Outbound

How to Use Intent Signals in B2B Sales

Joseph Wheatley
September 27, 2025
•
5
min read

What Are Intent Signals?

Intent signals are pieces of information that reveal a prospect’s interest in a product or service based on their online behavior.

They include:

  • Web pages visited
  • Content engaged with
  • Search queries

By analyzing intent signals, companies can gauge a prospect’s readiness to buy - enabling more targeted and better-timed outreach.

Intent Data and Types

Intent data is the dataset that contains intent signals.

There are three main types of intent data:

  • First-Party Intent Data: Collected directly by you. Examples: website visits, product usage, email engagement, webinar registrations, and downloads.
  • Second-Party Intent Data: Someone else’s first-party data, shared with you through a partnership or provider (e.g., G2 reviews, champion tracking platforms).
  • Third-Party Intent Data: Aggregated insights from across the web. Examples: social engagement, search trends, and public browsing data.

Intent vs. Interest Signals

Both are useful but serve different purposes:

  • Intent Signals: Show that someone is actively looking for a solution and may be ready to buy. Best for sales outreach and late-stage marketing.
  • Interest Signals: Show that someone is engaged but not yet searching for a solution. Best for awareness and early-stage nurturing.

Types of Intent Signals

Engagement Signals
  • Actions like likes, shares, follows, downloads, repeated site visits, or time spent on pricing pages.
  • Example: Someone downloads a whitepaper or visits your pricing page repeatedly → strong sign of intent.
Research Signals
  • Search activity around solutions or pain points.
  • Example: If you’re a retention marketing agency and a prospect searches for “best retention marketing agencies” it shows they’re actively considering solutions. This would be a good time to reach out.
Hiring Signals
  • Job postings show that a company has budget in a specific area and is ready to grow / invest.
  • Example: If you offer a sales tool and a company is hiring AEs or SDRs, it signals they may also invest in tools to support their growing team.
Technographic Signals
  • Information about a company’s tech stack.
  • Example: A business using Webflow as their hosting provider, may be open to trying a Webflow-native SEO tool to grow their website traffic.
Firmographic Signals
  • Data on company size, location, revenue, employee count, funding rounds, or events.
  • Example: A recent funding round signals budget availability and willingness to invest in growth.

How to Use Intent Signals

1. Clarify Your ICP
  • Know exactly who you’re targeting before layering on intent signals.
2. Focus on Relevant Signals
  • Not all signals matter. Identify which ones have the strongest intent.
3. Identify and Qualify Leads
  1. Start with finding your ICP.
  2. Layer on intent signals.
  3. Score leads by signal strength.

Example: First-party signals (like pricing page visits) are the strongest.

(Here you could add a lead scoring system with tiers: low/medium/high intent.)

4. Personalize Outreach
  • Use intent data to tailor messaging to the right pain points.
  • Avoid one-size-fits-all pitches.
5. Time Your Outreach
  • Timing is critical. Contacting a high-intent lead too early or late reduces close rates significantly.
6. Follow Up
  • Intent signals also help with follow-ups. If a lead shows repeated activity, re-engage with relevant value.

Applications of Intent Signals

  • Personalization: Tailor sales and marketing messages based on behaviours / signals.
  • Prioritization: Focus resources on accounts with the highest intent.
  • Retention: Identify existing customers who are actively researching competitors.
  • Expansion: Uncover upsell or cross-sell opportunities.

Benefits of Intent Signals

  • Efficiency: Focus on prospects ready to buy.
  • Personalization: Align messages with what prospects actually want / need.
  • Timing: Engage at the right moment.
  • Conversion: Improve meeting success rates and close rates.
  • Insight: Build richer customer profiles / CRMs.

Challenges With Intent Signals

  1. Data Quality: Signals can often be noisy, irrelevant, or inaccurate.
  2. Integration: Data silos and tech stack compatibility issues.
  3. Privacy & Compliance: Must meet GDPR/CCPA standards.
  4. Misalignment: Hard to connect vague signals with specific sales actions.

The Future of Intent Signals

Advancements in AI and predictive analytics will improve accuracy, timing, and personalization. Expect greater reliance on ethically sourced first-party data as privacy laws tighten.