Speed to lead
What is speed to lead?
Speed to lead is the time between a new lead reaching your business and your first real reply. The best-known study, in Harvard Business Review in 2011, found that firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as those that waited an hour longer. Foreman's standard is a reply in under 60 seconds, by text, voice, email and chat. The page below shows how to measure your own number.
What does the research say about reply time?
Oldroyd, McElheran & Elkington, The Short Life of Online Sales Leads (Harvard Business Review, 3/2011): firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as firms that waited an hour longer. The article is behind a subscription, so the figure here is as the article summarises it. It studies online sales leads, not every local trade, and it compares an hour with two; it does not test a 60-second target.
A second data point is about calls, not leads: in the 411 Locals field study, 37.8% of calls to small businesses were answered by a live person. See what a missed call costs.
How do you measure speed to lead?
Speed to lead = time of first real reply minus time the lead arrived. Do it per channel, then report the median (the typical lead) & the share answered inside your target, because an average hides the leads that waited a day.
| Channel | Where to find the timestamps | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Phone call | Call log or call tracking: time the call came in, time of the first answer or callback | Missed calls count from the miss to the first real reply |
| Text message | Message thread: time received, time of the first reply | An auto-acknowledgement is not a reply; count the first answer to the question |
| Web form | Form notification email timestamp, first reply timestamp | Test it yourself at night & on a weekend |
| Inbox: received & first reply times | Business hours only? Say so, then also count after hours | |
| Ad lead or marketplace | The platform's lead record & your first contact | Platforms often hold the lead before you see it |
How do you test it from the outside?
Send yourself a lead the way a customer would, through each channel, at three times: a weekday afternoon, a weeknight & a weekend. Write down the time sent & the time of the first real reply. Ten tests tell you more than a guess. The free missed-call audit does this for your business over two days & times every reply.
How does Foreman get to under 60 seconds?
By answering instead of queueing. Foreman texts back the missed call, answers the question, offers a real slot from your calendar & books it, then tells you. Anything that needs judgment goes to you with the full thread. That is a standard we hold to, not a guarantee of a result for your business.
Questions owners ask
What else do owners ask about speed to lead?
What is speed to lead?
Speed to lead is the time between a new lead reaching your business and the first real reply. It is measured per channel, in minutes or seconds, and reported as a median and as the share of leads answered inside a target.
How fast should a business reply to a new lead?
Foreman's standard is under 60 seconds. The research below shows the cost of waiting an hour or more; it does not prove 60 seconds is the exact right line, but every minute of delay gives the lead more time to contact the next business.
What does the research say about response time?
Oldroyd, McElheran and Elkington (Harvard Business Review, 3/2011) found that firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as those that waited an hour longer. It is a study of online sales leads at businesses selling to other companies and consumers, not of every local trade.
How do I measure my own speed to lead?
Pull the timestamps for each channel (the table on this page lists where), compute the gap from lead received to first real reply, and report the median and the share under your target. Then test it from the outside: send a form, a text and a call at night and on a weekend.
Does an auto-reply count as a response?
No. An acknowledgement that does not answer the question is not a reply. Count the first message that moves the lead forward, such as an answer, a booking offer or a callback.
Where do these numbers come from?
- Oldroyd, McElheran & Elkington, The Short Life of Online Sales Leads, Harvard Business Review, 03/2011: firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as those that waited an hour longer.
- 411 Locals, field study of 85 small businesses across 58 industries over 30 days: 37.8% of calls answered live, 37.8% to voicemail, 24.3% no response.
Checked 10/11/2026. Vendor studies are directional, not audited. Where a figure is called an industry estimate, we could not trace it to a primary study. Your own phone log beats every number on this page.