Glossary: The Stages in the Demand Waterfall

The Demand Waterfall is a framework for tracking the lifecycle of a contact from the point of entry into our systems until Closed Won. We track each contact’s Waterfall Stage, creating snapshot records whenever there’s a change, and reporting these historical details in the Waterfall Lead Dashboard.

Related: Benchmarks for B2B Funnel Conversion Rates <<

Stage Definitions in the Demand Waterfall

• Open-Cold: Contact is not in active cycle and has either not done anything, or not done anything in at least 30 days. The contact can receive calls from Business Development Reps (BDRs). (List purchase upload, previously recycled leads, etc.
• Open-Inquiry: The contact has recently engaged within the last 30 days but is currently scored as Cold and not actively in the cycle. The contact can receive calls from BDRs.
• AQL: Automation Qualified Lead. This means a lead that has met the Hot/Warm lead score threshold. AQL-Sales is pending sales acceptance. After 2 hours, it will fall to AQL-BDR (pending BDR acceptance). If there is not enough info in order to assign to a rep, AQL-Sales may be assigned to a BDR. Reps may still accept the lead if it is in their territory, but BDRs can accept leads in the AQL-Sales stage if they are the contact owner.
  • Sales reps can take a lead back from the BDRs if it is still in the AQL-BDR stage. Only BDR can call when Inbound BDR is overloaded and needs Outbound team support, marked under Red Flag lists.
• SAL: Sales Accepted Lead. Hot/Warm leads and transfers accepted by Sales Reps are not eligible to receive calls from BDR.
• TAL: Telemarketing Accepted Lead. Hot/Warm leads either accepted by the Inbound BDR team or accepted by a Sales Rep and fell to the Inbound BDR team due to lack of calls and/or follow up tasks. The contact can receive calls from BDR if:
  • A) If the lead has been inactive for the last 14 days and no follow-up tasks are scheduled
    or
  • B) The Inbound BDR requires assistance from the Outbound team due to high volume, as indicated in Red Flag lists.

• SGL: Sales Generated Lead. Non-customer Contacts entered into Salesforce manually by a Sales Rep in the last 30 days. The contact cannot receive calls from BDRs.
• TGL: Telemarketing Generated Lead. Non-customer Contacts entered into Salesforce manually by a BDR in the last 30 days. The contact is eligible to receive calls from BDRs if no follow up tasks are scheduled.
• TQL: Telemarketing Qualified Lead. A contact where a BDRs has scheduled a meeting with a Sales Rep and awaits the rep’s acceptance. The contact cannot receive calls from BDRs.
• SQL: Sales Qualified Lead. Contact attached to an open opportunity via an Opportunity Contact Role. The contact cannot receive calls from BDRs.
• Customer: Customer contact. Some contacts within a customer account may not be categorized as customers. The contact cannot receive calls from BDRs.
• Ignore: This stage includes contacts that will never become customers, either marked as Junk Data, Spam, Logi Employees, or permanently disqualified leads. Contacts in this stage will never become Hot/Warm leads unless an Admin manually overrides the stage.
• Recycle: Simply defined as a Contact that has fallen out of an active Sales Cycle. Specifically, a Contact that has either been disqualified by a Sales Rep/BDR (e.g. Not Ready, No Budget, etc.) or has expired.

• • Contacts will stay in the SAL stage until 1 day after the latest Acceptance date, the meeting date (if it was a transfer), or the follow-up date.

• • When this expires, if it has been <14 days since acceptance, the lead will go to the Inbound BDR, otherwise it will be recycled.

• • TALs undergo automatic recycling after 44 days, with a breakdown of 14 days for Inbound and 30 days for Outbound. 

• • If a contact is linked to an opportunity marked as Closed Lost, we will flag it for recycling.

• • In this stage, we pause nurture stream emails and BDRs calling for 30 days unless the Contact re-engages with us within that period.