Measuring Appointment Setting

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Another important factor to consider during the reflection phase of appointment setting is reporting and metrics. Upper-level management will want to see how appointment setting efforts are contributing to the overall sales won and revenue generated. Having a dashboard of relevant metrics and reports is key to measuring appointment setting and reporting to your stakeholders.

Before we go too far into reporting, we want to explain an important caveat. There are many different metrics to measure appointment setting, but not all are necessary to our overall sales goals.

With that in mind, we have found 3 metrics to be most useful for measuring appointment setting (click to jump right to the section):

  1. Pipeline Construction (Pre-appointment Database organization)
  2. Appointment Delivery (Appointments Set)
  3. Contribution to the Sales Pipeline (Post-Appointment)

Metric #1 Pipeline Construction (Pre-Appointment)

If you are using the EBrating or a similar lead qualification methodology, you will begin to see the database become more organized. Generally, you want to see the numbers descending in order from 0 to 7 with the 8’s, 9’s, 10’s, and 86’s much smaller.

Here we are monitoring the database to see positive movement of our prospects as we put more touches on them.

As aforementioned, the EBrating is a way to organize your database and eliminate unknowns in order to prioritize outreach. After the first few calls are made, your records are no longer a name on a list, but rather a validated company and role.

It’s just a matter of time until you can find time for an appointment.

Chart #1 – Cold Call List

This database is structured with a majority of 7’s (cold call). This lead source most likely came from a purchased list and will need a few SDR cycles to move more records toward 0 (Sales-Qualified).

Measuring Appointment Setting Cold Call List

Chart #2 – Marketing-Qualified List

Here we notice the database organized into a large portion of 3’s. This list may have been sourced from a webinar or whitepaper download and will require a tighter cadence to keep interest warm.

Measuring Appointment Setting MQL List

Chart #3 – Unhealthy Database

This database is made up of 8’s through 99’s and thus there is not much interest in the product. Your management team may want to augment the list or find a new lead source to spruce up their database.

Measuring Appointment Setting Unhealthy Database
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Ultimate Guide to B2B Appointment Setting

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Metric #2 Appointment Delivery (Appointment)

The ultimate appointment setting KPI is the number of appointments that are set on a monthly basis. We recommend reporting on both appointment-setting rate and completion rate to understand the factors getting in the way of sales appointments. A 10% reschedule is a nominal rate and should be expected.

It’s important to remember that there is a difference between a reschedule and a no-show. Comparing the appointments completed vs. appointments set can also help you identify weaknesses of your SDR team. If you notice a substantial amount of appointments set but very few completed, it’s possible that your lead generation specialist is too gung-ho and the interest in the product wasn’t genuine.

There are other factors to consider such as the roles of your personas and what their day-to-day operations entail. For example, a Director of IT in a small or mid-sized business may need to reschedule multiple times due to their demanding work schedule. This is not something that your SDR team can change but rather be proactive about and anticipate when setting up appointments.

Measuring Appointment Setting Set VS. Completed

Metric #3 Contribution to the Sales Pipeline (Post-Appointment)

The last metric to look at for appointment setting is the individual contribution to the sales pipeline. In other words, is appointment setting contributing to sales pipeline? What is the ROI of our appointment setting outreach based on conversion rate? With the end goal being to drive more revenue, you will want to pay close attention to this metric to track ROI of your appointment setting outreach.

Additional Metrics to Look At:

  • Amount of Touches Per Prospect – Who has received more touches than others
  • Touches to conversion – How many touches does it take to become an SQL
  • Duration to conversion – How many business days it takes to convert to SQL
Measuring Appointment Setting EBQ Dashboard Example

In the end, appointment-setting reporting is binary: either you’re setting appointments or you’re not.

We have seen many companies mistakenly probe into minute data points of their appointment-setting outreach in order to extrapolate information. Getting too granular with individual metrics can distract your sales development team from their primary focus: making calls.

Appointment setting is as much an art as it is a numbers game.

Repeat

Once you have a consistent feedback loop and relevant reporting, you can continue to improve and optimize your appointment-setting outreach. The great thing about building a well-rounded appointment setting strategy, is that you can scale it as you continue to grow your database, or in the case of working with a partner like EBQ, we help to facilitate the lead discovery process as you add more SDR’s.

Here is an example of how we were able to help one of our clients to successfully scale their revenue based on the amount of SDR’s hired.

Measuring Appointment Setting EBQ Metrics

You can see how they were able to grow their revenue in proportion to the amount of SDR’s hired as a result of EBQ’s lead generation support.

Figure out what is working and keep pushing through, smarter and more efficient than before. Maybe you acquire a new database or target a new vertical to penetrate. Whatever you do, make sure your techniques are flexible, repeatable, and scalable.

If you do, you will continue to deliver new appointments for continuous sales pipeline growth.

Download-pdf
Ultimate Guide to B2B Appointment Setting

Don’t have time to read the full guide right now? Download the Ultimate Guide to B2B Appointment Setting to read at your convenience.

Download the Ultimate Guide to B2B Appointment Setting
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