Guide · 13 July 2026 · 5 min read
BD metrics for firms that do not run a sales floor
Borrowed SaaS metrics measure the wrong things in a partnership. Count what predicts won work in a relationship-led firm.
Professional firms keep importing metrics built for transactional sales teams: calls logged, deals per rep, funnel velocity. In a partnership these numbers mostly measure obedience to the CRM, which is why partners ignore them and the dashboard quietly dies. The useful metrics are the ones that predict won work in a relationship business.
A short list that earns its meetings
- Qualified pipeline added per month: origination, the number most firms never see
- Win rate on decided bids, by sector: effectiveness, trending over quarters
- Bid cost per win: the price of your win rate, and the case for no-bidding
- Relationship coverage on strategic accounts: routes to decision-makers, counted honestly
- Stalled pursuit count and value: execution health, weekly
- Evidence freshness: share of the proof library reviewed inside twelve months
Fewer numbers, defined once, argued never
Six metrics with published definitions beat thirty with private ones. Write each definition where the number is displayed, derive them from live records rather than month-end assembly, and resist adding a metric until it has a decision attached. The dashboard is not the achievement; the behaviour it provokes is.