Lead scoring Q&A with Manticore's VP of Marketing

Lead scoring is being discussed more and more in the world of B2B marketing and demand generation best practices. I've asked Manticore Technology's Vice President of Marketing, Christopher Doran, to shed some light on the topic.

Q: Christopher, a lot of people are talking about lead scoring, but not a lot of people are doing it. What are the benefits of using lead scoring?

A: Lead Scoring is all about identifying leads which are most likely to buy today and sending them over to sales, while those that aren't quite ready stay in the marketing realm for additional nurturing until they're ready to buy.

It's quite the hot topic with B2B marketers right now.

Q: How do you recommend someone gets started with a lead scoring program?

A: There are three steps to getting started with lead scoring.

First is sales and marketing agreeing to a definition of a qualified lead, in effect identifying the point at which a lead from marketing is sent to sales. It's absolutely critical that sales and marketing agree on this definition. Get granular in your definition. Look at characteristics like industry, departments, titles, and willingness to buy, budget, need, and timeline for purchase.

The second step is looking for a lead scoring platform that will allow you to turn the characteristics you've defined into numeric values that will be calculated for leads as they exist in your pipeline.

Third would be indenting the numeric threshold at which a lead is qualified. Leads with scores above this number are owned by sales while leads below are further nurtured by marketing until they are qualified.

Q: What kind of characteristics should I be looking for in a lead scoring platform?

A: When choosing a lead scoring system - I recommend a couple of things. First - look for a system that you can easily modify on the fly. Lead scoring is an art - expect your scoring equation to develop over time. Your solution should easily evolve with you instead of requiring re-deployment with every evolution.

Second - look for a system that offers a free trial of the software. In this SAAS world we live in, there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to kick the tires on a system before you buy it.


Q: What if a lead has a low score initially but over time would score differently because you’ve qualified them or they’re finally ready to talk to a sales rep? How do you make sure that the good stuff floats to the surface?

A: Think of lead scores as dynamic creatures that are always rising and falling as more is learned about each lead's level of interest. When configuring your specific lead scoring equation, define what actions leads need to have taken in order to be qualified. Is it downloading a whitepaper? Or downloading a whitepaper, viewing a webinar, and requested a demo?

Your lead scoring system should be tracking these actions to ensure that your hottest leads rise to the top.

Thanks Christopher!