Data cleaning for CRM imports
Lead scoring
How to score and qualify a lead list (without a black box)
To score a lead list in Sift: open your CSV, go to the Score tab, start from a persona template (B2B SaaS buyer, event lead, or named accounts) or build your own rules, and Sift writes a Lead Score column plus a plain-English reason for every row. Every number is a rule you set, so you can see and defend it. Then extract the score range you want. It runs entirely in your browser, so the list is never uploaded.
What lead scoring actually needs to be useful
Most "lead scoring" is either a spreadsheet of nested IF formulas nobody can maintain, or an AI black box that spits out a number you cannot explain to your sales team. Neither survives a "why is this lead a 90?" question. Useful scoring has three properties:
- Transparent, every point traces to a rule you set, and the reason is written next to the score.
- Deterministic, the same list and rules always give the same result, so it is repeatable and auditable.
- Private, your lead list never leaves your machine, so you can score customer data you could not paste into an online tool or a chatbot.
Sift's Score tab is built to all three.
Step by step
- Load your list (a CSV or Excel file of contacts or leads) into Sift.
- Open the Score tab and pick a template: B2B SaaS buyer (senior + revenue/ops roles at software companies), Event / conference lead (recent signups with a decision-making title), or Named / enterprise accounts (your target-account list weighted by seniority). Or build rules from scratch.
- Adjust the rules: point each rule at the right column, tune the keywords, seniority weights, industries, recency window, or account list, and set the points. A live preview shows the score distribution and your top leads with their reasons.
- Apply scoring. Sift adds a Lead Score column and a Score reasons column to every row.
- Extract by score to keep only the range you want, then export the shortlist.
- Save the persona to replay the same qualification on next month's list in one click.
The rule types you can combine
- Seniority, points per tier (C-suite, VP, Director, Manager, IC) inferred from the job title.
- Role keyword, points when the title contains any of your terms (revops, growth, procurement).
- Industry / value in a set, points when a column matches one of your allowed values.
- Numeric range, points when a number (deal size, company headcount, ARR) falls in a range.
- Recency / date window, points when a date (signed up, last active) is within N days.
- Target-account list, points for being on your named-account list, matched exactly or fuzzily.