MQL Nurture Programs

Overview

Most MQLs aren't ready to buy — they're researching. Nurture programs keep your company top-of-mind during the 3-12 month evaluation window, converting MQLs to SQLs at 2-3x the rate of "send them to sales and pray." This skill covers nurture strategy, track design, and optimization.

Authoritative Foundations

• Forrester (SiriusDecisions) — Demand Waterfall — Define inquiry → MQL → SAL → SQL stages with explicit handoff criteria and SLAs between marketing and sales.
• Adobe Marketo Engage — Engagement programs — Run nurture as streams with cadence controls and exhaustion rules so leads are not over-mailed.
• HubSpot Knowledge Base — Lead scoring — Combine fit and engagement scores, and decay engagement over time so stale activity does not create MQLs.

Lifecycle Stage

Acquisition (stage 2). Canonical index → references/gtm-lifecycle-stages.md.
Metrics → references/lifecycle-metrics-by-stage.md (Acquisition).
Monitoring → the gtm-metrics skill (lifecycle-monitoring-dashboard.md).