In this upcoming webinar, sponsored by PathFactory, join host Matt Heinz (President, Heinz Marketing), Patricia DuChene (Head of Marketing, Sendoso), and Andrew Reed (Director of ABM, AVEVA) as they share how they’re building trust, increasing conversion rates, and shortening sales cycles—by creating content and campaigns that truly resonate. 

You’ll learn: 

• What today’s top-performing teams are doing differently to engage modern buyers 
• How content strategy and sales enablement are evolving together 
• The role of personalization and signal intelligence in building trust and accelerating decisions 
• Tactical examples of what’s working—and what’s not—from real customer journeys 

Whether you’re navigating a slow pipeline or looking for smarter ways to drive engagement, this conversation will offer practical, peer-led insights you can put to work immediately. Register today and you’ll also receive the on-demand recording and other resources!

The post [Live Interactive Webinar] “Ghosted to Growth: Revenue Leaders on Buyer Re-Engagement appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

The show is about 20 minutes, fast-paced and full of actionable advice, best practices and more for B2B sales and marketing professionals.

This week’s show is entitled, “Best Practices For Driving Innovation in B2B (Let AI Agents Do The Work)” and my guest is Anna Luo, SVP Customer Innovation & Marketing at Jivox.

Matt interviews the best and brightest minds in sales and Marketing.  If you would like to be a guest on Sales Pipeline Radio send an email to acceleration@heinzmarketing.com.

The post Sales Pipeline Radio – Anna Luo appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

CMOs who consistently earn the trust and support of their CFOs know that predictability is everything. Through our work with high-performing marketing leaders, we’ve seen a common thread: they don’t just report on marketing performance—they forecast it with accuracy and speak to it in terms their CFOs care about. In our last post, we explored how sales velocity can serve as a starting point for forecasting marketing’s revenue impact. But to build true credibility and secure long-term investment, CMOs must go further. This article builds on that foundation, highlighting how successful marketing leaders leverage conversion data, benchmarks, and financial packaging to create a trusted, mutually beneficial partnership with finance.

Why Forecasting Matters to CFOS

CFOs are responsible for managing risk and ensuring steady financial performance that meet their investors expectations. When forecasts miss, CFOs must act. In many times this means tightening of budgets.

True story: fewer than 25% of sales teams achieve 75% forecast accuracy or higher. Even worse, less than half of sales leaders trust their own projections. If sales—whose forecasts are revenue-based—are that uncertain, marketing projections often draw even more skepticism. And when projections feel like guesswork, CFOs play it cautiously by cutting budgets.

That’s why accuracy—not optimism—is essential. When your forecasting is consistently close to actuals, marketing earns a seat at the table. With predictive data and diligent calibration, CMOs prove to be their business partners, not budget line items.

Beyond Sales Velocity: Elevating Your Forecasting Game

Sales velocity is a great place to start—it’s simple, intuitive, and directly tied to revenue. But earning lasting confidence from your CFO requires a more complete view. The most successful CMOs layer in additional forecasting tools and conversion data to build models that are not only accurate, but defensible. Here’s how to take your forecasting game to the next level.

1. Funnel Conversion Modeling

Track your end-to-end funnel metrics and calculate:

Start with your top-line goal (e.g., $X revenue), convert with known rates, and reverse-engineer needed funnel volume. This bottoms-up approach gives your CFO a transparent, data-rooted forecast.  Here’s a spreadsheet to get you started.

2. Predictive Analytics & Historical Lift

Tools like MadKudu, Clari, and 6sense surface buying signals and model how prospects behave. AI/ML models have shown the ability to boost forecast accuracy by up to 20–30% .

Historical lift analytics also help forecast: If a $100K account-based effort generated 20% more pipeline historically, show how similar investments should produce predictable returns again.

3. Forecasting Cadence & Rigor

Forecast accuracy improves when reviewed actively. Korn Ferry found formalized forecast reviews bump forecasted win rates by 17% . Establish regular review cycles (weekly/biweekly) to tighten assumptions and keep adjustments plugged in.

Benchmarks CFOs Actually Care About

Benchmarks can be a valuable reference point—they give CFOs familiar ratios and comparisons to evaluate marketing performance. But they’re just that: reference points, not rules. Relying too heavily on benchmarks without the context of your specific business model, sales cycle, or go-to-market maturity can lead to flawed conclusions. Use them to inform your strategy, not define your success. Here are a few metrics CFOs tend to trust and how to use them wisely.

• MQL → SQL Conversion
• Opportunity → Win Rate
• Pipeline Coverage Ratio
• Customer Acquisition Cost
• LTV Ratio
• Forecast Accuracy

These benchmarks help finance evaluate whether marketing plays are efficient, scalable, and financially sound.

