An account is a formal record used to track transactions and activities for a specific person, item, or entity. While commonly associated with banking and finance for tracking money, the concept also extends to business for managing client relationships and to the internet for providing access to digital platforms.
The word "account" first appeared in 14th-century English, borrowed from the Anglo-French 'acunte'. This term originated from the Latin verb 'computare', which means "to count" or "compute". Its etymology underscores the word's foundational link to the act of tallying and reckoning values.
The practical application of accounts evolved with the rise of double-entry bookkeeping. For centuries, transactions were meticulously recorded in manual ledgers. As commerce grew more complex, these physical books gave way to the sophisticated digital accounting systems used today.
The term 'account' is versatile, appearing in various aspects of daily life and business. Its meaning shifts depending on the context, but it always refers to a record or arrangement for a specific purpose.
While both are core accounting concepts, an account and an accrual serve distinct functions in financial reporting.
The concept of an account is central to accounting, operating within a broader framework of related terms. These concepts work together to ensure financial activities are recorded accurately and systematically, forming the backbone of any financial reporting system.
This is how you can scale personalized outbound campaigns.
How does an "account" in a CRM differ from a "lead"?
A lead is an unqualified prospect, while an account is a qualified organization you have a business relationship with. Leads are typically converted into accounts, contacts, and opportunities after they have been vetted by your sales or marketing teams.
What is the significance of parent-child account relationships?
This hierarchy links a main corporate headquarters (parent) with its subsidiaries or branches (children). It provides a complete view of a business entity, which is crucial for strategic selling, identifying cross-sell opportunities, and understanding complex organizational structures.
Why is enriching account data so important for sales?
Enriched data provides a 360-degree view of a prospect, including firmographics, technographics, and buying signals. This enables highly personalized outreach, better lead scoring, and ultimately, higher conversion rates for outbound campaigns.
Network monitoring is the continuous process of tracking a computer network's performance and health to detect and resolve issues proactively.
Revenue Operations (RevOps) is a business function that aligns a company's sales, marketing, and customer service teams to drive predictable revenue.
Responsive design is an approach where a website's layout adapts to the user's screen size, providing an optimal experience on any device.
Webhooks are automated messages sent by an app when a specific event occurs. They push real-time data to another app's unique URL.
Lead scraping is the process of automatically extracting contact information and other relevant data about potential customers from online sources.
Sales acceleration refers to strategies and technologies designed to speed up the sales cycle, enabling reps to close more deals, faster.
Workflow automation uses rule-based logic to run a sequence of tasks that would otherwise require manual human effort to complete.
Marketo is a marketing automation platform used by B2B marketers to manage lead generation, nurturing, email marketing, and analytics.
Logo retention is a key B2B metric that measures a company's ability to retain its customers, or 'logos,' over a specific period.
Demand is the economic principle describing a consumer's desire and willingness to purchase a specific good or service at a particular price.
Audience targeting is the process of segmenting consumers into specific groups to deliver more personalized and relevant marketing messages.
The Dark Funnel describes customer buying activities that are untrackable by companies, such as private chats and word-of-mouth referrals.
Data appending is the process of adding new data fields to your existing database records to enrich and complete your information.
Lead generation is the process of identifying and cultivating potential customers for a business's products or services.
Buyer’s remorse is the sense of regret or anxiety that can arise after making a purchase, often questioning if it was the right decision.
Programmatic display campaigns use automation to buy and sell digital ad space in real-time, targeting specific audiences across the web.
Sales partnerships are strategic alliances where two companies co-sell products to expand their reach, generate new leads, and increase revenue.
Intent-based leads are potential customers whose online actions—like searches or content engagement—signal a clear interest in buying a solution.
Learn about business development representative, including skills and qualifications for BDRs, & roles and responsibilities of a BDR.
Learn about B2B data erosion, including causes of B2B data decay, strategies to combat data erosion, & measuring the impact of data erosion.
Regression testing ensures that new code changes don’t negatively impact existing features. It's a key step to maintain software quality after updates.
