Terms

Account Management

Account management is the strategic, post-sales process of nurturing relationships with existing clients to ensure their continued business and satisfaction. It involves deeply understanding a client's needs, acting as their advocate within the company, and proactively offering solutions to help them meet their objectives. This focus on building long-term, trusting relationships ultimately drives customer retention, loyalty, and revenue growth.

Key Responsibilities

Account managers serve as the primary point of contact for clients, ensuring their needs are met and their relationship with the company remains strong. Their role is a blend of customer service, strategic planning, and sales, all aimed at fostering long-term loyalty and growth.

  • Relationships: Nurturing and strengthening long-term partnerships with clients.
  • Communication: Acting as the main liaison between the client and internal teams.
  • Strategy: Understanding client goals to proactively offer solutions and guidance.
  • Growth: Identifying opportunities for upselling and cross-selling to increase revenue.
  • Advocacy: Representing the client’s interests and feedback within the company.

Best Practices

Effective account management hinges on a set of core principles that build trust and drive mutual success. By adopting these best practices, account managers can transform client relationships into strategic partnerships, ensuring long-term value for both sides.

  • Communication: Maintain regular, high-quality contact to understand evolving needs and build rapport.
  • Proactivity: Anticipate client challenges and opportunities, offering solutions before they even ask.
  • Knowledge: Deeply understand both your products and the client’s business to provide relevant, valuable advice.
  • Advocacy: Act as the client's champion internally, ensuring their interests are protected and their voice is heard.

Account Management vs. Account Executive

While both roles are crucial for revenue, they focus on different stages of the customer lifecycle.

  • Account Management: This role nurtures long-term relationships with existing clients to drive retention and identify upsell opportunities. It is ideal for enterprises with high-value accounts where loyalty is key, such as in SaaS. The main disadvantage is that it can be resource-intensive.
  • Account Executive: This role concentrates on acquiring new customers by converting leads and closing deals. It is vital for companies seeking rapid growth or market expansion. The primary drawback is the short-term nature of the relationship, which can risk customer churn without a smooth handoff.

Tools and Software

Modern account managers rely on a suite of digital tools to manage relationships and streamline their workflow. This technology helps them track interactions, collaborate with internal teams, and deliver exceptional client service.

  • CRM Platforms: to centralize client data, track communication history, and manage the sales pipeline.
  • Communication Tools: for seamless interaction with clients and internal teams, including video conferencing and messaging apps.
  • Project Management Systems: to organize tasks, monitor project progress, and ensure timely delivery of solutions.

Career Path and Opportunities

A career in account management often begins with roles like account coordinator or junior account manager. Professionals also transition from sales positions like account executive after mastering client acquisition. These roles build a strong foundation in managing client relationships and supporting senior staff.

Advancement can lead to senior or key account manager positions focused on high-value clients. Experienced professionals may also move into leadership roles. This includes becoming a Director of Account Management or VP of Client Success.

Frequently Asked Questions about Account Management

How is success measured in account management?

Success is measured by client retention rates, customer satisfaction scores (like NPS), and revenue growth from upselling or cross-selling. The primary focus is on nurturing long-term value and partnership, not just single transactions.

What’s the difference between account management and customer success?

Account management is often more commercially focused, handling renewals, upselling, and the overall financial health of the account. Customer success centers on ensuring clients achieve their desired outcomes with the product, which in turn drives retention.

Can a small business benefit from account management?

Absolutely. While a dedicated role may not be feasible, applying account management principles helps any business retain its most valuable customers. It ensures key clients feel valued, leading to stable revenue and powerful word-of-mouth referrals.

Other terms

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Gamification

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Gamification

Applicant Tracking System

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Applicant Tracking System

RESTful API

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RESTful API

Business Development Representative

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Business Development Representative

SAM

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SAM

Pipeline Coverage

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Pipeline Coverage

Microservices

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Microservices

Customer Acquisition Cost

Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is the total cost a business spends to gain a new customer. It includes all sales and marketing expenses.

Customer Acquisition Cost

CRM Enrichment

CRM enrichment is the process of adding third-party data to your existing customer profiles to make them more complete and accurate.

