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Many marketers believe generating more sales leads is the key to hitting revenue targets. That's not always true. In fact, most companies need to do a better job managing and qualifying the leads (or more likely the inquiries) they already have.

In this month's issue of Target Marketing, I wrote the cover article on "What's a Lead?" There, I offer the most important steps that marketing and sales alike, need to take to end their "tug of war" to improve ROI.

The 5 steps of successful lead qualification are:

1. Define and Agree On What the Word "Lead" Means
2. Consolidate and Centralize Your Prospect Information
3. Pick up the Phone and Qualify Prospective Leads
4. Handing Off Leads to Sales
5. Closing the Loop

The first step in the process requires marketing and sales to come up with a definition for a lead together. This article also emphasizes the critical role that the (often overlooked) phone plays in the lead qualification process.

Read Target Marketing: What's a Lead?

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Brian Carroll is the CEO of InTouch Inc. InTouch is a 50-person company focused on delivering effective lead generation solutions for "the complex sale."
Brian authors the very interesting B2B Lead Generation Blog which focuses on B2B lead generation, sales leads, and marketing for the complex sale.