The First Friday ReportTM

Near-Term Opportunities are Important, But So is Keeping the Pipeline Full

Your sales team likes nothing better than getting leads with a high probability of closing soon. So much so that many reps often ignore every lead they don’t consider hot.

A shotgun blast impacts a widely affected and less targeted area, while a laser beam is precise and accurate to its aim. Both have their place in sales and marketing. Which style works best for qualified lead generation and provides a lower cost per lead?

In sales and marketing we are all looking for ways to generate more leads. It's likely a daily discussion for most of us, but have you ever considered that your sales reps need fewer leads—or more accurately, fewer raw, unfiltered, unqualified leads. Sales reps need leads that have been carefully qualified, properly and consistently nurtured and appropriately developed increasing the likelihood of a completed sale.

We have a software client whose marketing representative proudly stated that they had driven 9,000 leads to sales the prior twelve months. The VP of Sales, however, expressed that he had received “zero leads.” So we ran some tests and found that inbound leads from one particular source were netting one qualified lead per 100 raw leads generated. What chance do you think there is that a busy sales rep would follow-up on 100 raw leads to generate one qualified lead? Your answer should be zero to none.