Sales cycle length matters because it directly impacts how fast you close revenue. At UserGems, we track it closely—not as a vanity metric, but as a real indicator of pipeline efficiency and team performance.

It also helps Sales Managers forecast accurately and spot exactly where deals are stalling.

Sales cycle length varies by deal size, product complexity, and buyer context. The goal: shorten it without sacrificing deal quality. Faster cycles mean your team closes more revenue with the same resources.

Below, we break down what drives sales cycle length and share practical tactics—from our team and other revenue leaders—to help you shorten yours.

How long is the average B2B sales cycle?

According to Zippia’s research, the average B2B sales cycle ranges between 1-6 months. While newer customers typically go through longer sales cycles (4-6 months), existing customers have shorter ones (1-3 months). Another reason to track your buyer job changes.

These numbers apply to mid-market deals. Enterprise cycles typically run longer—6-9 months, according to San Bhaskaran, CEO of UPilot.

What factors affect sales cycle length?

The sales cycle consists of many moving parts, and its length varies from deal to deal according to the following factors:

• Deal size: Your prospects are going to spend more time shopping and researching a $100,000 expense than a $1,000 one to determine if its benefits outweigh its price. This means that larger deal sizes translate to lengthier sales cycles.
• Product complexity: The more complex your product, the longer your sales cycle will be. For example, it may take multiple demos and presentations to make your customer understand the value of your product.
• Company size: The size of your customers’ companies can prolong the sales process as your reps may need to spend more time outlining your product’s value to multiple stakeholders from different teams.
• New market: If you’re selling to an audience in a newer market, your sales cycle is naturally going to be longer because you have to educate your prospects about your product and how it improves their organization’s bottom line.

Bottom line: bigger deals, bigger companies, and more complex products all mean longer cycles.

Long cycles aren't inherently bad if they match the revenue.But if deals are dragging without justification, it's time to tighten up your process and move faster.

3 ways to shorten the sales cycle

Consider this scenario:

Your sales reps struggle to meet quota because leads are stuck in the pipeline between qualification and close. This is causing cash flow volatility, making it difficult to reach your revenue goals.

If yes, you’re probably dealing with an unnecessarily long sales cycle caused by roadblocks at various stages.

The good news: you can fix this. Here's how to tighten your sales cycle and close deals faster.

1. Disqualify your leads

One of the fastest ways to shorten your sales cycle: disqualify leads early. Patrick Dang, the founder of Parallax, explains:

“Most salespeople make the mistake of trying to sell something to somebody who lacks a genuine need for what you offer.

“And when this happens, sometimes you can put a lot of energy trying to sell someone and kind of push them in the right direction, but in the end, they fail to buy because they lacked qualification from the start.”

To focus on leads likely to convert, your sales reps need to understand where the deal’s headed and park any that stall or plateau.

Patrick describes a framework called BANT — Budget, Authority, Need, Timing — that can be used to qualify leads and ensure that whoever you're reaching out to can buy your product or service.

The basis of the framework is simple — when you’re on a sales call, figure out if the person you’re talking to needs your product and has the budget and decision-making authority to sign off on the deal within a stipulated time.

And yes, your prospect has to check all four boxes to qualify as the right fit for your organization.

Let’s say you need to close $X worth of deals this quarter to meet your revenue goal. But your prospect (who has the budget, authority, and need) says that they require your solution starting next quarter, meaning they lack the timing component.

In that case, you’d be better off chasing after a lead who is looking to buy your product within the current quarter to give you a better chance of meeting your goals. Getting all of this information upfront requires strategic questioning.

Take a look at the chart below to learn how Patrick frames effective questions to qualify leads during a discovery call.

2. Multithread your deals

According to a Gartner report, “The typical buying group for a complex B2B solution involves six to 10 decision-makers, each armed with four or five pieces of information they’ve gathered independently.”

Additionally, the number of solutions these buying groups consider expands with the emergence of new technologies, suppliers, and products.

To help buying teams reach consensus faster, your reps need to multithread—connecting with multiple stakeholders instead of relying on a single contact. Here’s how to go about it:

• Create a value-based nurture campaign: Once you’ve connected with the influencers in your organization, share content like case studies, blogs, and reports with them to add value and build credibility before you pitch your solution. “The goal: when your decision-maker asks an influencer about you, they already know your name from a webinar, case study, or customer reference.” says Leslie Venetz, founder of Sales Team Builder.
• Send emails before and after a demo: This is the approach we take at UserGems to multi-thread deals, as it opens up a private channel to stakeholders and puts your product on their radar regardless of response rate. Blaise Bevilacqua, our Enterprise Account Executive, shares what our pre-demo and post-demo emails look like:

• Connect your champion’s problems to a company initiative: Since business problems always impact multiple people in an organization, Matt Flemman, Senior Sales Development Manager, LinkedIn Sales Solutions, suggests finding out what issues the buyer’s department is facing and researching the business impact of leaving it unresolved. After that, get in touch with a champion and shoot them an email to get a warm introduction with other stakeholders. Here’s the template Matt uses:

3. Create a sales process

Uncertainty kills momentum. When reps don't know the next step or leaders misread the buying cycle, deals stall.

To eliminate uncertainty, build a sales process that mirrors how buyers actually make decisions.

“Buyers choose ‘when’ they buy. We, as the sellers, are responsible for ‘how’ they buy. The experience will yield the result. A well-established sales process creates a better buyer's journey and encourages a successful customer journey from the very beginning,” says Gabrielle Reyson, Sr. ADR at UserGems.

To create an effective sales process, you need to focus on these key areas, according to Taylor Vo, AE at UserGems:

• Criteria for what a demo means: “This might be a given, but imagine an [ideal customer profile] demo comes through, and instead of a decision maker, it’s with a potential end user. It’s still very helpful to get information from them, but ask yourself if it will be valuable to the AE’s time as  they may have to spend a lot more on the opportunity starting  at that point.”
• ‍The SDR to AE handoff: “Many things can slip through the cracks during this phase. Aligning on (a) how you’ll introduce the AE, (b) the questions you ask in your confirmation email, (c) the info you plug into the CRM & (d) the point at which the AE takes over is huge. All of these impact your show rates, the AE's preparation for the demo, and communication if the prospect misses the meeting.”

Another key area to focus on, according to Iger Vergel, Account Manager at Quelink, is sales tools.

“As you begin to build your sales process, it’s important to consider what each tool accomplishes and how they work together. The key to choosing the right tools for each of your sales steps is finding the ones that address your specific needs,” he says.

Optimize your B2B sales cycle to drive ROI

Shorter sales cycles mean more closed revenue with the same resources. At UserGems, we help you do this by tracking buyer job changes—so when your champions move to new companies, you can re-engage them immediately with context they already trust.

Cobalt, a Pentest as a Service pioneer, saw 12x ROI by tracking former customers who moved to new companies. These warm contacts converted far better than cold outreach.

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