Prospect Intent Signals

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Lead Scoring: Throughout the Activation Phase, the prospecting team evaluates intent signals and updates lead scores.

Prospectors gather intent signals from four primary sources:

· Zero Party Data:  Prospects voluntarily provide personal info like: contact info, communication preferences, product preferences, desired content.

· First Party Data: As prospects engage with the corporation’s owned media (corporate website, social media sites, etc.), the corporation uses tracking technology to monitor intent signals.

·  Second Party Data: Zero Party or First Party data collected and shared by a partner corporation.

·  Third-Party Data: Data is collected, aggregated, and sold by corporations that do not have a direct relationship with the prospect typically gathered using Third-Party tracking cookies.

Zero Party data is increasingly critical for successful business development as tracking technology gets blocked.

Each corporation creates its own proprietary approach for gathering intent signals and calculating lead scores.

Three primary methods for calculating lead scores:

· Manual Lead Scoring: Uses multiple steps to determine the lead score.

1. Prospecting team calculates the percentage of all SQLs that converted into customers during a certain period of time.

2. Team analyzes all of the intent signals received for those SQLs that converted into customers.

3. Team then identifies the most common intent signals for those SQLs that converted and assigns scores for each of these signals.

· Logistic Regression Lead Scoring: This is a statistical method of calculating lead scores using spreadsheet software (such as Microsoft Excel) regression formula. The formula compares all intent signals and prospect attributes (such as demographics, firmographics, etc.) across all converted leads and calculates the lead score.

· Predictive Lead Scoring: Uses Artificial Intelligence predictive analytics technology to analyze all converted prospects and intent signals to automatically create a lead scoring formula.

Dark Funnel:
Prospects may research activities platforms where intent signals are not discoverable.

The term, Dark Funnel, is used to describe all of the prospect intent signals a corporation is unable to detect or collect.

Prospects may move in and out of the Dark Funnel as they gather information.

Some may even journey entirely through the Dark Funnel and magically show up at the Conversion Phase.

Hopefully, as good leads.

Tony Gray, BDP
Author of the Business Development Body of Knowledge