How Harmonic Improved Conversions Through Lead Qualification

Harmonic.ai delivers a complete startup database that is bringing the efficiency of public markets to the private sector, helping investors hone their theses by getting a real-time view of the companies that match them. Harmonic launched a little over a year ago and since then they have been growing much faster.

With this rapid expansion came significant challenges, particularly in qualifying potential customers and determining when they were ready to engage with the sales team.

Initially, Harmonic.ai had a straightforward approach, allowing almost anyone to schedule meetings with their Account Executives using a simple web form with a Calendly embed. This method, though convenient, soon began to create complications by filling meeting calendars with poor-fit prospects.

Meet Akbar Khan, the Head of Growth at Harmonic.ai. He's juggling sales, marketing, and operations. He's the go-to person for growth and GTM — primarily focused on growing Harmonic’s inbound pipeline.

The Problem: Inefficient Lead Management

The Initial Struggle - Qualification

Harmonic's AEs found themselves overwhelmed with meetings, half of which involved leads that did not progress into sales opportunities — due to a lack of qualification from Calendly’s scheduler. This inefficiency led to promising leads being overlooked, delayed responses to serious demo requests, and a decline in conversion rates.

Escalating Challenges - A Growing Sales Team

The company's reliance on basic tools and big plans to grow was going in the way of the evolving needs of Harmonic.ai. The sales team, leadership, and Akbar realized that they needed a new inbound process to capture the demand they had spent many months trying to generate.

The Solution: Harmonic's Strategic Move

In response to the challenges, Harmonic explored various tools to improve their inbound pipeline quality and conversion rates. After evaluating multiple tools, Harmonic selected Default for its end-to-end workflow, because of the complete workflow builder, seamless implementation, and no engineering effort required.

The Results: Impact of Implementing Default

• Improved Lead Quality: Harmonic went from not being able to filter out unqualified prospects to having a clear process for capturing inbound requests and directing the buyer to the designated sales rep.
• Increased Sales Efficiency: The sales team got more time for promising leads instead of chasing ghosts, or having a full calendar with non-ICP buyers — making the actual buyer wait longer for an opportunity to buy.
• Better Conversion Rates: This led to AEs closing more deals and hitting targets because they were talking to the right prospects. Now they can spend quality time with quality buyers resulting in better results and experience.

Additionally, this overhaul brought personal benefits to Akbar. He noticed a decrease in complaints from the sales team and found himself better positioned to focus on larger, strategic go-to-market initiatives that drive growth.

Conclusion: Default's Winning Edge

Harmonic.ai's experience highlights Default as a standout choice in inbound lead management for its ease and effectiveness. Its quick and easy setup means one-person growth teams and larger RevOps departments can hit the ground running faster and with fewer resources. Default’s simple yet powerful workflow builder streamlines lead qualification, enrichment, routing, and scheduling—from seed to IPO.

Just like Harmonic.ai experienced, using Default leads to higher lead quality and more pipeline. Schedule a demo of Default to see it in action.