For sales-driven organisations, a well-executed content strategy and well managed marketing automation can certainly drive chubby pipelines. At least it's easy to package it up that way. But if the Forrester statistic is to be true, the ultimate returns might not always prove fruitful, particularly when the pipe is full of high-quantity low-quality prospects.

We've been taking an account-based approach for a some time now and it's certainly proving effective. This Business 2 Community piece makes an insightful point about getting buy-in from the top. For ABM to really work, everyone must be on-board, particularly the C-levels. I fear that too many senior management teams still push (perhaps unconsciously) their marketing functions to drive high velocity pipes, where quality is not the centre point. Until this mindset shifts, companies will have a hard time executing against an ABM strategy.