Booked, held or qualified: what to pay for when you buy meetings
If you are comparing lead generation agencies, the price per meeting means little until you know what a “meeting” is. The same $250 can buy very different things.
Three definitions
- Booked means a time was put in your calendar. The prospect may never show up.
- Held means the call took place. This is what you can actually sell to.
- Qualified means the company and the person match a profile you agreed on in advance, and they said they are interested.
Why the difference matters
Not everyone who books a call from a cold email attends it. Suppose 70 of every 100 booked meetings happen. Paying $200 per booked meeting then costs you about $286 per meeting that actually happens, because $200 ÷ 0.7 ≈ $286. A lower price per booked meeting can be the more expensive deal.
Ask any agency: “Do I pay for meetings that were booked, held, or held and qualified? Who decides, and how fast?”
Questions to ask before you sign
- What exactly must be true for a meeting to be billed? Is it written down?
- What happens if the prospect does not show up?
- How long do I have to dispute a meeting that missed the standard?
- Is there a setup fee, a monthly platform fee or a minimum term?
- Whose domains do you send from, and who owns them if we stop?
Our own answers are on our pricing page: we bill only for qualified meetings that are held, you have 3 business days to dispute one, and there is no setup fee, retainer or term.