Forrester Research says that low-quality leads create sales problems. Essentially, marketing is pouring unqualified leads into the top of the sales funnel. Sales reps aren’t following up on the leads because there is not enough opportunity background data associated with each lead to justify real sales efforts.

Time really is money in the sales business, and no sales rep will waste time on a lead unless they know that the person in question has some version of budget access, authority and—most of all—need for the product and a timeframe within which they plan to purchase. As Forrester sees it, warm suspect leads are falling out of the middle of the funnel, forcing marketing to scramble to replace the leads and giving Sales very few real sales-ready opportunities with which to work. (See Figure 1.) Sales and marketing are disconnected, and few leads are actually converted. Marketing costs go up, sales go down, and needless to say, management is not pleased.

It used to be 6 touches for a sale. Now we think it’s 30