# Intent data in B2B: what buying signals really show

> Intent data is meant to show which companies want to buy right now. What first, second and third-party data are, how good they are and what to check.

Quelle: https://whovisit.app/en/blog/intent-data-b2b-buying-signals
Veröffentlicht: 2026-11-07
Herausgeber: Whovisit (ARAVILO, Innsbruck)

"Intent data" is one of the buzzwords in B2B marketing. It refers to data that is meant to show that a company is currently interested in a topic and might therefore buy soon. The idea is plausible: anyone who is searching right now is more open to a conversation. The question is how reliable such signals are and where they come from.

## Three kinds of intent data

| Kind | Where from | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| First party | From your own channels | Visits to your website, downloads, sign-ups, replies to emails |
| Second party | From a partner that collects it directly | Views of your profile on a review portal, attendance at a partner's webinar |
| Third party | From providers that bundle many external sources | Reading of specialist articles on a topic across many websites |

### First party: closest to the action

What happens on your own website directly concerns your offer. A company that reads your pricing page is interested in your product, not just in a topic. This data is the most precise, but also the scarcest: you only see companies that have already found you.

At company level, a visitor identification tool provides it. What becomes visible in the process and what does not is covered in [What visitor identification can and cannot do](https://whovisit.app/blog/besuchererkennung-b2b-was-sie-leistet).

### Second party: close, but shared

Review portals and trade publishers sell some information about which companies have researched your category there. That is closer to a purchase than general reading, but you share the signal with all other providers in the same category.

### Third party: broad, but blurry

Here, providers collect reading signals from many websites and assign them to companies and topics. This produces large volumes. The weaknesses: you usually do not know exactly which websites are involved, how the assignment to companies works and whether the visitors there gave consent. A rise in the topic "cloud security" may be a buying project or an intern writing a term paper.

## How to recognise good signals

1. **Proximity to the offer.** A signal about your product beats any signal about a general topic.
2. **Repetition.** A single visit is chance. Three visits on different days are a pattern.
3. **Several people.** If different departments from the same company are reading, such as technology and purchasing, a selection is probably under way.
4. **Freshness.** Signals lose value quickly. After four weeks they are often just history.
5. **Traceability.** You should be able to explain why a company counts as interested. A score without origin does not help sales in a conversation.

How to put signals in order is shown in [Lead scoring in B2B: a simple model based on website signals](https://whovisit.app/blog/lead-scoring-b2b).

## Data protection

Company-level intent data is less sensitive than data about individuals. It is still not entirely free of concerns. To capture a signal, something is almost always stored on or read from the reader's device. In the EU this generally requires consent. With purchased data, you must rely on the provider having handled this properly. Ask how consent was obtained. Have it confirmed in writing.

For your own data the rule is: load measurement scripts only after consent in the cookie banner. How to do that is described in [Consent or legitimate interest: how to decide](https://whovisit.app/blog/einwilligung-oder-berechtigtes-interesse).

## Frequently asked questions

**Is it worth buying third-party intent data?** For large target markets with many potential customers it can be worthwhile, to improve the order in which you approach them. For small niches, your own website signals are usually more precise and cheaper.

**Is a website visit already intent?** A single one is not. Several visits to pages close to a purchase are more likely to be.

**May I call after an intent signal?** The signal does not change the rules for calls and emails. They are set out in [Cold outreach in B2B: what is permitted in DE, AT and CH](https://whovisit.app/blog/kaltakquise-b2b-erlaubt).