Salesperson—“I need more leads!”

When offering sales and marketing support to our portfolio companies at Openview Partners, I hear a lot of the sales people crying out for more leads and that they have no one to call on.

They are generally saying “I have attempted to reach the leads you have given me and I have completed the list of calls.”

The sales teams generally have a misunderstanding that if they are provided leads that a call or two is going to move it to a sales cycle, or it will then be unqualified.

The reality is that leads need to be nurtured over time and adding more and more “new” suspects into a campaign is not the answer.

Make sure that you understand what is happening to leads provided to sales teams before adding more.