Package Marketing in CFO Language

Even the most impressive marketing results can fall flat if they’re not communicated in a way the CFO understands and values. To build credibility and secure future investment, CMOs need to translate marketing impact into the financial terms that matter—think efficiency, ROI, and forecast accuracy. Here’s how to frame your results so they resonate in the boardroom.

Additionally, track forecast accuracy:

“We predicted $1M in pipeline last quarter; actuals hit $1.05M (+5% vs forecast).”
“For this quarter, we’re forecasting $750K pipeline, based on funnel metrics and historical lift from similar campaigns.”

Bring the CFO into the Process

CFOs are far more likely to support marketing investments when they’ve had a hand in shaping the assumptions behind them. Involving finance early in your planning and forecasting process creates shared ownership of the numbers—and greater confidence in the outcomes. It’s not just about alignment; it’s about building a foundation for smarter, faster decisions across the business.

• Invite finance to model reviews—ask for their input.
• Share dashboards that show marketing spend vs. forecasted pipeline and outcomes.
• Create a rolling forecast model—updated monthly—to reflect real-time changes.
• Cite data-backed benchmarks and models so finance sees the rigor in assumptions

A Deloitte study found 79% of high-growth companies have CFOs and CMOs aligned on performance metrics—compared to just 55% in slower-growing firms. Proving alignment = growth.

Why this Matters

This isn’t just about delivering numbers—it’s about elevating the role of marketing as a revenue-responsible function with a true seat at the table. When CMOs use accurate forecasting, meaningful benchmarks, and financial language, they gain more than just CFO approval—they gain strategic influence. A strong partnership with finance helps marketing lead, not follow—shaping priorities, guiding investment, and having a real say in how the business grows. For marketers, it’s not just about protecting budget—it’s about owning outcomes and having greater control over your team’s (and your own) trajectory inside the organization.

If you’d like to talk to one of our consultants about how to get started creating a revenue-responsible marketing function for your organization, please feel free to reach out to us.

The post Data-Driven Forecasting and Budget Justification – A CMO’s Guide to Speaking the CFO’s Language (Part 2) appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

Customer-led growth (CLG) is a strategy that depends on aligning your tools with each stage of the customer lifecycle. CLG goes beyond onboarding, you have to actively engage your customers and provide resources for long lasting success. From onboarding to advocacy, the right tech stack enables you to deliver seamless experiences, unlock value faster, and drive long-term expansion. In this post, we’ll explore the key technologies that can support and scale customer-led growth.

Customer Lifecycle Stages

Before we dive into the technology, it’s important to note that you should have defined customer lifecycle stages. Similar to the normal sales stages, each customer lifecycle stage should have a definition, goal to advance to the next stage, and defined roles/responsibilities for each team involved. Here’s a look at the stages we use internally.

Another important note that the tools/tech listed below is not an extensive list and might not make sense for your organization. It depends on your product or solution and your current tech stack. Before you add more technology, it’s best to conduct a tech stack audit to determine what you have available and where you have gaps. In our experience, most technology is underutilized and there might be features or functions you don’t know about, that would be beneficial to your organization.

A great example is that you’ll notice a handful of platforms show up under multiple stages. The more support one platform can provide, the better. It’s best to utilize tools to their fullest potential, which saves you money (in some cases) and keeps your tech stack lean.

Now let’s breakdown the tech that can support each stage.

Onboarding

The goal in this stage is to ensure smooth adoption and early time-to-value. Below are potential tools that can support this stage. Determine the right mix for your org!

• Customer Onboarding Platforms
  • Rocketlane, GuideCX, ChurnZero
  • Manage onboarding projects, track milestones, and collaborate with customers
• Digital Adoption Platforms
  • Pendo, WalkMe, Appcues, Whatfix
  • In-app guidance, tooltips, walkthroughs, and product tours
• Customer Success Platforms
  • Gainsight, Totango, Catalyst
  • Track onboarding health scores, automate tasks, and manage playbooks
• Learning Management Systems (LMS)
  • Skilljar, LeanrUpon, Docebo
  • Offer structured traning and certifications to support product education
• Workflow Automation/Integration
  • Zapier, Workato, Tray.io
  • Automate onboarding tasks and data handoff between teams

Value Realization

The goal at this stage is to help customers achieve outcomes and realize ROI. You want customers to get the most out of your solution and to do that as soon as possible.

