A list of 30,000 profiles sounds like 30,000 people you can contact. It rarely is. Contact coverage is the share of profiles in an audience that include a usable channel, such as an email address. It decides which channels a list is good for, and it is one of the first numbers to check.
What our own data shows
Our team looked at the seven audiences reviewed so far on QualifiedLead Insights: 307,753 profiles in total, of which 34,199 include an email address. That is an overall coverage of 11.1%, but the average hides a wide range.
| Audience | Type | Profiles | With email | Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| IPL Scholarship | Facebook Fanpage | 8,188 | 2,194 | 26.8% |
| HannahOlala | Facebook Fanpage | 234,836 | 28,947 | 12.3% |
| IELTS Forecast Group | Facebook Group | 12,735 | 1,199 | 9.4% |
| Vietnamese in USA | Facebook Group | 9,305 | 803 | 8.6% |
| $100M Mastery Club | Facebook Group | 3,651 | 156 | 4.3% |
| Keap | Facebook Fanpage | 8,279 | 224 | 2.7% |
| Columbia University | Facebook Fanpage | 30,759 | 676 | 2.2% |
The median audience sits at 8.6%. The highest is more than twelve times the lowest. Seven audiences are a small sample, so treat these numbers as a picture of our current reviews rather than a market benchmark.
Why coverage varies
From the reviews, three patterns explain most of the difference:
- Purpose beats format. The highest coverage came from the IPL Scholarship fanpage, a leadership scholarship for young entrepreneurs. Two other fanpages, Columbia University and Keap, had the lowest coverage. What people come to a community for matters more than whether it is a group or a page.
- Casual followers share less. Large institutional and brand pages attract people who follow out of loyalty or curiosity, and their profiles tend to carry fewer contact details.
- Younger audiences share more. The three audiences with the highest coverage, IPL Scholarship, HannahOlala and the IELTS Forecast Group, are all about 55% aged 18–30 among profiles with a birthday.
How to plan around coverage
Coverage does not make a list good or bad. It tells you which channel to lead with.
- Under 5%: treat the list as an ad audience and a research source. Use it for custom and lookalike audiences on social platforms; email is a bonus.
- 5% to 15%: run paid social as the main channel and email as a secondary one, where you have consent.
- Above 15%: email nurture can carry real weight, alongside ads that keep your brand visible.
Then calculate cost on the contacts you will actually use. In our system, the Keap list costs $30 for 8,279 profiles but only 224 have an email, so the cost per emailable profile is about $0.13, compared with about $0.01 for the IPL Scholarship list at the same price. How to Calculate Your Real Cost per Lead walks through the full method.
The Lead Fundamentals series
- What Is a Qualified Lead? MQL, SQL and AI Lead Explained
- Intent Signals: What Social Behavior Tells You Before a Form Fill
- How to Calculate Your Real Cost per Lead (and CAC)
- Lead Scoring 101: Fit, Intent and Freshness
- Contact Coverage Explained (you are here)
Ready to check coverage for your own market? Explore audiences on QualifiedLead: every audience page shows profiles, contact coverage and price before you buy.
