A new study explores whether Fortune 100 companies respond to online buyer inquiries. This is important to Saudi companies because the majority of local firms base their budgetary projections, whether for an annual business plan or a single project, on information gathered through online resources. Results of Velocify's research suggest that most Fortune 100 companies are not following best practices and many are leaving buyers waiting indefinitely. A staggering 33 percent of online requests for quotes and information submitted in the study never received a call response from the seller, and more than half of the time Fortune 100 sellers waited more than 24 hours to place their initial callback to the buyer, with the average response time being 3.5 days. The “Fortune 100 Online Buyer Experiences Study,” explored whether the largest companies in America are adapting their sales processes to address changing buyer behavior and expectations for rapid and persistent responses to online inquires. “Companies are spending billions each year on advertising and lead generation initiatives to propel their businesses forward and grow,” said Nick Hedges, president and CEO at Velocify. “The results of this study show many companies are throwing money away by not responding appropriately or at all.” The study found that: * An alarming 33 percent of buyers never received follow-up by phone, and 12 percent received no response of any kind – neither a single email nor phone call. * Only 10 percent of leads received close to the optimal number of follow-up calls, which previous Velocify research found to be between five and seven attempts. * The average wait time for a phone call in response to a sales contact form was 3.5 days. Previous Velocify research has found that attempting to contact a lead within one minute of a web inquiry submission increases the likelihood of that lead converting into a paying customer by 391 percent. * While the average email response time was faster than response by phone, with nearly 35 percent of leads receiving an email response in under an hour, there is still considerable room for improvement for a process that is so easily automated and requires little effort to establish. * Fortune 100 companies with the highest revenue growth and profit margins performed better than their peers in response to online leads. For the study, Velocify contacted 62 companies on the Fortune 100 list, filling out three Web-based contact request forms for each company during their business hours. After the inquiries were submitted, Velocify monitored various items, including the length of time until first and subsequent responses were made and the total number of contact attempts over the duration of the study. Additionally, Velocify compared each company's response performance to their revenue growth rates and profit margins to examine correlations. Download the full report at www.velocify.com/F100.