• Product Analytics
  • Mixpanel, Amplitude, Heap, Pendo
  • Track feature usage, identify adoption trends, and uncover friction points
• Customer Success Platforms
  • Gainsight, Totango, Planhat
  • Monitor health scores, track succes plans, and alerts CSMs of risk/opportunity
• Surveys / Voice of Customer (VoC)
  • Medallia, Qualtrics, Typeform, Delighted
  • Collect feedback on feature usefulness and buiness outcomes
• BI / Reporting 
  • Looker, Tableau, Power BI, Mode
  • Create executive-level dashboards on usage, engagement, and business impact

Growth

The goal at this stage is to drive upsell, cross-seel, and product expansion. If your customers are happy, they are more willing to expand, which means more business for you.

• Customer Success Platforms
  • Gainsight, Totango, Catalyst
  • Identify expansion-ready accounts with usage and sentiment data
• CRM + CPQ (Configure Price Quote)
  • Salesforce + Salesforce CPQ, Hubspot, DealHub
  • Manage renewals, pricing, and upsell motions
• Revenue Intelligence / Forecasting
  • Clari, Gong, Aviso
  • Analyze buyer signals and forecasting expansion deals
• Marketing Automation & ABM
  • Marketo, Hubspot, Demandbase, 6sense
  • Launch targeted campaigns to promote new features or offerings to existing customers
• Product-Led Growth 
  • Pendo, Appcues, Gainsight PX
  • Prompt upsell or feature trials based on usage patterns in-app

Advocacy

The goal at this stage it to turn happy customers into promoters and influencers. If you’re customers are truly happy with your offering, they are willing to share with their networks. Sometimes you just have to provide the right tools to allow them to do so.

• Customer Advocacy / Reference Management
  • Influitive, SlapFive, ReferenceEdge
  • Manage advocacy programs, track references, and gamify engagement
• Community Platforms
  • Higher Logic, Discourse, Slack, Gainsight Digital Hub
  • Foster peer-to-peer support and self-service
• Review & Referral Management
  • TrustRadius, G2, ReferralRock, Birdeye
  • Encourage reviews and referrals through structured outreach
• CSAT/NPS Collection
  • Delighted, AskNicely, Qualtrics
  • Identify promoters and trigger advocacy invites
• Video Testimonials & Content Capture
  • Vocal Video, Testimonial Hero, StoryTap
  • Easily collect and publish customer stories at scale

In summary

Investing in the right tech stack is essential to enabling customer-led growth at every stage of the lifecycle. By thoughtfully aligning tools throughout the customer lifecycle stages, you empower your teams to deliver better outcomes and deepened customer relationships. With the right foundation, growth becomes not just possible but inevitable.

Have any questions or want to talk more about your CLG tech stack? Reach out for a free consultation with one of our experts. 

The post Tools to Power Every Stage of the Customer Lifecycle Journey appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

Choosing the right marketing consulting firm can be overwhelming—there’s no shortage of options, and it’s not always easy to tell who’s truly the right fit for your business. We get it. That’s why we put together this FAQ: to introduce ourselves, share what we’re all about, and help you decide whether we might be the right partner for your marketing needs.

In this blog, we’ve compiled the most frequently asked questions we hear from B2B marketers when getting to know Heinz Marketing. 

What is Heinz Marketing?

Established in 2008, Heinz Marketing is B2B marketing agency that brings a full funnel approach to help clients drive measurable results that bolsters revenue impact and boosts sales pipeline.

We are a team of sales and marketing experts that create custom strategies for clients that are rooted in our Predictable Pipeline Methodology, which are the foundational elements of any organization.

(And no, we are not affiliated with Kraft Heinz, the ketchup company!)

What does Heinz Marketing do?

Here are some of the services we provide:

1. GTM Strategy: Establish foundational marketing elements (Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), buyer personas, buying committee, messaging, content, sales cycle and enablement, resources and technology, and metrics).
2. ABM: Develop and execute ABM strategies including sales training based on our Predictable Pipeline work
3. GTM Orchestration: Develop and implement the planning to execution process including roles and responsibilities, inputs and outputs, communication, and more
4. Customer-led Growth: Quarterly strategies with themes and content ideas to keep customers happy and turn them into evangelists for your company
5. Staff Augmentation and Program Implementation: We can augment your team when you need export support whether it be program development and execution or strategic work

Why should I use Heinz Marketing?

We bring a foolproof approach for exceeding sales, marketing and go-to-market goals with our clients. That full funnel approach is what we call the Predictable Pipeline Method – a blueprint for b2b demand generation success.

More importantly, we treat every engagement as an opportunity to positively impact careers and lives by enabling work that matters, for your team and ours. We’re a team of thoughtful sales and marketing experts who understand the value in driving measurable results that bolsters your team’s revenue impact and boosts your sales pipeline.

Who uses Heinz Marketing?

B2B companies that understand the value of marketing and sales foundations who need help navigating complex sales cycles and cross-team collaboration.

We typically work with mid to enterprise level organizations, headquartered in the United States, but we have worked with marketing teams across the globe. 

