Revenue operations and sales operations sound like the same thing, but they're actually not just two different ways to make "driving revenue" sound fancy.
Sales operations (SalesOps) is all about the efficiency of the sales team, making sure they have what they need to stay on course. Revenue operations (RevOps), on the other hand, makes sure Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success are all aligned to improve efficiency across all revenue-generating departments.
While SalesOps is the friend on a road trip who controls the playlist and maybe even provides a few snacks along the way, RevOps is the friend who's got the entire trip planned out in a spreadsheet: every activity, every meal, the works.
So how do you know which is right for your business? Let's break it down.
Table of contents:
What is revenue operations (RevOps)?
RevOps is a business function that aligns sales, marketing, and customer success teams to maximize revenue growth. Think of it as the glue that holds Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success together, ensuring teams work together seamlessly across every stage of the customer journey.
RevOps teams break down silos and create a unified system with shared tools, data, processes, and goals. This improves efficiency—from smoother customer handoffs to faster sales cycles—ultimately driving higher revenue.
Plus, you get enhanced cross-functional collaboration, boosted customer retention, and a clearer view of the entire revenue pipeline, paving the way for predictable and sustainable growth.
Core responsibilities of RevOps teams
RevOps teams consist of operations folks—the master planners, data wizards, and organizational royalty. These teams are typically structured around specialized areas of expertise to support revenue-generating departments, such as Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success. They carry out responsibilities that keep these departments efficient, focusing on areas like:
Operations: This involves designing and optimizing revenue workflows, creating playbooks, and mapping strategies across departments. This team ensures all systems are aligned and everyone is following the right processes to support revenue growth.
Data and planning: This team establishes a single source of data truth, tracks KPIs, builds forecasts, and provides analytical insights to drive data-driven decision-making.
Tools and technology: This team manages the revenue tech stack—think: CRM, CSM, marketing automation—integrating platforms, and ensuring all teams have the tools they need to operate efficiently. They help select software, provide user support, troubleshoot issues, and optimize tech performance to prevent bottlenecks.
Enablement: RevOps also provides training, resources, and support to ensure sales, marketing, and customer success teams are equipped with everything they need to drive results across the customer journey.
What is sales operations (SalesOps)?
SalesOps is all about making the sales process more efficient, effective, and less of a hot mess. Think streamlining lead qualification, managing sales data within the CRM, selecting and optimizing tools to address evolving business needs, and handling tasks like forecasting based on current sales data and quarterly sales reporting.
SalesOps aims to remove roadblocks so sales reps can spend more time selling and closing deals. These teams keep tools and CRM data up-to-date or automate lead management so they don't waste precious time on manual tasks.
It's more focused on the efficiency of the sales team itself rather than the holistic approach to all revenue-generating departments like RevOps.
Core responsibilities of SalesOps teams
You can expect SalesOps teams to hone in on things like:
Sales process optimization: SalesOps helps fine-tune the sales cycle to enhance efficiency by standardizing workflows, eliminating bottlenecks, and ensuring reps follow best practices to close deals faster.
Sales tool management: SalesOps manages the sales tech stack, ensuring sales teams have the necessary tools to integrate seamlessly into their workflow, including CRMs, automation tools, analytics platforms, and even AI assistants. SalesOps also makes sure each sales rep knows how to use these tools to accurately track sales activities and performance.
Sales reporting and analytics: SalesOps uses data to improve sales strategies and make informed decisions, keeping an eye on key performance metrics like conversion rates and sales pipeline length.
Sales forecasting and territory planning: SalesOps teams use past sales data and market trends to predict future sales performance. They also help divide territories strategically to ensure reps target the right prospects.
