Missed inbound call

A missed inbound call is any call from a potential customer that did not reach someone who could help. That covers calls that rang unanswered, calls that dropped to voicemail during business hours, calls abandoned while waiting in a queue, and calls that were answered, placed on hold and then given up on.

Missed calls cluster predictably: the first half hour after opening, the lunch period, Saturday late morning and shift changes.

Why it matters for a sales manager

This is the only major failure in the funnel that has nothing to do with selling skill. The customer wanted to talk to you and could not. Missed calls are a coverage and routing problem, which makes them among the fastest things a manager can fix, usually with a schedule change rather than training.