We have worked with clients across many industries – manufacturing, healthcare, SaaS, cybersecurity, professional services, and more, including notable names like Pathfactory, MW Industries, and Vera Whole Health. 

Case studies and testimonials can be found on our Client Results page. If you’re curious about a specific industry, reach out and we’d be happy to provide more information.

What are your mission and values?

Our purpose is to positively impact careers and lives by enabling work that matters – and we do that through work for our clients, impacts to our community, and supporting our employees.

Our values are important, and we seek clients and employees that are a match and bring the following to their work:

• Poise – Bringing order and predictability to high-pressure and ever-changing situations.
• Drive – Learning and growing while focused on finding the right solutions for our clients.
• Confidence, Without Ego – Coachable and transparent while eager to continually improve.
• Commitment – Making our clients, our team, ourselves and our families and communities better.
• Can-Do Attitude – Proactive and evolving to always look for the best in people and situations.

Which marketing and sales tools do you support? 

We are tool agnostic, meaning we can work with whatever you have in your marketing and sales technology stack. We have experience across marketing automation platforms, CRM systems, sales automation, analytics, project management, etc.

Who is the founder/owner?

Matt Heinz started Heinz Marketing back in 2008 and continues to serve as President of Heinz Marketing today. He is a prolific author, podcast host, and nationally recognized, award-winning blogger, with 15+ years of marketing, business development and sales experience from a variety of organizations and industries. He is a dynamic speaker, memorable not only for his keen insight and humor, but his actionable and motivating takeaways.

To keep up with Matt, follow him on LinkedIn.

How can I learn more?

We’re happy to answer any questions we’ve missed here. Check out our website, blog, resources, sign up for our newsletter, or follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, or Instagram.

Want to chat? Email us for a free brainstorm session!

Image by CocosICE from Pixabay

The post Frequently Asked Questions About Heinz Marketing appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

If you read our B2B Reads, then you know I have been digging into custom GPT-building for some of our internal operations.  This post is a compilation of the lessons learned on properly structuring these things for customer marketing.  The goal is to speed you up in getting to a workflow that integrates better AI tools.  Before we get too far into it, here are a few other things to note:

1. If you are unfamiliar with custom GPTs, I will try to sum it up. They are essentially modules within ChatGPT (or other option) that you can load with prompts and knowledge-base documents, and instructions for how to use them.  They are great for repeatable processes such as persona creation, campaign planning, messaging design, and plenty of other functions.
2. This is not a guide on the mechanics of building them, if you need that I recommend you check out Andy Crestodina’s excellent guide. He has lots of other practical ideas and advice on this too.
3. I am still pretty new to this function, but we are on this journey together.
4. This is from doing “customer-led growth” work, but the concepts could easily be adapted to other areas of marketing.
5. Know your AI usage policies before uploading data/templates/materials into ChatGPT. Proper care should be taken to avoid any sensitive data being divulged.

There is a lot of trial and error in building these tools.  I have gone back and tweaked/adjusted GPTs that we have used for campaign development, persona creation, and others.

While not an agent, this is closer to the concept than just talking to ChatGPT.  Access to targeted information, templates, and docs brings it much closer to a purpose-built function.

And it can all be built in plain English.  Sweet.

If you are looking for ideas on what to do with a new CLG GPT, here are a few relevant posts from our blog:

• Rethinking the Account Development Growth Model
• FAQ: CLG Metrics
• Practical Tips for Precision Customer Marketing Campaigns

Let’s get into it.

Give it mixed data

For purposes like designing campaigns, generating user personas, or identifying opportunities, custom GPTs function best when given access to both quantitative and qualitative data sets.

This is an old soapbox for me: LLMs really open the doors for marketing to embrace mixed-methods analysis.  With clean and compliant data sets, ChatGPT is great at digging through qualitative data like survey responses, call transcripts, and account notes.  This stuff is time-consuming and often subjective.

Link this with nice, objective, quantitative data about things like product adoption, usage, and churn, and your GPT gets a great grasp of the behavioral patterns and the context that triggers them.

Admittedly, this one is tough to activate.  Cleaning is the challenge here.  How much time this takes depends on the policies, volume, and types of data you are working with, but expect to spend a lot of the time on this part.  The good news is you don’t have to do this very often.

I imagine it is good to update this data on a regular interval (like yearly or 6 months depending on cycle length), but I haven’t gotten there yet.

Use the GPT to troubleshoot itself

This one was pretty fun.  Obviously you don’t want a front-facing GPT to reveal its inner workings, but while working internally on it, I find it is helpful to have it analyze its own actions.  More specifically, I found that if I built some troubleshooting specifications into the instructions, that was a great way to get to answers faster.

