Why the definition matters more than the price
Under pay-per-meeting lead generation, you're billed for each qualified meeting that takes place. That makes “qualified” the most important word in the agreement. Leave it vague and every invoice becomes a negotiation; make it precise and nobody has to argue about anything.
A good definition is written before a single email goes out, uses facts that can be checked, and is narrow enough that a meeting either meets it or doesn't. It's not a wish list. It describes the smallest meeting that would still be worth your time.
The four parts of a good definition
1. The company
Which businesses count: industry, size (headcount, revenue or another measure you can check), geography, and anything that rules a company out — existing clients, competitors, a type of business you don't serve.
2. The person
Who has to be in the meeting: job function, seniority, and — most importantly — authority. “Head of operations or above” is checkable. “A decision-maker” isn't, unless you say what decision they make.
3. The reason
Optional, but powerful: why they're talking to you. A specific problem, a project, a renewal date, an audit. Include it only if it's something you can confirm in the meeting, and keep it modest — nobody confirms budget and timeline in a first conversation.
4. The meeting itself
What counts as having happened: the format (call, video, site visit), that the booked person attended, and whether a reschedule that later happens still counts. A booking alone isn't a meeting — see pay per appointment vs pay per lead for why attendance is the line that matters.
Examples by industry
The same four parts produce very different definitions. A few illustrations:
- Commercial roofing: the attendee manages or owns commercial buildings in the service area, controls maintenance spend, and has agreed to an inspection of a specific building. See commercial roofing lead generation.
- B2B SaaS: the attendee matches a named buyer persona at a company inside the ICP, isn't an existing customer or open opportunity, and attended the demo. See B2B SaaS lead generation.
- M&A advisory: the attendee owns the business, the business sits inside the mandate size band and sectors, and the meeting is a real conversation about their options. See lead generation for M&A advisory firms.
Grey areas to settle before you start
Most disputes come from situations nobody thought about in advance. Decide these up front:
- Right company, wrong person. If a qualified buyer sends a junior colleague instead, does it count? Usually not — but say so.
- Extra attendees. If the right person comes and brings others, it counts. Write that down too.
- Reschedules. A meeting that's moved and then happens is a meeting. One that's moved and never happens isn't.
- “Not now”. A qualified buyer who attends and says the timing is wrong was still a qualified meeting. Qualification describes who they are and why they're there, not the outcome.
- Overlap with your pipeline. Agree how you'll flag companies you're already talking to, so they're excluded before outreach rather than argued about after.
- Disputes. Agree how a meeting that doesn't match gets flagged, and how quickly, so nothing is decided from memory weeks later.
What not to put in the definition
- Outcomes. “Must buy” or “must request a proposal” turns a meeting fee into a commission, and no first meeting can promise either.
- Things you can't check. Budget, intent and timeline are worth asking about in the meeting, but they're poor billing criteria because they depend on what the prospect chooses to say.
- Everything you'd ideally like. Every extra condition shrinks the pool of people who can be contacted. Keep the definition to what makes a meeting worth having.
A checklist
- Company: industry, size, geography, exclusions.
- Person: function, seniority, the decision they make.
- Reason (optional): something you can confirm in the meeting.
- Meeting: format, attendance, how reschedules count.
- Grey areas: wrong person, extra attendees, “not now”, existing pipeline.
- Disputes: how a meeting is flagged, and by when.
This is the step we start every engagement with — see how it works — and it's what the fee in our pay-per-meeting pricing is charged against.