You’re Losing Deals You Never Knew You Were In: Why Sales is Won Long Before the RFP

A Hard Truth I Learned the Hard Way

I’ve been an entrepreneur since 2003. I’ve sold 4 businesses – one twice. My background is tech, but as a business owner my job is sales. No matter where I go or what I’m doing, I’m representing my “brand”, I’m influencing someone, and I’m looking for opportunities to help people and mutually make money.

In a way I’ve always done “lead generation.” The basic rule of thumb has always been “more prospects, more dials, more emails” – and as Glengarry Glen Ross says “ABC – A – always, B – be, C – closing – Always be closing.”

Glengarry Glen Ross

But over time, something didn’t add up. It didn’t sit right whether I was doing something for our own lead generation engine or for a client. 

We’d generate dozens of meetings, yet the close rates stayed low, and the show rates would baffle me. Sales reps were frustrated. Prospects “weren’t ready,” or we were “too early,” or worse—the deals we should have won went to someone else entirely.

I started asking around. Listening more. Reading some great books. Studying how top reps were closing the right deals.

That’s when it clicked: they weren’t winning because of what they said on the call. They were winning because the prospect already knew who they were before the call ever happened.

I reflected on a conversation I had with a former boss. He sold for a very large Logistics company and was very successful. One of the things that stuck with me about his “system”. He put a calendar reminder on his Microsoft Outlook to check back with the shipping supervisor every 30 to 60 days. But the key was his consistency. He did it. He actually made the call or visit. And when the company was ready to make the change, his professionalism, his consistency, and his brand got the deal done. It was an “a ha” moment from a simple conversation.

The battle was won months earlier—through content, conversations, and consistency.

That realization led to the use of what is called a Revenue Engine.

The Invisible Majority: 95% of Buyers Aren’t In-Market

According to the 95:5 rule by John Dawes, only 5% of your target market is actively buying at any moment.

That leaves 95% who aren’t in-market yet.

They’re not bad leads. They simply aren’t “leads” yet. They are future buyers who don’t yet have a need for you. 

They’re the buyers who are researching trends, attending webinars, reading articles, scanning your website without converting. They’re forming impressions, even if they’re not filling out a demo form.

If you’re not showing up to them consistently, you’re invisible when it counts.

By the time they do become in-market, they’ve already formed preferences. Preferences based on who educated them while they were still quiet.

Not who cold-called them first.

The Sales Playbook is Broken

Most sales teams are trained to focus on finding “leads.” They build sequences, work cold lists, chase activity goals. That may yield some quick wins, but it doesn’t build a pipeline that grows over time.

And like in Glengary Glen Ross, they complain “the leads are bad.”

Here’s the problem:

When your only strategy is chasing the 5% who are in-market now, you’re stuck in a brutal game of speed and price. Everyone else is chasing them too.

That creates:

In a noisy, saturated market, the only way to win sustainably is to own awareness before the buyer starts shopping.

That requires a new system.

The Awareness Trifecta: Company, Product, and Person

Here’s the part most teams overlook:

When a prospect finally becomes “ready,” they don’t just need to know what your product does.

They need to feel familiar with three things:

1 – Your Company — what you stand for, why you’re different

2 – Your Product/Service — how you solve their pain

3 – Your Sales Rep — the actual human reaching out

If all three are familiar, the buyer feels safe. Trust is already built. They’re far more likely to respond, meet, and convert.

If any one of the three is unfamiliar, they feel risk. Even if your solution is perfect.

At The Lucky Agency, we train and equip clients to build all three types of awareness, systematically, long before the deal hits the CRM.

How We Built The Lucky Revenue Engine

The Lucky Revenue Engine is our blueprint for winning in the 95%.

We built it because the old way of “selling” is like spinning plates on a pole. You have to keep them moving or they fall and break. If you’re good at “sales” then you’re a plate breaker. Inevitably you get enough going that some fall. We got tired of seeing that happen to us and our clients.

Here’s what it includes:

We don’t chase leads.

We engineer intent.

The Power of Intent

Intent isn’t just a buzzword. It’s measurable curiosity.

Here’s what we track:

These behaviors are signals. And when tracked properly, they create a picture of readiness before the buyer even raises their hand.

Since companies buy from you, not prospects, it’s important to see these signals across a single company, not just one prospect seat. Sometimes the decision making team reveals itself.

In our campaigns, we’ve seen:

That’s the power of intent: it lets you show up exactly when your prospect is ready, and not a minute too early.

The Cost of Inaction

We’ve seen what happens when companies delay this work:

We’ve also seen what happens when they invest early:

Your competitors are already building systems like this. If you’re not showing up in your market now, someone else is.

And they’re becoming the obvious choice.

Don’t Just Generate Leads — Build a Revenue Engine

Lead gen is a campaign. A Revenue Engine is a system.

It’s built on:

You don’t have to wait until your pipeline runs dry to fix it.

The most successful companies are building now for revenue they’ll need six months from today.

The Call to Rise Above the Noise

Because sales today isn’t about who pitches first. It’s about who shows up early, often, and helpfully.

The Revenue Engine isn’t magic.

It’s systems, signals, and awareness.

And it’s working.

Curious how you’re showing up to your future buyers?

Take our Revenue Engine Assessment