Every so often a thought leader emerges to declare that marketing-qualified leads (MQLs) are dead. This is usually connected to a fresh study (like this one from HBR) or survey (like this one from Forrester) that demonstrates how much more competition sellers face, and how complicated the buying process has become.

So far, MQLs have lived on. But these big declarative statements are not for nothing — they’ve promoted much-needed scrutiny and debate of the MQL metric which has ultimately improve the way MQLs are calculated and prioritized.

In this article, we’re going to take a look at how the definition of MQLs has changed and how real-world marketers are thinking about MQLs today.

Defining MQLs in 2024

An MQL is a lead the marketing team has determined to be more likely to convert than other leads, based on their intentional engagement with marketing activities and alignment with the ideal customer profile (ICP).

To identify an MQL, marketers will use a scoring system that combines engagement metrics with demographic, firmographic, and technographic information. Each of these data points will be weighted according to how reliable an indicator of interest they are.

Examples of MQL actions, listed according to weight, include:

• Click on an ad

• Signing up for a newsletter

• Downloading an eBook

• Repeating site visits, particularly on high-intent pages like the pricing page

• Engaging with your live chat support

• Watching a demo

• Joining a live demo

• Booking a 1:1 demo

• Signing up for a free trial

Once an MQL has been identified, it is up to the sales team to further qualify the lead and determine whether they are a sales-qualified lead (SQL).

The problem with MQLs

The lower-weighted activities listed above might be enough of an engagement indicator for businesses with low or no-cost CPLs, inexpensive products, and short or impulse-based sales cycles.

But when we’re talking about multi-year contracts with a B2B service or SaaS product, a junior marketer downloading an eBook means next to nothing when it comes to intent to buy. And with longer-than-ever sales cycles, more complicated decision-making processes, and tough competition, mistaking an individual’s interest for a business’s intent can be costly.

When this perpetuates, it can cause a rift between sales — who grow frustrated wasting time disqualifying tire-kicking leads — and marketing — who, despite meeting their KPI of MQLs, are seeing rising CACs and hearing complaints from sales.

On the lead’s side, a flood of follow-up emails from sales after downloading an eBook or signing up for a webinar can be more annoying than helpful and can even lead to a negative brand perception.

So… are MQLs dead?

Not necessarily. But in a lot of businesses, they needed a shake-up.

In an episode of Grow and Tell, Nico Dato, the VP of Marketing who helped grow Podium to a $100m revenue business, said, “I'll go talk to the head of marketing and sales. I'm like, "Hey, do you work with each other?" They're like, "No, not really. They provide us MQLs." I'm like, well, that's part of the issue. It's like the throw over the fence mentality is totally broken. And so you have to align those goals… the MQL metric is just not - it's not a real metric, in my opinion.”

For some leaders, like Nico, throwing out the acronym and moving towards a shared revenue goal is the best way forward. For others, the MQL remains with a clearer, tighter qualification framework that sales and marketing agree on.

How marketers are using MQLs today

We spoke to a number of B2B marketers and found that the majority are still using an MQL as a key KPI — they’ve just gotten a lot clearer on the criteria for qualification and the role they play.

Logan Mallory, VP of Marketing at Motivosity, an HR SaaS company, says, “MQLs remain highly relevant in our marketing strategy. At Motivosity, we have different categories for MQLs, each representing different levels of engagement and readiness to convert. These categories help us tailor our marketing strategies more effectively.”

They’ve also found a way to avoid the ‘throw it over the fence mentality’ that Nico disparaged, and it’s made for better leads and more effective marketing.

“We meticulously track MQLs to map our leads and understand which marketing strategies are most effective at each stage of the sales funnel. By analyzing the conversion rates of MQLs to SQLs, we can determine which strategies are working and which need adjustment.

For example, seeing high conversion rates from webinar attendees might indicate that webinars are particularly effective for our audience, prompting us to invest more in this area.”

Gabriel Lukov, Head of Sales at Businessmap, says MQLs still serve a purpose, but they “are not the primary objective of our marketing team, they serve as vital metrics that contribute to our overarching goal — customer acquisition and success.”

“We define an MQL based on a variety of factors such as customer interactions with our content, digital behavior, and perceived level of interest and fit. We complement MQL tracking with alternative performance metrics to ensure a well-rounded understanding of our marketing effectiveness and customer behavior. These include, for instance, customer engagement metrics and conversion rates from MQL to SQL and eventually to a paying customer.”

