What Are Market Qualified Leads?

Qualifying Market Leads is an important part of creating a more effective sales strategy. MQLs, or Marketing Qualified Leads, is a way for a sales team to find which prospective leads will mostly likely become a customer compared to a traditional lead. This is all based upon their activity on converting in the sales cycle. Sorting out the MQLs allows your sales force to spend more time working towards prospective customers and thus, creating more revenue.

How do you tell who is an MQL?

MQL are a key aspect of the B2B sales process, however, there is not one specific MQL used for every company. A MQL is defined differently from company to company, so it’s a smart move to create a buyer persona based on many different factors. A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers (Hubspot)

There may be a huge amount of potential leads you are missing out on. Some examples of some characteristics an MQLs might exhibit are:

• Requesting information
• Downloading demos;
• Signing up for newsletters/subscriptions;
• Visiting your webpage;
• Sharing information via email/social media platforms;
• Reading blog pieces your company wrote;
• Reaching out to your business.

If a lead if taking part in any of these activities, that means they are coming to you and showing interest in your company and services.

However, only 44% of B2B marketers use buyer personas (ITSMA). This means a very valuable resource is not being used in most B2B companies, giving you the upper hand. 

So, a person to using your information – that doesn’t mean they are a MQL. Other key factors to keep in mind when determining your MQL is their demographics. For example:

• Age
• Income;
• Education;
• Title/Position/Roles;
• Industry.

These multiple demographics added with characteristics your lead is exhibiting creates your Market Qualified Lead.

You’ve talked to your team and created some buyer personas for your company. Now, what?

Time to implement it! By analyzing your MQLs leads and closing ratings – see what works best for your company and for you. Create more call-to-actions and downloadables across your company’s website to obtain a better grasp of who is actually using them as a resource. Learn more about existing customers to establish their key traits.

Learn, Research, Implement. 

Developing MQLs is not a once and done initiative. It is a process that takes time and needs to grow as your company grows.