Successful sales pros understand that cold calls and cold emails are seldom “one and done” – but what’s a good benchmark? Knowing follow-up statistics in sales allows you to set reasonable limits on callbacks and email reminders so that you can move on to more promising contacts. But they can also serve as goals that encourage you to keep at it.
How important is follow-up in sales?
Sales outreach takes many forms and it can take many attempts before you consider a contact converted or add to your “fail” file. There are two basic types of contacts for outreach:
Prospects
A prospect is someone who, as far as you know, is not aware of your product or company – yet. But they have been identified by the marketing or sales team as a good match for your ideal customer profile. Your mission (should you choose to accept it) is to reach out to them by either cold calling or cold emailing.
The catch, of course, is that they likely haven’t heard of you before. And how do you personally react when receiving a call or email out of the blue? You ignore it unless a diligent salesperson won’t give up until they get through.
Leads
In sales terms, a lead is slightly “warmer” than a prospect. They have engaged with one of your marketing assets, so you know that they know about your company and/or product. Now, they need a bit of a nudge to continue down the funnel. With a call or email, you just might get them there. But is one attempt enough? No, because the lead might have:
- Not seen the email or call
- Been too busy to respond
- Not thoroughly reviewed your messaging and not understood your value proposition
But don’t worry, because there’s a simple solution here.
What is the success rate of follow-up?
The best route is to contact them again and strike up a conversation. Not just once, but many times if necessary. According to a recent study, 80% of all sales are made after five to twelve contact attempts from a salesperson.
On the other side of the spectrum, sales have only a 2% success rate for closing after just a single contact from a salesperson. In other words, if you don’t follow up, you have almost no chance of a sale.
What percentage of sales reps don’t follow up?
Despite the statistics we just talked about, according to Invesp, 48% never make follow-up phone calls. In addition, of those who make some attempt, 44% of them give up after just one “no” response.
Similarly, when it comes to emails, 70% of reps send a single message and then call it a day. But they’re truly missing out: by sending follow-up emails, you’ll improve your chance of getting an answer by 25%.
More sales follow-up statistics
Now that we’ve established the importance of follow-up calls, let’s talk about when. There are certain times of day that, statistically speaking, cold calls are more successful:
- In the early morning – from 8:00 AM – 10:00 AM
- In the later morning – from 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM
- In the later afternoon – from 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM
But there’s one exception to this rule, and that’s the Speed to Lead concept. Here are some amazing figures that show the power of following up immediately after a lead reaches out:
- Companies show an almost 400% improvement in conversion if they call their leads within one minute of an inquiry.
- This rate drops to 160% when calling two minutes later (but that’s still not bad)
- If simple qualification is your goal, then calling back within an hour after engagement improves your chances by seven times.
One way to achieve these numbers is by using B2B lead generation tools that fill in missing data and update contact information so you can make sure you’re always reaching out with the right information.
Another secret to beat sales follow-up statistics
Want to shorten your sales pipeline and avoid many of those follow-up calls? Use search intent data. According to Lusha’s State of B2B Sales survey, the top three challenges for starting a sales cycle are:
- Creating a personalized pitch
- Qualifying leads
- Finding prospects
All of these factors can be traced back to a lack of information to identify prospects and then learn enough about them to figure out if they have a good chance of converting.
But search intent data lets you know about prospects that are actively looking for a solution like yours. Instead of basing your outreach on generalized info such as firmographics or technographics, intent data reveals high-potential contacts that are likely shopping around – they might even call you back after your first try.
Key takeaways
- Understanding sales statistics for follow-ups lets you set realistic goals for how many times you should call or email a prospect or lead.
- Repeated sales follow-up efforts greatly increase your chances of closing a deal, yet the majority of reps give up before reaching the average number of required attempts.
- Leveraging intent data can give you information to optimize your outreach initiative and close more deals with fewer calls or emails.
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