Eighteen months after @Bev Burgess and @Tim Shercliff released their book “Account-based Growth – Unlocking sustainable value through extraordinary customer focus,” Inflexion Group Managing Principal, Andy McFarlane, reflects on our learnings from activating this strategy with clients around the world.
Our experience over the last year and half, reinforces the premise that an Account-based growth (ABG) strategy can be the right route to success for technology and professional services firms. Of course, these organisations are all aiming for growth, the difference with Inflexion Group’s ABG strategy is that it offers a structured, data-driven approach to achieve sustainable growth from the client accounts which are most likely to deliver it. Achieving success with this strategic process requires some special ingredients.
Here’s what we’ve learned so far:
- Be prepared to put Pareto into practice
The first stand-out is the Pareto rule itself; the 80/20 principle that underpins the thinking behind our Account-based Growth strategy. This is so often referenced in planning meetings, yet so rarely used as a way of aligning company-wide execution. I enjoy the response of leadership teams when the data-driven reality of applying Pareto’s rule to their business gets unwrapped. Light bulbs go on when we develop a tiered account model which prioritises growing top accounts and clarifies the perils of the ‘long tail’ as a company strives to achieve more sustainable, and particularly profitable, growth.
- Be bold and demand high-level buy in
The attitude of a leadership team is an early indicator of likely success. Embedding the idea of an Account-based growth strategy driven by data, with the goal of sustainable growth, throughout the entire organisation is critical. One of my favourite examples is one Chief Marketing Officer who, on embracing an ABG strategy, repositioned themselves as Chief Growth Officer, working tightly with their CEO.
- Mine your data and line up your resources
An Account-based growth strategy benefits from an integrated data set covering the needs of strategy, sales, marketing, and customer success teams, as well as a dynamic account-based marketing team.
- Make a plan and follow it
The fourth stand-out for me is how often we see executive sponsorship and engagement programmes limping along as random acts of engagement. To be effective, an Account-based growth strategy requires a planned and structured programme designed to proactively deepen and broaden relationships with clients. This can be as simple as a one-page account business plan that is used every week to keep the executional focus on the things that really matter.
You can read more about Account-based growth on our website, and you can find ‘Account-based Growth – Unlocking sustainable value through extraordinary customer focus’ by Bev Burgess and Tim Shercliff here.
