5 ABM moves tech CMOs should make for 2026

Planning season is here. Buyers changed. Channels changed. AI changed your stack. Your 2026 ABM plan should reflect it.
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Below are the five moves I’d bet on for the new year no matter the size of your team. Short, practical, and built for CFO alignment. Each one ties to what shifted in the last 12 months and what to do now. Let's go.

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1. Make measurement your first workstream

Why now?
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CFOs are deeper in deals. Board updates ask for pipeline, not MQLs. ABM and CRM tools finally make account-level analytics usable without a data team. AI features in your MAP can now stitch touches and flag anomalies.
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Do This:

• Stand up a full-funnel ABM scorecard by account tier: reach, engagement, meetings, pipeline, revenue, expansion.
• Wire real alerts when engagement spikes at a named account. Sales gets a task within minutes, not next week.
• Track lift: win rate, ACV, and cycle time for ABM-targeted accounts vs. the rest.
• Kill any metric your CFO cannot use to forecast.

What changed:

• On many platforms, native account analytics and AI-assisted attribution have become sufficiently robust for mid-market teams. It's still a work in progress, but analytics are getting better.
• Finance is deeper in the deal. If you can't show pipeline and revenue influence by named account, you will lose budget.

2. Go intent-led with AI

Why now?
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The last 12 months made it clear: most of the buying journey is invisible. Real-time intent signals and prediction models are how you stop guessing. To drive performance, marketing teams must harness intent data and use AI to optimize targeting, bids, content delivery, and analysis.
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Do This:

• Enrich named accounts with topic-level intent, firmographics, and technographics.
• Prioritize on in-market probability, not persona hunches.
• Let AI route next steps: who to contact, what to send, which channel today.
• Build two plays: spike play for hot intent and surround sound for warming accounts.

What changed:

• Third-party intent, first-party behavior, and ad data now integrate nearly seamlessly across both ad stack and intent data platforms. Not being technical is no longer an excuse.
• AI inside your stack can score accounts and route plays automatically, allowing a small marketing team to act like a team of 50.

3. Make personalization "feel" personal

Why now?
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Buyers expect you to understand their business without a discovery call. They want content that sounds like it was written for their industry, role, and situation. Most importantly, they want authenticity. Your team can do that at scale today.
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Do This:

• Build a modular narrative: one core story, with role and industry modules you can mix and match.
• Launch account hubs for Tier 1: curated content, ROI math, mutual plan, and a short AE video.
• Put CFO-ready proof everywhere: time-to-value, risk reduction, peer stories.
• Keep the bar high. Personalization fails when the base content is generic.

What changed:

• LLM-powered editing enables fast variant creation without the need for five copywriters.
• Channel tools support accurate "segment-of-one" delivery.
• Buyers want to hear from founders, employees, not marketing.

4. Automate a real omni-channel journey

Why now?
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Channel behavior shifted again. Events are back. LinkedIn continues to dominate B2B attention. Short video, targeted programmatic, and even smart direct mail are outperforming when they're linked together. The winners aren't doing "more channels." They're creating one cohesive account experience.
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Do This:

• Plan plays, not assets: email + LinkedIn + site + SDR + event + direct mail, all saying the same thing.
• Share an account-level channel calendar with sales so human touches and media line up.
• Use video everywhere: 90-second explainers by industry, quick personal intros, proof clips.
• Add small-format events for Tier 1 and 2: exec breakfasts, workshops, office hours.
• Measure account reach and repetition, not just clicks.

What changed:

• Platform targeting and first-party data enable precise, low-waste reach.
• We're seeing outsized results when teams integrate channels tightly. In one recent ABM program, we beat lead goals by 125% and doubled form conversion with weekly optimizations and cross-channel coordination.

5. Standardize the playbook so you can scale

Why now?
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Ad-hoc ABM breaks at 15 accounts. The last year has proven that teams that win have a codified playbook, shared rituals with sales, and repeatable templates. That's how your small ABM team can manage 100's of named accounts without chaos.

Do This:

• Document your ABM OS: tiering criteria, selection, planning template, launch kit, weekly cadence, scorecard.
• Build the sales enablement layer: buying-group messaging, talk tracks, objections, proof by industry, 1:1 outreach kits.
• Run a weekly ABM standup with sales on target accounts.
• Audit quarterly. Cut plays that don’t move pipeline. Double down on those that do.

What changed

• Tools matured, but the process is still a force multiplier. Our framework outlines the readiness areas to lock in: strategy, training, budget, tools, data, AI adoption, partners, messaging, content, design, channels, and measurement.
• Standardization is what turns an "ABM campaign" into an ABM program that the entire organization can run.

Your 30-day kickoff

Week 1

• Finalize the named account list and tiers with sales.
• Ship the scorecard and define alert thresholds.

Week 2

• Pipe intent signals into your CRM.
• Draft two plays: spike and surround sound.

Week 3

• Stand up account hubs for the top 10.
• Record three proof videos and one CFO-grade case.

Week 4

• Launch the integrated omnichannel play for Tier 1.
• Review lift vs. control. Adjust next week’s touches.

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Pulling it together

If you do nothing else this fall, do these three things:

1. Ship the ABM scorecard and wire alerts to sales.
2. Pipe intent into your account list and route plays using AI.
3. Lock the playbook so marketing and sales can scale the same system.

When those pieces click, the rest falls into place. Personalization lands. Channels reinforce each other. Finance sees impact. Your team spends more time on creative strategy and less time herding tools.
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Want a working session? We can audit your ABM in less than a week and leave you with a 90-day rollout plan that your CFO and sales leader will sign off on.
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Contact us today to get started.

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