Client Segmentation for Targeted Sales

If my CEO asked me to book more meetings with our ICP, here's the first thing I'd do: Build a proper target account list. I know, hear me out The biggest difference between winning and loosing GTM teams? Prioritization. Most B2B companies don't have an ICP, they have an ACP (average customer profile). They sell to too many verticals or personas Knowing with SURGICAL precision your ideal customer (pays you the most, stays the longest, easy to sell into, needs almost no support), allows you to do things your competitors can't Here's what I'd do: 1. Get CRM access & export a list of all of our existing and past customers 2. This list should have this info, broken down by customer: - Industry - Company size - Geography - Annual contract value - Sales Cycle Length - Job Title of our champion - Anything else you deem important, like tech stack, funding, department size 3. Add to Google Sheet 4. Group them by segments and calculate win rate by segment. I'd probably segment by industry and/or company size THE IMPORTANT PART: 5. Give this list to my CEO and have them rate each customer 1-5 from worst-fit to best-fit. 5 being “I’d want to keep this customer at all costs” & 1 being “If that customer canceled today, I’d almost be happy” 6. Next to that score, have my CEO fill out a “Why?” field to explain why they gave that customer that score. Can be just one sentence 7. Sort the list by score, best on top, worst on the bottom 8. Find the patterns. There’s no shortcut here. Look at the data, play around with it, form hypothesis and test them Eg. “my CEO thinks the best customers are those who pay us the most while having a short sales cycle, which tends to be mid-market companies in non-regulated industries where we have a VP champion” 9. Express & validate the criteria. Repeat it back to my CEO. I'm looking for a "that's it". Cross-check with Sales and CS 10. I'd use Sales Navigator (or whatever l have access to, ZoomInfo, Ocean.io) to make a complete list of ALL the companies who match this exact criteria. Could be anything from 50 - 20k companies 12. Next I'd pull a list of all the relevant stakeholders within these account. If we sell to SMB, it might just be 1 person per account. If we sell into enterprise, it might be 5-10 people per account 13. This list is now the basis of our GTM. I would for example: - Create content that's hyper-relevant for this newly defined person (focusing on the Champion), leveraging internal Subject-Matter Experts at our company - Build a custom feed in Sales Nav so we can track whenever one of our ICPs posts something and I'd send this to my CEO so they can engage - Run our best Linkedin posts as Thought Leader ads towards this list - Run Conversation Ads to book demos (highly underutilized) - I'd use a tool like Keyplay to score the accounts to feed to my sales team - I'd track signals like hiring, tech stack changes, content engagement to run warm outbound

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗹𝘆𝘀𝗶𝘀 𝗜 𝗰𝗮𝗻’𝘁 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗲𝗻𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵 𝗼𝗳? Customer segmentation by size, industry, and geography. Why? Because when you stop treating all customers the same, you start growing 𝗳𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿, more 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗹𝘆, and with fewer 𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗲𝘀. This analysis is the unlock for: 📈 Smarter growth strategies 💰 Healthier margins 🤝 Happier customers 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗯𝘆 𝘀𝗶𝘇𝗲, 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗴𝗲𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗽𝗵𝘆? ✅ 1. Sales & service effectiveness • A $250M CPG distributor in the Midwest doesn’t need or want the same approach as a $7bn manufacturer in Germany. • Segmentation helps you sell and support the right way - for the right customer. ✅ 2. Better strategic & operational decisions • Want to know which customers are high-effort but low-margin? Which industries are expanding the fastest? Which region has the stickiest customers? • Segmentation brings that clarity. ✅ 3. Improved customer experience • Customers don’t expect to be treated equally - they expect to be treated relevantly. • When all your teams understand the nuances of the customer they're serving, retention and satisfaction go up. 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗼 𝗶𝘁 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹: 1️⃣ Group customers by: • Size (revenue or headcount) - a useful proxy for complexity • Industry (manufacturing & industrials, tech, services, life sciences & healthcare, CPG, etc.) • Geography (region, market, country) 2️⃣ For each segment, analyze: • Profitability • Support/service effort • Sales cycle and retention • Volumes, expansion or upsell potential 3️⃣ Find your high-leverage segments 4️⃣ Align GTM, finance, ops, and support around them 5️⃣ Refresh regularly - your base will evolve 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗟𝗶𝗻𝗲 • Customer segmentation isn’t just a data exercise. It’s a strategic advantage hiding in plain sight. • When you know who your best customers really are - you build better, sell smarter, and scale faster. #CustomerStrategy #Operations #Finance #Growth #Segmentation #BusinessStrategy #fpanda

