By The Numbers - What Lead Tracking System Are You Using?

Note the look on this woman's face. Her phone is ringing. It's more than likely just another customer who called in a few weeks ago for an estimate and hasn't heard back from anyone.

Forget it. Let the phone ring. Before she takes any more calls, she's going to put those leads in alphabetical order and try to get some assemblance of order around here. She's feeling a little overwhelmed, to say the least.

Obviously it's a little over the edge, but the emotions this woman is feeling are not uncommon for those business owners who are stressed because they haven't taken the time to put a tracking system in place.

It's time to step back, breathe deep, and set up your systems.

We know, we've been there (but not for long). Call now. By The Numbers can help! If you can't manage it, you can't measure it. WINNERS KNOW THEIR NUMBERS!

By The Numbers - How Does Tracking Increase Revenues?

The other day I said that tracking will increase revenues. One of the most basic reasons for lead tracking is so that leads will no longer disappear into the wild, blue yonder, or in other words, leads will no longer be lost.

Let me tell you a story about a visit to a certain company. Now this was not just any ordinary company, but a company that has a pretty good reputation. They have their trucks all over the valley, they have advertising everywhere, and from the looks of it, the employers and employees are bringing home some money.

Expecting to see a company that would have a pretty good system for handling leads, I asked what their procedure is. My answer from the gal at the front desk? "Ummm, nothing. I just write down the name and number and give it to one of the guys to follow up." No spreadsheets, no database. Quickbooks was the only thing they used for tracking leads, and that wasn't even a lead tracker....it's a sales tracker.

This was surprising to me. First of all, the owners were spending a significant amount of money on advertising and have no idea of the return. Secondly, they were not even capturing names and addresses of people they could market to in the future if the people did not buy now. And third, they have absolutely no idea of salesreps' strengths and weaknesses, not to mention how many leads versus sales are coming in. Since the cash intake was comfortable, they were not concerned.

This scenario is not uncommon. I believe that if the owners understood how much more they could be increasing revenues just by following the numbers on any one of the 3 points mentioned above, they would not be so lackadaisical in tracking. Even one recovered lead can mean thousands of dollars to a business owner.

Hopefully you're not one of those who just scratches a lead on a piece of paper and sticks it in a sales rep's mailbox and counts on that sales rep taking care of it from there. Remember, if you can't measure it, you can't manage it. Hard to manage all those yellow pieces of scratch paper floating around out there....

WINNERS KNOW THEIR NUMBERS!