Weighted (Fair Share)
Fair Share lead distribution in Lead Distro AI: weight becomes a daily target and every lead goes to whoever is furthest behind. Worked day-by-day examples, fill-ratio math, and how targets differ from caps.
What is Fair Share?
Fair Share is the pacing version of Weighted. The number on each buyer stops being a percentage and becomes a daily target: how many leads that buyer should get today. Every incoming lead goes to whoever is furthest behind their target.
That one rule produces the behavior operators usually want and rarely get from a lottery: nobody receives a second lead while somebody else is still at zero, and by the end of a normal day everyone is sitting on roughly the number they asked for.
Use Fair Share when a buyer says I want 20 leads a day. Use Weighted when a buyer says I want 40 percent of your volume. The setting is the same column; the promise is different.
When to use Fair Share
- Buyers commit to a daily number. Set the target to what they asked for and the daily cap to the most they will ever take.
- You run low or medium volume. Under roughly 50 leads a day, the plain Weighted lottery looks random to a buyer watching their inbox. Fair Share does not.
- Buyers watch their delivery in real time. Fair Share is defensible minute by minute, because you can always answer who is furthest behind.
- You want spare volume spread evenly. Once everyone hits their target the overflow keeps flowing, and it splits evenly across whoever still has cap headroom.
How to configure it
- Open your campaign, go to Settings > Routing, and set Distribution Method to Weighted (Fair Share).
- The Destinations column now reads Tier / Daily Target instead of Tier / Share, and the numbers lose the percent sign.
- Click the grey pill on each buyer and enter the number of leads they should get in a day.
- Set each buyer's daily cap to the hard ceiling, which is the most they will accept even on a big day.
- Targets do not need to add up to anything. They are counts, not percentages.
The target is a pacing number, not a ceiling. A buyer with a target of 20 will keep receiving leads past 20 if volume allows and nobody else needs them. The daily cap is what actually stops delivery. Set both.
The math, in one line
fill = leads received today / daily target
The lead goes to whoever has the lowest fill.A buyer on a target of 5 that has taken 1 lead is at 0.20. A buyer on a target of 2 that has also taken 1 is at 0.50, so it is further along and waits. That is the entire algorithm.
Worked example: the first 10 leads of the day
Three buyers on one tier, with targets of 5, 3, and 2. Everyone starts the day at zero.
| Buyer | Daily target | Daily cap |
|---|---|---|
| Acme Legal | 5 | 8 |
| Bright Path | 3 | 3 |
| Overflow Partners | 2 | 4 |
| Lead | Fills before the pick (Acme / Bright / Overflow) | Goes to | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0.00 / 0.00 / 0.00 | Acme | Everyone is tied at zero, so the tie is broken at random, biased by target size |
| 2 | 0.20 / 0.00 / 0.00 | Bright Path | Two buyers tied at zero, Acme is ahead |
| 3 | 0.20 / 0.33 / 0.00 | Overflow | Overflow is the only one still at zero |
| 4 | 0.20 / 0.33 / 0.50 | Acme | Lowest fill |
| 5 | 0.40 / 0.33 / 0.50 | Bright Path | Lowest fill |
| 6 | 0.40 / 0.67 / 0.50 | Acme | Lowest fill |
| 7 | 0.60 / 0.67 / 0.50 | Overflow | Lowest fill |
| 8 | 0.60 / 0.67 / 1.00 | Acme | Lowest fill |
| 9 | 0.80 / 0.67 / 1.00 | Bright Path | Lowest fill |
| 10 | 0.80 / 1.00 / 1.00 | Acme | Lowest fill |
After 10 leads the totals are 5 / 3 / 2, exactly the targets, and every buyer hit theirs at almost the same moment. The plain Weighted lottery aims at the same ratio but would not reliably land on it until several hundred leads had gone through.
