The 30% Rule: Handling Unqualified Leads

A sales leader asked in our slack community if a 30-40% unqualified meeting rate is normal, or if they are doing something wrong despite having forms and SDRs in place.

The community’s advice on managing the noise:

→It’s a Feature, not a bug. Most companies prefer taking a few bad calls over "over-screening" and accidentally blocking a future customer. Perfect filtering is impossible because buyers lie or needs change faster than forms.

→If the volume is too high, your ICP is likely too broad. Be like early Facebook—start by targeting a hyper-specific niche (like Harvard students) before expanding.

→Let Robots Handle the Small Fry. Don't just delete small leads; automate them. Use AI chatbots or self-serve payment links to monetize low-tier prospects without wasting a rep's time.

→Triage your bad meetings. If 30% are unqualified, look for the pattern (e.g., specific industry, company size) and add one specific "knockout" question to your form to catch them.

Bottom line: 
You can't eliminate 100% of waste without hurting your pipeline. The goal isn't to block every bad lead, but to use AI and stricter ICPs to ensure your humans only talk to the best ones. 🤖