Account-Based Lead Generation

Contact-first prospecting finds one person at a company and hopes they can sell internally on your behalf. Account-first prospecting starts from the company, maps who actually needs to be involved in the decision, and researches and engages several of them in a coordinated way. It's more work per account and it's the right approach whenever the deal is large enough, or complex enough, that one champion isn't enough to close it.

When account-based beats contact-based

Use ABM when          deal size justifies hours of research per account,
                       the sale involves procurement, IT, legal or a
                       committee, the market of viable accounts is small
                       and known
Use contact-first when the market is large, the deal is simple and
                       single-threaded, and volume matters more than depth

The tell that you should have started with ABM: deals stall after one enthusiastic contact goes quiet. That's usually not disengagement — it's the deal hitting an internal stakeholder nobody researched or engaged, and nobody outside that company is in the room to un-stick it.

Building the target account list