Hot take: If you're still segmenting customers solely by ARR and company size, you're leaving money on the table. After a painful realization, we completely overhauled our segmentation model: Our highest-paying enterprise customers weren't necessarily the most profitable or successful. Traditional segmentation missed these critical factors: Product usage patterns Growth potential (not just current spend) Support cost-to-revenue ratio Implementation complexity Use case maturity The result? We were over-serving some accounts and under-serving others based on flawed assumptions. Our new dynamic segmentation model includes: User adoption velocity Feature utilization depth Growth readiness score Technical maturity index Success potential metric The impact? 47% reduction in time-to-value 32% increase in expansion revenue More precise resource allocation Happier customers (and CS team!) A startup paying you $30K might have better product-market fit and growth potential than an enterprise paying $200K but struggling with adoption. Modern customer segmentation should be fluid, multi-dimensional, and focused on success potential, not just current value. What factors do you consider in your segmentation model? #CustomerSuccess #SaaS #GrowthStrategy #CustomerExperience

Years doing cold outreach taught me this: Bad segmentation will break your campaigns Look, I get it—spray and pray is easy. It’s low maintenance, and sometimes it even works. But here’s the problem ❌ Low reply rates ❌ Risk of burning your dream clients ❌ Wasted email volume on unqualified prospects The result? Fewer meetings booked per week. Here’s what to do instead: 𝟭. 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱 𝗮 𝗵𝗶𝗴𝗵-𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝘀𝘁 Scrape your Total Addressable Market (TAM) using Apollo.io (or similar). Then, upload the data into Clay for deeper segmentation. 𝟮. 𝗦𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗯𝘆 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝗺𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗽𝗵𝗶𝗰𝘀 Break your list down by: ✅ Industry ✅ Seniority ✅ Revenue* ✅ Company size ✅ Role/Department To get precise revenue data, use waterfall enrichment: 🔹 Clearbit 🔹 HG Insights 🔹 RocketReach 🔹 People Data Labs 🔹 Owler - A Meltwater Offering This helps you focus on high-probability prospects who are more likely to convert. 𝟯. 𝗚𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗲𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮𝗱𝘃𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 Leverage Claygent to segment based on unique attributes: 🔍 Does the company offer Buy Now, Pay Later? 🔍 Are they SOC II, GDPR, or ISO 9001 compliant? 🔍 Do they have a podcast? Use yes/no questions or multiple-choice (max 3 options) to improve accuracy. The goal? Gather enough intelligence to anticipate their pain points, and solutions before even reaching out. 𝟰. 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝘆-𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 Ocean.io helps you find hundreds of companies similar to your highest-paying clients, while a simpler (but still effective) approach is to segment by industry and refine it over time. 𝟱. 𝗦𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗯𝘆 𝘃𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗼𝗿𝘀 & 𝘁𝗲𝗰𝗵 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 Another powerful way to qualify leads is by the vendors they use: ⚡ BuiltWith – See what technologies are installed on a website. ⚡ ScrapeLi – Check if they follow a certain company on LinkedIn. ⚡ PredictLeads – Scrape employee certifications & job postings to understand what software they’re using. At the end of the day, better segmentation = better results. 𝗤𝘂𝗶𝗰𝗸 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗽: Scrape a lead list Segment by firmographics Use Claygent for advanced segmentation Use case study-based segmentation Use vendor-based segmentation P.S. Are you implementing these methods?

