Lead Generation Glossary

Firmographic Data

Company-level descriptive data used to classify and filter organisations for outbound targeting. Key fields include industry, employee headcount, annual revenue, geography, and funding stage. The foundation of ICP-based list building.

Technographic Data

Data about the technology stack a company currently uses. Reveals which platforms, tools, and integrations are in place. Used to target companies running a specific CRM, marketing automation tool, or legacy system your product replaces or integrates with.

Intent Data

Behavioural signal data indicating a company is actively researching a topic related to your product. Sources include third-party content consumption data and search behaviour aggregated across publisher networks. Allows outbound teams to prioritise accounts already in a buying motion.

Contact-Level Data

Individual-level records including name, job title, seniority, email address, LinkedIn URL, and direct phone number. Distinct from account-level data which describes the company. Both are needed for effective outbound: account data defines whether to target, contact data defines who to reach.

Data Decay Rate

The rate at which contact records become outdated as people change roles, companies, or email addresses. B2B contact data decays at roughly 20 to 25 percent per year. Lists older than six months should be re-validated before any campaign launch.

List Segmentation

The process of dividing a prospect list into subgroups based on shared attributes such as industry, company size, geography, or job function. Segmentation enables tailored messaging for each group rather than sending one generic sequence to the entire list.

Verified Email

An email address that has been checked against a validation service to confirm it exists, is active, and is safe to send to. Campaigns built on unverified lists produce high bounce rates that damage sending domain reputation rapidly.

Suppression List

A list of contacts or domains excluded from all outreach, covering existing clients, competitors, opted-out contacts, and any accounts marked as do not contact. Applied to every new campaign list before launch to prevent contacting the wrong people.

Contact vs Lead

A contact is a record in a database with name, company, and email. A lead is a contact who has shown some signal of potential interest or fit, either through engagement with outreach or through matching the ICP closely enough to warrant active pursuit. Not every contact is a lead.

Inbound Lead

A prospect who initiated contact with your company, typically through a website form, content download, or direct inquiry. Inbound leads convert at higher rates than outbound because they self-selected. Most B2B companies cannot generate enough inbound volume to hit revenue targets without supplementing with outbound.

Outbound Lead

A prospect identified and contacted by the sales team rather than one who initiated contact. Outbound leads require more nurturing touchpoints before converting to a meeting but allow precise targeting of the ICP regardless of whether they are currently in market.

Lead Magnet

A piece of content or resource offered to attract inbound contact details, such as a checklist, template, or industry report. In B2B, lead magnets pre-qualify the lead by topic. A lead who downloads a cold email infrastructure checklist has already signalled relevance before any sales conversation begins.

Lead Scoring

A numerical system that ranks prospects by combining ICP fit score with behavioural engagement signals such as email opens, website visits, and content downloads. Higher scores indicate a prospect worth prioritising for SDR follow-up over lower-scored contacts on the same list.

Negative ICP

A defined profile of company types that should be excluded from targeting because they consistently churn, produce low deal values, or are difficult to close. Building a negative ICP is as important as building the positive one. It prevents the same poor-fit accounts from being reloaded into campaigns.

Top of Funnel (TOFU)

The earliest stage of the pipeline where prospects are being identified and first contacted. TOFU activity is measured in volume: contacts reached, emails sent, calls made, and LinkedIn connections initiated. TOFU output is the raw material for everything downstream.

Buying Signal

An observable action or event indicating a prospect may be ready to evaluate a purchase. Common B2B buying signals include hiring for a role your product supports, a funding announcement, a technology change, or repeated engagement with your content in a short window.

Trigger-Based Outreach

Outreach initiated by a specific buying signal rather than a time-based campaign schedule. Examples include contacting a company within 48 hours of a funding announcement or reaching out to a new hire in a relevant role. Trigger-based outreach converts at higher rates because timing is aligned with a real event in the prospect's world.

Account Prioritisation

The process of ranking target accounts by combined score of ICP fit, intent signals, and timing factors, so outbound effort is concentrated on the accounts most likely to convert right now rather than distributed equally across the full addressable list.

Contact-to-Lead Ratio

The percentage of outreach contacts that convert to a positive reply or meeting request. The primary efficiency metric for list quality and messaging effectiveness. Below 1 percent indicates a targeting, data quality, or copy problem. Above 5 percent on cold outbound indicates strong ICP alignment.

Pipeline Velocity

The speed at which leads move through the pipeline from first contact to closed deal. Calculated as the product of number of opportunities, average deal value, and win rate, divided by average sales cycle length. Increasing any one of these four variables increases pipeline velocity.

Cost Per Lead (CPL)

Total spend on a campaign divided by the number of leads generated. CPL varies significantly by channel and ICP. Outbound cold email typically produces a lower CPL than paid advertising for B2B audiences. CPL without a corresponding lead quality metric is misleading: cheap leads that never convert inflate volume without producing revenue.

Lead-to-Meeting Rate

The percentage of leads that convert to a booked discovery call or sales meeting. Measures the quality of both the lead and the SDR follow-up process. A low lead-to-meeting rate on high-volume outbound indicates either poor lead quality or slow, inconsistent follow-up speed.

Sourced Pipeline

The total value of deals in the pipeline that originated from a specific lead generation activity or channel. Allows revenue attribution back to the campaign, list, or channel that produced the opportunity, enabling budget allocation decisions based on what actually generates revenue rather than what generates the most activity.

Lead Velocity Rate (LVR)

Month-over-month growth in qualified leads. A leading indicator of future revenue because it measures whether the pipeline input is growing, flat, or declining before the effect reaches closed revenue. Positive LVR sustained over several months predicts ARR growth. Declining LVR predicts a pipeline shortfall 60 to 90 days ahead.

Attribution Model

The rule set used to assign credit for a closed deal to one or more touchpoints in the buyer journey. First-touch attribution gives all credit to the first interaction. Last-touch gives it to the final one. Multi-touch models distribute credit across all contacts. The attribution model chosen determines which channels appear to be performing and which are undervalued.