Next week is the last one of August, with the sales month closing on Saturday unless your dealership delivers vehicles on Sunday.

Leads that come in during the last seven days of the month close at an 8% higher rate than those from the first week. That’s one of the main findings from Foureyes, which released a new study analyzing more than 8 million sales opportunities across dealerships nationwide.

The provider of dealership sales intelligence on Tuesday also explained what Foureyes dubbed the “Day 4+ Cliff.”

According to the report, nearly three-quarters of all sales occur in the first three days of an opportunity’s creation. While significant, Foureyes said that trend means there is still one in four sales occurring after that point, which experts said is “also not insignificant.”

Similarly, Foureyes found that close rates plummeted after day three, going from 12.4% in the first three days to just 2.3% during days four through seven.

“Why? Buyer lost interest? They bought somewhere else? Maybe,” Foureyes said in its report. “But this is the same time period when Foureyes finds follow-up efforts also plummet across dealerships. Coincidence?”

When looking at used cars versus new models, Foureyes discovered new and used vehicles produce distinct patterns in close-rate behavior across the 30-day window.

The report indicated that despite new vehicles having a slightly higher 30-day close rate, used vehicles sell much faster in the first few days (77.2% versus 69.5%).

And what about how dealerships obtain the lead?

Foureyes reported that phone leads close 3.5 times more than the rate of form leads (24.8% versus 7%). Meanwhile, walk-ins top the close chart at 41%, prompting Foureyes to say the gap among those three lead sources “underscores how dramatically close rates differ by lead type and signals where dealerships may have an opportunity to improve follow-up effectiveness.”

The study was designed to pinpoint where and when close rates peak across the 30-day lead lifecycle. Foureyes wanted to help dealerships spot overlooked opportunities, the timing factors that shape lead conversion, and provide sales leaders, GMs, and dealer principals with a more complete picture of how today’s buyers convert.

“These are missed handshakes,” Foureyes founder and CEO David Steinberg said in a news release. “We ran this study to give dealers a clearer view of not just how many leads they close, but when they close and what’s getting overlooked. Every sale that slips past Day 3 is still winnable. Dealers just need to be equipped with the right visibility and process to close them.”

The full report titled, Every Lead Counts: Inside the 30-Day Close Rate Curve, also includes benchmarks and guidance to help operational leaders evaluate their current performance, identify revenue leakage, and build processes that support smarter follow-up across the full sales cycle.

The report can be found via this website.