Here is how a B2B marketing strategy SHOULD look like (and how it actually looks in most B2B companies). 𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐲 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐁2𝐁 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐞𝐬: 1. Paid ads promoting product/demo 2. Automated email & LinkedIn outreach 3. Gated e-books to generate "leads" 4. Product pitching webinars 5. AI-generated blog articles. 6. Occasional posts on the company's social pages 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐥𝐰𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐦𝐞 (based on the State of Full-Funnel Marketing research): -Miserable "lead" to opportunity conversion and endless debates about the quality of the leads - Missed revenue targets - High cost of acquisition - Extended sales cycle Usually, the core problem of these companies is a lack of marketing fundamentals and a clear GTM strategy. 𝐆𝐓𝐌 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐲 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐁2𝐁 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞: 0. 𝐆𝐨𝐚𝐥𝐬. Goals should be based on your current resources, opportunities, and historical growth, not based on wishes or unrealistic expectations. 1. 𝐓𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐬𝐞𝐠𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬. Segmentation is the first step in developing ICP. Different segments have different use cases, buying processes, and revenue potential. You need to select the focus segment. 2. 𝐈𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐢𝐥𝐞 (𝐈𝐂𝐏). Here are 5 ICP pillars. - Firmographics - Buying committee - Account segmentation (Tiers & Lists) - Qualification and disqualification criteria - Customer research 3. 𝐁𝐮𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬. During customer research, define what triggers the buying process, and what are the typical steps buyers take. But keep in mind that most customers are not actively buying. Try to figure out what channels they use for education, who they follow, and what content resonates with them and motivates them to learn more about specific solutions (demand triggers). Understand typical questions, concerns, and inhouse approval process. 4. 𝐌𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐠 & 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠. In the AI era, the differentiation, strong narrative, and clear messaging are vital. 5. 𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥-𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐥 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐧. Define programs to influence the whole buying process: — Awareness and demand generation. — Demand capturing and activation — Sales and buyer enablement — Retention — Expansion 6. 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 & 𝐀𝐝𝐯𝐨𝐜𝐚𝐜𝐲. Last stage is often ignored, but without an efficient CS and advocacy, your company will deal with: - Lack of case studies and referrals - High churn Build a great relationship and minimize time to value with appropriate onboarding. Embed customer research into the CS process. Leverage the opportunity to create case studies and share insights with marketing and sales for further expansion. 7. 𝐌𝐞𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐬 & 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐬. Create a dashboard with key revenue metrics and sales pipeline velocity. Define key leading indicators. Create a blended attribution model to see the impact of marketing.

We run 5,000 Account-Based Advertising campaigns and deliver 1 billion ad impressions every month for our B2B customers. Here’s how we use Account-Based Advertising internally at Demandbase: BACKGROUND: As you can imagine, we are heavy users of Account-Based Advertising. We don't only sell it, we live it. Our goal is to focus on accounts with the greatest LTV. The primary levers we pull are segmentation, ad creative, and integration into our overall account-based GTM strategy: 1. Segmentation Segmentation is the foundation of our account-based advertising strategy. It enables the appropriate level of resources, the right message, and the right workflows to be focused on every account in our ICP. We segment accounts by starting more general and then get more granular, so each general segment has subsegments with greater levels of specificity. Here is our classification of segments: * Geo–country level * Revenue range - we have five revenue segments * Tiers - we have three tiers based on industry, technographics, and engagement scoring that define how much resources we put to each account * Journey Stage - we use custom stages that define where an account is in the customer journey * Product Interest - a combination of intent data and campaign responses 2. Ad creative Our goal is to the deliver the most relevant asset for the segment to drive the greatest engagement. We do that in three ways. First, we use an asset engagement heatmap. This shows what content assets are getting the highest level of engagement across channels and use those messages to target each segment. Second, we use dynamic creative that personalizes by industry and company name in real-time. Third, we use detailed and technical creative for re-targeting, after accounts have engaged with our website. 3. Integrating Advertising into our account-based GTM Account-Based Advertising by itself is only one component of an account-based GTM. Results will be limited if not thoughtfully integrated into a broader strategy. There are three key ways we do this at Demandbase. First, we orchestrate the same segmentation and creative strategy across Marketing and Sales Channels (i.e. LinkedIn, Meta, Google, Marketing Automation, Content Syndication, SEM, and Sales Automation). Second, we use the Tier segmentation to define the level of resourcing entitlements we give to each account. Tier 1 receives the most entitlements across Sales and Marketing (i.e. direct mail, 1:1 campaigns and experiences, and executive strategy sessions). Third, we create advertising response and engagement reports using UTM parameters for our SDR as a way to prioritize and personalize outreach. TAKEAWAY: Account-based advertising is a popular and effective use case for engaging accounts and providing air coverage. You can use segmentation and good creative to optimize its effectiveness. But its full potential is only realized when you integrate it into your account-based GTM strategy.

