Trying to assign a firm, be-all-end-all number to sales best practices is tricky. While it’s always good for the sake of clarity to aim for specific numbers, it can be self-defeating and counterproductive to force yourself to adhere to a set number if your particular talents don’t lend themselves to it.

When you think about how many calls a top performing sales person should make in a day, it’s important to remember that quantity does not equal quality.

Quantity ≠ Quality

• Assigning a specific number puts the emphasis on quantity, or “busy work,” not on the process it takes to cultivate and nurture quality leads. A “call” is one thing, a quality conversation is quite another.
• The quantity of calls depends on who you are calling, and for what purpose, aka C-suite execs versus middle managers, cold calling versus warm calling, etc.

So, it’s easy to see why a one-size-fits-all approach to the question “how many calls should salespeople make?” is an ill-fated approach. A better one is more nuanced, but it can include specific numbers (or perhaps ranges of numbers) dependent on the situation. Here are some examples:

Here are some examples:

• If you’re conducting high-volume cold calling, such as what a newly established business might do right out the gate, numbers are important. This is one case where quantity may be more important than quality. Experts put the range here at 250+ per day.
• If you’re conducting mid-level cold-calling, in which your salesperson has to conduct lead generation, demos, and the like, 50 is a more reasonable number.

From here, the approach becomes even more detailed. Say you’re reaching out to university professors with the goal of setting up a product demo. A more reasonable expectation may be 15-30 such calls in a day.

In general, the best approach is one that is targeted.

So, if you want a specific number with regards to how many calls your salespeople should be making a day, look at who they are calling first, and what they want to accomplish from those calls. A low-conversion, high volume approach is fine when you’re just looking to “dial for dollars,” but if you want to cultivate quality conversation and move a lead up in the qualification process, the approach must naturally become more focused and involve more legwork and education, as well as customized follow-up.

Unfortunately, there is no one-size-fits-all for this question, so make your focus on your outcomes and go from there to find what works best for your team!