Selling has long been considered as an “art” driven by personal intuition and native sales talent. However, significant changes have occurred over the past 30 years, as a result of technological advances and changing customer expectations. As one answer to these changes, practitioners and scholars have promoted the idea of “sales as a science”, relying on documented, repeatable ways of selling that reflect scientific methods. We argue that process mining is a relevant candidate f
or empowering “sales as a science” via its capacity to analyze, discover, and enhance
end-to-end processes. Through a design science approach, we propose a framework for
applying process mining to sales, comprising a refined notation and seven process min
ing analysis scenarios. Our study represents a first step towards gaining a better un
derstanding of real-world sales processes based on digital traces from operational
systems e.g., customer relationship management (CRM) systems, or emerging technologies
e.g., smart watches.