Do not-home doors count in close rate?

No. Including them gives you a knock-to-close ratio, which is useful for planning a day and misleading for judging a pitch.

What if somebody answered but would not talk?

Judgement call, and consistency matters more than which way you decide. Pick a rule and apply it every time, or the number cannot be compared week to week.

How often should I calculate it?

Weekly is usually the shortest useful window. Daily close rate in door-to-door swings so hard on small numbers that it mostly measures noise.

How to calculate your close rate

Close rate is sales divided by contacts, where a contact is a door at which a human actually spoke to you. Dividing by every door you knocked gives a knock-to-close ratio instead, which is a different and less useful number. The denominator is the whole decision: one measures your pitch, the other measures your pitch and your timing mixed together.

The formula, and the part that goes wrong

Sales divided by contacts. The arithmetic is trivial and reps get it wrong constantly, because the tempting denominator is the one you already have: total doors.

Total doors is easy to count and it silently folds your timing into a number you will use to judge your pitch.

What a contact is

A door where somebody spoke to you. Not a door where you heard a television, not a door where a curtain moved. If the conversation did not happen, the pitch was never tested and the door does not belong in the denominator.

Why the distinction pays

A close rate against contacts moves when your pitch changes. A ratio against total doors moves when your hours change, your area changes, or the weather changes. Only one of those is a number you can act on.

Common questions

Do not-home doors count in close rate?: No. Including them gives you a knock-to-close ratio, which is useful for planning a day and misleading for judging a pitch.
What if somebody answered but would not talk?: Judgement call, and consistency matters more than which way you decide. Pick a rule and apply it every time, or the number cannot be compared week to week.
How often should I calculate it?: Weekly is usually the shortest useful window. Daily close rate in door-to-door swings so hard on small numbers that it mostly measures noise.

More on your numbers

Contact rate, close rate and knock math — and telling a pitch problem from a timing problem.

All of your numbers