When is a lead dead?

When Is a Lead Dead?

Most leads aren’t dead. They’re just waiting on someone willing to do the work.

In today’s Question of the Day, I use the story of the diamond mines in South Africa—The Big Hole—to illustrate a powerful idea: value often exists just beyond where most people stop digging.

In this episode, we cover:

•  Why leads are rarely truly “dead” 
•  The real question: how much time, skill, discipline, and patience are you willing to invest? 
•  How mindset shapes your follow-up and long-term results 
•  The difference between giving up on a lead and working it strategically 

If you’ve ever written off opportunities too early, this episode will challenge that thinking and push you to reconsider how deep you’re willing to go.

Have a Question? - Submit your questions to chrish@nexstarnetwork.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome to the question of the day. Today's question is from Tony in Pennsylvania. And Tony asks, When is a lead dead? When do you stop following up? That's a great question. Thanks for submitting that question. Very rarely is a lead dead. Really, the question is, how hard are you willing to work for it? That's the real question. But it's pretty rare that a lead is actually dead, not moving forward anymore. It mostly comes down to the time you're willing to commit to it, or the time you have available to commit to it, the effort that you want to put into it, so how many times you want to follow up, and and how hard you want to come up with a reason to follow up, and and and practicing that skill so that you're good at delivering that, the patience, having the patience that knowing this isn't gonna get across the finish line on one follow-up, honing those skills, having the discipline to practice until you can't get this wrong. Like that that's really what it comes down to is are you willing to work for it? But it's very rare that a lead is actually dead. I'll use an example. Um in the late 1860s, in South Africa near the Orange River, diamonds were discovered. And this discovery of diamonds led to thousands of prospectors coming to the area. And and in 1871, a large deposit of diamonds was found on a farm. This led to even more thousands of prospectors coming in and digging individual diamond claims. Now, the thing was, like most gold rushes, most of these prospectors lacked capital, lacked tools. They would get into situations where they'd run into rock or water, and they didn't have the tools or the skills to navigate past that. The time, how long were they going to put their lives on on hold um without a paycheck if they're not finding anything? That patience, right? And so many, many lacked these tools that you needed to be successful. And so eventually they would sell off their claims, and there would be others that were more dedicated or had had more of these resources that would buy up the claims, and they would consolidate these claims into larger operations. And eventually those larger operations consolidated into what became the Kimberley mine or the big hole. You can Google it and see an amazing picture of it. Um, but it really, this this Kimberly mine, the big hole, was responsible for millions of carats of diamonds. And it even helped form what became known as De Beers, who today dominates the diamond industry. So this whole story, I tell this whole story that really there were thousands of prospectors out there. There was millions of carats of diamonds, but only a few of those thousands of prospectors actually got rich. And it wasn't because, it wasn't because they were just the few that got lucky and found, you know, one large deposit here and there. There was lots of deposits. There was lots of diamonds everywhere, but only a few got rich because only a few had the tools, the resources, the patience to put in the work to get them. And so I relate this example back to when is a lead dead? Very few instances is a lead actually dead. I consider a lead dead when the customer actively tells you, stop, stop calling me. In which case, usually there was something negative that led up to that, and we can talk about process and report. But so usually that's not the case if you have a good process. But if a customer asks you to stop, you need to respect those wishes, right? So if they ask you to stop, consider that lead dead. The other would be if they bought elsewhere, but even then, I don't know if it's completely dead. You just gotta change your opportunity, I guess. So, like if I was an HVAC company and they did a furnace replacement with some other company, obviously they're not gonna buy a new furnace now, but that doesn't stop me from service and a service partner plan or accessories for that. Like, there's still opportunities there. So I don't even know in that case if it's actually dead. I guess it's dead in the sense they're not gonna buy a furnace again for a while, but there's still other opportunities there. So I but that's really it. Like that's when a lead is actually dead. When the customer asks you, stop. In reality, what's actually happening is it never actually becomes dead, it just gets moved further down your priority list. And so if you're following up, whether you're a salesperson