Ira Prevalova, Growth Marketing Director at Adverity, takes a similar approach, saying, “Our primary goal is to drive business growth by generating leads that are highly likely to convert into loyal customers. While MQLs are a critical part of this process, we also focus on nurturing leads, improving customer experience, and increasing customer lifetime value. We strive for a balanced approach that includes MQLs as a key metric but also looks at the bigger picture of customer acquisition and retention.”

Elisa Montanari, Head of Organic Growth at Wrike, a work management platform, points out that while MQLs are less valuable than pipeline and revenue data, they continue to be important, “when comparing channels and marketing tactics.” In other words, MQLs can be a useful tool for making optimizations and strategy decisions, so long as you “analyze the entire funnel from MQL and SQL to closed deals and conversions. These measures help you understand the lead quality generated by each channel, bottlenecks, and more accurate measures of full ROI.”

In short, the MQL metric is not dead for most marketers — but it has evolved, and it is just one part of the picture.

Alternatives to MQLs

While most marketing teams are still using an MQL in some shape or form, there have been some interesting alternatives proposed that are worth considering.

1. The buying group

In a Forrester series titled ‘Saying Goodbye to MQLs’ the term ‘Buying Groups’ is proposed as a replacement for MQLs in B2B.

“Our research shows that B2B buying decisions are made in groups, representing multiple departments, roles, and personas. According to data from Forrester’s 2023 Global B2B Buyers’ Journey Survey, 2023, 93% of B2B buyers participated in a buying group consisting of two or more people. And of those B2B buyers, 71% participated in a group of four or more people to make their purchase decisions. Yet many organizations still have a revenue process that focuses exclusively on a single lead, signal, or MQL.”

Buying groups better represent the group of individuals tasked with identifying solutions and making a decision. They might include the more junior members of the team who do early comparative research, mid-level managers who build a shortlist, participate in demos and utilize free trials, and C-Suite teams who are presented with a proposed solution, approve the spend and make a final decision.

Buying groups can be more difficult to track and qualify. They do become highly relevant for marketing and sales teams that adopt an account-based marketing approach.

2. Product-qualified leads

Some SaaS companies have replaced the MQL with a product-qualified lead (PQL), or track the two side-by-side. A product-qualified lead is one that signed up for a free trial or freemium plan and, as Product Led's Wes Bush puts it, "experienced meaningful value using your product."

To measure a PQL, the business needs to decide which product actions and behaviors are indicators or ‘meaningful value.’ Like other lead types, these actions and behaviors are typically weighted in a lead scoring model to help prioritize leads for sales teams.

Product-qualified leads can be used in conjunction with MQLs. For example, an MQL engages with your brand via marketing channels and signs up for a free trial, then goes on to become a PQL when they realize the value of the product, and finally becomes an SQL when they show intent to purchase after engaging with the sales team.

Setting better goals for your marketing team

Whether MQL, PQL, buying groups, or something else entirely, a metric is only good as the criteria behind it and the way it is implemented.

1. Set clear criteria and get buy-in from sales

Setting clear criteria, and weighting for that criteria, for your MQL or other lead type is essential for generating leads who are more likely to convert. This criteria should be presented to sales and agreed upon, then reviewed regularly to assess lead quality and make changes where required.

A sophisticated, customizable lead scoring platform with automatic degradation for behavior-based activities will help put this criteria into action.

2. Layer other business metrics

To avoid the “throw it over the fence” mentality, marketing should be invested in the outcome of the MQLs they generate. This means they should be close to the rest of the pipe and held to account if MQLs are not becoming SQLs and then customers. Achieving this requires true marketing and sales alignment, as well as data transparency.

3. Create lead categories

If you have a long sales cycle or are competing for multi-year deals, an MQL showing interest in your product or service now could take months or even years to turn into a customer. This can make it difficult to track the marketing team’s efforts.

Creating lead categories can help. For example, you might have a category of early-stage researchers who are funneled into automated nurture journeys until they start to show true intent signals and shift over to the sales team for qualifications. If you have a SaaS model, you could put a PQL in place to bridge the gap between marketing and sales.

4. Think beyond the conversion

When marketing and sales are engaged with customer loyalty metrics, they think beyond the conversion and aim to generate customers who have a higher CLV and go on to become referrals. This requires marketing, sales, and success to work together with the common goal of driving business growth.

Final word: MQLs are only as good as the systems around them

Metrics become vanity metrics when they are no longer connected to the overall health of the business. Regularly challenging and changing your MQL criteria will go a long way to making this staple marketing metric worth tracking.