Weighted
Weighted lead distribution in Lead Distro AI: give each buyer a percentage share of a priority tier (60/40, 50/30/20) with worked examples, tier fallthrough, and what to do when shares do not add up to 100.
What is Weighted distribution?
Weighted gives each buyer a share, which is the percentage of leads it should receive. A 60/40 split between Acme and Bright Path means Acme gets about 60 percent of the leads and Bright Path about 40 percent.
For every lead, Lead Distro AI runs a draw among the eligible buyers where each buyer's chance of winning is its share of the total. Bigger share, better odds, every single lead.
A share is a probability, not a quota. A buyer on 50 percent has a coin-flip chance on every lead independently. Nothing tracks how many it already received today, which is what makes small batches look lumpy and large ones land on your numbers.
When to use Weighted
- Different capacity. Acme's intake team handles 100 leads a day and Bright Path handles 40. A 70/30 share sends each roughly what it can absorb.
- Tilting toward the better buyer. Acme pays $80 and converts at 12 percent, Bright Path pays $60. A 65/35 share favors the stronger buyer without starving the other.
- Ramping a new buyer. Start at 90/10, watch the return rate for a week, move to 80/20, then 50/50 when you trust them.
- High volume. Weighted converges on your percentages over hundreds of leads, so it shines above roughly 50 leads a day per campaign.
If your buyers asked for a number of leads per day rather than a percentage, use Weighted (Fair Share) instead. Same column, different promise, and it settles inside a single day.
How to configure it
- Open your campaign and go to Settings > Routing, then set Distribution Method to Weighted.
- On the Destinations tab, each buyer shows a Tier / Share cell: a purple tier badge and a grey share pill.
- Click the grey pill to set the share. Enter a whole number from 1 to 100.
- Make the shares on each tier add up to 100. That is when each number reads as its true percentage.
- Use the up and down arrows on the tier badge to move a buyer between tiers.
Example: a simple 60/40
| Buyer | Tier | Share | Chance on each lead | Out of 1,000 leads |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acme Legal | P1 | 60% | 60% | about 600 |
| Bright Path | P1 | 40% | 40% | about 400 |
| Total | 100% | 100% | 1,000 |
Example: 50/30/20
| Buyer | Tier | Share | Chance on each lead | Out of 1,000 leads |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acme Legal (largest, best payer) | P1 | 50% | 50% | about 500 |
| Bright Path (mid-tier) | P1 | 30% | 30% | about 300 |
| Overflow Partners (newest, on test) | P1 | 20% | 20% | about 200 |
| Total | 100% | 100% | 1,000 |
Why 10 leads never look like your percentages
This is the single most common Weighted support question, and the answer is just how independent draws behave. On a 50/30/20 split, here is the realistic range you should expect at different volumes.
| Leads so far | Target split | Typical actual range | Read this as |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 5 / 3 / 2 | anywhere from 7/2/1 to 3/4/3 | Noise. Do not tune anything. |
| 100 | 50 / 30 / 20 | roughly 44 to 56 for the 50 percent buyer | Getting close. Still noisy at the edges. |
| 1,000 | 500 / 300 / 200 | roughly 484 to 516 for the 50 percent buyer | Your shares are working. |
| 10,000 | 5,000 / 3,000 / 2,000 | within about 1 percent | Textbook. |
Do not adjust shares based on a single day at low volume. You will be chasing randomness, and the correction will overshoot in the other direction. If you need the split to hold day by day, that is exactly what Weighted (Fair Share) is for.
Tiers: Weighted has a priority ladder too
Every buyer sits on a tier, shown as the purple P badge. Lower tiers are tried first. Inside a tier, the share draw picks exactly one buyer. Only if that buyer declines does the next tier run its own draw.
| Buyer | Tier | Share | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| Acme Legal | P1 | 70% | Wins about 70 percent of the P1 draws |
| Bright Path | P1 | 30% | Wins about 30 percent of the P1 draws |
| Overflow Partners | P2 | 100% | Only sees a lead when the P1 winner turned it down |
This is how you combine a split with an overflow ladder: put the buyers who share volume on one tier, and put your catch-all on the tier below. The buyer that loses a tier draw is not tried for that lead, so the fallthrough is tier by tier, not buyer by buyer.
A buyer alone on its tier shows a locked 100% share that you cannot edit. There is nobody to divide with, so it takes every lead that reaches its tier. Add a second buyer to that tier and both pills become editable again.
When a tier does not add up to 100
Nothing breaks. The draw uses each share out of the tier's real total, so the ratios you set still hold. What changes is that the numbers stop reading as percentages.
| Buyer | Share you typed | Tier total | What it actually gets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Acme Legal | 50 | 130 | 38% |
| Bright Path | 50 | 130 | 38% |
| Overflow Partners | 30 | 130 | 23% |
When this happens, a banner appears above the Destinations table naming the real total and what each buyer resolves to, with two one-click fixes:
- Scale to 100 keeps the ratios you set and rewrites the numbers so they add to 100. The 50/50/30 above becomes 38/39/23, and nothing about the split changes.
- Split evenly gives every buyer on the tier the same share. Use it when you meant an even split and the numbers drifted.
Nothing is rewritten until you press one of those buttons. The banner is telling you what your numbers mean, not fixing them behind your back.
Edge cases, in detail
| Scenario | What Lead Distro AI does |
|---|---|
| A buyer hits its cap mid-day | It leaves the draw entirely. The remaining shares carry the whole tier, so a 60/40 tier with the 40 capped sends 100 percent to the other buyer until 08:00 UTC. |
| You pause a buyer | Same as a cap. It leaves the draw and the rest of the tier absorbs its share. |
| A buyer's filters reject one lead | That buyer is out of the draw for that lead only. This is why filters, not shares, are usually the reason a split looks wrong. |
| The tier winner declines the lead | The lead falls to the next tier's winner. The buyers that lost the draw on the first tier are never tried for that lead. |
| A share is set to 0 | It is treated as 1, not as off. To take a buyer out, pause it. A zero share is not an off switch. |
| You add a buyer to a tier | Its share dilutes the others in proportion. Add a 20 to a 60/40 tier and the effective split becomes 50/33/17 until you rebalance. |
| A buyer is alone on its tier | Its share is locked at 100 percent and cannot be edited. There is nothing to divide. |
Weighted vs the alternatives
| Weighted | Weighted (Fair Share) | Round Robin | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What the number means | Percent of volume | Leads per day | Nothing, turns are equal |
| How the winner is picked | Random draw by share | Whoever is furthest behind target | Whoever is next in line |
| How fast it converges | Hundreds of leads | Within the day | Immediately |
| Two in a row to one buyer | Normal | Only if everyone else met their target | Only if the others were ineligible |
| Best volume range | High | Low to medium | Any |
Frequently Asked Questions
What happens if my shares do not add up to 100?
Can I change shares without losing history?
What if a weighted buyer hits its daily cap?
Can a single buyer be at 100 percent?
Can I weight by revenue instead of lead count?
How is Weighted different from Round Robin?
Why did the buyer with the smallest share get three leads in a row?
Do shares apply across tiers?
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If you have any questions, send us an email at support@leaddistro.ai