Targeting Your Leads Decisions: Why the Same Lead Converts Differently by Timing
You buy a hundred leads. You call every one of them, or email every one of them, and maybe two or three actually join. Everyone tells you that’s normal, that this industry converts at one or two percent and you should be happy with that, and you believe them because the number matches what you’ve experienced. Then you meet someone converting the same kind of traffic at fifty or sixty percent, and you realize the “normal” everyone kept telling you about was never a law of physics. It was just what happens when you talk to the wrong people at the wrong moment.
A lesson inside the Classic Masters Course pairs Dave Wood with a marketer named John who built one of the highest-converting lead flows in the entire organization, somewhere in the neighborhood of seven hundred signups out of roughly twelve hundred leads. That’s not a copywriting trick. It’s a targeting decision made long before anyone ever sees an ad.
Why does the exact same lead convert differently depending on when you catch them?
John’s entire approach starts with a model of where a prospect actually is in their own decision-making, not where you’d like them to be. He describes it as three distinct phases. Phase one is the person who just started looking, the one who typed “make money from home” into Google for the first time last night and is still, by his own estimate, roughly six months away from actually buying anything from anyone. Phase two is the person who has already narrowed things down to a specific opportunity and is closer, maybe two months out. Phase three is where he chooses to spend nearly all of his own effort, and he explains exactly why:
Second phase, you’ve kind of found the opportunity that you want to go for. Maybe you’re two months away, and the final phase is usually, hey, you know what company you’re joining, now you just want to find the right team to join with. That’s where I like to find my leads. At that final phase.
Most people marketing online are fishing in phase one without realizing it, catching people who are months away from buying anything from anyone, no matter how good the follow-up sequence is. No amount of persuasion skill turns a six-month decision into a same-day one, because the decision was never a persuasion problem to begin with, it’s a timing problem. John deliberately builds his funnels to intercept people already in phase three instead, people who already know which company they’re joining and are only searching for the right team to join it with. He’s not convincing anyone to want something they didn’t already want. He’s simply the first credible option standing in front of someone who already decided to buy, at the exact moment they went looking for somewhere to put that decision.
That distinction matters more than most people give it credit for, because it changes what “good marketing” even means. A phase-one lead needs education, patience, and months of nurturing before they’re anywhere close to buying. A phase-three lead needs almost none of that. Send phase-one-style education to a phase-three lead and you’ll bore someone who was ready to act an hour ago. Send phase-three urgency to a phase-one lead and you’ll scare off someone who genuinely isn’t ready yet and will feel pushed. Knowing which phase you’re actually marketing to is the decision that determines almost everything else about how the message should sound.
What does it look like when your targeting actually matches the buyer’s stage?
Dave tells a story about visiting John’s house one evening and watching his phone ring nonstop, each call a different person already sold on the opportunity and only checking one last detail before joining. One caller asked if the price really was as low as advertised, got a yes, and joined on the spot. Another call came in minutes later for a completely different offer, John’s leads are segmented across several niche funnels, and the pattern repeated: someone who had already made up their mind, calling to confirm the last small fact standing between them and clicking join.
That’s what phase-three targeting actually produces. Not persuasion. Confirmation. The lead already resolved the whether-to-do-this question somewhere else, on their own time, researching on their own schedule, and John’s funnel was simply built to be standing there when they finally reached for their phone. Compare that to cold traffic sent straight at a phase-one prospect, and it’s obvious why the conversion rates land in completely different universes even though both started as “a lead.”
Why does explaining your company before someone’s ready to hear it kill the sale?
There’s a second layer to this lesson that matters just as much: once you know where someone actually is in their decision, stop handing them information they don’t need yet. Dave points out that old-school presentations, the classic Amway model included, hold the company name back until the final few minutes on purpose, because if you named it up front, half the room would already have made up its mind and left.
Most people build funnels backward from this. They put the company logo at the top of the page, explain the history, the founders, the products, before the visitor has any reason to care yet. As Dave frames the real mechanic underneath that mistake, “It’s helpful to know that people are buying things for their reasons, not because of all the reasons you used to justify why we got in. Because what do we really want to know a company solid for? There’s only really one reason. It’s to justify your decision. Right? Well, if you haven’t made a decision yet, that information is virtually useless. And nobody cares ever.” A prospect who hasn’t decided to buy doesn’t want your credentials. They want to know what changes for them, and every detail you volunteer before they’ve made that decision is a detail giving them a reason to click away instead of a reason to stay.
