Qualified leads are right in the breadbasket of your target market. They’re the right size and you're connecting directly with the decision maker..

Get Marketing and Sales to agree on the definition of a Sales-Qualified Lead.

Marketing and sales need to agree on the characteristics of a sales ready lead. Only pass leads to sales that have met your definition of "qualified."

The marketing qualified lead (MQL)

This is a lead that is judged more likely to become a customer, when compared to other leads.
MQLs have shown that they have a relevant need that needs fulfiling or problem that needs solving.  They may have demonstrated this by, for example, downloading your eBook or whitepaper on the subject. 

MQLs and SQLs are different lifecycle stages of the same lead.

A sales qualified lead (SQL)

This is a lead that your sales team believe is ready to make a decision and is therefore worthy of a direct sales follow-up.

Define Marketing Qualified Lead [MQL] Criteria

Sit down with your Sales team and have them make a list of the key items they look for when evaluating lead quality. Examples could include company size or number of employees, job title, or industry.

Once you have the list of items the Sales team is looking for, you can then go back and determine which questions you'd like to and are reasonable to answer in the marketing process. The questions become the criteria in which your marketing team will determine if a lead in the marketing pipeline is a marketing qualified lead [MQL].

An MQL is someone in your pipeline which your marketing team identifies as a great lead and hands it off to the sales team. Typically any lead who converts on a bottom funnel offer, such as a demo, free trial, consultation, or case study, will be an MQL, however, you can also pull out leads higher in the funnel if they meet the criteria of an MQL.

Working with your Sales team and having these criteria clearly defined and worked into your marketing process will ensure that you're handing off the quality leads to the Sales team.