A Salesforce Administrator is a certified professional who manages and customizes the Salesforce platform to meet a company's specific business needs.
Total Addressable Market (TAM) represents the maximum revenue a company can earn by selling its product or service in a specific market.
Sales enablement technology refers to software and tools that equip sales teams with the resources they need to close more deals efficiently.
A sales lead is a potential customer—an individual or organization that has shown interest in your company's products or services.
Site retargeting is a marketing strategy that shows ads to people who have previously visited your website but left without converting.
Event marketing is a strategy where brands engage directly with target audiences through live events like trade shows, conferences, or webinars.
A sales call is a real-time conversation between a salesperson and a prospect, aiming to persuade them to purchase a product or service.
Intent data tracks a user's online behavior—like searches and site visits—to identify signals that they are ready to make a purchase.
Revenue forecasting is the process of estimating a company's future revenue, using historical data and market trends to guide strategic planning.
A sales territory is a specific group of customers or a geographic area that a salesperson or sales team is responsible for managing.
Learn about buyer intent, including understanding buyer intent signals, strategies to capture buyer intent, & buyer intent vs. customer interest.
Intent leads are prospects who show buying signals through their online actions, indicating they're actively looking to make a purchase.
A sales dashboard is a visual tool that centralizes and displays key sales data, metrics, and KPIs to help teams track performance and goals.
Serviceable Addressable Market (SAM) is the portion of the market your business can realistically serve with its current products and sales channels.
Warm outreach is contacting prospects with whom you have a pre-existing connection, like a mutual contact, making your message more personal and effective.
A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is a tool that centralizes customer data to help manage interactions and nurture relationships.
Feature flags let you remotely control features in your app without new code. This enables safe testing, gradual rollouts, and quick rollbacks.
Cold calling is a sales tactic where reps contact potential customers by phone who haven't previously expressed interest in their product or service.
Technographics is data that outlines a company’s technology stack, helping B2B teams identify prospects based on the software and hardware they use.
Rollback procedures are a set of steps to restore a system to a previous, stable version after a failed update, ensuring minimal disruption.
Data security protects digital information from unauthorized access, corruption, or theft throughout its entire lifecycle.
Customer buying signals are the actions, behaviors, or statements a prospect makes that indicate they are moving towards a purchase decision.
Ramp-up time is the period a new hire takes to get fully up to speed and become a productive member of your go-to-market team.
Chatbots are AI-powered programs that simulate human conversation. They interact with users via text or voice, typically for customer support.
Net new business is revenue from customers who have never purchased from your company before. It’s a crucial indicator of sustainable growth.
Pipeline coverage is a key sales metric. It's the ratio of your total open pipeline value to your sales quota for a specific period.
X-Sell, or cross-selling, is a sales strategy of selling additional, related products or services to an existing customer base.
Demand generation is the process of creating awareness and interest in your products to build a pipeline of qualified leads for your sales team.
Sales enablement provides sales teams with the necessary tools, content, and information to help them sell more effectively and efficiently.
An enterprise is a large-scale organization, often a corporation, defined by its complex structure and substantial number of employees.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is the total cost a business spends to gain a new customer. It includes all sales and marketing expenses.
Stress testing is a type of software testing that determines a system's robustness by pushing it beyond its normal operational capacity.
Contact data is the set of details, like names, emails, and phone numbers, used to get in touch with a person or business for outreach.
Net Revenue Retention (NRR) is the percentage of recurring revenue kept from existing customers, including upsells, downgrades, and churn.
Sales workflows are a set of automated actions that streamline the sales process, helping teams engage leads consistently and close deals faster.
A sales methodology is the framework that guides how your sales team approaches the entire sales process, from prospecting to closing deals.
Application Performance Management (APM) monitors and manages an application's performance, availability, and the experience of its end-users.
GDPR compliance means following the EU's strict data protection laws to ensure the secure and lawful handling of personal data.
An Operational CRM is a system that automates and improves customer-facing business processes like sales, marketing, and customer service.
Learn about buyer, including identifying your ideal buyer, understanding buyer's journey, & evaluating buyer decision processes.
