What is a Qualified Lead?

A qualified lead or a sales qualified lead is a potential customer who has been identified through marketing efforts undertaken by the marketing team. This individual is generally someone who has somehow responded to marketing efforts and has made some intentional or unintentional indication of their interest or willingness to purchase the company's product. This individual is turned or referred over to the sales team for follow-up contact or engagement.

What is Lead Qualification?

Lead qualification is the process of determining which potential customers are most likely to make a purchase.  The purpose of lead qualification is to eliminate those who are not likely to purchase the product and to increase salesperson efficiency. 

What constitutes a Qualified Sales Lead?

Generally, a prospective customer or client id deemed to be qualified when the sales team determines that they should be contacted or engaged about purchasing the company's product or service. The sales team generally reviews the profile or characteristics of a potential customer. These may include:

• Customers perceived needs;
• Potential solutions meeting customers needs;
• Fit of company product or service with customer needs;
• Ability of customer to deliver the required return value (ex. Pay for goods/services).

An unqualified lead is one that does not meet the company's standards for follow-up contact by the sales team. It may seam counter-intuitive for the sales team to not follow up with every potential customer. The reason comes down to allocation of resources (particularly the salespersons time). If the salesperson has a finite amount of time to allocate to selling activities, she will need to allocate that time to the customers or clients most likely to convert into a final sale. This is true for internal sales and external sales teams.