I would then go through my campaign strategist GPT.  Each time an answer was wrong or different, we would dig in together.  In fact, the most useful thing I found to do was to have the GPT write instructions for itself on how to reach and replicate the desired outcome.

It is a pretty meta thing to have it writing itself when the outcome is incorrect, but it makes sense.  Who knows you better than yourself?

You can also take this one step further and even have it optimize its own prompts and instructions.  Andy suggests this in his guide, and I found that to be an excellent tip.

Don’t have it make decks

Ok, this one I decided wasn’t worth the troubleshooting time.  Making decks seems like a low ROI activity.

A custom GPT can read decks and pull out information, but I have had a real bear of a time trying to get it to input information into a deck template.  Some solve must exist, but I have not found a time-efficient way to make it consistently produce a template-correct deck.  My lesson is to just avoid it altogether.

Technical difficulties aside, converting to the deck yourself is a good exercise to review the work that the GPT did.  It forces some critical thought. If you remove too many of these human checkpoints, things get real same-y, real fast.

Be specific in defining template usage

“Be specific” was something my high school teachers said when search engines were just getting started.  Some things never change.

Even though it struggles to fill out slide templates, it can still use templates quite effectively.  Specificity is important to effective usage.  For example, I want our GPT to put out information that is relevant to our campaign template, without going too far astray.  However, I don’t want it to make a deck since future users won’t know to expect it to mess that up somehow.  So I got specific, and now the responses are structured in a way that aligns with my needs, and are faster to be review-ready.

Give it supporting information

Think about what all you ultimately need from why you are using the GPT, and give it support documents.

For example, on a whim I fed our CMO’s Guide to Marketing Orchestration into the knowledge base of our Campaign Strategist GPT.  Now, when it spits out campaign strategy thoughts, it includes next steps that are aligned with our orchestration processes and workflows.  I did not ask for this, it just did it.

Operational documents are really solid adds to the knowledge base as the GPT will naturally look to connect the dots.

Here are some other ideas that will help get you further, faster:

1. High performing ad-creative. You could target this by customer segments, with ads named according to the segments they performed well in.
2. Project plan templates. This will help it suggest immediate next-steps.
3. Your org chart.  This helps it assign roles for next steps.  It misses the boat here sometimes, but it has gotten me more than halfway most times.
   1. You can specify that it assign next steps to a role rather than an individual, it does this pretty well.
4. Email/report templates if you want it to suggest points to add to your next QBR or whatever.

Conclusion

So there we go, 5 lessons I have learned from build custom GPTs to help with customer marketing.  Happy to talk through this with you, if you want to schedule a conversation please reach out to us.

The post Lessons from Structuring GPTs for Customer-Led Growth appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

With B2B growth increasingly powered by customers—not just marketing and sales—traditional funnel models are falling short. Linear approaches miss the nuance of how companies actually adopt and scale solutions internally.

To address the issue, I’ve built an Account Development Model rooted in the principles of product-led (PLG) and customer-led growth (CLG) and inspired, in part, by the theory of innovation diffusion. This model reflects the real internal journey accounts take—from first signal to full strategic partnership—by aligning sales, marketing, customer success, and product around how buyers adopt innovation over time. The model can apply to a single buyer journey or a longer, customer-led land-and-expand journey. And that is where it truly shines.

Here’s a breakdown of the model and how each stage supports long-term, sustainable B2B growth.

1. Awareness and Identification

This is where the seeds of CLG are planted. A buying team becomes aware of a problem—or recognizes a broader trend—that requires change. Your role here is to ensure your solution is visible in the proper context, but more importantly, that your message resonates with the earliest signals of need. One member of your target audience may even be trialing the free version of your product (if applicable) on their own.

At this point, the goal isn’t to push or sell—it’s about being discoverable when buyers are quietly conducting their research.

2. Interest and Exploration

Once awareness is established, a subset of individuals begin to explore their options. These are often change agents or internal champions seeking solutions. They’re not building a business case yet—they’re gathering inspiration.

Your strategy here is to educate, enable, and empathize. Help them understand what’s possible, not just what your product does.

3. Evaluation and Analysis

This is where buying teams widen. The focus turns to feasibility, internal alignment, and organizational fit. Procurement, IT, finance, and leadership get involved.

Instead of selling harder, your job is to make evaluation easier: clear case studies, comparison tools, frameworks for internal alignment, and collaborative decision-making.

4. Trial and Pilot

For CLG to succeed, early adopters within the organization must experience value firsthand. This isn’t just about running a pilot—it’s about designing a pilot that leads to a “wow” moment for the right people.

Help buyers test your solution in the context of their unique workflows. This is where product and customer success become critical partners.

