BANT: the budget, authority, need and timeline checklist

BANT gives a team a shared definition of "qualified". Without one, marketing hands over leads that sales rejects, and nobody agrees why. With BANT, a rep can say "need and timeline, yes; budget unknown" and everyone knows what is missing.

The catch is that it assumes the buyer already knows what they need and has money set aside. Plenty of good deals start with a clear problem and no budget yet, because the budget shows up once someone makes the case for it. Strict BANT drops those deals too early. Teams selling complex deals often move to MEDDIC for this reason, since it looks harder at pain and the decision process.

People reveal BANT details in public without being asked. Here are sample sentences, scored 0 to 100 for buying intent the way HearBuyers scores posts:

• Sample, score 94. "I run ops at a 30-person agency. We've set aside about $500 a month and want a new project tool live before January." Budget, authority (they run ops), need and timeline, all in two sentences.
• Sample, score 71. "Our team needs a better way to track client requests. What are people using?" The need is clear, but there's no budget or timeline yet, so it sits near the default alert threshold of 70.
• Sample, score 18. "Writing a thesis on project management tools, which ones do companies use?" There's no authority and no purchase.

The first post would pass BANT before you ever speak to the person. The second deserves a helpful reply and a question about timing.

• Running BANT as an interrogation. Asking "what's your budget?" in the first minute puts buyers on guard. Pick it up over the course of the conversation.
• Disqualifying on budget alone. If the need is strong, help the buyer build the case for budget.
• Treating authority as one person. In B2B, the person who signs rarely decides alone.
• Never updating the answer. Timelines change, so re-check them before a forecast call.

• Lead qualification: the wider process BANT is one method for.
• MEDDIC: a more detailed framework for complex deals.
• Sales qualified lead: what a lead becomes once it passes your criteria.
• Hot lead: a lead whose need and timing are both clear right now.

Try it on your own market: paste a post from a buyer into the buying intent scorer and compare its one-line reason with your BANT notes.