Imagine this: You’ve spent months investing in lead generation, only to realise that most of your prospects are either uninterested or unqualified. Sound familiar? It's a common challenge for B2B companies, but the solution is simpler than you think. By building a laser-focused target account list, you can stop chasing the wrong leads and start engaging the accounts that are most likely to convert.
But what does it take to build a truly effective list? It’s not just about collecting company names or industry data—it’s about leveraging AI-powered tools, intent signals, and strategic alignment between your sales and marketing teams to turn prospects into loyal customers. In this guide, we’ll reveal proven strategies to help you identify, segment, and engage high-value accounts, transforming your pipeline into a revenue-driving machine.
Ready to optimise your approach and unlock the full potential of your sales efforts? Let’s dive in and explore how to build target account lists that deliver real results.
Building a high-quality target account list begins with defining a crystal-clear Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). A well-crafted ICP serves as a blueprint for identifying which companies are the best fit for your products or services. It ensures your sales and marketing teams focus their efforts on accounts that are more likely to convert, ultimately increasing efficiency and return on investment (ROI).
An Ideal Customer Profile is a detailed description of a company that would benefit the most from your offering. Unlike buyer personas, which focus on individual decision-makers, an ICP zeroes in on the ideal organization to target. It includes attributes that make a company an ideal match, such as industry, company size, revenue, location, technology stack, and pain points that align with your solution.
By using an ICP, your teams can filter out accounts that are less likely to convert, reducing wasted resources and focusing efforts on high-value prospects. This is crucial for businesses engaged in Account-Based Marketing (ABM), where a targeted, strategic approach is essential.
To build a high-quality ICP, it's essential to include several critical factors that define your ideal accounts. Here’s a breakdown of the main components:
Behavioural data is a powerful predictor of intent and can help refine your ICP. Look for signals that indicate a strong likelihood to buy, such as:
Understand who makes the buying decisions within your target accounts. This may vary depending on the industry and the size of the company.
Focus on key decision-makers such as:
Developing a clear and actionable ICP requires a structured approach. Here are some steps to guide the process:
Speak directly with existing customers to gain insights into why they chose your solution and the specific pain points it addresses. This qualitative data can reveal trends that quantitative data might miss. Ask questions such as:
Once you’ve established a clear Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), the next crucial strategy for building a high-quality target account list is leveraging intent data. In today’s competitive landscape, knowing when to reach out to a prospective account can be just as important as knowing who to reach out to. This is where intent data comes into play—it helps your sales and marketing teams identify which accounts are actively seeking solutions similar to what you offer, allowing you to prioritise high-intent prospects.
Intent data is information collected about a company’s online behaviour that indicates a potential interest in your products or services. It captures both explicit and implicit signals to help you gauge an account’s readiness to buy.
Explicit Signals: These are direct actions that demonstrate a clear intent to purchase. Examples include:
Implicit Signals: These are indirect actions that imply interest but aren’t as overt. Examples include:
By analysing these signals, you can identify which companies are in the consideration stage of the buying journey and ready for outreach. This allows you to focus your sales efforts on accounts with the highest potential for conversion.
In B2B sales, reaching out to a prospective account at the right moment can be a game-changer. Even if you have the perfect solution for a company, contacting them when they aren't actively looking or ready to buy can result in missed opportunities. Intent data ensures that you’re engaging with prospects at the right time, which increases the likelihood of capturing their interest.
A study by Forrester found that 74% of B2B buyers conduct more than half of their research online before making a purchase decision. By the time they reach out to a vendor, they are already well-informed. Leveraging intent data allows your sales team to get ahead by engaging with these prospects before they officially raise their hands.
Here’s a breakdown of how you can gather and utilise intent data to identify high-quality accounts:
Once you’ve gathered intent data, the next step is to prioritise which accounts to target. Not all signals are created equal—some are stronger indicators of purchase intent than others. Here’s how to prioritise:
Not all accounts will be ready to buy immediately. Segment them based on where they are in the buying journey:
After defining a clear Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and leveraging intent data, the next strategy to enhance your target account list is utilising advanced sales intelligence tools. These tools provide invaluable insights into your target accounts, allowing your sales and marketing teams to engage with prospects more effectively. In today’s data-driven world, having access to the latest, most accurate information is crucial to gaining a competitive edge.
Sales intelligence tools are platforms that gather, analyse, and provide insights about companies and their buying behaviour. These tools go beyond basic contact information, helping businesses understand their prospects' pain points, current solutions, and buying readiness. By leveraging real-time data, you can refine your target account lists, identify opportunities, and prioritise outreach based on actionable insights.
These tools can provide a wide range of data, such as:
When selecting sales intelligence tools, focus on platforms that offer the following features to enhance your targeting efforts:
Sales intelligence tools can classify target accounts based on their engagement with your brand over time. For instance:
Once you've developed a clear Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and identified high-intent accounts, the next step is to segment your target account list. Segmentation is critical because it allows your sales and marketing teams to focus their efforts on specific groups of accounts with tailored strategies, improving engagement and conversion rates.
