An obvious way to stimulate profit is to generate more volume. To generate more volume, take a hard look at the way you’re receiving and following up on the leads coming into your business.

Obtaining and managing leads kickstarts the entire financial management cycle. Following up on leads creates the basis for your scorecard. It tells you how you’re tracking against your overall sales goal.

Here are some useful questions to ask yourself about your lead flow process:

1. Where do your leads come from? Do you generate leads yourself or do you wait for the phone to ring?
2. When you bring a lead into your business, how is it documented?
3. How often do you follow up if you’re tracking leads?
4. Do you have and use a lead tracking report?

No leads, no sales

Don’t make the mistake of only tracking contracts. Tracking the leads each salesperson is approaching daily will give you a good idea of how many leads it takes to get to a proposal. From there, you can backtrack and know how many leads need to be generated to reach your sales goal.

Leads should be tracked for specific periods, such as  monthly. This information, in chart form, would allow you to know, at a glance, the value of all proposals submitted during the reporting period as well as the number and value of sold contracts for the period and the number and value of remaining open proposals.

It also allows you see where any issues arise that you may wish to address with your sales force. This is a broad outline. You will want to come up with a report that meets the specific needs of your company and your sales team.

A useful lead-tracking chart could include:

• The date a lead came in;
• The name of the salesperson assigned to the lead;
• The name of the potential client;
• The address, phone, email of the potential client;
• The date of the appointment set by your sales person;
• The date the estimate is completed;
• The date the proposal is delivered;
• The proposed value of the project;
• The percentage chance the salesperson feels he/she has to close the deal;
• Sold contracts;
• Declined contracts;
• Open proposals; and
• Salesperson’s comments.

If your goal in 2014 is to generate more revenue, then, as a first step, take a look at how you’re generating and following up on new leads in your business.

This post is an excerpt from the ebook, “The Landscapers Guide to Integrated Financial Management,” published by A Better Way 2 Learn. LM columnist Frank Ross, cofounder of A Better Way 2 Learn, will take part in A Better Way 2 Learn’s 2013 Financial Management TeleSummit, which kicks off Tuesday, Dec. 3. This live, three-night event is being presented by A Better Way 2 Learn Financials, GoiLawn and Landscape Management Register here.