5. Initial Adoption and Strategic Buy-In

Once the pilot succeeds, a few strategic leaders begin to take a more active role. They see potential, but haven’t scaled it across the organization yet.

CLG’s success depends on these early internal advocates. Help them shine by enabling them to share outcomes internally and align with others.

6. Integration and Optimization

Adoption expands beyond the pilot group. Integration into systems, processes, and teams begins. Optimization becomes key—this is where you move from proving value to improving outcomes.

The goal here is to reduce friction and increase stickiness. Don’t just support users—support internal change management.

7. Full Adoption and Internal Advocacy

The product is now embedded across teams. Champions emerge organically. Users help other users. Internal Slack channels pop up. You’ve gone from vendor to partner.

CLG occurs when your customers begin driving internal growth, without you in the room.

8. Achieving Critical Mass

At this stage, usage is widespread. More importantly, your solution is seen as essential infrastructure. It’s easier for new stakeholders to adopt than to opt-out.

This is your tipping point. Your job? Don’t take your foot off the gas—double down on customer education, enablement, and success metrics.

9. Strategic Partnership

Now, you’re not just solving a problem—you’re shaping strategy. You’re co-developing roadmaps. You’re seen as a long-term enabler of competitive advantage.

This is the north star of CLG: when your success and the customer’s success are so interdependent, growth becomes mutual.

10. Long-Term Partnership and Account Growth

Here, you begin to expand use cases, business units, and geographies. You’re not reselling—you’re co-building the future.

What is your best growth lever at this point? Listening deeply, iterating collaboratively, and guiding the customer to the next step.

11. Advocacy and Referrals

Finally, customers become evangelists. They speak at conferences. They join your advisory council. They refer peers.

This is where CLG becomes exponential. Your best salespeople don’t work for you—they work for your customers.

Final Thoughts: The Power of Mapping Growth to Adoption

What makes this model different is that it doesn’t treat the “deal close” as the finish line. It doesn’t assume internal adoption is linear or even guaranteed. It respects how real buying teams behave inside complex organizations—and it gives sales, marketing, CS, and product a shared language for growing accounts over time.

In a customer-led world, the organizations that win aren’t the ones shouting the loudest—they’re the ones listening the closest.

Let your customers lead the way. You need to meet them at each stage of the journey.

If you want to chat about CLG or anything in this post, please reach out: acceleration@heinzmarketing.com

The post Rethinking Account Development: A Customer-Led Growth Model for B2B appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

70% of organizations that run structured pilots for new processes see faster adoption and 30% better results. (Harvard Business Review).

That kind of impact starts with grounding your new process in real work. In my last blog, we covered why starting with a real project is the best way to implement and test a RACI matrix. Now we are taking it a step further by looking at how to pilot a full GTM workflow that includes your RACI and proves it works in practice.

A structured pilot helps you uncover friction points, validate the workflow, and fine-tune before a broader rollout.

Here is a clear 4-step guide to help you do just that.

1. Pick a Familiar Campaign and Narrow the Pilot Scope

To get meaningful feedback on your new GTM workflow, select a campaign that is already built and familiar to the team. At the same time, focus your pilot on just two connected stages of the workflow where handoffs and coordination matter most.

Why it works
Using a known campaign keeps the team focused on how the work flows, not on the content or messaging. Narrowing the scope makes it easier to track changes and identify improvements. Teams that try to test the entire workflow at once often get overwhelmed and lose sight of where the real bottlenecks are.

What teams overlook
Past campaigns hold valuable clues about where things slowed down, such as late approvals, unclear ownership, or duplicated efforts. Testing handoffs between specific stages often reveals the biggest opportunities for improvement.

How to do it

• Choose a campaign from the last six to twelve months with clear performance benchmarks, like a product launch or quarterly newsletter
• Identify two workflow stages where handoffs are tricky, such as building the campaign strategy and executing on the strategy or creative review to launch approval
• Map the current handoff process between those stages and overlay your new RACI roles to clarify accountability

2. Choose a Cross-Functional Team That Is Bought In

Success depends on having a team that is genuinely engaged and open to collaboration. Select team members and centers of excellence who are willing to test the new workflow and provide honest feedback.

Why it matters
Without buy-in, pilots become box-checking exercises. You need people who want to improve how work happens and are comfortable iterating based on what they learn.

What teams overlook
Piloting is not just about process. It is about people. Engaged participants help surface real issues and contribute practical solutions.

How to do it

• Invite team members with experience in the campaign or related workflows and a track record of embracing change
• Assign a pilot lead responsible for scheduling check-ins, gathering feedback, and keeping communication flowing
• Set up a dedicated communication channel, like a Slack group or weekly check-in, to keep everyone aligned

3. Measure How Work Moves, Not Just Final Results

Campaign success is important but during a pilot you want to focus on how smoothly the work flows. Look for signs that the new workflow reduces delays and confusion.