What replaces persuasion once your targeting is actually right?
Directness. Dave describes the shift that happened once his own messaging stopped tiptoeing around what people actually wanted and just said it plainly: someone asks whether they should get in, and the answer is a direct challenge back at them, not a sales pitch. “Hey, Dave, should I get in? Just stop being a wussy and just get in. Do you want money or not? It’s just unbelievable the response that created in people, right?” That works precisely because it’s aimed at someone already leaning toward yes. Say that to a phase-one prospect who’s never heard of you and it reads as arrogant. Say it to a phase-three prospect who already wants in and is only stalling out of nerves, and it reads as exactly the permission they were waiting for.
Put the pieces together and the lesson is simple to state and harder to actually practice: find out which phase the person in front of you is really in before you decide what to say, and stop volunteering information they haven’t earned the right to need yet. Everything else in this lesson, the niche funnels, the segmented lists, the blunt tone, is downstream of that one judgment call. Get the phase right and a conversation that would have taken a dozen follow-ups somewhere else closes in a single phone call. Get it wrong and the best script in the world reads like noise to the person on the other end.
This lesson goes further into how John actually builds and segments his niche funnels to intercept leads at exactly the right phase, along with more of the phone-call examples that show what a properly targeted funnel sounds like in real time. It’s part of the Classic Masters Course. If you’re new to it, get the entire course, this lesson included, for $99 at the Classic Masters Course.
Full lesson transcript
Lightly edited from the original recording — fillers removed, nothing added. Income disclaimer.
Here for a second, and look at the crazy shit we do, you know, at Empower Network, and it really is hilarious, you know, a lot of the time, you know, and sometimes people see it and they're like, well, yeah, that wouldn't work, you know, or whatever, and they're like, I would never do that, you know. There's a guy, and I thought this was funny, it's shortly after we launched, and I think we had like 12,000 people or something like that joined, you know, we did like a million and a half dollars our first four weeks, you know, last month actually we did about two and a half million in sales, and this month we're on track to do about three and a half, right? So it just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger, and, you know, there's a guy that was like, you know, I would never do that because, you know, they're just talking about getting money all the time, and I just give lots of value, is what I like to do. And so, you know, I pop on the wall and I said, so you like to give a lot of value without anybody paying you anything, right? Is that what you mean?
And he's like, well, no, they pay me what it's worth, and I said, oh, they pay you for the value, what are you teaching them how to do? And he's like, well, I'm teaching them to create. I was like, yeah, you're talking about getting money and just being a wussbag about it is what you are. Caused a little bit of a stir, right? But also what I learned, and I learned this a long time ago, is when you just stop at the bullshit and tell people what they actually want, right, it's amazing how people respond to that.
It's amazing how they respond, because most people just won't share the truth. Most people won't tell you what they actually think, right? So when we came out originally and we just said to people directly, look. Hey, Dave, should I get in? Just stop being a wussy and just get in.
Do you want money or not? It's just unbelievable the response that created in people, right? So anyways, I like that, you know, benefits versus features. Features are so boring. Oh, did you?
Were you broadcasting that on the internet? I'm just, with a buy link below it. You should, you probably should have, yeah. No, I'm just kidding. Probably not.
But in any case, guys. So there's things. There's things that can help you get a lot more sales from a lot less people. And I want to point something out too. When I got started on the internet, I got started selling other people's stuff, you know, and what I found real quick was that their stuff didn't sell very well, right?
It took a lot of manual work to sell using other people's stuff most of the time because their stuff was awful, right? So I just kind of made my own stuff, right? And then my own stuff was cranking out all these sales and it was producing all these results. And what I had done was I had removed everything from the presentations other than stories and get money, right? And when we started this company, we had freedom to kind of say what we wanted, right?
I mean, if you guys notice even the new presentation, I don't even talk about the comp plan at all in it, right? That was a pretty cool comp plan, right? In most companies, they have 18 slides about the comp plan like anyone cares. And the truth is nobody cares ever. They want to know that they can get money and that it works, right?
If there's a network marketing. And so I used to talk about the comp plan all the time. And then I remember back to those old Amway presentations, right? And these guys would sit up there, and granted they were the worst call to actions ever. I mean, if they would have just said at the end of the presentation, all right, everybody take the application, start filling it out and join now, and told him a price, which they didn't do.
