The document provides 10 ideas for reducing the gap between interest and opportunity in sales. This gap occurs when marketing qualified leads do not convert into actual customers. The ideas include setting clear expectations upfront in webinars, following up promptly with prospects after events, understanding prospects' business needs and pain points, identifying compelling events that require prospects to take action, learning to distinguish between true lack of time or interest from prospects, backward planning to set deadlines, and being persistent despite initial rejections. The overarching goal is to apply ideas discussed in marketing events and avoid losing prospects in the period after initial interest.

1. The gap we’re talking about is the gap between interest and opportunity; and the
gap seems to be a big one. Here are a two examples:
A tech business gets over 1,000 people on their introductory webinars but the MQLs
(Marketing Qualified Leads) are simply not converting into live prospects.
An insurer with some really relevant offerings tells us they can get the right people in
the room – the FD, IT, HR, H&S. They seem engaged but then it all goes quiet – what
some call “Death Valley”.
Here are 10 ideas to make a difference.
1. Set expectations early. Declare your intent. At the start of the webinar tell people
you are happy to share your ideas today, but the real challenge comes when you
apply these ideas. Consider using a senior member of your team to top and tail
your webinar. The Subject Matter Expert does the education part, and the senior
player sets the commercial agenda.
2. What happens at the end? Many people are saying it’s hard to detect the signals
when working remotely. So, we need to be clearer and more direct – not “pushy”
but direct. Think about what is being said and how it’s being said at the end of
your webinars.
3. What happens next? One financial institution we worked with spent a fortune
on roadshows. They were disappointed at the payback. It turned out their local
people were either not following up or doing it late. One of their competitors
picked up on this. They found out what topic the institution was running a
roadshow on and then they contacted the prospects immediately afterwards,
knowing that the issue was front of mind. Quick follow-up is key.
4. Stand in their shoes: My former colleague Jean-Francois Messier used to say: “We
have to stop being an interruption to what matters most to our clients, and
become what matters to them.”
5. Get on their agenda early: Before you try and get them excited about your “what”
(all the things you want to tell them about) first get excited yourself about their
“why”. Understand their business issues and help.
6. See the need to change: My client Toon Meyer used to tell his people; “They won’t
buy your £50,000 solution if they think they only have a £50 problem.”
7. Compelling events: A compelling event means that they have to do something,
the only question is with whom and when. There are three kinds of compelling
event:
a. External compelling events are events like changes in legislation or changes in
the economy that leave the customer no option but to take action.
b. Corporate compelling events are events like an acquisition or a CEO’s strategy
statement that drives action for others in the business.
c. Personal compelling events are things that lead your talking-partner to take
action, perhaps the need to prove their value to their boss.
If you want to avoid “Death Valley” then find the compelling events and get your
client or prospect to acknowledge them.
8. Too busy: Sometimes this means they are up their neck. Sometimes it just means
it’s a low priority. Know your customer. If it’s just coming up to annual report
time, then the Company Secretary probably is too busy. Find their cadence and
work with it. Learn to distinguish between “no time” and “no interest”.
9. Backward plan. We often hear ‘call me back on this in a few months”. Get some
momentum going by backward planning: “So you say you must have this in place
by the end of September? That means you’ll need the spec ready by the end of
June; that means having the data collected by mid-May and you said you’d need
six weeks’ data so that brings us to the end of March, so we really need to get the
process signed off in the next two weeks.”
10. Be persistent. There’s some frightening data which suggests that 80% of B2B
people say “no” 5 times before they say yes (The no may not be “No never” but
could be “no, not yet”, “no, not this”, “no, not you”, “no, not me”!). But 44% of sellers
give up after the first “no”. Be resilient, disciplined and persistent – don’t be a pain
but do stick with it.
So, if you are experiencing a gap between interest and opportunity, we hope these
ten ideas will give you greater success.
Mind the gap; between interest and opportunity
10 things you can do
At SalesLevers we have the
capability and capacity to
help you diagnose the current
situation, formulate ways to
sell out of recovery, develop
people with the short term
skills they need for the months
ahead, reinforce the changes
with sales enablement tools
and strong implementation
techniques and finally, as your
business and your customers
emerge from the recovery
phase we can help you re-
calibrate for a changing future.
For more on this speak to
Richard Higham on +44 7712
588757 or email at richard.
higham@saleslevers.com
1. Set expectations early
2. What happens
at the end?
3. What happens next?
4. Stand in their shoes
5. Get on their
agenda early
6. See the need to
change
7. Compelling events
8. Too busy
9. Backward plan
10. Be persistent