🚨 Most companies think they’re segmenting customers. In reality, they’re just sorting accounts by size or spend. But true customer segmentation is about grouping accounts by behavior, needs, and growth potential—not just ARR. Here’s why it matters: 🔑 Renewal strategy → Your high-risk, low-engagement customers need proactive health checks, tailored success plans, and executive alignment. 💡 Upsell strategy → Your high-adoption, expansion-ready customers should get roadmap previews, advanced training, and joint business planning. ⚖️ Efficiency strategy → Digital-led engagement for your long-tail ensures consistent value delivery without stretching your CS team thin. Companies doing this well (think Salesforce, HubSpot, and ServiceNow) don’t treat all customers the same. They’ve built playbooks tailored to who the customer is today and where they can go tomorrow. 👉 Without segmentation, you’re flying blind—wasting resources on accounts unlikely to grow, while missing expansion signals from your strongest advocates. The real unlock? ✅ Use segmentation to prioritize where to invest, then align renewal and upsell motions accordingly. 💬 How does your company currently segment customers—and does it actually guide your renewal and growth playbooks, or is it just a reporting exercise?

If I was running ABM at a fast-growing security company (like Wiz, Snyk, or Netskope), here's how I'd avoid wasting money on bad-fit accounts. 👇 AI Segmentation. Most companies segment by industry. They say something like: "We target Tech, Retail, and Hospitality companies with 1,000+ employees." Motel 6 and Airbnb show why this breaks. Same firmographic profiles. But very different business situations, needs, and priorities when it comes to information security (or any tech purchase). You wouldn't sell to them the same way. AI Segmentation helps you uncover and target the highest value segments for your business, beyond basic industries. Here's how I would do this for a security company: 1.) Segment on business situation (not industry). -- Analyze your best customers (high NRR, high ACV). -- Group by specific situations that align to your value prop. e.g. Security Maturity Level, Security Use Cases, Compliance Sensitivity, etc.  -- Find the *natural* clusters based on value, not generic industry labels. 2.) Identify segments with AI. -- Use Keyplay AI to categorize every account in your market. -- Backtest segments against historical data to find which segments have the highest NDR, ACV, and Win Rates. -- Find new ICPs, outside generic vertical groups. 3.) Action the data -- Create ABM plays at intersections with highest win rates. -- Develop content specific to each segment combination (e.g., "Cloud Security for Advanced DevSecOps Teams in Retail") -- Refine your segmentation models as you grow. This process can reduce non-ICP Spend (waste) by 20-30% and help you find thousands of net new target accounts. Don't just throw your budget at industries. Find the segments where your solution resonates most, where you win often, win fast, and win big. That's strategic segmentation. p.s. If you want me and my team to kick-start this process for you, we're offering a free strategic segmentation analysis to CMOs at SaaS security companies with >$20M ARR. Get your report here --> https://lnkd.in/gMezS4Zk #ABM #ICP