SQL (Sales Qualified Lead)
A lead that sales has accepted as worth active pursuit.
Sales Qualified Lead (SQL) is a lead that the sales team has accepted as qualified enough to actively work toward a deal. SQL typically follows MQL in the funnel and implies a sales rep has reviewed and committed to the opportunity.
Context
SQL is the handoff point between marketing and sales. Getting this stage right requires a clear SLA: what marketing commits to delivering (criteria for MQL), what sales commits to doing (response time, working the lead), and how failures are triaged.
Cost per SQL is a more actionable paid-media metric than cost per lead for most B2B companies, because CPL optimizes for volume and CPSQL optimizes for quality. The gap between these two metrics is often 3–10x.
A healthy B2B SaaS might show $200 CPL (cost per lead), $800 CPSQL (cost per SQL — 4:1 MQL→SQL ratio), and $4,000 CAC (5:1 SQL→closed-won). The CPSQL is the number paid media teams should optimize toward.
When 'SQLs' regularly go stale without sales engagement, the SLA is broken. A marketing team producing SQLs sales doesn't work is worse than producing fewer, better leads.
Related terms
Services that apply this
More B2B & SaaS terms
ICP (Ideal Customer Profile)
A description of the best-fit customer for a B2B product.
ABM (Account-Based Marketing)
Targeting specific named accounts with coordinated multi-channel programs.
Intent Data
Signals indicating a company is actively researching products like yours.
ARR (Annual Recurring Revenue)
The normalized annual value of all recurring subscription revenue.