You call that a lead?

Lead generation means different things to different people. As noted on Wikipedia, Lead Gen is defined as "a marketing term that refers to the creation or generation of prospective consumer interest or inquiry into a business' products or services." From this definition the word interest is the key to successfully being able to generate new revenue for your company. So what is interest and how much interest must there be for something to be qualified as an actual lead? Interest, as defined by WordNetWeb is "having or showing interest; especially curiosity or fascination or concern." And, how often have your sales representatives wasted precious selling time following up on a "lead" that wasn't really a lead at all because the "interest" was just in getting off the phone and saying whatever it took to do so?


I would like to purpose that to qualify interest, as defined above, as an actual lead worth paying for there must be enough interest for the prospective company to do one of three things.

First, a conversation with at least one of the buyers, User Buyer, Technical Buyer or Financial Buyer must take place AND they must have interest in having a conversation at a later date (12+ months) to discuss a future project where your services could be utilized. This I call a Future Lead and follow up accordingly.

Second, includes the criteria of the first with the exception of the time frame being less than 12 months and details of that project have at least been discussed in general. I call this a Momentum Lead.

Third, contains the same criteria as the Future and Momentum Leads but with a 6 month or less time frame for services being needed, a scheduled on-site appointment or conference call set and so much detailed information included that it actually looks like a first appointment has taken place. That is what I define as a true lead and how I do lead generation for my clients.

You may be wondering about the User Buyer, Technical Buyer and Financial Buyer mentioned earlier and I'll dive into those on my next Blog. Thanks for reading; now I'm off to hunt down some more leads!