Sales Qualified Lead (SQL)
A lead that meets agreed criteria indicating sufficient fit and buying readiness for direct sales engagement.
A shared SQL definition stops sales from wasting time on unready leads and stops marketing from being judged on volume alone, so pipeline reporting and handoffs between the two teams become consistent.
A software company marks a lead as SQL only after a discovery call confirms a budget over $20,000, a named decision-maker and a purchase timeline under 6 months, then creates an opportunity in the CRM within 24 hours.
SQL criteria such as BANT can screen out early-stage buyers who are still forming budgets. Definitions drift between teams and regions, and an SQL label means little if reps do not record why leads were accepted or rejected.
Leads typically move from marketing qualified lead (MQL) to SQL once a sales rep or SDR has qualified them against agreed criteria, often a framework such as BANT (budget, authority, need, timeline) or MEDDIC. In CRMs such as HubSpot, SQL is a lifecycle stage, and the MQL-to-SQL conversion rate is the number of SQLs divided by the number of MQLs in the same cohort.
Data Engineering, Intelligent Automation
HubSpot Knowledge Base — Use contact and company lifecycle stages — https://knowledge.hubspot.com/records/use-lifecycle-stages; HubSpot — How I use BANT to qualify prospects — https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/bant