Lead qualification metrics are a critical measure of how effective your brand is at identifying leads, qualifying them, and following up with the leads that are most likely to convert to sales. Tracking those vital metrics allows you to better assess your sales team’s ability to determine which leads are most viable and, therefore, which ones they should follow up on. It can also help you identify any potential gaps in your processes and how you can better qualify the most important leads for your brand.
Essential Lead Qualification Metrics
If you aren’t keeping an eye on these lead qualification metrics, you may be missing out on an opportunity to close sales.
1. MQL to SQL Conversion Rate
Marketing Qualified Leads (MQL) are the individuals who have engaged with your marketing materials, including your website or email list, who fit your customer profile. They are often early in the sales funnel and might not yet be ready to make a full buying decision.
Sales Qualified Leads (SQL), on the other hand, are MQLs that have been assessed and qualified by your sales team. They meet additional qualifications that make them more viable leads, including:
- The right budget
- The authority to make a buying decision
- Actual need or desire for the product you’re offering
In addition, SQLs are typically ready to make a purchase on a reasonable timeline, based on the average length of your sales funnel.
By assessing your MQL to SQL conversion rate, you can get a better idea of how effective your marketing team is at identifying and nurturing the leads that are most likely to convert into customers. If you have a high conversion rate, it typically indicates that your brand is doing a good job of creating marketing materials that are able to attract high-quality leads—and that your sales and marketing teams are likely in alignment. On the other hand, if you have a low conversion rate, it could indicate that you need to make some changes to your marketing.
2. Average Qualification Time
Your average qualification time provides you with an idea of how long it takes to identify and qualify a lead. It helps you better understand how effectively you are able to convert those leads and make a sale.
There are a number of factors that can influence your average qualification time, including your specific industry, where the lead came from, and what criteria you are using to determine lead qualification. However, ideally, you would like to decrease the time needed to qualify and convert leads where possible.
3. Lead-to-Close Rate
Lead-to-close rates establish what percentage of your leads ultimately go on to make a purchase from your brand. Your lead-to-close rate establishes a number of key things for your brand. First, it gives you a closer look at your marketing effectiveness: are you bringing in leads that are likely to convert, or are you marketing in a way that brings people to your website who are unlikely to make a purchase?
Next, it offers information about your sales efficiency, including how likely your sales team is to successfully convert leads and their ability to guide leads through the sales funnel. An inefficient sales team may let more leads fall out of the funnel and fail to keep up with them, decreasing your overall lead-to-close rate.
4. Qualification Accuracy
Qualification accuracy offers a measure of how good your sales team is at qualifying leads. It measures the percentage of the leads that your sales team has qualified or identified for follow-up. If your qualified leads have a low conversion rate, it could indicate that your sales team is not doing a good job of qualifying them—and that could mean that they do not understand what makes a good lead or how you can best guide them through the sales funnel.
Your qualification accuracy can depend on many factors. Obviously, not every lead will ultimately convert with your brand. However, by establishing your overall accuracy, you can get a better feel for how your team is identifying leads and nurturing them through the sales funnel.
5. Follow-Up Speed
Follow-up speed measures how long it takes you to respond after a query from a potential lead. It helps you establish how long it takes your team to answer questions, respond to queries and communications, and otherwise start the process of guiding interested leads through the sales funnel.
Your follow-up speed can have a huge impact on your conversion rates. Customers generally reach out to your brand during a period of peak interest: the time at which they are most likely to make decisions and are ready to make a purchase. If you take too long to respond to them, it can cause that interest to dim, which ultimately means that they may not make the purchase they’re hoping for.
Furthermore, responding quickly to customer queries can go a long way toward increasing overall trust in your brand. Customers are more likely to feel positively toward brands that answer their needs quickly. If your competitors submit an answer first, they may choose to trust them with their purchase, instead, because they have both captured that period of peak interest and offered the information that the customer needed.
How Automation Tools Can Aid in Lead Qualification
Automation tools like Verse and Atlas can go a long way toward improving your lead qualification metrics, increasing your connections with customers, and ultimately improving your sales.
Assess and Qualify Leads More Accurately
With tools like Atlas and Verse, you can get a better idea of which leads are most likely to convert based on a variety of factors—including factors like their email clicks or behavior on your website, which your sales team might not even notice. Not only that, the process happens automatically. The sales team gets sent the leads that are most likely to convert, which means they can focus their efforts on converting those leads, rather than on determining which customers are most likely to convert.
Improve Qualification Time
When your sales team is responsible for all of your lead qualification efforts, it can take considerable time. They may need to interact with customers for days or even weeks before they can assess whether they meet the needed qualifications to move them through the sales funnel. Automation tools, however, make that process much quicker, allowing you to keep leads in your sales funnel and improve their overall satisfaction.
Communicate More Quickly
Response time is a key part of customer satisfaction, especially as they move through the sales funnel. If it takes you a long time to respond to your leads, they may decide that your competitors are a better fit for your needs—and that means you are missing out on sales. With automation tools, however, you can respond more quickly to all of your customers’ needs.
Chatbots
Chatbots like Atlas can allow customers to connect with a virtual representative of your brand at the time that’s most convenient for them. They can take many basic queries and answer them on behalf of the sales team, providing the answers that customers need in the moment. Often, that can help your brand catch those periods of peak interest and connect more fully with customers.
Chatbots also help free up your sales team so that they can focus on more complex queries that require a human touch.
Automatic Responses
Automation tools can respond to customers across platforms, allowing you to capitalize on their interactions with your brand as they occur. For example, you can automate email responses to go out when customers take a specific action on the website, providing them with the information they need to take the next step and guiding them through your sales funnel. Automation tools can also send out messages automatically if it has been too long since the last time a customer interacted with your brand, potentially drawing them back into your funnel.
Avoid Leads Falling Through the Cracks
Not only can automation tools help you respond to your potential leads, they can help reduce the odds that those leads will fall through the cracks. In addition to sending messages directly to customers, automation tools can notify your sales team if too much time has passed since the last time they interacted with a customer or issue reminders about messages customers may have sent in, making it easier for the sales team to keep up with those interactions and make sure they do not lose track of a customer’s needs.
Connect With Us To Improve Your Lead Qualification
Tracking lead qualification metrics makes it easier for you to assess your sales team’s performance, the alignment between sales and marketing, and the effectiveness of your efforts. Often, the right tools can make a huge difference in your ability to connect with customers and meet their needs.
Are you ready to discover how tools like Verse and Atlas can improve your lead qualification efforts and ultimately increase customer satisfaction? Book a demo with Verse today.
