What speed to lead means
A lead is anyone who reaches out to your business for the first time. They might fill in a form on your website, call, send an email or message you on Facebook or Instagram.
Speed to lead is the time between that first message and a real reply. A real reply answers the question or offers a next step, like a time to talk or a link to book. A note that only says "we got your message" does not count.
What the research says about speed to lead
In 2011, Harvard Business Review published a study of how companies reply to web leads. Researchers Oldroyd, McElheran and Elkington found that the average reply took 42 hours. Many companies never replied at all.
An earlier study, the Lead Response Management Study by Dr. James Oldroyd with InsideSales.com, looked at what happens when you reply fast. Leads contacted within 5 minutes were 21 times more likely to become qualified than leads contacted after 30 minutes.
Both studies are more than ten years old, and they looked at sales teams, not a two person shop. But the lesson still fits a small business. People rarely contact just one company. They send the same request to two or three, and the first useful reply often wins the job.
Why small businesses reply slowly
It is almost never because the owner does not care. The leads simply arrive at the worst times.
- You are on a job, in a meeting or with a patient when the form comes in.
- Website forms land in an inbox that only gets checked at the end of the day.
- Calls come in after hours or while the front desk is on another line.
- Messages are split across email, phone, Facebook and Google, so some get missed.
Example
An example of how one slow reply loses a job
This is a made up example to show the idea. It is not a client story.
Picture an HVAC company in Oakville. On a Saturday at 8:40 pm, a homeowner fills in the website form because the furnace is making a loud noise. The form goes to the office inbox. Nobody sees it until Monday at 9 am.
The homeowner also filled in a form for a second company. That company sent a text two minutes later with a link to book a visit on Sunday morning. By Monday, the job was already booked with them.
How to measure your own speed to lead
You do not need software to find your number. Pull up your last ten new inquiries. For each one, write down when it came in and when someone sent a real reply. Then work out the gap.
Also test it yourself. Fill in your own website form on a weekday evening and see how long the reply takes. Most owners are surprised by the answer.
Five ways to reply to new leads faster
You do not have to answer every lead yourself within 5 minutes. You only need the first reply to be fast and useful.
- Send an automatic reply within a minute that gives a real next step, such as a booking link or two times you can call.
- Send new leads to the phone of whoever is working, not to a shared inbox.
- Text back every missed call, so callers get an answer before they dial the next business.
- Write short reply templates for your five most common questions.
- Check your speed to lead once a week, using the same ten lead count as above.
Sources
Oldroyd, Lead Response Management Study with InsideSales.com, 2007
