As you’re looking at the big number for Q4 and wondering where all those new sales opportunities are going to come from, consider this…
For every 10 leads your sales operation deemed worthwhile to pursue last quarter, they threw away 10 leads that could have bolstered your number this quarter.
And it gets worse…because they also threw away another 10 leads that would’ve been worthwhile to pursue next quarter.
That’s right…for every 10 leads pursued in a given quarter, most sales teams are trashing 20 other leads that will be viable within the next two cycles.
In a Playbook diagnostic—“Five Signs You’re Missing Sales Opportunities“—Dan McDade, the author of The Truth About Leads, shares data and insights gleaned from 250,000 prospect interactions, and explains how most B2B sales teams end-up leaving a full two-thirds of their sales opportunities just lying on the table.
But here’s the thing…the fault doesn’t lie with the salespeople…not entirely, anyway.
Sure, salespeople will sometimes give-up on a lead too quickly, or make hasty decisions about a lead’s qualification and interest. But as Dan makes clear, this problem often exists because salespeople are doing exactly what they’re supposed to do—i.e. focusing on opportunities they can close this period.
So…does that mean that all these wasted opportunities are inevitable? That there’s nothing you can do to reclaim and recover them?
Not at all.
In fact, if you take the self-assessment that Dan provides in the diagnostic, you really can’t miss the solution. Just turn the assessment around a little bit, and a fairly straightforward solution for getting two to three times more qualified sales opportunities is revealed.
(Hint: The third answer is the key!)
