Intent data
Intent data is third-party or first-party behavioral signal used to infer that an account is actively researching a purchase.
First-party intent is observed on owned properties and is high-confidence but low-coverage. Third-party intent is inferred from off-property behavior and is broad but noisy, often resolved to the account level from IP or bidstream data. Treating the two as interchangeable inputs to one score is the standard error.
Intent is only actionable when it is bound to a defined response: which accounts, surfaced to whom, with what obligation to act, within what window. A signal that produces no governed action is a subscription cost.
Where it breaks
Intent surges are delivered to a dashboard nobody owns, so the perishable window closes before anyone acts.
Related terms
- Lead scoring
- Lead scoring is a model that ranks records by expected conversion, and it is only valid when it is calibrated against realized outcomes.
- Ideal customer profile (ICP)
- An ICP is a testable specification of the accounts a company can serve profitably and repeatably, expressed in attributes the revenue system can actually evaluate.
- Account-based marketing (ABM)
- ABM is a demand model in which the account, not the contact, is the unit of targeting, measurement and qualification.
- Routing
- Routing is the deterministic assignment of a record to an owner based on registered rules, segment, territory, coverage, and existing account relationship.
Field notes on this
- The MQL debate needs an acceptance record
A recorded acceptance decision makes lead-quality disputes inspectable. It is a signal, not a complete diagnosis of demand performance.