Rather than treating all prospects the same, segmentation helps you:
Here’s how you can segment your accounts to maximise the effectiveness of your outreach:
Use intent data to identify accounts that are actively searching for solutions similar to yours. Segment them into tiers based on their readiness to buy. Here are some example tiers:
To streamline your efforts, make sure your CRM system is optimised for segmentation:
Once you have segmented your target accounts, the next essential step is ensuring alignment between your marketing and sales teams. Without this collaboration, even the most precise targeting efforts can fall short. Studies show that misalignment between sales and marketing can cost companies up to 10% of their revenue.
However, when these teams work together seamlessly, it can drive significant growth by improving engagement and closing high-value deals faster.
Sales and marketing alignment is more than just generating leads or running campaigns. It’s about creating a cohesive strategy that ensures both teams are working toward the same objectives:
Check out our guide on LinkedIn for 5 strategies to align your sales and marketing teams!
One of the most powerful ways to align your sales and marketing teams is by adopting an Account-Based Marketing (ABM) approach. ABM focuses both teams on a pre-defined list of high-value accounts, ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most. Here’s how it can help:
How to start: To kickstart your ABM strategy, co-create target account plans with both sales and marketing teams, identifying specific pain points and crafting personalised outreach campaigns tailored to each account. This joint effort will foster collaboration and accelerate conversions.
With your sales and marketing teams aligned and a segmented target account list in place, the next crucial step is executing a multi-touch outreach strategy. This approach involves reaching out to your target accounts through multiple channels and touchpoints to maximize engagement. A single email or phone call is no longer enough to break through the noise—today's decision-makers require a more persistent, yet personalised, approach to capture their attention.
A multi-touch strategy is the practice of using a combination of channels—like email, LinkedIn, phone calls, and targeted ads—to connect with prospects at various stages of their buyer journey. It’s not just about quantity but strategically orchestrating these touchpoints to create meaningful interactions that move prospects closer to making a purchase.
The key is to balance persistence with personalisation. You want to stay top of mind without coming across as pushy or impersonal.
Modern B2B buyers are inundated with outreach from countless vendors. According to industry research, it can take 8 to 12 touchpoints to effectively engage a prospect and initiate meaningful conversations. Here’s why a multi-touch approach is critical:
Use a mix of channels to engage your target accounts. Here’s a breakdown of effective options:
Pro Tip: Tailor your approach based on the preferred communication channel of your target accounts. For example, some industries may respond better to LinkedIn outreach, while others may prefer phone calls.
Use the insights gathered from your CRM and intent data to inform your outreach strategy. For instance:
Design structured sequences for different segments of your target accounts. For example:
Cadence Example:
Continuously track the performance of your multi-touch outreach efforts using analytics tools. Key metrics to monitor include:
A successful target account strategy requires more than just generating leads. It’s about consistently engaging the right accounts, converting them into customers, and maximising their lifetime value. By measuring the impact of your strategy, you can:
To measure your target account strategy effectively, focus on a mix of quantitative and qualitative metrics. Here are some of the most critical metrics to monitor:
While tracking metrics is essential, it’s equally important to regularly review and optimize your account lists. The market is always evolving, and your strategies should be too. Here’s how to keep your account list fresh and effective:
As you gather data on account performance, refine your Ideal Customer Profile to better reflect the characteristics of your highest-value accounts. Adjust your targeting criteria to focus on segments with the highest conversion rates and CLV.
In today's competitive B2B landscape, success hinges on precision and focus. By implementing the strategies we’ve outlined—starting with a well-defined Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), leveraging intent data, using advanced sales intelligence tools, segmenting your target accounts, aligning your sales and marketing teams, and executing a multi-touch outreach strategy—you can transform your approach to customer acquisition.
Building high-quality target account lists is not just about gathering names and contact information; it’s about targeting the right accounts at the right time with the right message. With data-driven insights and a well-coordinated strategy, you can drive better engagement, increase conversion rates, and maximise your return on investment.
However, the journey doesn’t stop here. To stay ahead, it’s crucial to continuously measure, optimise, and refine your approach based on real-time data and evolving market conditions. By using powerful tools like MarketSizer and integrating the best practices covered in this guide, you’ll be well-equipped to build stronger relationships with your target accounts and drive sustainable growth.
Now is the perfect time to take your account targeting strategy to the next level! Whether you’re just getting started or looking to optimise your existing approach, don’t let your efforts go to waste. Start implementing these strategies today and watch your sales pipeline fill with high-quality, engaged prospects.
👉 Ready to supercharge your account-based marketing efforts? Leverage MarketSizer’s Insights to identify, target, and convert the accounts that matter most.