Booked meetings that do not happen, and how to stop them.

In our markets about 80 per cent of booked B2B meetings take place, and the figure rises when the meeting is agreed in a conversation, booked close in, sent from the client’s own domain with a clear purpose, and confirmed by the rep before the day. For LGN.AI, selling enterprise edge AI, 87 per cent of booked meetings were attended. Meetings that are pushed, booked weeks out or never confirmed are the ones that disappear.

Why booked meetings do not happen

• It was pushed, not agreed. The prospect said yes to end the call.
• It was booked too far out, and by the day it no longer meant anything.
• Nobody confirmed it, so it slid behind something more urgent.
• The invitation did not say why the meeting was happening or who it was with.
• The person who booked it was not the person who owns the problem.

Five habits that keep meetings in the diary

1. Agree it in a conversation.

   A meeting a person has agreed to on the phone, about a problem they have said they have, is kept more often than one taken from a link in an email.

2. Book it close in.

   Days rather than weeks. The reason to meet is strongest straight after the conversation.

3. Make the invitation explain itself.

   From your domain, with a video link, the purpose in a line and the name of the person they will meet.

4. Confirm it before the day.

   The rep who booked it confirms it, in the same tone as the first call.

5. Feed back every no-show.

   It goes back to the rep who booked it, and the qualification is tightened if a pattern appears.

How to measure it

Count meetings held, not booked, and keep the show rate as its own number. A rising booked count with a falling show rate is a qualification problem, not a success. The pipeline calculator shows what the show rate does to the dials a meeting target needs, and how a meeting is handed over covers the confirmation step.