CRM Enrichment

Consultative Selling

Consultative selling is an approach where salespeople act as expert advisors, diagnosing customer needs to provide the most suitable solutions.

Consultative Selling

Sales Funnel

A sales funnel is a model illustrating the customer's journey from initial awareness to the final purchase, narrowing down leads at each stage.

Sales Funnel

Intent leads

Intent leads are prospects who show buying signals through their online actions, indicating they're actively looking to make a purchase.

Intent leads

Sales Kickoff

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Sales Kickoff

Lead Scrape

Lead scraping is the process of automatically extracting contact information and other relevant data about potential customers from online sources.

Lead Scrape

Sales Coach

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Buying Criteria

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B2B Data Platform

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B2B Data Platform

Account-Based Marketing Software

Account-Based Marketing (ABM) software helps teams coordinate personalized marketing and sales efforts to land high-value customer accounts.

Account-Based Marketing Software

ABM Orchestration

ABM orchestration aligns marketing and sales actions across channels to deliver seamless, personalized experiences to high-value accounts.

ABM Orchestration

Sales Partnerships

Sales partnerships are strategic alliances where two companies co-sell products to expand their reach, generate new leads, and increase revenue.

Sales Partnerships

Outbound Sales

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Outbound Sales

Sales Operations Analytics

Sales operations analytics is the practice of analyzing sales data to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the entire sales process.

Sales Operations Analytics

Responsive Design

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Responsive Design

Rollback Procedures

Rollback procedures are a set of steps to restore a system to a previous, stable version after a failed update, ensuring minimal disruption.

Rollback Procedures

End of Quarter

“End of Quarter” (EOQ) refers to the final weeks of a business quarter when sales teams rush to meet quotas, often leading to a flurry of deals.

End of Quarter

Workflow Automation

Workflow automation uses rule-based logic to run a sequence of tasks that would otherwise require manual human effort to complete.

Workflow Automation

Email Personalization

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Email Personalization

Demand

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Demand

Canary Releases

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Canary Releases

Sales Automation

Sales automation uses software to streamline and automate repetitive, manual sales tasks, freeing up reps to focus on selling.

Sales Automation

Sales Engineer

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Sales Engineer

Hadoop

Hadoop is an open-source framework designed for the distributed storage and processing of extremely large data sets across clusters of computers.

Hadoop

Sales and Marketing Analytics

Sales and marketing analytics involves measuring and analyzing performance data to maximize effectiveness and optimize return on investment (ROI).

Sales and Marketing Analytics

B2B Marketing Attribution

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B2B Marketing Attribution

Video Selling

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Video Selling

Knowledge Base

A knowledge base is a self-serve online library of information about a product, service, department, or topic.

Knowledge Base

Closed Opportunities

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Closed Opportunities

Webhooks

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Webhooks

Cross-Site Scripting

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Cross-Site Scripting

Affiliate Marketing

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Affiliate Marketing

Firmographic Data

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Firmographic Data

Headless CMS

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Headless CMS

Shipping Solutions

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Shipping Solutions

Account Executive

An Account Executive (AE) is a sales professional responsible for closing new business deals and managing existing client relationships to drive revenue.

Account Executive

Direct Sales

Direct sales involves selling products directly to consumers in a non-retail setting, such as at home, online, or person-to-person.

Direct Sales

Buying Committee

A buying committee is a group of stakeholders within an organization who are jointly responsible for making major purchasing decisions.

Buying Committee

Buyer

Learn about buyer, including identifying your ideal buyer, understanding buyer's journey, & evaluating buyer decision processes.

Buyer

Point of Contact

A Point of Contact (POC) is the designated individual or department that serves as the main hub for information and communication on a matter.

Point of Contact

Sales Development

Sales development is the process of identifying and qualifying potential customers to create a pipeline of sales-ready leads for closers.

Sales Development

Contact Data

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.

Contact Data

Email Cadence

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Brag Book

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Sales Enablement Technology

Sales enablement technology refers to software and tools that equip sales teams with the resources they need to close more deals efficiently.

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Programmatic Display Campaign

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Programmatic Display Campaign

B2B Intent Data Providers

Learn about B2B intent data providers, including evaluating intent data quality, leveraging intent data for growth, & B2B intent data: key providers comparison.

