10 Pardot Lead Scoring Best Practices

Pardot lead scoring is a great way to prioritize your leads and make sure you’re spending your time on the most qualified prospects. But with so many factors to consider, it can be tough to know where to start.

To help you get the most out of Pardot lead scoring, we’ve put together a list of 10 best practices. By following these best practices, you can be sure you’re scoring your leads accurately and effectively.

1. Create a scoring model that aligns with your sales process

If your sales process is linear (i.e., a prospect must complete certain steps in order to be ready to buy), then your lead scoring model should reflect that. For example, if you have a three-step sales process (Awareness, Interest, Decision), then you would want to create a lead score for each stage.

However, if your sales process is more complex (i.e., a prospect can be ready to buy at any time), then your lead scoring model should be more flexible. In this case, you would want to create a lead score for each individual criterion (e.g., job title, company size, budget, etc.), and then weight those criteria based on their importance.

Creating a lead scoring model that aligns with your sales process will help you better qualify and prioritize leads, and ultimately close more deals.

2. Use negative scores to eliminate unqualified leads from the top of the funnel

If you’re not familiar with Pardot, it’s a marketing automation tool that allows you to score leads based on their engagement with your brand. The higher the score, the more engaged the lead is.

One way to use Pardot lead scoring is to give negative scores to leads that don’t meet your minimum qualifications. For example, if you’re looking for leads that are in a certain job title or industry, you can give them a negative score if they don’t meet those criteria.

This is a great way to keep unqualified leads from cluttering up your database and skewing your results. It also allows you to focus your attention on the leads that are most likely to convert, which is where you should be spending your time.

3. Score for engagement and activity

If you’re only scoring leads based on demographic criteria (like job title, company size, or industry), you’re not getting the full picture of how engaged a lead is with your brand. By also scoring for engagement and activity, you can get a more holistic view of which leads are most interested in your products or services.

Engagement scoring looks at factors like whether a lead has opened or clicked an email, visited your website, or filled out a form. Activity scoring looks at factors like how many times a lead has been contacted, how long ago they were contacted, and whether they’ve responded to any contact attempts.

Both engagement and activity scoring are important because they give you insights into not only who your best leads are, but also how likely they are to convert.

4. Don’t over-score or under-score

If you over-score leads, you run the risk of having too many unqualified leads in your system. This can lead to your sales team getting frustrated with Pardot and not using it to its full potential.

On the other hand, if you under-score leads, you may miss out on good opportunities because a lead didn’t score high enough.

The best way to avoid these problems is to make sure you’re scoring leads accurately. Use a mix of factors, including engagement, demographics, and firmographics, to get a well-rounded picture of each lead.

5. Use multiple lead score fields

When you use multiple lead score fields, you can more accurately track a prospect’s interactions and level of engagement. This is because you can assign different weights to different interactions.

For example, you might give more weight to a webinar sign-up than an eBook download. By using multiple lead score fields, you can make sure that your most engaged prospects are getting the attention they deserve.

Additionally, using multiple lead score fields can help you segment your leads more effectively. For example, you might have one lead score field for general engagement and another for product interest. This way, you can target your marketing efforts more efficiently.

Overall, using multiple lead score fields is a great way to get more accurate insights into your prospects’ behavior and interests.

6. Set up alerts to notify you when prospects hit certain thresholds

If you’re not alerted when a prospect hits a certain score, you might miss the opportunity to engage with them. By setting up alerts, you can make sure you’re always aware of when a prospect is interested and ready to be contacted.

You can set up alerts in Pardot by going to Admin > Lead Scoring > Alerts. From there, you can create an alert and choose what trigger conditions should cause the alert to be sent. For example, you could set it up so that you’re notified whenever a prospect reaches a score of 80 or higher.

Pardot lead scoring alerts are a great way to make sure you never miss an opportunity to engage with a hot prospect.

7. Use automation rules to adjust scores based on specific actions

Automation rules allow you to score leads based on their behavior in a way that’s not possible with the default lead scoring model. For example, you can give leads a higher score if they open your emails, click links, or visit certain pages on your website.

This is important because it allows you to score leads based on their engagement with your content, which is a good predictor of whether they’re interested in your product or service.

It’s also important to note that you can use automation rules to adjust scores up or down. This means that you can penalize leads for negative actions, such as unsubscribing from your emails or visiting your pricing page without taking any other action.

Overall, using automation rules to adjust scores is a great way to fine-tune your lead scoring and make sure that you’re only sending sales-ready leads to your sales team.

8. Make sure your marketing and sales teams are aligned on what makes a qualified lead

If your marketing team is generating leads that your sales team doesn’t consider qualified, then those leads are going to waste. Likewise, if your sales team has a different definition of a qualified lead than your marketing team, they’re going to be frustrated when the leads they receive don’t meet their expectations.

To avoid this situation, it’s important to have a clear understanding of what each team considers to be a qualified lead. Once you have that alignment, you can create a Pardot lead score that accurately reflects the criteria that both teams agree upon.

9. Keep an eye on your lead quality

If you’re not careful, it’s easy to let your lead quality suffer as you focus on increasing the quantity of leads coming in. However, more leads doesn’t necessarily mean better leads. In fact, if your lead quality is low, it can actually hurt your business in the long run.

That’s why it’s important to strike a balance between quantity and quality when it comes to your leads. Make sure you’re taking the time to score and grade your leads so that you know which ones are worth pursuing and which ones aren’t.

Additionally, don’t be afraid to adjust your scoring criteria as needed. As your business grows and changes, so too will your ideal customer. By keeping an eye on your lead quality and making adjustments as necessary, you can ensure that you’re always focused on generating the best leads possible.

10. Test, test, test!

When you’re first setting up your Pardot account, it’s important to get a feel for how the system works and how your leads will interact with it. The best way to do this is by testing out your lead scoring rules on a small group of leads before you launch your campaign.

This will help you catch any potential issues with your lead scoring rules and ensure that they’re working as intended. It’s also a good idea to periodically test your lead scoring rules to make sure they’re still accurate and effective.