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Adding Customer Milestones

Milestones are formal steps in the customer's buying process. The Customer Milestones view helps sales professionals identify and track customer requirements that must be met as the sales cycle progresses. After the milestones are set, use the Our Activities list to target specific activities that need to be accomplished to meet each milestone. These activities might include formal presentations, product demonstrations, benchmarks, proposals, and other activities required to make the sale. Figure 8 shows the Customer Milestones list, and the activities associated with the selected milestone in the Our Activities subview list.

Figure 8. Customer Milestones View with Associated Activities

Click for full size image

Milestones are similar to Activity Plan templates that are created with predefined activities. For example, the initial milestone, Request Offering, is associated with recommended activities to be performed by you and your sales team. These activities might include understanding the problem or opportunity, defining the customer's Compelling Event and confirming the budget, completing an opportunity assessment, and developing an organization map for the customer's business.

A sample of customer milestone types is included with the Siebel Sales application. Your administrator can change the milestones, based on your business needs. You and your sales team can create, edit and delete activities associated with the milestones that address the opportunity.

To add a milestone

  1. Navigate to the Opportunities screen, and in the Opportunities list, select the opportunity.
  2. Click the Target Account Selling view tab.
  3. From the Show drop-down list, select Customer Milestones.
  4. In the Customer Milestones list, add a new record.

    5. The current date appears in the Date field.

  5. In the Event field, select the type of event from the list, and then click Save.

    6. A set of suggested activities appears in the Our Activities list. You must save the type of event for the activities to appear.

  6. In the Description field, enter a description of the milestone event.
  7. In the Customer Responsibility field, choose the customer contact who is the key contact and owner of the milestone event.

Repeat the procedure until you have entered all key milestone events. Review the recommended activities for each milestone before adding new milestones.

To add associated activities to each milestone

  1. Follow the procedure, To add a milestone, to create a customer milestone.
  2. In the Our Activities list, add a new activity record and complete the fields.
    1. In the Type field, choose the activity type from the list.
    2. In the Display In field, choose where you want the activity to appear.

      3. Options are Activities Only, Calendar and Activities, and To Do and Activities. If you choose Calendar and Activity as the display method, you must enter a start date for the activity for it to appear in the calendar.

    3. In the Resources text field, describe the resources required to support the activity.
    4. If the activity will be delegated, for example, from a manager to a member of the sales team, click the hyperlink in the Owner field, and query for the new owner in the Employees list.

      5. The default owner is the User ID of the activity creator.


 Siebel Sales User Guide 
 Published: 18 April 2003