should remove re-entry and coordination work while keeping important judgment with the responsible person.
Finally, review the process using completed workflow data. Look for repeated delays, missing stakeholders, common proposal changes, and handoff problems. Continuous improvement turns the sales playbook into a living operating system rather than a document that reps stop using.
Keep the process connected to real sales work
Account executives meet with clients daily to discuss ways Process Street can assist them in meeting their goals. Their work relies on communication and collaboration between account executives and other members of the sales team. SDRs follow up, reach out, confirm meetings, and schedule the time and date on the AE’s calendar. The AE then manages calls, trials, demonstrations, and the sales cycle.
Our account executives spend much of their time talking to new signups and qualified prospects. During these calls, they run the Discovery Call workflow to guide the conversation and show the product. For bigger deals, an AE may run an example process and build part of that process for a more detailed demo. The point is not to demonstrate every feature. It is to show how the product can solve the prospect’s unique pain points.
We break the sales cycle down into its constituent stages so the team can use specific workflows at each stage. During sales discovery, prospect research is conducted and the AE connects by phone, email, or a scheduled meeting. The aim during this stage is to ask key qualifying questions, answer questions from the prospect, and take a proactive approach that may move the opportunity along the sales pipeline.
Early evaluation is still ambiguous. The prospect is deciding whether the product is a good fit, so the team may run a product demo, progress call requests, attend meetings, plan the sales pitch, and prepare a sales presentation. The AE should connect with multiple decision-makers on the purchasing side when the buying process involves several stakeholders.
Active evaluation is a more thorough evaluation completed by the customer. The prospect may be actively testing the product or applying it to a real process. This time investment is a useful signal, but the outcome still relies on evaluation on the prospect’s side. The AE remains available to answer queries, resolve confusion, share relevant updates, and revisit the sales proposal when required.
The negotiation stage is a strategic discussion between buyer and seller that ideally leads to the deal being closed. The purpose is to reach an agreement acceptable to everyone. Prospects communicate what they need and where they may be willing to make concessions; the AE determines what can change in price, contract terms, or plan configuration and routes those changes through the relevant approval process.
Closing the deal is a make-or-break moment, but it should not depend on improvisation. Running a standard process helps ensure the right techniques, language, documents, and handoffs are applied on a team-wide level. Notes and status changes can be pushed into Slack to provide visibility and transparency for sales leadership and the product or Customer Success teams.
Design workflows people can follow
Start by documenting each step of the sales process and transcribing those steps into a Process Street workflow. Keep the instructions specific enough to enforce best practices, but concise enough that the workflow supports the work instead of interrupting it. Form fields should capture important information during the sales cycle and turn it into actionable sales insight.
Conditional logic should cater to each unique use case. If one request type is selected, only the subsequent tasks for that path should be presented. Another use case can reveal different subsequent tasks. This lets several related requests be handled in a standardized manner from a single workflow.
Assignments should identify the person responsible for each action. Approvals should notify the relevant manager that a review is needed and let that person approve, reject, or comment. Permission settings should protect sensitive commercial information. File uploads should keep signed documents with the workflow record. Together, these controls make the process easier to execute and easier to audit.
A discovery checklist can contain battle cards for anyone who needs a quick refresher. The data collected should help the team create actionable sales insights, monitor churn risks, and improve forecasting accuracy. Later workflows can collate sale proposal information, automatically notify the right people, and make the final deal information accessible to the teams responsible for delivery. This combination helps sales leaders have confidence that required tasks are being executed and that important details are available before closing.
Frequently asked questions
What is a sales opportunity?
A sales opportunity is a qualified prospect with an identified need, a reasonable path to purchase, and an agreed next action. It is more developed than a lead because the seller has evidence that a real buying process may be underway.
How is a sales opportunity different from a lead?
A lead is a person or account that may fit your target market. A sales opportunity has passed defined qualification criteria such as need, stakeholder access, timing, and commercial fit.
What should a sales opportunity checklist include?
Include the business problem, impact, stakeholders, decision process, timing, risks, next step, owner, and required approvals. Your checklist should also define when an opportunity advances, pauses, or closes.
How should sales teams track opportunities?
Keep the opportunity record in your CRM and connect it to an executable workflow for discovery, proposals, approvals, and handoffs. This gives the team both pipeline visibility and proof that the required work was completed.