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What do slow replies cost your firm a year?

By Rogue Digital · Published

In short

A firm with 20 enquiries a week, 35% of them out of hours, jobs worth £2,500 and a 25% close rate could lose about £55,800 to £223,000 a year by replying next morning, not in 5 minutes. Those are example numbers. Put in yours.

Your firm

Each box starts with an example, not a statistic. Change them.

Calls, forms, emails and messages that ask for a quote or a visit. Example: 20.

Evenings, weekends and lunch breaks, when nobody is free to answer. Example: 35.

What a typical won job is worth to you, before costs. Example: 2,500.

Of the enquiries you answer fast, how many become jobs. Example: 25.

Slow replies could cost you, a year

£55,800 to £223,000

Reply next morning, assumed 14 hours after the enquiry, instead of within 5 minutes.

Out-of-hours enquiries a year
364
Jobs you would win with 5 minute replies
91
Jobs lost a year to a next-morning reply
about 22 to 89

If every out-of-hours enquiry were answered within 5 minutes instead of next morning, our model says you would win about 22 to 89 more jobs a year. That is an estimate from published research, not a forecast.

The research behind this measures whether a firm reached or qualified a lead, not whether it won the sale. Treat the high figure as a ceiling.

Tell us where enquiries wait

A 30 minute call. We look at how enquiries reach you and when they get a reply.

What each reply time costs a year

The slower the reply, the more of the out-of-hours work you lose. The research drop is steepest in the first half hour, so most of the cost is already there at 30 minutes. The white bar is the research curve and the grey bar is our conservative one. The same numbers are in the table below.

  • Research curve (high)
  • Conservative curve (low)
5 minutes£0£030 minutes£217,000£54,2001 hour£219,000£54,6004 hours£221,000£55,300Next morning (14 hours)£223,000£55,80024 hours or more£224,000£55,900
Cost a year of each reply time, against a 5 minute reply
Reply time Low (conservative) High (research)
5 minutes£0£0
30 minutes£54,200£217,000
1 hour£54,600£219,000
4 hours£55,300£221,000
Next morning (14 hours)£55,800£223,000
24 hours or more£55,900£224,000

How this is worked out

Four steps, all on this page. Every figure below either links to its source or is marked as our assumption.

  1. Out-of-hours enquiries a year = enquiries a week × 52 × the out-of-hours share.
  2. Jobs won with a 5 minute reply = that × your close rate.
  3. Jobs won at a slower reply = that × the chance of winning at that speed, compared with 5 minutes.
  4. Cost = jobs lost × your average job value.

The assumptions

  • A 5 minute reply is the benchmark

    Every other reply time is compared with it.

    Assumption: ours, not a research figure

  • At 30 minutes you keep 1 in 21 of the chances

    The research curve, from the Lead Response Management study (qualification, not sales).

    Source: The Lead Response Management Study, 2007

  • At 24 hours or more you keep 1 in 60 of the chances

    The research curve, from Harvard Business Review (qualification, not sales).

    Source: The Short Life of Online Sales Leads, 2011

  • 1 hour, 4 hours and next morning sit between those two points

    Interpolated on a log scale by us. No study gives these three figures.

    Assumption: ours, not a research figure

  • The next working morning is 14 hours after the enquiry

    An enquiry at about 19:00 answered at about 09:00. Real firms differ, so treat 12 to 16 hours as the range.

    Assumption: ours, not a research figure

  • The low figure keeps three quarters of the research drop off

    We scale the research effect down to a quarter of the drop. Our assumption, not a research figure.

    Assumption: ours, not a research figure

  • Your close rate is the rate for enquiries you answer quickly

    You enter it. We do not suggest one.

    Assumption: ours, not a research figure

A worked example with the example numbers

  1. 20 enquiries a week × 52 = 1,040 a year. 35% out of hours is 364.
  2. A 25% close rate on those is 91 jobs if every one gets a reply in 5 minutes.
  3. A reply 14 hours later keeps 1.9% of that chance on the research curve, so you win 1.8 and lose 89. At £2,500 a job that is £223,000. This is the high figure.
  4. The conservative curve keeps 75.5% of the chance (a quarter of the research drop), so you lose 22 jobs. At £2,500 a job that is £55,800. This is the low figure.

What the research does and does not say

Both studies measure whether a firm reached or qualified a lead. Neither measures closed sales. We apply their drop to wins, which is our step, not theirs. Both involve InsideSales.com, a company that sells lead response software. We checked each line at the source on 21 October 2026.

  • The Lead Response Management Study

    James Oldroyd (MIT Sloan), with InsideSales.com. LeadResponseManagement.com (InsideSales.com), archived copy. c. 2007 (as cited; the archived page footer reads 2004 to 2010).

    The odds of qualifying a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 21 times.
    This study did not address close ratios.

    Measures: Phone contact and qualification of web form leads, from three years of data across six companies, over fifteen thousand leads. Published by a vendor of lead response software.

    Quoted from the Internet Archive copy of 27 December 2012.

  • The Short Life of Online Sales Leads

    James B. Oldroyd, Kristina McElheran and David Elkington. Harvard Business Review, March 2011. March 2011.

    Firms that tried to contact potential customers within an hour of receiving a query were nearly seven times as likely to qualify the lead (which we defined as having a meaningful conversation with a key decision maker) as those that tried to contact the customer even an hour later, and more than 60 times as likely as companies that waited 24 hours or longer.

    Measures: Qualifying a lead, meaning a meaningful conversation with a key decision maker, across 1.25 million leads at 42 US companies. One author, David Elkington, is the chairman and chief executive of InsideSales.com. The full text is behind the HBR paywall; the quoted line is read from the Internet Archive copy linked here.

    Quoted from the Internet Archive copy of 17 January 2021.

Key takeaways

  • The cost of a slow reply is mostly the out-of-hours enquiries. Count those first.
  • Published research finds that the odds of qualifying a lead fall fast in the first half hour. It does not measure sales.
  • The answer is a range on purpose. Use the low figure to plan and the high figure to see the ceiling.
  • Nothing you type leaves your browser.

Questions

Does this store what I type?
No. The sums run in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere, saved, or added to the address bar.
Are the example numbers real statistics?
No. They are examples so the page works the moment you open it. Replace each with your own.
Why is the answer a range?
The research behind reply speed measures reaching or qualifying a lead, not winning the sale. The high figure applies the research drop to wins. The low figure applies a quarter of it. The real figure for your firm sits somewhere in between, or below.
What counts as out of hours?
Any time nobody on your team is free to reply: evenings, weekends, lunch breaks, site visits. Use your own share.

Where do your enquiries wait?

Book a 30 minute call and tell us where enquiries wait. We will look at it with you.

Tell us where enquiries wait