What is a qualified prospect?

A qualified prospect is a potential client who meets specific criteria based on your business needs. Only voluntary prospects are considered qualified during prospecting, meaning the information provided by the lead is given willingly and freely. Purchased prospects and database contacts are not considered qualified leads.

The different types of qualified prospects

There are three ways to classify qualified prospects:

• Marketing Qualified Leads (MQL) are prospects who meet the minimum criteria to continue marketing actions.
• Sales Qualified Leads (SQL) are those who are sufficiently qualified for a sales approach.
• Product Qualified Leads (PQL) are leads who have experienced significant value by using your product through a free trial or freemium model. Each organization should define its own criteria: MQL for marketing, SQL for sales, and PQL for product.

Improve your closing

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

An MQL is typically someone who meets the minimum criteria to keep engaging them, hoping to move them down the marketing funnel and hand them off to sales for further evaluation and conversion.

To qualify a marketing lead, you need some preliminary data points such as:

• Prospect's name
• Company name
• Email address
• Industry or vertical
• Contact number
• One or two questions to assess interest (e.g., a pain point) to help you craft a targeted marketing approach.

Sales Qualified Lead (SQL)

Unlike MQLs, SQLs have provided budget information, shown a higher level of interest, company size, the lead's role/company, number of employees, or something sector-specific. When running an account-based marketing campaign, you can "fast-track" new leads from the target list as SQLs.

To qualify a prospect as sales qualified, you need some preliminary data points such as:

• User interest in talking to sales
• Request for demo/quote
• Company size
• Purchase intent

A qualified lead is a prospect generated by the marketing team, evaluated by the sales team, and fits the profile of an ideal customer with buying intent. Proper lead qualification is essential for building a healthy sales pipeline.

It's important to note there are no standard criteria; it's unique to your business.

Tip: By using a CRM like HubSpot, you can automate these disqualifying factors to save time.

B2B: 4 Key Characteristics of a Qualified Prospect

How can you recognize a prospect's qualification by their maturity level? Even in their consideration phase, they stand out by:

They have a need, and that need is to solve a business problem. They're looking for an answer to a question, a service, a provider, to fill a gap in their company, a service, or a solution.

They value their decision-making power: they have enough authority to commit their company. Usually, they are a decision-maker. They are at a point where urgency is key. They want to create major change because they know it's the right time.

They are all ears and fully trust you—your offer, your person, and everything you represent. They often want to meet you because they're open-minded and believe you can deliver the results they want.

You might think this client is just a dream and too good to be true?

Indeed, it's rare to meet such a prospect, but if you do, it's a big opportunity to build a trusting relationship.

At first, almost no prospect will have all four characteristics. Don't lose hope—the perfect client is rare but does exist. And there will always be others. ;)

For this reason, your executive development plan should make you happy.