Demand gen & ABM agencies, reviewed and ranked

B2B pipeline programmes and account-based motions. Scored hardest on whether they report pipeline and revenue or hide behind MQL counts.

23 evaluated, of which we would put 22 in front of a client and cut 1.

MQLs are the metric agencies choose when pipeline is bad

Revenue and pipeline measurement carries the heaviest weight in this rubric, at a quarter of the total, because lead volume is the easiest number in B2B to inflate and the least connected to revenue. An agency optimising to MQLs will hit its MQL target. Ask what happened to pipeline and CAC, and whether they would still be paid if those went the wrong way.

‘We do ABM’ usually means a list and some ads

A real account-based motion has target-account selection you can interrogate, orchestrated plays across channels, and genuine sales alignment — the sales team knows which accounts are in-programme and what to do when one engages. Retargeting a purchased list is not ABM, however it is described in the deck.

Ask who builds the measurement

Most of the arguments in this category are about attribution, and attribution is plumbing: CRM configuration, funnel instrumentation, an agreed model. Agencies that can stand that up prove their own numbers. Agencies that cannot will at some point explain that the pipeline exists but the system is not capturing it.

Evaluated

And the ones we cut, so you can judge the rest

Named, with the reason and the sources.