Consumer Relationship Management (CRM) is a strategy for managing all of a company's relationships and interactions with its customers.
Learn about business continuity, including understanding key components, steps to ensure continuity, common challenges, & best practices.
Email marketing is a digital strategy where businesses send targeted emails to prospects and customers to build relationships and drive sales.
Account-Based Sales (ABS) is a focused B2B strategy where sales and marketing teams treat high-value accounts as individual markets of one.
Customer relationship marketing is a strategy for building lasting connections with customers to foster long-term loyalty and engagement.
Sales and marketing analytics involves measuring and analyzing performance data to maximize effectiveness and optimize return on investment (ROI).
Outbound lead generation means proactively reaching out to potential customers who haven't yet expressed interest to introduce them to your brand.
Learn about B2B data platform, including key benefits of B2B data platforms, choosing the right B2B data platform, challenges in implementing B2B data platforms.
Lead generation software helps businesses automate finding and capturing potential customers' contact information to build sales pipelines.
A Customer Data Platform (CDP) centralizes customer data from all sources to create a complete, unified profile for each individual customer.
A Representational State Transfer (REST) API is a web service that uses a simple, stateless architecture for systems to communicate online.
Sales coaching is a process where managers help reps improve their skills and performance through personalized feedback, training, and guidance.
An API (Application Programming Interface) is a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to each other and exchange information.
Single Sign-On (SSO) is an authentication method allowing users to access multiple applications with one set of login credentials.
Learn about B2B intent data, including how B2B intent data enhances sales strategies, sources of B2B intent data, leveraging B2B intent data for competitiveness.
Email personalization uses subscriber data—like their name, interests, or past behavior—to create highly relevant and targeted email campaigns.
Process Builder is a Salesforce automation tool that lets you create 'if/then' business processes with a user-friendly visual interface.
Data enrichment is the process of enhancing raw data by adding missing information from other sources, making it more complete and actionable.
An AI sales script generator is a tool that uses artificial intelligence to create personalized sales scripts for any outreach scenario.
Learn about B2B, including what is it, its key elements, the benefits of B2B partnerships, the differences between B2B and B2C, and strategies for effective marketing.
Learn about B2C2B, including how B2C2B transforms sales, key strategies for B2C2B success, & differences between B2C2B and B2B2C.
Objection handling is the process of responding to a prospect's concerns or hesitations about a product or service to move a deal forward.
Dynamic pricing is a strategy where businesses set flexible prices for products or services based on current market demands and other factors.
Predictive lead generation uses data and AI to find prospects most likely to buy, helping teams focus their efforts on high-value leads.
A buying signal is any action from a prospect that indicates they are interested in making a purchase, helping sales teams prioritize leads.
Product-Led Growth (PLG) is a business strategy where the product itself drives user acquisition, conversion, and expansion.
Precision targeting is a marketing strategy that uses data to identify and reach a highly specific audience most likely to convert.
Lead qualification is the process of determining which prospects are most likely to become paying customers based on predefined criteria.
A Content Management System (CMS) is software for creating, managing, and modifying website content without needing specialized technical skills.
A use case is a detailed description of how a user interacts with a system to achieve a specific goal, outlining the steps from start to finish.
Closed opportunities are potential deals that have concluded. They are categorized as either 'closed-won' (a sale was made) or 'closed-lost'.
Customer centricity is a business approach that puts the customer at the heart of every decision, aiming to build loyalty and long-term value.
Learn about B2B marketing attribution, including challenges in B2B marketing attribution, & key metrics for effective attribution.
Docker is a tool that packages applications and their dependencies into isolated environments called containers for easy deployment and scaling.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is a system of integrated software that businesses use to manage and automate their core day-to-day processes.
Customer retention refers to the strategies and activities a company uses to prevent customer churn and encourage them to continue buying.
A Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) API is a web service that uses XML to exchange structured information between different applications.
A Letter of Intent (LOI) is a document declaring the preliminary commitment of one party to do business with another, outlining the chief terms.
Trigger marketing uses customer actions or events to automatically send highly relevant, personalized messages at the perfect moment.