How Many Contacts Required to Make a Sale?--The Sequel

It was pure coincidence that I spoke with Mike Torticill of Cool Life Systems in Montgomery, New York about an hour after finishing yesterday's blog post.  After our conversation, he sent me some statistics from a recent blog post at the Cool Life Systems web site regarding contacts, leads, and sales.

Here is an excerpt. 

• 2%  of sales are made on the 1st contact
• 3%  of sales are made on the 2nd contact
• 5%  of sales are made on the 3rd contact
• 10% of sales are made on the 4th contact
• 80% of sales are made on the 5th-12th contact

And if that doesn’t get you…

• 87% of all leads are never pursued
• 45% – 63% of the all leads eventually buy the product or service from someone
• 48% of all sales leads that are pursued are dropped after the first call/meeting
• 80% of all sales close after the fifth contact/meeting (see above)
• 73% of sales people do not have a growth plan for their top five accounts

Actual percentages are going to be impacted by the type of product or service that you are selling and to what type of market.

However, to support Mike's point, the quality of your systems and the disciplined use of those systems will have a significant impact in some of these areas.

Are these numbers surprising or are they congruent with your experience.  Feel free to comment.