A lead count can look good while your sales team ignores most of it. Before you sign with a lead vendor, or an AI tool that qualifies leads, check the handoff, not only the volume. These are illustrative checks, not customer results or claims about a particular product.
Ask what counts as a handoff
Write down the fields a useful lead must carry: intent, budget signal, timing, the question the buyer asked, consent to be contacted and a named owner. If the vendor cannot say which of these they pass on, you are buying names.
Ask who accepts it
Decide who on your team accepts or rejects a lead, and how they record why. A rejection reason tells you more about vendor quality than a lead count.
Ask whether outcomes go back to the ads
Google Ads documents qualified lead and converted lead goals so CRM stages can feed ad optimization. See Google Ads lead goal guidance Ask whether the vendor sets this up, and whether your consent terms allow sending contact data. See also enhanced conversions for leads guidance
Check the stage you optimize on
A third-party guide on Meta's Conversions API for CRM suggests a middle-funnel stage that is frequent enough to learn from and inside the attribution window. It is not Meta documentation, so verify it. See Zapier's third-party guide
Know when volume is fine
For a simple, low-ticket sale, a lead count may be enough. Add handoff checks as your sales cycle gets longer or your leads get more expensive.
Quick checklist
- Written handoff definition agreed by both sides
- Named owner for every lead
- Accepted and rejected counts with reasons
- Consent recorded before any data is sent back
- A review of what the team did with last month's leads
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