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Data Enrichment

Data enrichment is the process of enhancing raw data by adding missing information from other sources, making it more complete and actionable.

Data Enrichment

Sales Metrics

Sales metrics are quantifiable data points that track and measure a sales team's performance against specific goals and objectives.

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Digital Advertising

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Bounce Rate

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Closed Won

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GPCTBA/C&I

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GPCTBA/C&I

Customer Retention

Customer retention refers to the strategies and activities a company uses to prevent customer churn and encourage them to continue buying.

Customer Retention

Consumer

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Consumer

Content Management System

A Content Management System (CMS) is software for creating, managing, and modifying website content without needing specialized technical skills.

Content Management System

Persona-Based Marketing

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Persona-Based Marketing

Single Sign-On (SSO)

Single Sign-On (SSO) is an authentication method allowing users to access multiple applications with one set of login credentials.

Single Sign-On (SSO)

Revenue Intelligence

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Revenue Intelligence

Big Data

Learn about big data, including understanding big data characteristics, benefits of leveraging big data, & challenges in managing big data.

Big Data

SEO

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is increasing the quantity and quality of traffic to your website through organic search results.

SEO

Account Development Representative

An Account Development Representative (ADR) identifies and qualifies new business opportunities, creating a pipeline for account executives.

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Order Management

Order management is the end-to-end process of tracking customer orders from placement to fulfillment, ensuring a seamless customer experience.

Order Management

Lead Routing

Lead routing is the automated process of distributing incoming leads to the right sales reps based on predefined criteria.

Lead Routing

Account-Based Sales Development

Account-Based Sales Development (ABSD) is a focused strategy where SDRs target key stakeholders within specific, high-value accounts.

Account-Based Sales Development

Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)

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Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)

Objection Handling in Sales

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Objection Handling in Sales

Voice Broadcasting

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Voice Broadcasting

Salesforce Administrator

A Salesforce Administrator is a certified professional who manages and customizes the Salesforce platform to meet a company's specific business needs.

Salesforce Administrator

Copyright Compliance

Copyright compliance is adhering to laws that protect creative works. It involves legally using content by obtaining permission or licenses.

Copyright Compliance

Qualified Lead

A qualified lead is a prospect vetted as a good fit for your product. They match your ideal customer profile and show genuine interest.

Qualified Lead

B2C2B

Learn about B2C2B, including how B2C2B transforms sales, key strategies for B2C2B success, & differences between B2C2B and B2B2C.

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Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

A Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) is a prospect who has shown interest based on marketing efforts but isn't yet ready for a sales conversation.

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

Marketing Qualified Account

A Marketing Qualified Account (MQA) is a target company that has shown significant engagement, indicating it's ready for the sales team to pursue.

Marketing Qualified Account

Enrichment

Enrichment is the process of adding third-party data to your existing customer profiles to get a more complete picture of your leads.

Enrichment

No Cold Calls

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No Cold Calls

Request for Information

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Request for Information

Network Monitoring

Network monitoring is the continuous process of tracking a computer network's performance and health to detect and resolve issues proactively.

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Sales Pipeline

A sales pipeline is a visual representation of where prospects are in the sales process, from the first contact to the final sale.

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Account Mapping

Account mapping is comparing your customer list with a partner's to find common prospects and unlock new sales opportunities.

Account Mapping

Sales Dashboard

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Lead Scoring

Lead scoring is the process of assigning points to leads based on their attributes and actions to determine their sales-readiness.

Lead Scoring

Channel Partners

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Predictive Lead Generation

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Predictive Lead Generation

Outbound Lead Generation

Outbound lead generation means proactively reaching out to potential customers who haven't yet expressed interest to introduce them to your brand.

Outbound Lead Generation

Lead Qualification Process

The lead qualification process is how you determine which prospects are most likely to become customers by evaluating them against specific criteria.

Lead Qualification Process

Sales Lead

A sales lead is a potential customer—an individual or organization that has shown interest in your company's products or services.

Sales Lead

Ramp Up Time

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.

Ramp Up Time

Contact Discovery

Contact discovery is the process of finding accurate contact details for potential leads, including names, emails, phone numbers, and job titles.

Contact Discovery

NoSQL

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NoSQL

Enterprise

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Enterprise