Lead qualification 101

You know what they say…

“The only thing worse than having no leads is having bad leads.”

It’s like a game of ‘hot or not’ for your consultancy - weeding out the bad apples so you can get to the good stuff.

Sure, you could go around talking to everyone you meet about your consultancy services, but that would be a huge waste of time and energy.

You need to make sure you’re targeting the right people, by identifying potential clients who are a good fit for your service.?

What makes a prospect a good fit?

Well firstly, it’s great if a lead matches your ideal customer profile. It doesn’t need to be an exact match - that depends on how specific your ideal customer profile is - but it does help if they look like other clients you’ve worked with, so you can share industry-specific case studies and quantifiable results later down the line.

Secondly, they need to have a problem you can solve. If their problem isn’t big enough, they won’t be ready to buy. If their problem is too big or complex and you aren’t able to solve it, you won’t be able to properly service them. The problem has to match your capacity and capability to solve it.

It’s crucial that your prospect has the budget, timeline and motivation for buying. If they don’t have the budget (or aren’t in a position to be making purchasing decisions), don’t have the time to commit to the relationship, or are otherwise unengaged or disinterested in your proposition, they’re a poor fit. (For now).

Finally, you may have company-specific criteria that determines if a prospect is a good fit. At TGO Towers, we have a strict ‘Zero A***holes’ policy.

How do you qualify leads?

Let’s discuss two methods for qualifying leads.

1. Indirect qualification

Doing research yourself is by far the easiest way to determine if a prospect is a good fit, without actually having to engage with them directly.

• Signs of growth - stalk your prospect’s personal and company profiles on LinkedIn, and flicker through the News tab on Google, to look for typical signs of growth. Examples include the ‘HIRING’ badge on profile photos, announcement of a new round of funding, evidence of international expansion, etc.
• Problem-aware - depending on your proposition, it might be relatively easy to determine if a prospect has a problem you help to solve, by reading comments on forums or LinkedIn groups. For example, if you’re a Productivity Consultancy and you see a recurring theme of marketing agencies struggling to deliver content on time and on-budget, for which you have a relevant solution, you have a pre-assembled pool of prospects to ingratiate yourself with.
• Financial viability - use software like Capitalise or Experian, to check a company’s credit score. After all, your prospect might be a great fit, but if they’re terrible payers, do you really want them?
• Not an A***hole - look your prospect up on directories like G2 or Glassdoor and read verified reviews written by customers and employees of the prospective company.

2. Direct qualification

I have two preferred methods for asking outright questions to your prospects, to gauge their suitability.

a) A triage call

A triage call is typically the first call you have with a prospect (it comes before the demo).?

I don’t advise that they’re any longer than 15 minutes.

I don’t advise that you try to sell anything on this call either.

All I ask, is that you call it something sexier than “triage call”, and loosely follow this structure:

1. The why - Why now? Why me?
2. Tell me about your business - Who do you help? What problems do you solve? How does it work?
3. Widen the gap - Where are you at? Where do you want to be?
4. Problem - What’s missing from your business right now? What’s broken?
5. Need - What do you need from me right now?
6. Time - Is this a now thing, or a later thing, for you?
7. Check in - Relay what they’ve told you above e.g. “You want GOAL but OBSTACLE is in the way, you’ve tried ACTION but FAILURE, you need a way to RESULT
8. Fit - Assess if they’re a fit or not. If they are, offer up your next call (a strategy call or a demo, where the aim IS to sell to them). If they’re not, politely explain why they’re not a good fit, and try to point them to somewhere or someone that can better solve their problem.

b) A diagnostic

Diagnostics are a great way to capture leads, but they’re also great at qualifying them too.

We like to use ScoreApp ( but our affiliate link will double the standard free trial days: https://share.scoreapp.com/ea2b1bee)

Let’s say you’ve built a diagnostic that assesses a prospect’s ability to leverage true innovation in their company, you can not only identify candidates for your services as an Innovation Partner, but also assess the degree to which they need your help.

So, try throwing a few questions onto the end, like:

• Have you tried solving this problem before? (Yes/No)
• How much budget do you have allocated to fixing this problem? (None/￡5k/￡20k/￡100k+)
• How ready are you to solve this problem? (We’ll be ready in 6 month/We’ll be ready in 2-4 weeks/We were ready yesterday)

If adding these questions affects completion rate, consider removing or altering these qualifying questions.

Don’t forget to integrate your diagnostic with your CRM, so you can view these insights directly in your pipeline.

Next steps

Once you’ve implemented your qualification methods, remember to update your CRM the second you gain new insight.

The more detailed your pipeline, the easier it is for you and your sales team to determine the next best prospect to go after.

If a prospect is a “not right now”, fire up a task in your CRM or add a reminder in your calendar, to nudge them along closer to when they’ve indicated that they will be ready.

It’s good practice to make your Tasks view the default tab in your CRM. It’s one thing you want to be checking on a regular basis.

And on that note! If you’d like to assess how MEH your consultancy’s proposition is (or, you simply want to see what ScoreApp has to offer), try our Growth Positioning Diagnostic.