Shorten your sales cycle with electronic signature
Your deal is won in the meeting, but the contract still takes days to come back signed: that's where, between the verbal agreement and the signature, your cash sits idle. On average, a paper contract with approval loops and email back-and-forth comes back signed in 11 days. With Certyneo, the decision-maker signs from their mobile in under 24 hours — saving approximately 8 days of cycle on every deal, revenue recognized sooner, and a forecast that lands. The contract is formed as soon as the parties agree (article 1101 of the Civil Code); the eIDAS advanced signature gives it a certain date and conclusive proof.
- Average gain
- -8 days of cycle
- Signature
- 90% under 24 hours
- Legal framework
- eIDAS · art. 1101
The real closing bottleneck is the signature
When a sales director reviews their sales cycle, they track discovery, demo, negotiation. But the time truly lost hides after the "yes": the contract goes by email, sits in an inbox, climbs through an approval chain, comes back scanned incorrectly, goes back for corrections. This last mile averages 11 days on a paper process — 11 days during which the deal is neither lost nor won, revenue isn't recognizable and the competitor has time to return. Nothing of commercial value is created there: it's pure friction, the easiest to eliminate from the entire pipeline. Legally, the agreement already exists: Article 1101 of the Civil Code forms the contract upon meeting of minds, without written form for the vast majority of B2B agreements. What's missing isn't consent, it's its dated and enforceable materialization. Certyneo compresses this last mile: the decision-maker signs from their phone, the advanced signature timestamps the agreement, Article 1366 of the Civil Code gives it the same probative force as paper. The contract comes back signed in under 24 hours in 90% of cases — roughly 8 days of cycle recovered per deal.
How Certyneo compresses your last commercial mile
Closing in 24 h from mobile
The decision-maker on the client side signs from their phone in under 2 minutes, without downloading an app or creating an account: they click the link, receive a code by SMS (OTP), sign. Measured result: 90% of contracts come back signed within 24 hours, versus 11 days average on a paper process. Over a sales cycle, that's roughly 8 days gained per deal — so much revenue recognized sooner and cash collected faster.
Automatic reminders D+2 / D+5 / D+7
An unsigned contract no longer waits for a sales rep to remember it. Certyneo automatically reminds the signer at D+2, D+5 and D+7 via email, SMS and Slack notification, until signature. Your sales reps stop doing manual signature collection and focus on new deals. It's often this reminder mechanism, more than the signature itself, that crushes cycle length.
Funnel tracking: sent, viewed, signed, alerts
A dashboard displays your contract funnel in real-time: sent, viewed (with date of first review), signed, rejected. You know a decision-maker opened the contract three times without signing and you alert the sales rep at the right moment. Forecast finally rests on real signals — opens, reviews — not the optimism of a declarative pipeline.
CRM integration, zero double-entry
Native HubSpot, Zapier, Make, webhooks and REST API connectors trigger contract send as soon as an opportunity moves to "closing", and return the signed status to the CRM automatically (Salesforce and Pipedrive integrations in preparation). Your sales ops stop copying progress from one tool to another: signature data lives where your pipeline already lives.
From contract send to timestamped signature in under 5 minutes
The complete process, from deal won to archived proof, without leaving your desk.
1. Send the contract
Upload the negotiated PDF or start from a Certyneo template. From your CRM, sending can trigger automatically when the opportunity moves to closing phase — no more re-entry or delay between the "yes" and the contract going out.
2. Add signatories
Enter name, email and phone for each signatory, including those from multiple companies. Each receives a personalized secure link and signs at their pace, in sequence or in parallel. The D+2 / D+5 / D+7 reminders are armed by default.
3. The decision-maker signs in 2 minutes
The signatory opens the link on their mobile, identifies via SMS code (advanced eIDAS AES signature) and confirms. No account to create, no app to install: that's what brings 90% of contracts back within 24 hours.
4. Timestamped and archived proof
The signed contract is timestamped and delivered with its proof PDF (OTP identity, SHA-256 fingerprint, consultation log), archived for 10 years. The "signed" status feeds back into your CRM: the deal is closed, revenue is recognizable.
