Buying signal
A public sign that a person or a company has a reason to be interested in what you sell right now: a new hire, a question asked in public, a review, an announcement. It tells you who to contact and, just as importantly, why now.
Business signal
An event in the life of a company that creates a need: a funding round, a new factory, an acquisition, a change of CEO. It is one family of buying signals, focused on the company rather than on the person.
Interest signal
An interaction with content related to your topic: a reaction, a comment, a follow. The person has not announced anything, but the topic is on their mind. It is a reason to start a conversation about the subject, not proof of a purchase project.
Weak signal
An isolated or indirect clue, such as a reaction to a related topic. On its own, it does not justify a message. Repeated, or combined with other signals, it can become a strong one.
Trigger event
A change that makes a purchase likely in the months that follow: a new job, a hiring drive, an office move, a new regulatory requirement. It gives you both a reason to write and a topic to write about.
Pre-purchase moment
A published action that points to a need in the near future: a job opening, a new site, a software rollout, a funding round. Unlike an interest signal, the company has already committed to a change, so the timing is easier to read.
Signal strength
Weak, moderate or strong: the more precise a signal is, the more often it repeats and the closer it is to what you sell, the stronger it is. Strength decides whether a signal is worth a message and how directly the opener can refer to the topic.
Intent data
Intent data is inferred from a company’s anonymous browsing on third-party websites. It tells you that a company is reading about a topic, not who is reading or why. Buying signals start instead from what an identified person has posted or liked, in public.
Opener
The first line of a message. It starts from the prospect’s own topic, never from the action that got them spotted (you don’t write “I saw your like”). A good opener shows you understood their situation before you mention what you sell.
ICP (ideal customer profile)
The ICP, or Ideal Customer Profile, describes the kind of company that makes your best customer: industry, size, region, budget, and the problem it has. You read it in your five or ten best customers. The persona, by contrast, describes the person to contact at that company.
Persona
The description of the person to contact: job titles, industries, company sizes, regions, and the people you do not want to contact. It sets the frame in which signals are searched for and qualified, so a signal from outside the persona is ignored.
Cold outreach
Contacting someone with no particular reason to do it now, usually from a list built on job title and company size. It is the opposite of signal-based prospecting: the message has to create interest instead of building on it.
Signal-based prospecting
Contacting a person because a signal shows they have a reason to reply, at the moment they have it. Also called signal-based selling. The target list matters less than the timing and the topic that each signal provides.
Social selling
Selling through professional social networks: posting, commenting and keeping up a presence so that prospects come to you. Signal-based prospecting complements it by reaching out to the people who are already talking about your topic.
Sequence
The planned series of messages for one prospect: the first message, then the follow-ups, spaced out over time. In signal-based prospecting, each message in the sequence stays tied to the signal that started the conversation.
Reply rate
The share of contacted prospects who reply, positively or not. It is the first measure of whether your targeting and your opener work, before looking at the number of meetings booked.
Qualified meeting
A meeting with the right person, who has a real need and the power to decide or to recommend. A booked meeting that meets neither condition fills the calendar without moving a sale forward.
White label
A service an agency resells under its own name. With a MeetMagnet agency account, it runs prospecting for several clients, backed by our team.