Lead
Potential customer
In short
A lead is a person or business that has shown interest and given you their contact details, but has not bought yet.
A lead appears when someone fills in a contact form, asks for a quote, books a no-obligation call or signs up for a newsletter. They have raised their hand. Now it is up to you to follow up. The word is used both for the person and for the enquiry itself.
Warm and cold leads
Not all leads are equally warm. Someone asking for a price on a specific job is closer to buying than someone who downloaded a free checklist. Both are a conversion, but they deserve different follow-up. Call the warmest ones first.
Leads that are not followed up are wasted money, especially if you paid for the ads that brought them in. A simple CRM, or just a spreadsheet, makes it easier to keep track of who you have spoken to and what happens next.
A worked example, and a check
If you spend NOK 3,000 on ads and get 15 leads, each lead costs NOK 200. If 3 of them become customers, each customer has cost NOK 1,000. Count how many enquiries you got last month, and how many of them got a reply the same day. Response time is often easier to improve than the number of enquiries.
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