The vanity of volume: why more leads is the wrong goal
More leads feels like progress. Usually it is the most expensive way to stand still.
Every marketing dashboard has a number that goes up and to the right and means almost nothing. Lead volume is the favourite. It is easy to grow, easy to celebrate, and easy to mistake for momentum.
The problem is that volume hides its own cost. Double your leads and you have usually doubled the work of qualifying them, the noise your sales team wades through, and the spend behind the top of the funnel — often without moving a single extra deal across the line.
The goal was never more leads. The goal was more of the right customers, won profitably, and kept.
Elevate · The Signal
Volume is a proxy that escaped
Leads started as a proxy for revenue. Somewhere along the way the proxy became the target, and Goodhart's law did the rest: when a measure becomes a target, it stops being a good measure. Teams optimise for the count, and the count fills with people who will never buy.
What to measure instead
Replace the vanity number with three honest ones: the conversion rate from lead to customer, the cost to acquire each one, and the value they go on to create. A campaign that halves your leads but doubles their quality is a win — the volume chart just won't show it.
Know, don't guess. That is the whole job.