The Sales Fiction Index™ is a pipeline diagnostic created and delivered by Robert Roseberry. It measures, precisely and verifiably, what percentage of your current sales pipeline can be confirmed as a real opportunity — and what percentage is, in his words, fiction.
The word "fiction" is deliberate. It is not an accusation about the people who filled the pipeline. It is a description of the data. A deal with no date and time confirmed for the next meeting (Falldown), no recent prospect contact, and a close date that has moved three times is not an opportunity. It is a story told in a CRM field. The Sales Fiction Index measures how many of those stories you currently have — and what they are costing you.
What the SFI Measures
The Sales Fiction Index evaluates every live deal in the pipeline against four criteria. A deal must pass all four to be counted as verifiable.
Confirmed Next Step
Is there an agreed, calendar-confirmed next conversation with the prospect? A follow-up email sent is not a next step. A meeting booked is.
Prospect Recency
When did the rep last speak — not email, not message — with the actual decision-maker? Two weeks of silence is a dark deal.
Close Date Accuracy
Has the close date moved more than once? A sliding close date is not a forecast. It is optimism with a deadline attached.
Manager Visibility
Does the manager know the real status of this deal — not the CRM entry, but the actual conversation with the prospect — right now?
A deal that fails any of these four tests is classified as fiction for the purposes of the diagnostic. The total percentage of deals in this category is your Sales Fiction Score — the single number that tells you what your pipeline is actually worth.
What Is a Typical Sales Fiction Score?
Across 25 years of running the SFI across North America, Asia Pacific, Europe, and the Middle East, the average Sales Fiction Score sits at approximately 65%. This means that in a typical sales organisation, roughly two-thirds of the pipeline cannot be verified as real against the four criteria.
"If your quarterly target is $3M and your Sales Fiction Score is 65%, you are making forecast decisions against approximately $1,050,000 of verified pipeline. The rest is a story you are telling your board."
The score varies by industry, region, and the rigour of the CRM process already in place. Technology companies in growth markets tend to score higher — more activity, more optimistic entries. Professional services and industrial companies tend to score slightly lower. But the direction is consistent: almost every organisation that has not explicitly installed a pipeline standard has a Fiction Score above 50%.
What Happens During the SFI Diagnostic?
The Sales Fiction Index takes one week. It begins with a workshop in which Robert introduces the four criteria and applies them — live, in the room — to your actual pipeline. Not a sanitised dataset, not a training scenario, but the deals your reps currently have open.
The application of the criteria surfaces something that is often uncomfortable but always useful: the difference between how a deal looks in the CRM and how it actually stands with the prospect. This is the fiction, made visible in real time.
By the end of the week, every deal in the active pipeline has been scored. You receive a Sales Fiction Score — a precise percentage — and a prioritised action plan that tells you which deals can be recovered, which have gone dark and need a defined recovery play, and which should be removed from the pipeline entirely to give you a forecast you can actually defend.
What Do You Do With the Score?
The Sales Fiction Score has three immediate uses.
It resets the forecast. Before the next board call or forecast meeting, you know exactly which deals are real and which are not. You can present a number you can defend — not a number extrapolated from an optimistic CRM.
It identifies the manager gap. The SFI almost always reveals that the fiction is concentrated in specific managers' pipelines. Not because those managers are bad at their jobs, but because they were never given a standard for what "real" looks like. The score tells you exactly where to focus the subsequent coaching investment.
It creates a baseline. The most powerful use of the SFI is as the starting point for a coaching programme. You know your Score today: 65%, or 58%, or 72%. The programme has a measurable goal: bring that number down. Fifteen years of IDC data shows that organisations that install the pipeline standard reduce their Fiction Score by 20–30 percentage points within the first two quarters.
Pipeline Fiction Calculator
Enter your quarterly pipeline target and see how much is likely unverifiable — and what the ROI on running the SFI looks like before you commit.
Run the Calculator →What Does the SFI Cost?
The Sales Fiction Index Assessment is US$2,500. This covers the diagnostic workshop, the full pipeline scoring, the Sales Fiction Score, and the prioritised action plan. The $2,500 is credited in full toward any subsequent programme — so if you proceed to the Anchored Business Process, you pay nothing extra for the diagnostic.
Book a Free Conversation First →Every engagement begins with a free 30-minute conversation. Robert speaks personally with every VP Sales and CRO before any diagnostic is scheduled. Both sides determine whether there is a genuine fit. If there is, the SFI follows. If there is not, you leave with a clearer picture of where your pipeline problem lives — at no cost.
Common Questions About the SFI
