What I learned about revenue forecasting after talking to founders
While building RevPredict, I've been asking founders how they predict monthly revenue.
A few patterns showed up almost immediately.
1. Pipeline numbers create false confidence
If founders see $200k in pipeline, they subconsciously treat it like future revenue — even though historically only a fraction closes.
Timelines slip more than people expect
Deals that are "closing this month" quietly move to next month… and then the month after.
CRM forecasts are often just optimistic guesses
In many cases the forecast is basically what someone hopes will close rather than something calculated from historical data.
4. The most realistic forecasts usually come from probabilities
The founders who seem closest to reality tend to apply something like:
Discovery → ~20%
Demo → ~40%
Proposal → ~70%
Negotiation → ~85–90%
It’s still imperfect, but it removes a lot of the optimism bias.
I'm curious how others here handle this.
Do you forecast revenue using:
• historical close rates
• CRM stages
• spreadsheets
• or mostly gut feeling?
