The Best Account-Based Marketing Tactics for Driving Pipeline and Revenue

Most marketers say they’re doing ABM.

But most ABM programs don’t move revenue.

They’re slow, misaligned, or bloated with the wrong accounts.

I’ve seen what works (and what stalls). This post cuts the fluff and gets straight into the ABM tactics that actually drive meetings, opportunities, and closed-won deals.

Let’s fix your pipeline.

Key Takeaways

• Don’t chase more accounts. Focus on the 5–7 people who influence deals.
• Combine intent data + CRM insights to strike when interest is hot.
• Top-performing ABM plays mix outbound, paid ads, and SDR follow-up.
• Leads don’t solely matter. Track meetings, opportunities, and deal velocity by account.

What is ABM?

Account-based marketing happens when you stop chasing leads and treat your best-fit accounts like VIPs.

It’s precise. It’s focused. It’s expensive.

But when done right, it works, especially if your sales cycle is complex and involves multiple stakeholders.

Here’s what it looks like:

• You build a shortlist of accounts that match your ideal customer profile (ICP).
• You identify the people who influence or make the buying decision at each account.
• Then, you launch multi-channel campaigns to engage those people with personalized content, offers, and outreach.

ABM works best when:

• You’re in B2B, and your product has a longer sales cycle.
• Sales and marketing are aligned on what a good account looks like and how to win them. This alignment also makes leads 67% more likely to convert.
• You have access to both first-party (CRM, web behavior) and third-party (intent, firmographic) data.

ABM is not:

• Just running retargeting ads with the company name on them.
• Sending one-off cold emails with a custom subject line.
• Taking your lead-gen campaigns and calling them “ABM.”

If your business has a simple product, a low price point, or you just need to get more people in the top of the funnel, ABM might not be your move. In that case, go with demand gen or inbound.

But if your growth depends on closing a shortlist of high-value accounts?

ABM is the play.

Common ABM Mistakes

• Targeting too many accounts with too little signal
• Reaching one person and calling it a win
• Running ads with no sales follow-up
• Reporting on leads instead of pipeline

If this sounds familiar, you’re not doing ABM. You’re doing high-cost lead gen.

1. ABM Starts With Saying No to 95% of Your TAM

Most marketers try to go too wide.

They pull a big list of “qualified” companies, buy some ads, and hope it sticks.

That’s not ABM. That’s just expensive lead gen with fancier targeting.

Targeting thousands of accounts with small deal sizes? You’re wasting money fast.

Real ABM means narrowing in on the 5% of your market that is most likely to buy and building a real pipeline from there.

Here’s how I build that kind of list:

Start With the Right Data Signals

You’re looking for:

• Firmographics: Revenue, headcount, geography, industry
• Technographics: What tools they’re using (and if they integrate with yours)
• Intent signals: Who’s actively researching solutions like yours
• First-party behavior: Past visits, email clicks, demo requests, etc.

If you’re not layering all four, your targeting is probably off.

Tools I recommend: Bombora, G2 Buyer Intent, ZoomInfo, Clearbit, and your own CRM.

Tier Your Accounts

Not every account deserves the same effort.

Break your list into:

• 1:1 accounts: Big whales. Personalized content, gifting, and SDR coverage.
• 1:few: Mid-size accounts grouped by vertical or use case.
• Programmatic: Smaller targets you engage with smart automation.

You’ll burn out your team (and your budget) trying to treat everyone like a 1:1 account.

Use recency as a filter

Intent data goes stale fast. If someone hasn’t shown recent engagement, put them on pause.

If your ABM list is 2,000+ accounts, it’s probably not ABM. That’s just wishful thinking with expensive ad targeting.

2. You’re Not Targeting a Company. You’re Targeting a Group Chat.

A deal doesn’t happen because one person liked your ad.

You need buy-in from the whole crew: the person who feels the pain, the one who holds the budget, the one who signs the contract, and the one who always says no.

That’s your buying committee.

Most ABM campaigns fail because they only reach one or two people. That’s not enough.

Here’s how I approach it:

Map 4–7 Key Roles Per Account

In most B2B deals, you’re dealing with:

• The economic buyer: The one who controls budget
• The champion: Your internal advocate
• The end user: The person who’ll use your product
• The technical evaluator: IT, security, or ops
• The blocker: The person who just says “no” to everything

You need content and messaging that speaks to each of them.

