Lead qualification and scoring for better leads

The biggest mistake made by marketers is to give mere inquiries to a salesperson. When inquiries are handed off without being methodically qualified, it doesn’t take the sales department long to start viewing all marketing-generated “leads” with skepticism.  For this reason, most leads sent from marketing to the sales organization are lost, ignored, or discarded. 

Are you currently sending your sales team qualified leads or merely inquiries? There is a difference. An inquiry is an interested party who has requested information and needs some level of assistance. But inquiries are not leads. A lead isn’t a lead until it’s been qualified. 

I was happy to participate in a Lead Scoring & Management Roundtable organized by MarketingSherpa. They posed 10 of the toughest questions B-to-B marketers often ask them about qualifying and scoring leads.

MarketingSherpa: Lead Scoring & Management Roundtable Report

Related post: Disciplined Lead Qualification Improves Sales Performance

Comments

[Neil Sagebiel]

Thanks for making the distinction between inquiries and qualified leads. It's easy to get excited about inquiries (and response rates) and overlook the critical qualification step.

[Josiane Feigon]

Great information on lead scoring as more and more inside sales directors are scoring leads.

I usually provide a lead criteria based on our methodology, feel free to share it http://www.tele-smart.com/eletters/archive/2005_may.htm

Josiane