What is it and why do you need it?
The first step in the process of creating and executing an ABM plan – especially for a strategic account – is to define your ambition for that account. Creating a clear ambition demands strong leadership and, ideally, collaboration with the customer, to build a shared vision of where the business partnership could go and the areas where you can build mutual value.
It’s likely that the account director, together with the account team and the executive sponsor on the account, will already have a view of your company’s ambition with the customer, so start by discussing it with them At Inflexion Group, we recommend using a structured interview guide to help you explore that ambition in the context of your starting point with the customer today.
How do you use it?
Set the scene by explaining the ABM process and framing this first step – clarifying the ambition – in the context of the medium to long term relationship with the customer, rather than the next quarter. For your most important customers, a three-year time horizon is a good one to use since it allows the team to consider the art of the possible, and also to plot what needs to happen over the next several quarters in order to realise your longer-term objectives.
Then use the discussion guide to help you understand where you are with the customer today, where you want to be in three years, who you need to build relationships with in order to get there, and who you are competing with in the account. We use the proven discussion guide below, which work as an individual interview guide for the account director or executive sponsor, and as a focus group discussion guide with the broader account team.
As well as clarifying your ambition and setting the scene for your ABM planning, the information you capture will be a useful starting point for the second step of the ABM process: creating actionable insight. Your conversation may have already helped to focus the insight gathering process, say within a specific business unit of a global customer organisation. If not, your insight will need to start at a broader level and then be revisited in greater depth once you narrow down your focus on specific opportunities.
Read more about when and how to use this interview guide in ‘Account-Based Marketing’ (Burgess, Kogan Page, 2025), or take the on-demand course on Getting Started with Strategic ABM from the ABM Academy.
See our previous toolkit article on using an account onboarding checklist in Strategic ABM.