Once you’ve mapped the buying committee, here’s how to actually find and track them:

Use the Right Tools

• LinkedIn Sales Navigator to find people by role
• UserGems or ZoomInfo to track job changes and uncover hidden stakeholders
• Your CRM and win/loss data to see who’s been involved in past deals

If you’re relying on job titles alone, you’re missing nuance. Roles don’t always match up to responsibilities.

Match Your Message to Their Pain

The blocker doesn’t care about your features. The economic buyer wants ROI. The end user wants ease of use.

Don’t send them all the same whitepaper and expect results. Personalize your offers and CTAs by role, not just by account.

Don’t overcomplicate this. You don’t need a 10-slide persona deck per role. You need one or two insights per person and the discipline to act on them.

3. Your Whitepaper Isn’t an Offer. Here’s What Is.

Generic CTAs like ‘Download this eBook’ don’t cut it. Your offer needs to make them want to meet, not just read.

You’re doing gated content marketing, which is fine, but it won’t get you meetings with high-value accounts.

Real ABM offers solve a real pain, for a real person, at a real company.

Here’s what that looks like:

Start With Account-Specific Research

You can’t pitch value if you don’t understand what they care about.

Look at:

• Press releases and funding announcements
• Quarterly earnings reports
• Job listings and hiring trends
• LinkedIn posts from execs or team leads

If their CFO just talked about cutting costs, don’t pitch them a vision deck on long-term transformation.

Your message should hit what’s urgent. Not what’s ideal.

Build Offers They Can’t Ignore

Skip the generic collateral.

Use:

• Executive 1-pagers tailored to their industry or maturity stage
• Competitor teardown reports that show where they’re falling behind
• Intent data recaps with a “what this means” breakdown
• ROI models or calculators tied to their outcomes

Even a quick Loom video walking through a custom recommendation can outperform a polished eBook.

Syndicate Smarter

Syndication = getting sharp assets in front of your best-fit buyers, where they already hang out.

This can include third-party syndication platforms, SDR follow-ups, LinkedIn, and email footers. 

Syndication doesn’t mean reposting your blog. It means distributing sharp, relevant assets through channels your target accounts already trust and following up while you’re still top of mind.

4. Structure a Multi-Channel ABM Playbook That Converts

ABM doesn’t work in silos. You need to surround accounts from every angle, not spam them from just one.

Here’s how to structure it:

a) Outbound Sequences That Don’t Suck

Use 3–4 emails. Each one should be tailored by account, role, and stage.

The sequence should feel like it came from a real human (because it did). If it reads like marketing automation, it won’t land.

Tools that help: Instantly, Smartwriter, Lavender

Add a follow-up via video or a personalized LinkedIn message. Sometimes that’s the touch that cuts through.

b) Paid Ads With Real Personalization

Yes, you can run account-specific ads. But name-dropping the company isn’t enough.

Use dynamic ad creative that speaks to the role and the pain. 

Example: “Hey IT leaders at [Company Name] — tired of security workarounds?”

Use platforms like LinkedIn Matched Audiences, Metadata.io, and RollWorks to get this right.

Pro tip: Retarget accounts that already engaged with email or your site. Campaigns that combine paid + owned channels see a 67% lift in conversions.

c) Direct Mail That Triggers Action

Don’t waste budget on branded mugs.

Use direct mail when the timing is right:

• After a demo
• When an opportunity is stalled
• When intent signals spike,but no one responds

Services like Sendoso, Reachdesk, and Postal make this easy to automate and track.

And yes, gifts still work, especially when paired with something useful (like a report or a customized recommendation).

d) Sales-Assisted Nurtures That Get Remembered

Think of your SDRs like strategic closers, not inbox spammers. But that only works if they’ve got context. 

Here’s how:

• SDRs should know when someone from the account clicked an ad
• What pages they visited
• What content they downloaded
• Which signals happened across marketing and sales

Use one shared system (Salesforce, HubSpot, Gong—whatever you’re on) to keep both teams in sync and focused.

That’s how you surround an account without overwhelming it.

