Loss Reasons: Learning From Deals You Don't Win
Capturing why a deal was lost, and reading it back as a report.
What this is
When you mark a deal Lost, you're asked why. Six common reasons are one click away — Price too high, Went with a competitor, No budget, Bad timing, No response, Not a fit — or you can type your own. The answers come back as a Why We Lose report on the Reports page.
Why it matters
Losing deals is normal. Not knowing why you lose them is the expensive part.
Once a few months of reasons build up, the report answers questions you can act on. Losing mostly on price is a pricing or positioning problem. Losing mostly to no response is a follow-up problem — and that one's free to fix. Losing on bad timing means those contacts are worth revisiting in six months rather than writing off. Without the data, all three feel identical: a deal that didn't close.
How to record one
- Open the deal and click Mark Lost.
- Pick a common reason or type your own.
- Click Mark Lost to confirm.
There's also a Skip option. Recording the loss without a reason is better than not recording the loss at all — those group under "Not recorded" in the report, and a lot of them is itself a sign the habit hasn't stuck yet.
Reading the report
Reports → Why We Lose shows each reason, how many deals it accounts for, and their total value — respecting the date range at the top of the page, so you can compare quarters.
Value matters as much as count: five small deals lost to price is a different problem from one large one.
What it doesn't do
Loss reasons are recorded for your own analysis. Nothing is emailed to the customer, and marking a deal Lost doesn't notify anyone outside your team.