Frequently Asked Questions
- How many days of sales cycle can you really win?
- On average about 8 days per deal. A paper contract with approvers and email back-and-forth takes 11 days to get signed; with Certyneo, 90% of contracts are signed within 24 hours, with the decision-maker signing from their mobile in under 2 minutes. The gain comes as much from instant signature as from automatic follow-ups at D+2 / D+5 / D+7 that eliminate downtime between sending and signing. On a pipeline of several dozen deals per month, these 8 cumulative days visibly shift revenue recognition from one quarter to the next.
- How do I measure the impact on my sales cycle?
- The Certyneo dashboard timestamps each step: send date, first view date, signature date. You get the actual send → signature time per contract, per sales rep, and per agreement type, and compare it to your paper baseline. By matching these dates to your CRM milestones (opportunity won → contract signed), you isolate exactly the time spent on the "last mile" and track it over time. To project financial gains before you start, our ROI calculator estimates the days and revenue recovered based on your contract volume.
- What signature level to accelerate closing: SES, AES, or QES?
- For a B2B commercial contract, advanced signature (AES) is the best speed / security trade-off: identity verified by SMS OTP, unique certificate per signer, qualified timestamp, compliant with eIDAS regulation. It can be signed in 2 minutes from a mobile while remaining enforceable. SES (simple signature) is sufficient for low-stakes or confirmatory agreements. QES, more cumbersome to implement, slows closing and is only useful when a text expressly requires a qualified signature — rare for standard commercial contracts.
- How do automatic follow-ups work?
- Upon sending, Certyneo schedules follow-ups at D+2, D+5, and D+7 as long as the contract is unsigned, via email, SMS, and Slack notification. Your sales reps no longer have to chase signatures: the system does it for them, at the right pace, until signature or rejection. It is often this mechanism, more than the signature itself, that cuts cycle time — a contract forgotten in an inbox is the leading cause of deals dragging on.
- Does Certyneo integrate with my CRM without double-entry?
- Yes. Native connectors for HubSpot, Zapier, Make, as well as our webhooks and REST API, trigger contract sending when an opportunity moves to closing and automatically return the "signed" status to your CRM (Salesforce and Pipedrive integrations coming soon). Your sales ops no longer copy statuses from one tool to another: signature data lives in the pipeline. The API is documented at certyneo.com/developers for custom integrations.
- Does a contract signed faster remain legally enforceable?
- Yes, speed does not degrade legal value in any way. Article 1101 of the French Civil Code forms a contract upon agreement of the parties, and Article 1366 gives electronic writing the same probative force as paper, provided the signer is identified and document integrity is guaranteed — which Certyneo ensures via SMS OTP and SHA-256 fingerprint embedded in the PDF. The presumption of reliability in Article 1367 of the French Civil Code makes advanced signature enforceable without further proof. Each contract comes with its eIDAS audit trail and is archived for 10 years.
- What tracking and analytics to manage my closing?
- The dashboard displays your contract funnel in real time: sent, viewed (with date and number of views), signed, rejected. You receive an alert when a decision-maker opens the contract without signing, and you can track signature rate and average time per sales rep or agreement type. These open and view signals feed a forecast based on measured facts, not declarations, and show you exactly where the cycle is blocked.
- What is the ROI of accelerating your sales cycle?
- The ROI can be seen on three levers: approximately 8 days of cycle gained per deal, so revenue recognized sooner and cash collected faster; sales time reclaimed, as signature follow-ups are no longer manual; and an improved conversion rate, a contract signed within 24 hours leaving less room for buyer doubt or a competitor comeback. Multiply these 8 days by your monthly contract volume and average deal size to quantify the impact — our ROI calculator does this using your own data. The free plan (5 envelopes/month) lets you verify the gain with no commitment.
Also read
Shorten your sales cycle starting with your next contract
Permanent free plan (5 envelopes/month), no credit card required. Signing in under 24 hours, automatic follow-ups, funnel tracking, and CRM integration included. eIDAS framework, French Civil Code Article 1101.