In your experience, at what stage of awareness do you see the most conversions from leads to opportunities?

As marketing and sales funnel definitions and awareness stage names/definitions can be different across different organizations, I'll describe the stage rather than try to label it first. In my experience, when a lead has, either by volume of activity or volume/strength of intent actions, indicated they are ready to purchase a solution (i.e. sales ready) lead to opportunity conversion is highest. This also applies if you're using more of a buying unit or team concept, and you have multiple leads become sales ready, especially if the leads are decision makers or influencers in the unit. Successfully defining what a sales ready lead requires input and agreement across product marketing, demand generation, and sales in order for the conversion to have the highest likelihood of success.

Traditionally I've labelled these as MQLs or MQAs but I think it's important to focus on the activities and signals from the lead(s) to identify the stage in awareness that most likely leads to an opportunity. I also believe the actions and activities that indicate an awareness stage should continuously be revisited by your organization to allow for evolving market conditions and customer needs to be accounted for and ensure your conversion remains high.

In my experience, I’ve seen the most conversions from leads to opportunities when value is realized in week 1. This is of course dependent on your product offering, but generally speaking, the initial “aha moment” has to be realized quickly and delivered with value.

How do you help make this happen? Your onboarding and nurture flows have to be optimized. What does your customer need to experience to be delighted? How much value do you need to deliver before they refer other users? I recommend starting here.