How long to keep calling leads?

One of the most frustrating aspects of prospecting is the lead who doesn’t call you back or return your emails.  As a result, one of the most popular questions we receive is “How long should I keep chasing up a lead who doesn’t return my calls?”.  If you only read this far, the answer is:  four times.  However, if you keep reading will give you a little more guidance...

In deciding whether to keep calling or “give up”, here are a few things to keep in mind and why we think about four times is the right number.

• People are busy – really busy.  Think about your own personal Advisers – do you always return their calls immediately, and those are people you already know and have a relationship with.  Sometimes it takes weeks for someone to eventually get back to you.
• Silence means only silence.  People could be travelling, on holidays or sick – hence no reply.  People could be dealing with business or personal difficulties.  Your messages may have been lost due to IT errors.  Silence means only silence – don’t assume anything more into it.

On that basis, you need to be ready to try contact at least 2-3 times, perhaps once a week or fortnight, just to overcome “busyness”.  But also consider...

• Mix up your contact methods.  Say, a couple of phone calls, a couple of emails and a letter.  Emails are a great supplemental contact method as they can be kept by the lead for future use, even if they don’t get back to you now.  I have had many leads call me out of the blue months after I tried contacting them, simple because they ended up searching for my email.
• You can always re-contact a lead again in the future.  If you are polite in your contact efforts now, then after 4-5 attempts you can put that lead’s details back into your list and re-contact them again in 3-6 months. There’s no point in writing off a lead until you have real proof there is no hope in working with them.
• For your last attempt, try a “guilt message”.  If you have tried contacting someone 3-4 times and are ready to have one last go, try leaving a polite but guilty message.  I find this tactic has about a 30-40% success rate.  The message needs to remind the client of your efforts to contact them, promote that you are not desperate for business but would like to chat with them and clearly state that this will be your final message.  While you keep leaving messages, some people will think that they can wait to contact you, knowing that you will keep calling them.  This message resets those expectations.  So something like...

Hi Steve, it’s David at Vue Consulting.  I have tried calling you twice in the last three weeks and have also sent you an email of introduction, but I haven’t had any luck getting through to you.  Based on my initial understanding, we should be able to offer you some competitive ideas.  However, I dislike hassling people, so this will be my final message for you.  If you would ever like to have a chat or coffee in the future, I’d welcome that opportunity and my contact details are below.  Best of luck for the future.  Kind regards, David

Finally, remember that the world is full of leads.  If the person you are chasing is a truly high potential lead, then perhaps you give it eight goes instead of four.  But at the same time, its critical to maintain your energy and positive attitude when prospecting, so don’t burn out on a single lead either.  Just put them back in your list for the future and move onto another lead. Confident, persistent, realistic and polite Advisers make great prospectors.