I mean, they probably sold everybody in the room. But I remember I stayed in that thing for years thinking that a certain amount of people made you a quarter million a month. And then after about three years, I was staring at the comp plan one day that I got from the actual company that I'd never read, and realized I didn't even know where any of that money came from, because they had never talked about it in a presentation for three years. And I was just sitting there thinking that amount of money came from the product sales. And I think the reason they didn't talk about it is because it came from the tools, you know, but it was like three years of that.
I didn't even know. People don't care, right? I see a lot of people on Facebook. You guys ever get, you know, the email that's, you know, the hot new deal. It's just like that thing, but it's in pre-launch, right? It's just like Zeek Rewards, but it's in pre-launch, you know, and then they've got to, you know, update and realize the SEC just shut them down yesterday, you know, but they just like this, but better, you know, just like Amway, but better.
Nobody cares about Amway. Nobody cares what something is, right? And a couple of things, and I think that this is an important distinction. I realized a few years back, because I mean, I primarily did network marketing. It's what I did, right?
I was selling business opportunities, which is actually truthfully a lot harder to sell most of the time. Yeah. Than selling an info product. It's easier to sell a $500 course than it is to sell a $500 business opportunity, right? I tested that and it's like three times easier and there's more money, right?
It's just easier to do. It flips in with no resistance. If you're selling a course, anybody can use it, whereas if you're selling a business opportunity, especially to this niche, people say, well, I'm already in that thing. Well, I'm already in this thing.
And they give you all these reasons on why they can't do it, right? So I noticed that when I go and I tell people exactly what they should do. When I tell people exactly what they need to do next all the time, right? Exactly what to do all the time.
And I don't explain anything they don't care about until after they buy, it just works better, right? So I took like 90% of the details out of all my presentations. I was selling a business opportunity, and I noticed if I used the company slides and had the logo of the company on it, people would hang up on the webinar. I experienced that, right? He got in a company, right?
That I was involved with. And I told, I think I told you that actually, but they flipped up the company presentation with the logo on it. And you know, what happens is if people are familiar with the company, they'll just turn off and they won't pay attention to any of the presentation at all, right? And that's why in the Amway meetings, they wait till the last five minutes to tell you it's Amway. Because if they told you at the beginning, you'd get up and leave the room, right?
Anybody ever experienced that, right? I remember. I used to say that. I used to sell stuff on the internet when I first got started, because I was selling opportunities a little different, but I'd sell stuff and then people would get in and then realize what it was. Now that's how secretive I was.
He thinks it's funny, right? You know, but it helps. It's helpful to know that people are buying things for their reasons, not because of all the reasons you use to justify why we got in. Because what do we really want to know a company solid for? There's only really one reason.
It's to justify your decision. Right? Well, if you haven't made a decision yet, that information is virtually useless. And nobody cares ever. Right?
The best funnel I've seen you guys put up is that, you know, that letter that you've got. And that letter essentially just talks about all the problems all of us experience. And then why top tier is better than MLM. It never explains what it is. And you have to buy an application to even figure out what it is.
Right? And all the crappy funnels people use have pictures of the logo everywhere all over the site. And everybody sees it and they just go look up what it is and they leave the site. And remember that people, when they're joining something, right, they're joining because they want to get money. They're looking for a team to be a part of.
They want it to be easier. Right? And they want to do it and kind of feel cool about it. Right? That's why I think Lawrence, I think your network marketing company, they do a good job with marketing.
Right? Because most of the nutritional companies, right, what do they do? They're selling a weight loss shake. And honestly, nobody cares. Nobody wants weight loss shakes.
Right? I mean, do you guys ever go to the store and look for weight loss shakes that are the hottest shakes in the store? You know what I mean? Ever? But you know, everybody wants to look sexy, drive fast, and make lots of money.
And that's all they talk about, isn't it? I think they talk about the shakes for like, you know, two minutes in there. Because nobody cares. And then you scheme them into buying the shakes based on driving fast cars and making money. You know?
I got a closet full of vitamins back home. You know what I mean? Because I keep buying them all the time. I buy them and I start taking them and I don't. So if somebody comes up and they say, hey, Dave, I got some hot new vitamins.
Right? I'm going to open my closet and just say, well, I'll take some. You know, put them in there, dude. Right? Take one of them and then put it behind the vitamin C I bought last week.
And forget that it's there. But everybody wants to be able to make lots of money doing nothing. Drive a fast car. Right? And feel good.
Right? So that's all we talk about. Now, John, can you come up here real quick? Now, I schemed John. Give him a hand.