following up, or if you're a company that has like an inside salesperson whose job is dedicated to following up, you probably have a priority of the calls that you're making, right? And it's gonna go something like this. Don't take this as gospel, but it's gonna go something like this. You're gonna come in in the morning and you're gonna follow up with the one-day old leads, the one-day unsold leads. And then you're gonna move to the two-day old and then the three-day old. And then maybe you're gonna look at what promotions you're running, and you're gonna run a list of unsold customers that fit that promotion, and you're gonna call those customers about the promotion, right? And then you're gonna move to the week old unsold leads, and then maybe you're gonna move to customers that you've been in communication and you needed to follow up on something, give them new information. So maybe you're gonna call them next, and then you're gonna move to the two-week old customers, and then the one-month old, and the two-month-old, and the three-month-old, and the four. You're just gonna keep working your way out. And so at some point, those customers, if they're not moving forward, not purchasing, they're just gonna work their way down, and eventually you're just not gonna have the time to get to them. But they're never dead, they just move further down your priority list. But on that note, it also shocks me because I'll be talking to salespeople or especially like inside salespeople. Um, this is most common where it comes up, but I'll be talking to an inside salesperson and they'll say, like, yeah, I called everybody. And I'll say, like, what do you mean? You called everybody. Yeah, I called everybody on my list. Like, I literally called all my people. And then usually I'll ask, well, how many people was that? And it'll be like 20. There's 20 people on my list. Come. So there's only 20 people unsold that we can follow up with. That always shocks me because leads never die. Your list is everybody who's never purchased. Any customer ever in the history of that company that didn't buy is your customer. It's just where do they fit in that priority, right? You're gonna start with the most recent customers and work your way out. But really, by definition, if they didn't buy, they're still your customer and you can follow up with them. So, so you're you're never done, you've never called everybody on your list. They're not dead, they're just stalled. So there's all kinds of statistics, right? Like if we're talking about inside sales and following up, six or more attempts, that's where the magic happens. Most customers don't buy after just one or two attempts, but yet most salespeople, most insight salespeople give up after one or two attempts. Most two-way communication happens at six or more attempts. Also, customers are most likely to move forward in that 24 to 72 hour mark, right? They're calling a company, they're having a company come out to their house, a stranger come out to their house, they're taking time off of work, time out of their day because they're serious about moving forward. And when all the boxes are checked, they're going to move forward. They are going to buy. And so it makes sense to prioritize those customers first and work your way out, but don't give up. You're still going to find customers further down that pipeline that are going to buy. I had a week one time where I was supposed to, I was supposed to travel. I was supposed to go visit a company and a big snowstorm came through. And so my flight got canceled the first day, flight got canceled the second day, and then by the third day, like the only flight I could get could get got me there like late at night. Right. So at this point, it's kind of like, well, I'm not traveling this week, not going to visit that company. So I had this like week where I didn't, I didn't have coaching calls blocked off, right? And so I worked with this company and we dug in and we dug into their pipeline and we dug into uh customers that we had not contacted in quite a while, right? These customers that were way down on the list. And we reached out to them. And just through these individual reach outs, I stopped counting at 20. That's where I quit counting, but 20 or more customers that we contacted and things started to move forward again. Either they were in a different situation or they had more time now or something. But 20 or more, because we took the time to start digging into that pipeline, re-engage with those customers. So those customers, those diamonds are there. It's just do you have the patience, the skills, the time to dig in and find those diamonds. But a lead, to answer your question, a lead is never dead. It just moves down the priority list. So that's today's question of the day. If you're enjoying question of the day, follow, share, give a rating. Question days on major streaming platforms. If you have a question, reach out to me either on social media or email. Both are going to be listed below in the show description. Let's get your question answered. And if you're an X Star member, schedule a call with me and we can address this one on one. Let's get very specific to your situation. I'm Coach Chris. We'll see you tomorrow.