Ever felt like a last‑minute magician, summoned to save a deal with a dash of ‘marketing magic’? You’re not alone. Strategic wins aren’t pulled out of a hat; they’re earned through method and rigor. Whether the call comes late, or marketing never makes it to the deal table, the result is the same.
The problem: order‑taking marketing vs. strategic partnership
Two patterns keep surfacing when pursuit marketing fails to fire.
- Scenario Sales wants last‑minute magic. Sales brings marketing in only when the deal is already racing toward the deadline. The brief is vague (“we need a quick win”) and the expectation is instant lift. With no time for insight or differentiation, marketing can only deploy surface‑level tactics, usually too late to sway the decision.
- Scenario Marketing stays silent. Sometimes the runway exists, but marketing never claims its seat at the deal table. Unable to explain how it will influence stakeholders or sharpen the value proposition, the team defaults to generic assets. Sales hears only noise and moves on without them.
Both scenarios reduce marketing to an order‑taking function and leave value on the table. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Why true pursuit marketing matters
True pursuit marketing is a discipline I’ve spent years refining. Within the first year of deployment, it helped me lift strategic‑deal win rates by more than 20%.
While exact average deal size figures are not commonly published as a single industry average, the IT outsourcing market, for example is massive and growing rapidly. According to Statista, the global IT outsourcing market revenue was $512 billion in 2024, and is projected to grow at a CAGR of about 11% to reach $777.7 billion by 2028.
Given the scale and complexity of these deals, neither strategic alignment between sales and marketing nor the deep insight required to craft differentiated value propositions, win themes, and an effective multi‑channel activation strategy can happen overnight. To put it into context: in the ‘sprinkle some magic’ scenario, marketers are already out of time to make an impact on the most complex deals before they’ve even started.
The risks of the “last mile push” approach
Sales might hope for a quick ‘marketing fix,’ but the truth is that if marketing is brought in too late, the real levers of influence have already passed. The result?
- Weak value proposition that fails to reflect the buyer’s true priorities.
- Superficial, undifferentiated messaging that doesn’t resonate, and certainly doesn’t help you stand out.
- Greater risk of mistakes, particularly as governance requirements tighten (GDPR, vendor scrutiny, antitrust oversight).
When this happens, the strategic value marketing could bring to the pursuit is lost, and so is the opportunity to demonstrate how marketing contributes to winning any deal.
From magic to strategic discipline: pursuit marketing done right
The figure below shows how pursuit marketing accelerates and sharpens the middle stages of an established ABM process, switching focus from growing an account to winning a specific strategic opportunity.
The visual shows exactly where pursuit marketing slots into the five‑step ABM process. From the moment a strategic opportunity is qualified, the timeline compresses: insight building, strategic marketing focus and campaign planning happen in rapid succession, before a tightly managed activation phase then a disciplined hand‑off back to the broader ABM programme.
To thrive in this high‑pressure window, pursuit marketers must:
- Apply business acumen and buyer insight to shape value propositions and win themes.
- Translate insight into tailored content and multichannel activation that resonates with real people in the buying centre.
- Stay close to the sales team from qualification through to final decision.
This isn’t reactive support; it’s a strategic discipline that demands clarity, commitment and the confidence to add value where it matters most.
What can you do?
- Sales and marketing leaders: Don’t settle for last‑minute requests from sales or marketing’s absence from the deal team when you could be building the foundations for collaboration that, with the right discipline, can also scale across smaller deals. Elevate your marketing teams’ skills, impact, and career by mastering pursuit marketing as a strategic discipline.
- B2B marketers and ABM-ers: Build your pursuit marketing skills and have a real impact on your company’s performance.
If this has piqued your interest, join me on my next Advanced Pursuit Marketing Course, starting 10 June 2025.
