It’s not hard to determine buying intent in the world of digital sales. With proper behavioral pattern tracking, you can find out which prospects are showing buying signals at any scale, whether you have 10 prospects or 10,000 prospects. In sales, timing is a critical factor. Making a purchase too early or too late can significantly change the outcome. By identifying buying signals, sales can prioritize prospects who are ready to buy and also time the sales process appropriately.
Defining Buy Signals
Buying signals are behavioral patterns that prospects display when evaluating your products and services. With digital and SAAS buying, these patterns can be easily identified by tracking website, email, accurate mobile phone number listings , and in-app interactions. Signals can also be tracked by monitoring sales engagement. Is the prospect highly engaged in sales? Is he/she asking relevant questions?
Let’s take a look at 10 defining signals that will help you find sales-ready prospects:
1. Pricing Questions
If a prospect checks your pricing page or asks a question and then continues to evaluate your product, that’s a strong buying signal. It means the prospect accepts your pricing and is more likely to buy if they feel your product fits their needs.
Price page visits as a purchase signal
2. Booking a demo or signing up for a free trial
Another signal is scheduling a demo or signing up for a free trial. While this isn’t a direct purchase intent, it does suggest that the prospect is micro-committed to your product and considering it. Think of it like the difference between seeing an interesting product on Amazon and adding it to a wish list. The act of adding to a wish list can be seen as more serious interest than just browsing.
Product registration as the purpose of purchase
3. Engagement with pre-sales emails
It’s a good idea to keep track of how prospects are interacting with your onboarding and pre-sales emails. Reading your emails and even responding to them or clicking on links from them can be considered good engagement and will serve as a strong signal. Combine this metric with other data points to determine intent and follow up accordingly.
In an age of mass emails to the point where people are now desensitized to emails, good email engagement can be considered a strong signal.
4. Account activation and complete setup
Especially for SAAS companies, this is a strong data point for product qualified leads. A prospect who has completed all the necessary signup steps and has properly set up their account shows strong intent.
To get started, identify key onboarding steps and create a process to track when prospects complete these steps. For example, for email marketing software, setting up your email with the software and creating a trial campaign are good indicators of initial interest.
salespanel account settings prospect scoring prospect intent
5. Frequency of product engagement
The most powerful indicator of intent is product engagement. A prospect who has visited your website multiple times throughout the fans data is much more likely to purchase than someone who has only visited your website once or twice. If you have a SAAS product, a prospect who uses your product frequently is a very strong signal. Again, this is part of the product qualification process.
6. Asking questions about migrating to your product
Serious buyers who are using competing products often ask you how you compare to the competition and how they can seamlessly switch to your product. If a prospect has looked at your pricing, tried your product, and is now asking about migrating, they are a strong buyer candidate.
7. Asking questions about policies, contracts, and after-sales
Serious buyers, especially high-priced customers interested in your product, will often ask tough questions about policies, contract terms, etc. Questions may include:
I have a question about something mentioned in your terms of service.
How do you handle customer data? Do you provide a confidentiality agreement?
How do you handle data security?
Are there any additional fees?
Do you provide a dedicated account manager?
What if I need to upgrade later?
How do you handle cancellation data qatar
? If a high-value prospect is asking these questions and has also tried your product, they are likely in the consideration process and need these questions answered before they buy.
8. Going beyond the free usage limits
Most SAAS companies offer some form of free trial or free account that has limitations. Users who go beyond the free limits are probably getting good value from the product and should benefit from upgrading.
It’s a good idea to create an automated process to identify these prospects and promote account upgrades to them.
9. Interest in a specific use case/product/solution
People who are trying to solve a specific problem are more likely to buy if their problem is solved at a price they can afford. If a prospect engages with content related to a specific feature, product, or use case, it shows strong intent. Not only does this data help you track buying signals, it also helps you target supporting content and give you a good initial sale by providing this data.
lead generation website tracking for qualified product leads
10. Consume high-value content
Interacting with multiple types of content sends clear buying signals. Here are some:
Support content
Online seminars
Case studies
Guides
Implementation tutorials
Only those who are truly considering your product will engage deeply with your high-value resource. Using website tracking and page view duration data, these buyers can be identified.
Pay attention to these 10 buying signals to prioritize high probability trades and sell efficiently.