Lead Scoring for Increased Sales Efficiency
Jul 15, 2005
Lead Scoring associates a value to each lead based upon a weighted
criteria. For example, a prospect that fills out a web form might have a higher
score than purchased list. By giving a numerical value for each lead, reps can
better prioritize their lead lists and focus on those opportunities with the
greatest potential value.
By creating a calculated field in salesforce.com you can design your own scoring plan. It might be as simple as scoring based upon lead source (as seen below), or it may include a variety of factors including product of interest, opportunity size, intent to purchase, and time frame. Some of this information might be captured at the time the lead is created, but calculated fields are dynamic so as the rep adds or verifies information the score will adjust accordingly.
To add a lead scoring field, create a custom calculated field on the lead page layout. There is a sample below but you’ll want to adjust it to fit your business.
Formula:
if (
ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Web"), 1,
if ( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Phone Inquiry"), 2,
if( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Partner Referral"), 3,
if( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Purchased List"), 4,
if( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Customer Service"), 5,
if( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Referral"), 6,
if( ISPICKVAL( {!LeadSource} , "Unclassified"), 0, 0)))))))
Once you have the lead scoring field, have your reps can add it as a column in their view and use it to prioritize their day. It really makes a huge difference in terms of productivity.
As
you become more sophisticated with your lead scoring
its best practice to design a scoring system that values all leads
greater
than 100. The danger of a simple hot/warm/cold type system is that you
risk of reps ignoring leads the cold leads, whereas if the value is at
least
100, reps feel obligated to following up.
Lead scoring also provides you with a system for analyzing lead quality. If you have a two tiered sales organization, there are often complaints that junk is thrown over the fence. The challenge is that if all you have is antidotal evidence, it’s hard to change behavior. With lead scoring you can see by rep, what the average score for their converted leads is and the average score for closed deals. This metric can be added as a dashboard element or built into their comp plan.
There are lots of other best practice ideas surrounding lead scoring. If you’ve got an idea or a more sophisticated formula that you use, post it to the comment section below.
Bookmark
This sounds great, but would this end up being a custom number formula field?
Posted by: Brooke Browne | July 20, 2005 at 07:02 AM
That's the idea. You'd use a custom formula field similar to the one above to calculate a number for the lead score. Does that answer your questions?
Posted by: Gforce | July 20, 2005 at 08:11 AM
Yeah that does. I just wasn't sure once I selected the formula field, as it asks what type of formula.
I'll give it a go!
Posted by: Brooke Browne | July 21, 2005 at 06:45 AM
Help! this seems great, but I ran out of room. Is there a way to use ISPICKVAL along with an array (if ISPICKVAL is (X:Y:Z),"this value","that value")???
I am desperate here...
Posted by: Kelsey | August 18, 2005 at 04:39 PM
FYI I thought you might find this article from Eloqua interesting as talks about different types of lead scoring and their related benefits:
Bright Ideas: Lead Scoring
Today we focus on lead scoring and its practical application for business to business marketers. Simply put, lead scoring is a mechanism for marketers to systematically measure the changing value of a lead in a marketing or sales pipeline. Leads with higher scores are considered more likely to convert to closed revenue. Marketing organizations that take advantage of lead scoring can improve their lead conversion rates, more efficiently allocate resources and improve communication with the sales force
To implement lead scoring, marketers typically use a calculating numeric field in the contact record of their CRM system. Scores can be assigned and updated according to a broad range of criteria to effectively organize prospects into buckets that are meaningful to both marketing and sales. Leads in these buckets can be prioritized and assigned a treatment such as a follow up sales call, email or direct mail piece.
The most common form of lead scoring is based on explicit contact information. An example of this is a job title, where progressively higher lead scores may be assigned to managers, directors and vice presidents according their escalating level of buying influence. Lead scoring can be tied to other explicit information like geographic regions or specific vertical markets. The example below is a simple lead scoring methodology based on explicit information:
Title industry Geography
VP Sales (+20) Brokerage (+15) Northeast (+15)
Sales Director (+15) Insurance (+10) Midwest (+10)
Sales Manager (+10) banking (+10) West (+5)
Sales Rep (+5) credit (+5) South (+5)
Based on this scoring methodology, a Sales director in the brokerage industry based in California would have a lead score of 35.
More sophisticated examples of lead scoring are those based on implicit information, like a lead’s intent, interest or purchasing timeline. This is akin to a retail customer picking up a sweater, holding it up to the mirror, and then looking around for a sale clerk. These are obvious buying signals that need to be acted upon. Implicit information can be gathered by tracking prospect activity like web site visits, email opens or responses, live chats, web page hitsvisits, and more. With comprehensive, timely information, marketers can draw more accurate conclusions about the relative value of a lead, and respond quickly to changes in buying readiness.
The key to effective lead scoring is marketing automation. Managing a dynamic contact field based on both explicit and implicit information requires careful synchronization and tracking of marketing activity across various media. Marketing automation is the ability to automatically generate an appropriate response or action based on changing contact data or behavior. Lead scoring is but one application of marketing automation. Others include data quality management and event management.
Where is lead scoring heading? We believe that lead scoring will eventually evolve from individual lead attributes and actions to a concept we call the Codynamic Lead Score; an aggregate of lead scores from past and present interactions with all contacts of a given company. Codynamic lead scoring will measure a ‘groundswell’ of interest within a given organization, giving business to business marketers a highly accurate way to target customers, shorten the sales cycles and drive revenue.
Posted by: Jim Williams | November 22, 2005 at 06:05 AM
I'm having trouble getting If function to calculate correctly.
IF( NumberOfEmployees > 5000, 5,0)
I want it to be 6 if number of employees is greater than 10,000. Can't get the syntax to work.
Posted by: Gary Stockton | May 09, 2007 at 03:16 PM
Is it possible to add more sophistication to the formula such as looking at activity? (ie. add X points every time a lead downloads a whitepaper or attends a webinar.) These would be items that appear in the Activity object.
How would you go about doing this?
Posted by: Paul Dombowsky | May 09, 2007 at 08:32 PM
I have the same question as Gary, I want to count up the activities and campaigns associated with the lead and have that affect the lead score.
Posted by: Chistopher Marzilli | April 08, 2009 at 09:11 AM
I actually have the same question as the last two posts. We are looking for a way to score our leads based on activity, has anyone been successful at doing this?
Posted by: Meghan Carney | May 20, 2009 at 08:58 AM