Now, I don't know how long he'll stand there. I want to tell a story real quick. So, you know, he doesn't want to speak ever, which doesn't make sense. He doesn't want to speak ever, which, by the way, you never have to, which is nice. But, you know, he, like, planned this thing, I think, when he got here.
And he's like, all right, Dave, instead of speaking, can I make a webinar? Right. You know? And just send it to you later. So, no, you don't have to speak.
But John gets abnormal results in conversions. And there's a reason why. You know? And so I just want to ask you a few questions, if that's okay. Sure.
So, you brought in eight things. And top recruiter in virtually all of them. Right? And you brought in, how many people have you brought in here in Empower? I think 690.
Right around 690, 700. 690. How many leads have you... Give him a hand. Give him a hand.
I can't remember exactly how much. I think 212. Yeah, 212. Yeah. How many leads have you generated for this, though?
I was just looking at this the other day. It's right around, what's, 1,200 or so? 1,200 leads? See, you've generated 1,200 leads and you've got... About 700 sign-ups.
Yeah. That's pretty gangster. Right? That's not normal either.
But, now, he does it a little bit different than a lot of people. You don't just slam your list. Right. With offers. Right.
So, the leads that are opting in are people that are opting in specifically to look at this. Right. Is that right? Yeah. So, what do you do as far as an offer goes?
How do you get it to where you get these... Because you do this in everything. I looked at your market. Niche marks, yeah. Huh?
Niche marks. Niche. Niche. So, you... How do you get...
You do a niche market, you target it. Yeah. Everything's very targeted. So, it's... I always say there's three phases of the buying process.
There's... As soon as somebody's looking to join a business opportunity, they're usually about six months away from actually purchasing. When you first... Most people that are in this room probably went through the same process. When you first went online, maybe you went to Google and you typed in, make money from home.
At that point, you just started your research, and more than likely, you're probably six months away from purchasing. Second phase, you've kind of found the opportunity that you want to go for. Maybe you're two months away, and the final phase is usually, hey, you know what company you're joining, now you just want to find the right team to join with. That's where I like to find my leads. At that final phase.
Yeah. So, you do... It's really niche, right? And it's very targeted. Now, I wanna point something out.
I actually joined you in something once, and it was late one night. What happened was is I needed some video equipment, and it's expensive. You get taxed when you ship stuff into Costa Rica, so I shipped it to John's house.
I just felt like going and hanging out, and I was like, hey, I'm gonna swing by and hang out. And I went to his house. I was fascinated because his day went like this, right? Yeah. He's sitting there, and we're chit-chatting, and the phone rings, right?
And he picks up the phone. He says, hey, this is John. It's like, hey, John, my name's Mary, and I was looking at your website, and I was thinking about joining. I was about to hit the button, and I just had one question. Can I ask a question to you?
And he's like, yeah. Is it really only $25? Yes, Mary. Are you ready to get started? Yes, I'm ready to get started, John.
All right, here's the join link. He sends her a join link, and she gets started. They're chit-chatting, and then he hangs up the phone. And then the phone rings again. It's like, hey, John, this is...
This is John. How are you doing? And he answers the phone, signing people up into stuff all day. And it's different things, like five different things, right? And so I was just like...
It was just weirded out, because it was really different. And then I opted into one of his lists for one of these little names. And I was like, well, I'm going to go with this one. And he says, hey, this is John. Are you ready to get started?
Yes, Mary. Are you ready to get started? Yes, I'm ready to get started, John. All right, here's the join link. He sends her a join link, and she gets started.
They're chit-chatting, and then he hangs up the phone. And then the phone rings again. It's like, hey, John, this is Dave. How are you doing? What do you do?
My phone rings all the time. Generally, you're the person who picks up. And I swear to God, for the next... It was like 90 days, I only got an email for that thing. That's all I got emails for.
Right? I didn't just get emails for four other things. I just got emails for that thing, and that's it. Right? And then late one night, I was drinking some water, and I was thinking about it, and I sent him an email at 2 in the morning, right, and I said, John, I'm thinking about joining, and I swear to God, five seconds later I got a response. It was like, well, as a matter of fact, I'm right here, you know, if you want to call me and you have any questions.
But so you get leads in it, it's just consistent, right? Stay very targeted on the exactly what they opted in for. That's exactly what they're gonna get, and that's it. And you don't just slam with random stuff to your list. I mean, very rarely, you know, I'll do a launch, product launch or something like that, and I will combine all my lists, you know, because I have everything segmented into different things, so I'll combine all my lists for the product launch, but that's once every eight months, something like that, you know. Hey, you're just a fascinating guy, John.
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