By behavior I’m referring to frequency of visits, how many downloads and in what period of time. Someone who has looked at a couple of white papers and attended a webcast in a 30 day timeframe, I think you can approach to have a good conversation. To extend that, if you are also gathering information about their current/future project (budget, authority, need, timeframe…) depending on the information you gather, this could also dictate a call if, for example, someone is making a decision in 30 days.

Finally, reviewing and keeping track of the type of content would lend some insight into where the prospect is in the buying cycle. For example, someone downloading a whitepaper on a topic that discusses a problem like Understanding Bottlenecks and Bandwidth Management in the data center, could be in the early stages of research. Versus someone downloading trial software is more likely working off of a shortlist and in the evaluation and decision stage of their buying process. I’m starting to get into lead scoring methodology which really warrants another blog series posting. I hope this helps.