Why it matters
Workflow improvements show up in faster handoffs, fewer revisions, and clearer ownership. These early signals tell you if the process changes are working before final outcomes appear.

What teams overlook
Teams often wait until the end to evaluate success, missing small but critical workflow issues as they happen. Tracking progress regularly helps catch and fix bottlenecks early.

How to do it

• Define key workflow metrics like time spent on each task, number of feedback cycles, or volume of clarification requests
• Use project management tools to flag tasks that experience delays or require rework

4. Hold a Review Meeting to Learn and Improve

The pilot does not end when the campaign launches. A structured review meeting lets you discuss what worked, what didn’t, and how to improve the workflow before rolling it out more widely.

Why it matters
Group reflection helps identify which issues are isolated and which are systemic. It also builds team ownership of the new process.

What many teams overlook

Teams often treat the pilot as a checklist rather than a learning opportunity. They rush the review or limit participation, which leads to missed insights and resistance when scaling the workflow.

How to do it

• Use a shared document or collaboration tool to collect feedback in advance with questions like:
  • Which workflow steps sped up your work?
  • Where did you face roadblocks or confusion?
  • Did RACI roles clarify responsibilities or cause uncertainty?
  • What one change would improve the process?
• During the meeting, review collected feedback, highlight common themes, and agree on 2–3 priority fixes
• Assign owners and deadlines to those fixes, and plan a quick follow-up check-in to track progress
• Summarize key learnings and share a short report with leadership and related teams to build support for wider rollout

Final Thoughts

The key to successful GTM orchestration is not just building a workflow but testing it in real time and learning fast. Start small, stay focused, and let your pilot guide you to a smoother and more effective process. 

Want to see how we help teams bring structure and clarity through marketing orchestration? Connect with one of our experts today!

The post 4 Steps to Pilot Your New GTM Workflow appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

Your buyers are telling you what they need long before they ever talk to sales. But too many teams are still focused on vanity engagement metrics that don’t translate to pipeline.

If you’re still optimizing for form fills, you’re missing the real cues.

Sales cycles are slower. More deals stall. And across marketing, sales, and customer success, teams are flying blind without a clear view of what buyers and customers are actually signaling.

This post breaks down how leading revenue teams are cutting through the noise—triaging signals, mapping expansion paths, and building cross-functional systems to act. It includes frameworks and checklists you can put to work right now.

1. Signal ≠ Intent: Triage Before You Trigger

Most teams treat all engagement as good engagement. But that’s how you burn out your SDRs and tank your conversion rates.

Instead, implement signal triage. Layer signals across two axes:

• Customer Health (based on usage, sentiment, adoption)
• Customer Value (based on ACV potential, strategic fit)

This matrix gives you four segments:

Signal Triage Grid: Health vs Value Matrix

2. Whitespace Mapping: Your Hidden Revenue Engine

Once you’ve identified expansion-worthy accounts, you need to map their whitespace.

This means identifying:

• What products/services they don’t have yet
• What needs or usage patterns suggest they’re ready for more
• What outcomes they’re trying to achieve

Whitespace Example: Account-Level View

3. From Signals to Sequences: Activation Across Teams

Capturing signals is just step one. The real power comes from aligning your GTM teams to act on those cues.

That means:

• CSMs receiving alerts from product usage or NPS spikes
• Marketing launching dynamic nurtures triggered by signal thresholds
• Sales following up with tailored plays linked to behavior or milestones

Example Workflow

4. Don’t Just Measure Backward: Use Forward-Looking Metrics

Pipeline acceleration and customer growth depend on early indicators, not just closed-won data.

Start tracking:

• NPS shifts over time (especially early surges)
• Product usage increases by role or segment
• First-time logins from new personas
• Referral or advocacy behavior
• Self-serve training engagement

5. CLG Tactics Checklist: Execute with Confidence

Signal Strategy

[ ] Define and document what “meaningful signals” look like at each stage
[ ] Tier signals by buyer intent, product engagement, and customer sentiment
[ ] Segment signals by account type
[ ] Document signal triggers and the GTM responses tied to each

Activation Readiness

[ ] Set signal thresholds that trigger outreach
[ ] Map signal types to specific plays
[ ] Use modular content aligned to signal themes
[ ] Build cross-functional workflows triggered by signal behavior

Expansion Engine

[ ] Maintain a Health vs Value matrix for active customers
[ ] Create a whitespace map per top account
[ ] Enable QBRs with signal insights
[ ] Track forward-looking signals (NPS, referrals, usage trends)
[ ] Compare results of signal-based vs manual campaigns

Conclusion: Build Your Signal Stack

The best-performing teams aren’t just reacting to buyer behavior—they’re predicting it. And they’re aligning Sales, Marketing, and CS to act before the window closes.

