The enquiries that have not become customers yet, kept somewhere other than a phone’s call history and a salesman’s memory.
A lead is lost far more often than it is refused. Somebody calls, the price is discussed, and then a week passes — and by the time anyone remembers, the customer has bought elsewhere. Nothing was decided; the follow-up simply did not happen.
A list changes that only if the list is where the work happens. Each lead carries who they are, where they came from and what stage they have reached, and the follow-up sits against them with a date on it, so the question "who needs calling today" has an answer that is not somebody’s recollection.
Add it when the call comes in, with the source it came from.
To the staff member who will actually chase it.
The next action sits against the lead, dated.
Won leads become parties you bill; lost ones stay on record.
The customer before and between the bills: the inquiry that came in, the lead someone is chasing, the appointment that was booked, and the credit you are prepared to extend. Everything attaches to a party, so a customer’s history is one thread rather than several.
This area earns its keep in the gaps — the follow-up nobody remembered, the appointment nobody confirmed, the limit nobody checked before billing.
What comes in the door, and what happens to it afterwards.
An inquiry is a question that arrived; a lead is someone you are actively working towards a sale. Both are kept, and the reports show what became of each.
Yes — lead assignment puts it in one person’s name, so follow-up is somebody’s responsibility.
They become a party you bill, and the conversion is visible in the convert-leads report.
Most leads are not refused — they are simply never followed up.
