Insights and Research for Marketing, Sales Development and Sales

Marketing organizations need to accurately track and measure results for account based and volume efforts separately, but require the ability to view them side-by-side. The world’s fastest-growing companies understand how all go-to-market (GTM) approaches contribute to revenue. Reviewing common metrics together demonstrates how account based and volume initiatives move through the sales process to generate results.

The TOPO Double Funnel is a single view that can standardize measurement across the entire GTM organization, as well as improve forecasting and drive accountability. The TOPO Double Funnel builds on the Account Based Funnel to measure results from the target account list, while also measuring results from volume efforts, or traditional demand generation, to companies outside the list.

Marketers struggle to measure different GTM results

The growth of digital marketing made it easy to measure each stage of marketing results, and sequential measurement became the predominant model for tracking success. As account based practices began emerging, this new GTM model did not fit into what had become the standard measurement model. Marketers and organizations struggled to rationalize these different approaches.

Many organizations did not adopt an account based approach because they didn’t know how to measure it, while others tried to fit account based into traditional volume measurement models. Some organizations mistakenly moved all go-to-market activities to account based. This is not the right answer either. According to the TOPO Account Based Benchmark Report, high-growth companies that adopted account based spend only 30% of their marketing budget on account based.

Organizations need to accept that a marketing strategy will often have multiple go-to-markets, and each will have its own set of metrics. This is where we see the need for an approach that unifies these different sets of metrics.

Bring multiple GTM approaches into one measurement model

Aligning results from account based and volume efforts is the first step in understanding how they work together. Not only does the following illustration show the alignment in both stages and how they are named, but it also reveals that these two sources join together at the SDR-QL stage after SDRs qualify a lead or account and schedule a meeting for sales. This point of unification is important for marketers to see and understand.

TOPO Double Funnel metrics defined

Target Accounts / Leads: The first measurement milestone for account based is target account. For volume, the first is individual leads. The TOPO Double Funnel lets marketers see these numbers side-by-side, even though they are determined in different ways. The number of target accounts is based on accounts that are similar to an organization’s highest-value customers. They may be prospects or customers. The number of target accounts is based on identifying the best-fit accounts, while leads are the number of actual leads delivered—or expected—by volume marketing efforts.

Engaged Accounts / Engaged Leads: The account based approach measures engaged accounts and volume tracks engaged leads in the next stage. Each of these metrics is based on someone taking an action, or a series of actions, but are determined in different ways. The number of engaged accounts is measured using the Account Engagement Score. This is the definitive measure of an account’s interactions with an organization, including marketing, sales development, sales, and customer success. The Engagement Score for a customer incorporates onboarding, rollout, and adoption activities. Some organizations might call engaged leads marketing qualified leads, but since there are so many ways to qualify leads, TOPO recommends every organization establishes its own threshold for engagement.

SDR-QLs: The two funnels come together at the sales development rep qualified leads stage. The specific contacts at the engaged target accounts and engaged leads are screened and verified by SDRs to meet the agreed-upon definition for moving to the next stage with sales. Even though these come from different sources, all qualified leads and contacts can be added together to determine the total number of accounts that sales reps have to follow up with. This is the point of unification of the TOPO Double Funnel.

Opportunities: Opportunities can be tracked in two different ways: in total and by account. All new opportunities are grouped together for sales in this stage; however, the TOPO Double Funnel shows marketers how to measure them separately based on GTM approach. Total opportunities can be tracked across all GTM approaches, but account based tracks opportunities by account, which is the recommended way to report opportunities.

Closed-Won: Account based and volume efforts should be measured side-by-side all the way through to closed-won deals. Efforts can be tracked separately based on approach to still see the impact on revenue.

Takeaways

Compare metrics of all GTM approaches side-by-side. No matter what go-to-market approaches an organization adopts to meet its strategy, it now has the ability to track results together to understand how each contributes to revenue generation. The example of the TOPO Double Funnel tracks account based and volume approaches; however, other approaches can be substituted or even added to these two.

The early stages of the funnel are unique to each GTM approach, but everything converges at the SDR-QL. The TOPO Double Funnel brings alignment and unification to metrics where they never existed before. Every GTM approach tracks unique metrics at the start of the process. For example, account based starts with target accounts and engaged accounts, while volume starts with leads and engaged leads. The metrics of the two approaches—and any GTM approach selected—come together at SDR-QL when an SDR qualifies an account or lead and schedules a sales meeting.

Multi-funnel measurement strengthens cross-functional GTM alignment. The TOPO Double Funnel brings together metrics from different GTM approaches, along with results from stages owned by marketing, sales development, and sales. Regular reviews of the complete results by cross-functional teams creates accountability and alignment that individual team reporting does not achieve.

Conclusion

The TOPO Double Funnel ensures that the entire GTM organization has regular visibility into the performance of all go-to-market approaches all the way through the process to closed-won accounts and their impact on revenue. The world’s fastest-growing companies set their revenue targets for each GTM effort and review their results side-by-side. Marketers will improve their collaboration with sales development and sales teams when all departments report results and have accountability for meeting revenue targets together