Route leads to the right owner and keep the SLA
Speed to lead decides more deals than any nurture. The standard is simple: every MQL has an owner within minutes, a first touch within one working day, and a status that says what happened. This article gives the routing rules that hold up, the SLA most teams commit to, the tool setup, and how MarqIQ measures whether sales is keeping it. Ask “how fast does sales follow up” for your own number.
Routing rules that hold up
- Named accounts first: if the company has an owner, the lead goes to that owner. Nothing else overrides it.
- Then territory: country or region, from a field you fill on purpose, not from geo-IP.
- Then segment: size or industry to the team that sells to it.
- Then round-robin within the team, weighted by capacity, skipping people on leave.
- Never “unassigned” as a resting state. An unowned MQL is a routing failure to be reported, not a queue.
The SLA most B2B teams commit to
| Step | Standard | Measured from |
|---|---|---|
| Owner assigned | Within 5 minutes, by rule | The MQL date |
| First touch (call or email) | Within one working day; inbound demo requests within one hour | The MQL date |
| Status set | At first touch: attempting, connected, qualified, recycled | The first touch |
| Accept or send back | Within three working days, with a reason | The MQL date |
Set it up in your tool
Build the assignment rule in the order above.
HubSpot: a workflow with Rotate record to owner after the account-owner and territory branches. Marketo: lead assignment via the CRM sync (Salesforce assignment rules) or a smart campaign that sets the owner. Salesforce: Lead Assignment Rules, with a queue only for exceptions. Pipedrive: automations on lead creation, or a round-robin app.
Create the task or notification at assignment.
A task due in one working day, on the owner’s list, with the lead’s source and what they did.
Make the status required at first touch.
Short picklist, one value per outcome, a reason required on recycle.
Run the unowned report daily.
MQLs with no owner after an hour, and MQLs with no touch after a day. Both should be empty.
How MarqIQ checks it
The Funnel analysis measures how long new MQLs wait before sales touches them and how many are left untouched. The Data Audit counts people with no owner. Ask “how many leads are unassigned”, “which owner has the most unworked leads” or “how fast does sales follow up” for your own numbers; the advice suites name the fix — routing rule, task, SLA — where they find the gap.
Next steps
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