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The Short Life of Online Sales Leads - HBR Article


TrainerNik
262 Points
Posts: 10
Topic starter
Joined: 4 years ago

Dear Newdastians!

You run the snapshot report, you tailor-make your own marketing material, you run a campaign to a competent lead list (previous billable relationship) and the hot leads start pouring in.

Now what?

Do you call or email right away, or does a level of hesitation set in while you think, "am I being too aggressive with my follow-up?"

I ask our partners and their sales teams every day "How committed is your organization and sales team to respond to those hot leads?" "How quickly are you following up?" "Do you have the resources today, to adequately follow up with hot leads?". The results of this study committed in 2011 by the Harvard Business Review may have some compelling data for your sales & marketing teams.

https://hbr.org/2011/03/the-short-life-of-online-sales-leads

Something we used to swear by when I first started on the phones at Vendasta, in March 2017, was a commitment to calling a hot new lead within 60 minutes, or we ran the risk of being taken off the lead list, or worse, losing the ability to access the inbound sales line!!

Yes, this data is 10 years old now but the point I'm trying to get across is our attention span as a society, is as short as ever now. What does your organization do to make sure a hot sales lead doesn't go to waste, and then goes to your competition? What are you doing to get that first appointment with a new prospect?

Make sure to comment below and Happy Selling!

1 Reply
JonNeher
304 Points
Posts: 52
Joined: 4 years ago

I love this post Nik! It's a great reminder: despite all the things outside of your control that affect your success there are still things you can do personally to help!

My other favorite statistic to pair with that 60-minute study? 60% of customers say "No" (or variations of this) four times before saying yes! So there are two important things you control:

  1. How quickly you reach out!
  2. How often you reach out!