Prospecting is one of the most challenging components of sales, even for the best hunters. There is one often misunderstood and seldom tracked metric that holds the potential to redefine the success of a business. This often-underappreciated metric we are referring to is the number of touch points required to transform a prospect from a new name on your target list to a qualified prospect that says, “Let’s have a chat.” Qualified, of course, means that the lead meets your criteria for product mix, annual spending, etc. In this post, we answer the question: How many touches does it take to get a meeting for corrugated manufacturers?
Success doesn’t necessarily come with speed. It requires a blend of endurance, strategic planning, and patience. In the fast-paced, immediate-gratification world we live in, patience may seem antiquated, but this virtue must be embraced when selling industrial custom packaging or retail point-of-purchase (POP) displays, which can take months to close. The journey from cold prospect to scheduled appointment requires communication, process adherence, and astute timing. Understanding this and nailing down these data points will allow you to better predict and plan for future revenue growth.
Why Is It Important To Know
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, companies were trending away from road warriors making in-person cold calls. Travel is expensive and time-consuming. Every trip, even a few hours away, is 100% cost if the sale doesn’t materialize. Face-to-face meetings can play a significant role in the sales process, but they must be more strategic and follow initial contact and qualification through phone calls or digital interactions. Today, many companies have held onto elements of virtual sales, but a lot of them lack a process, consistency, and tracking. Sending out occasional emails isn’t enough to convert a prospect. Multiple touches at regular intervals are required. Touch points include all phone calls, voicemails, video calls, text messages, email communications (e.g., personal and bulk emails), social media interactions, and even direct mail. It is crucial to understand how many touches are required for conversion because the data is helpful for multiple purposes:
- Sales forecasting: These data points can help with sales forecasting and pipeline management, leading to more accurate predictions for future sales performance, which can guide decision-making.
- Resource allocation: Having an accurate picture of the work involved in converting a lead allows companies to better allocate time, effort, and resources to lead-generation activities.
Sales strategy refinement: Understanding the conversion timing can assist with refining your sales strategy by making sure each touch is meaningful and helps to move the lead closer to conversion. It can also allow communication to be tailored to the customer’s buying journey. - Performance metrics: With data showing the number of touches to conversion, these performance metrics can be used to assess the effectiveness of sales and marketing efforts. If the number of touch points grows, it may indicate a change in contacts or process is required.
How Many Touches Does It Take to Get a Meeting in the Paper-Based Packaging Industry?
Understanding the sales process and the time and effort it takes to convert a cold lead into a qualified relationship is essential for anyone selling paper-based packaging products. A salesperson may need to invest hours of activity with multiple touchpoints before a lead becomes sales-ready. The time and number of touches required for conversion can vary depending on the product or service offered.
Although everyone’s experience may be different, our customer data shows the following differences per company based on what they are purchasing.
How many touches to get a meeting:
| Product | Touches | Time From Cold To Meeting |
|---|---|---|
| Brown Box | ~20 | (60–90 Days) |
| POP Displays | 30-50 | (180+ Days) |
| Retail Packaging | 25-40 | (90-180 Days) |
| Folding Cartons | 15-20 | (90-180+ Days) |
We should note that these are averages; some outliers convert in days, and some may take a year or more. Also, this involves three to seven contacts per company. Additionally, it is outbound phone call-heavy (65%) and uses direct line and cellphone numbers. Phone calls allow open-ended questions to be asked and useful information to be uncovered when one listens more than one speaks. To succeed, the sales team must be consistent with its outreach over time, not just make a touch or two a month via email.
The following data from Crunchbase supports phone-heavy outreach:
- Organizations that don’t cold call experienced 42% less growth than those that do.
- Voicemails eventually lead to a callback (11% after the first, 22% after the second, and 33% after the third).
- The majority (57%) of C-level buyers prefer to be contacted via phone.
Notably, our data finds that the size of the company being approached can play a crucial role in the conversion process. Smaller companies with less bureaucracy tend to be easier and quicker to convert, while larger corporations with more layers may require more time and effort. Additionally, the higher the contact person’s position in the company, the harder it is to convert them.
Sales of POP displays are cyclical and tend to be more project-based—this is where astute timing matters. Getting to the right person when they have a project can move the process along faster. If they don’t have a project when you speak with someone, nurturing the lead consistently will be key to converting them. When looking at inbound leads, these numbers drop significantly, averaging around two to three touches and less than a week for conversion. When someone has come to your website and filled out a form, they are looking for a packaging vendor. This indicates the importance of a balanced approach using outbound and inbound strategies.
One caveat is that other variables may not have been considered here, and results can vary from company to company, region to region. The sales team’s approach and varying skill levels can impact these numbers. Some industries may be harder to penetrate than others. The packager’s messaging, value proposition, and delivery will also influence the number of touches required to secure an appointment with a qualified opportunity.
Ultimately, the key to a successful sales process is understanding the number of touches and time commitment required for your approach and adapting strategies accordingly. Sales teams not currently measuring touches can gauge their prospecting performance against the above averages. If they find themselves falling short, it’s an indication their strategy may need to be reassessed. These insights provide an invaluable road map to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of their lead-conversion process.
How Athena Can Help
Seeing the time commitment and amount of work required just to get a first meeting can be overwhelming. At Athena SWC this is what we specialize in. Using our holistic approach to inbound and outbound marketing, we provide the people, processes, and tools to support all your front-end sales needs and get you the first step meeting with truly qualified leads. Contact us to learn more.