It’s not about chasing MQLs. It’s about decoding curiosity and acting with precision.

Want to see how real revenue leaders are making it happen? Join us for two upcoming webinars to see these tactics in action:

• July 17: “From Signals to Revenue: The Modern Growth Playbook for CMOs and CROs” (Register today!)
• August 6: “Ghosted to Growth: Revenue Leaders on Buyer Reengagement” (Register today!)

Send us an email to discuss how to make your full lifecycle marketing and growth more efficient. 

The post Read the Room: Operationalizing CLG Signals That Actually Matter appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

In this blog, we’ve compiled some of the most frequently asked questions about CLG metrics and how to put them into practice.

1. What are key metrics for measuring CLG success?
CLG metrics focus on post-sale impact. Key ones include:

• Net Revenue Retention (NRR)
• Expansion Revenue (upsell/cross-sell)
• Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
• Advocacy Rate (reviews, referrals, testimonials)
• Product adoption/usage
• Time-to-value (TTV)

2. What are the KPIs for each stage of the customer journey?

• Onboarding: Time-to-first-value, activation rate
• Adoption: Usage frequency, feature adoption, login consistency
• Retention: NRR, churn rate, CSAT, support ticket volume
• Expansion: % of accounts expanded, expansion ARR, upsell rate
• Advocacy: NPS, referral volume, review submissions, case study participation

3. How do I measure Net Promoter Score (NPS)?
NPS is calculated based on survey responses to: “How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?” Responses are grouped into:

• Promoters (9–10)
• Passives (7–8)
• Detractors (0–6)

NPS = % Promoters – % Detractors

Track trends over time and segment by product line, customer type, or CSM coverage to find actionable insights.

4. How do I calculate Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)?
A simple formula: CLV = Average ARR per customer × Average customer lifespan (in years)

Advanced models incorporate gross margin and churn risk. CLV helps justify investment in onboarding, CS, and customer marketing.

5. What’s the difference between CLG metrics and traditional marketing metrics?
Traditional metrics (MQLs, CTRs, funnel conversion rates) measure top-of-funnel activity. CLG metrics are about long-term value from customers you already have. They’re indicators of customer health, loyalty, and advocacy — not just acquisition.

6. How do I measure expansion revenue from existing customers?
Track revenue from:

• Contract renewals with increased seats or usage
• Cross-sell of new products/modules
• Upsell to higher pricing tiers

Tie this to marketing-influenced activity (ABM, content, campaigns targeting existing customers).

7. What metrics can help identify customers most likely to become advocates?

• Product usage depth
• Engagement with success or education content
• High CSAT/NPS scores
• Attendance at events or webinars
• Participation in community or beta programs

8. How do I link product usage data to marketing success?
Use product analytics tools to identify high-usage patterns and map back to:

• Campaign engagement
• Messaging impact
• Personas most likely to succeed

Work with CS and Product teams to unify definitions of “healthy usage.”

9. How often should I review CLG metrics?

• Operational metrics: Weekly or monthly (e.g., usage, onboarding status)
• Strategic metrics: Quarterly (e.g., NRR, CLV, expansion rate)

Align your review cadence with QBRs and renewal cycles.

10. What tools do I need to track CLG metrics effectively?

• CRM (Salesforce, HubSpot)
• Customer Success Platform (Gainsight, Catalyst)
• Product analytics (Pendo, Mixpanel)
• BI tools (Looker, Tableau)
• NPS/survey tools (Qualtrics, Delighted)

Data integration and alignment between marketing, CS, and product teams is key.

11. Can I use NPS or CSAT as leading indicators of revenue?
Yes, but with caution. High NPS can correlate with expansion and advocacy, but only when paired with behavioral indicators like product usage and actual renewals. Use them directionally, not in isolation.

12. How do CLG metrics align with CRO and RevOps goals?
CLG metrics help marketing speak the language of revenue. They align with:

• CRO: Expansion, NRR, customer growth
• RevOps: Funnel optimization beyond acquisition, data unification, churn reduction

When CLG metrics are shared and understood cross-functionally, they become a driver of strategic growth.

Summary

Whether you’re just starting out with Customer Led Growth or trying to scale, this FAQ is your cheat sheet to measuring what matters. Got a question we didn’t answer? Reach out—we’d love to help.

Need help defining your CLG metrics and setting up your dashboards? Reach out to us at acceleration@heinzmarketing.com and let’s connect.

Image Credit: Image by freepik

The post Frequently Asked Questions About CLG Metrics in B2B Marketing appeared first on Heinz Marketing.