Every sales leader has been there: Your inbox is seemingly flooded with leads, but your pipeline feels emptier than ever.

Marketing keeps sending you “qualified” prospects, yet your sales reps are stuck wasting valuable time sifting through them, trying to figure out who’s actually ready to make a move.

The issue isn’t the number of leads; it’s knowing which ones are worth your reps’ time. But without a clear way to prioritize the best opportunities, even top-performing sales teams struggle to consistently hit their quotas.

So, what tactics can you introduce to ensure your team focuses on the leads with the highest conversion potential?

In a recent Marketing Against the Grain episode, Kieran and I dive into four powerful lead-scoring strategies that truly move the needle. Let’s explore how to surface the highest-potential leads and put your sales team in a position to succeed.

1. Combine customer fit and intent to better prioritize sales leads.

If you’re only scoring leads based on how well they fit your ideal customer profile (ICP), you’re missing a big piece of the sales success puzzle.

Effective lead scoring takes into account both segment fit — factors like job title, company size, and industry — and intent, which measures their interest through actions like demo requests, trial signups, or content engagement.

So, while fit tells you who could be a good customer, intent shows you who is actually ready to engage right now. Together, these elements give you a prioritized list of leads that are more likely to convert.

In the early days at HubSpot, we focused almost exclusively on fit-based scoring, making sure leads aligned with our ideal target audience. But we soon realized that even the most perfectly matched leads wouldn’t convert if they weren’t actively engaging.

Once we incorporated intent signals, however, our reps had better clarity on whom to prioritize and how to approach them. This simple shift improved close rates and created a wildly more efficient sales process.

Pro tip: Implement a balanced lead scoring system by tracking behaviors that consistently correlate with high conversion rates and assigning appropriate weights based on their impact. Tools like HubSpot’s lead scoring feature can help automate this process.

2. Keep it simple: Complex scoring systems kill sales adoption.

The more complicated your lead scoring model, the less likely your sales team is to use it.

Reps need a straightforward, easy-to-understand scoring system with clear priorities. If they have to guess how leads are being scored — or worse, if the score doesn’t align with their instincts — they’ll ignore it and revert to their own methods.

For example, at HubSpot, we initially experimented with models that included too many variables: layered fit criteria, advanced behavioral signals, and intent measurements. On paper, these models seemed logical, but in practice, reps didn’t trust them. Instead, they reverted to their personal lead-ranking systems, and the model was largely ignored.

The breakthrough came when we simplified the scoring model by prioritizing high-impact actions. For example, we focused on leads tied to conversion events with proven close rates, giving reps immediate, actionable leads they could trust.

Once they saw better results without needing to overthink the criteria, adoption improved, and lead scoring became an essential part of hitting quotas.

Expert insight: Don’t just give reps a scoring system — provide a complete outreach package. Include essential resources like email templates, call scripts, and recommended content to give them the confidence and support they need to engage high-priority leads effectively.

3. Use HINKLs to expand your funnel and hit sales quotas.

At HubSpot, we came up with the concept of HINKLs (High Intent Non-Qualified Leads) when we realized that we needed a way to grow beyond traditional product-qualified leads (PQLs).

We define HINKLs as leads that haven’t directly raised their hand to talk to sales — through actions like demo requests or trial sign-ups — but whose behavior signals intent. For example, they might interact with product features, templates, or other high-value content similar to leads who do convert.

Our growth team developed HINKLs by running regression analysis on closed deals and identifying behaviors that strongly correlated with conversions. This allowed us to surface leads that weren’t immediately obvious but had a high likelihood of upgrading or purchasing.

Expanding the sales funnel with HINKLs gave our reps access to qualified leads that weren’t previously on their radar, helping them consistently hit quotas by targeting hidden, high-potential prospects.

4. Establish — and maintain — feedback loops with sales.

Even the best lead scoring model will fail if you don’t listen to your sales team.

Reps are on the front lines, interacting with leads daily, and their insights are crucial for refining your scoring criteria. To keep your model relevant, establish regular feedback sessions — whether through formal rep councils or informal check-ins — and continuously adjust based on what’s actually working.

In HubSpot’s early days, feedback was simple. We could shout across the room and get instant answers. But as we scaled, we introduced structured feedback loops, including a monthly rep council where we reviewed lead performance and made necessary adjustments.

This process kept the model dynamic and aligned with real-world sales needs, increasing trust and adoption while improving lead quality over time.

Pro tip: Pair qualitative feedback from sales with performance metrics. For example, combine both lead conversion rates and rep feedback to uncover the nuanced ‘why’ behind leads that convert or stall, leading to smarter and faster scoring adjustments.

Drive Sales Success with Smarter Lead Scoring

By combining customer fit, intent signals, and constant feedback, you can refine your lead scoring model to drive more targeted outreach, boost sales conversions, and keep your pipeline consistently full. Remember: It’s not about finding every lead — it’s about finding the right ones and then empowering your team to close deals faster and more efficiently.

To learn more about lead-scoring tactics and marketing growth strategies, check out the full episode of Marketing Against the Grain below:

This blog series is in partnership with Marketing Against the Grain, the video podcast. It digs deeper into ideas shared by marketing leaders Kipp Bodnar (HubSpot’s CMO) and Kieran Flanagan (SVP, Marketing at HubSpot) as they unpack growth strategies and learn from standout founders and peers.