What happens after everyone hits their target
Nothing stops. Once every buyer is at a fill of 1.00 they are level again, so the next lead goes to whoever is level and still has room under their cap. In the example above, Bright Path's cap of 3 equals its target, so it is finished for the day at lead 9. Leads 11 and up alternate between Acme (cap 8) and Overflow (cap 4).
| Lead | Acme (target 5, cap 8) | Bright Path (target 3, cap 3) | Overflow (target 2, cap 4) |
|---|---|---|---|
| After 10 | 5 | 3 | 2 |
| 11 | 5 | capped out | 3 |
| 12 | 6 | capped out | 3 |
| 13 | 6 | capped out | 4 |
| 14 | 7 | capped out | at cap |
| 15 | 8 | capped out | at cap |
| 16 | at cap | at cap | at cap |
Lead 16 finds nobody eligible, so it lands on Error with the reason Destination Cap(s) Reached. If your campaign regularly gets that far, add an uncapped overflow buyer on a lower tier.
Target versus cap: they do different jobs
| Daily target (the share pill) | Daily cap | |
|---|---|---|
| What it does | Sets pacing order: who is next | Sets a hard stop: no more today |
| Can it be exceeded | Yes, freely, if volume allows | No, ever |
| What happens at the number | Nothing visible. The buyer just stops being the neediest | The buyer leaves the pool until reset |
| Leave it unset | Everyone paces the same | Buyer takes unlimited volume |
| Typical setup | What the buyer asked for | The most they will tolerate on a spike day |
A useful pattern: target 20, cap 30. On a normal day the buyer lands near 20. On a heavy day they take up to 30 rather than turning volume away, and they never get more than 30 no matter what.
Tiers still come first
Fair Share uses the same tier ladder as Weighted. Priority is a hard gate: a starving tier-2 buyer never jumps ahead of an eligible tier-1 buyer, no matter how far behind it is. Fill ratios are only compared within a tier.
If the tier's neediest buyer declines the lead, it falls to the next-emptiest buyer in that tier rather than to a random one, and then on to the next tier.
Edge cases, in detail
| Scenario | What Lead Distro AI does |
|---|---|
| Two buyers are tied on fill | The tie is broken by a weighted random shuffle, so the same buyer does not win the first lead of every single day. |
| Delivery to the chosen buyer fails | Their counter is rolled back, which restores the deficit, so they win again on the next lead. They never received a lead, so they are not charged for one. |
| A buyer is added mid-day | It starts at zero received, so its fill is 0.00 and it will win the next several leads until it catches up. That is intended: it is furthest behind. |
| You raise a target mid-day | The fill drops immediately (same leads, bigger target) so the buyer moves up the queue right away. |
| A target is set to 0 | It is treated as 1. To take a buyer out, pause it. |
| The day rolls over | All daily counters reset at 08:00 UTC, which is midnight Pacific, so every fill returns to 0.00 and pacing starts fresh. |
| A buyer is alone on its tier | It takes everything that reaches that tier up to its cap. The target still shows and stays editable, because it will matter as soon as you add a second buyer. |
Fair Share vs Weighted, side by side
| Weighted (Fair Share) | Weighted | |
|---|---|---|
| What the number means | Leads per day | Percent of volume |
| Winner is | The buyer furthest behind their target | A random draw weighted by share |
| Repeats | Never, until everyone is level | Common and expected |
| Converges | Within the day | Over hundreds of leads |
| Numbers must add to 100 | No | Yes, for the percentages to read correctly |
| Best at | Low and medium volume, per-day commitments | High volume, percentage deals |
| Reacts to a paused buyer | The others absorb the volume immediately | The others absorb the share immediately |
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a buyer stop receiving leads once it hits its target?
Do targets need to add up to 100?
Does 50 / 30 / 20 behave the same as 5 / 3 / 2?
When exactly does the day reset?
Why did the buyer with the smallest target get the first lead of the day?
Should I use Fair Share or Round Robin?
Can I mix Fair Share with an overflow buyer?
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If you have any questions, send us an email at support@leaddistro.ai