Pro tip: Don’t have a huge sales org or ABM stack? No problem. Start small and pick 10–20 Tier 1 accounts, build manual outreach sequences, and run LinkedIn Matched Audience ads. Track everything in a shared sheet. You’ll learn fast what works and you don’t need software to prove value.

5. Don’t Celebrate Leads. Track Pipeline.

ABM isn’t about MQLs.

It’s about meetings, opportunities, and revenue. If you’re still reporting on form fills or CTRs, you’re missing the point.

Everyone loves a dashboard. But if it doesn’t help you close deals faster, it’s not worth much.

Here’s what I actually track and what you should too:

• Account engagement score
• Meetings booked per tier
• Pipeline velocity
• Close rate by campaign

You’re not tracking leads. You’re tracking deal flow.

Account-level visibility shows the whole picture like who’s active, who’s stalling, and where to push next.

Core Metrics That Matter

• Account engagement score: Are the right people at the right accounts engaging across channels? Your score should include actions like ad clicks, email opens, site visits, and meeting attendance, weighted by recency and role.

Tools like 6sense and Demandbase can do this for you, or you can build your own model using CRM + intent data.

• Meetings booked per tier: Especially track Tier 1 and Tier 2 accounts to see where your efforts are paying off.
• Pipeline velocity: How fast are accounts moving from first touch to opportunity? If deals are dragging, you’ve got a friction problem.
• Close rate by campaign: Which ABM plays actually turn into revenue? Double down on what converts.
• Benchmark: A 20–40% engagement rate per account is solid. Less than 10%? Time to rethink your offer, your targeting—or both.

Track by Account, Not Contact

Think beyond lead scoring. Account-based visibility shows you the full picture.

If you only look at individuals, you’ll miss when deals are heating up or falling off.

A good ABM dashboard shows engagement by account across every channel—email, ads, sales touches, and web activity.

Layer in deal stage, tier level, last touch, and open opps so your team knows who to prioritize and how to act.

Run Regular Reviews

Every quarter, sit down with sales, marketing, and CS to gut-check the program.

Ask:

• Which accounts moved
• Where campaigns stalled
• What messaging actually landed

And if your best accounts aren’t engaging?

Layer in a new signal or step. A new offer. A new hook.

That’s how you correct the course before the pipeline dries up.

ABM Plays I’ve Seen Work (and a Few You Should Steal)

Once the core playbook is running, test bold moves. These aren’t “best practices.” But they’ve landed actual pipeline and they’re worth stealing.

1. Invite-Only, No-Pitch Executive Roundtables

No pitch. No deck. Just a curated group of VPs and C-levels talking shop.

Position your brand as a peer, not a vendor. Add a follow-up offer after the event to keep the convo going.

2. Turn Cold Accounts Into Hot Opportunities

If engagement drops from a previously active account, that’s your moment.

Send a thoughtful gift. Trigger a personalized SDR email. Don’t let them go cold.

3. Launch Custom Microsites for the Top 10 Accounts

Create 1:1 pages that include:

• Personalized demo video
• Industry-specific case studies
• CTA tied to their business goals

Use unique URLs and track behavior.

4. Use CS for Expansion ABM

Customer success teams know where the pain (and opportunity) is.

Use the same ABM tactics—ads, offers, exec outreach—but apply them to your existing accounts for upsell and cross-sell.

ABM doesn’t stop at closed-won. Shift your playbook from acquisition to retention. Focus on value expansion, not just pain relief.

Renewals and upsells often come down to timing, not need. ABM helps you stay top of mind until the moment’s right.

5. Run “Test-And-Incubation” Pods

Take a small slice of Tier 1 accounts and run bold plays:

• Experimental content formats
• Higher-risk offers
• Multi-channel blitzes

If it works, scale it. If not, no harm.

Conclusion

Effective ABM isn’t about scale. It’s about precision.

If your tactics aren’t boosting account engagement, generating real opportunities, and accelerating deals, you’re wasting budget.

Cut the noise. Sharpen the list. Tighten the playbook.

ABM doesn’t work because it’s trendy. It works because it’s focused.

If your pipeline is dragging, don’t go wider—go deeper. Revenue follows precision.