Key differences between RevOps vs. SalesOps
Both RevOps and SalesOps help drive business growth and boost revenue, but they take different approaches. They focus on different areas, track different metrics, and operate at different scales. Here's the recap.
| RevOps | SalesOps |
|---|---|---|
Approach | Cross-functional (sales, marketing, customer success) | Primarily sales-focused |
Goal | Optimize revenue across the entire customer lifecycle | Improve sales process efficiency |
Focus | End-to-end customer journey and revenue generation | Sales execution and performance |
Strategy | Drives strategic revenue growth and overall business alignment | Improves tactical sales execution and performance |
Example metrics | Annual recurring revenue (ARR), customer lifetime value (CLTV), customer acquisition cost (CAC) | Conversion rates, average deal size, sales cycle length |
RevOps vs. SalesOps metrics
RevOps tracks metrics like customer lifetime value (CLTV), customer acquisition cost (CAC), and annual recurring revenue (ARR), which accurately measure the impact on RevOps strategy.
For example, CLTV indicates that customers stay longer and spend more—which is heavily influenced by a consistent customer experience across all touchpoints.
SalesOps focuses on metrics like conversion rates, sales cycle length, and deal efficiency. These metrics are crucial for SalesOps because they directly reflect the performance and effectiveness of the sales team's processes.
For instance, a shorter sales cycle is a sign that SalesOps' efforts to streamline the sales process are working, while higher conversion rates show that sales reps are moving those leads through the pipeline.
When to choose RevOps vs. SalesOps
Deciding between RevOps and SalesOps comes down to more than just your goals. It's about the complexity of your customer journey, available resources, and your business model.
While all businesses want sustainable growth, the scale and method of achieving growth can differ. Smaller teams may not need a dedicated RevOps team but may apply RevOps principles by aligning their existing teams and tools. Any business can implement a RevOps strategy, but not every business requires a dedicated team.
Choose RevOps when:
You're dealing with silos: If different departments are working in isolation, it's easy to end up with inefficiencies, misaligned goals, and a whole lot of confusion. RevOps breaks down these silos by centralizing data, aligning key objectives, and improving communication. The result? More streamlined processes and, yep, more revenue.
Your tech stack is overwhelming: When you've got too many tools and systems that aren't vibing, it's easy to feel like you're drowning in tech. RevOps comes to the rescue by simplifying your tech stack, making sure every tool actually adds value.
You want sustainable revenue growth: If you're looking for long-term, steady revenue growth (not just a quick spike), RevOps can help by predicting and planning for the future. This holistic approach ensures all parts of the business are aligned for consistent growth.
You have a complex customer journey: If your company uses a subscription or usage-based model, the customer journey can get pretty complicated, with multiple touchpoints, interactions, and stages to manage. RevOps ensures you've got the right resources, support, and strategies in place at each step of the way, keeping things running smoothly.
Choose SalesOps when:
You have limited resources: If you're an early-stage company and your budget isn't ready for a full-on cross-functional strategy, SalesOps is the way to go to help you build a solid and efficient sales process.
Your sales team lacks structure: If your sales team is all over the place with efficiency levels and no streamlined processes, SalesOps can help bring order to the chaos. It'll give you the consistency and structure needed to boost reps' productivity.
You're implementing new sales tech: When introducing new CRM systems, automation software, or other sales tools, SalesOps helps manage the rollout, train your team, and make sure everyone actually knows how to use the tools.
You need rapid sales improvement: If sales numbers are slipping and you need to turn things around fast, SalesOps can dig into your current processes, identify bottlenecks and inefficiencies, and suggest changes—whether it's fine-tuning the sales pipeline or improving lead qualification. With a few changes, you'll likely see a major improvement in performance.
If your biggest challenge is sales efficiency, go with SalesOps. If you need a full-funnel revenue strategy, RevOps is calling your name.
Automate all your operations with Zapier
Whether you're planning the entire road trip with RevOps or just looking to keep the sales playlist on repeat with SalesOps, it's all about choosing the right strategy for your journey. One way to make sure your trip runs smoothly? Automation.
Zapier's RevOps automation solutions and Sales automation solutions empower teams with 7,000+ app integrations, custom workflows, and AI-powered tools to streamline and scale your processes. If you're looking to unify data, automate repetitive tasks, and maintain processes, Zapier's no-code automation can help you keep your entire revenue engine running smoothly. Learn more about how to automate your revenue operations and how to automate your sales operations.
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