How to use real-time data and alerts to support account management

Analyst research firms typically invest a significant share of revenue in key account management because their business is usually subscription driven, and subscriptions have an expiry date.

They know it’s more cost-effective to invest in client success and retain a client at renewal than replace them. A Forrester study found that a team dedicated to the success of key accounts, supported by appropriate technology, delivers 107% ROI within three years: “As customers succeed, you benefit from higher retention rates, lower costs to serve, and more cross-sell and upsell opportunities.”

So, with strong account management so vital to revenue, how can business leaders support that function?

People buy from people

“People want a fair deal from someone they like.” So writes Daniel H. Pink in his bestseller To Sell is Human, highlighting the power of good business relationships based on trust. Such relationships won’t develop in a vacuum; they’re built through contact.

Account managers know this – it’s why they try so hard to secure regular keep-in-touch meetings with their clients. But clients are busy people attuned to account managers trying to sell off the back of their marketing department’s latest e-shot. Client diaries are full, they request to postpone, the renewal date looms.

A client-led reason to talk

What account managers need is a genuine client-led reason for contact, not just a generic quarterly meeting (which is a supplier-led reason for contact).

A client is a person with a problem or ‘job to be done’, which in the analyst research sector is often a question to be answered by evidence. Understanding that need and helping the client meet it drives perception of value.

There’s enough data to analyse in tools like Google Analytics to occupy an account manager’s entire day. But the way the data is presented doesn’t always make it easy to translate behaviour into needs. If account managers wanted to spend all their time analysing data rather than talking to clients they’d be data analysts. How can business leaders help them play to their strengths as relationship managers instead?

How to transform data into actionable insight

We did a lot of research with our larger analyst research company clients when we developed Content Catalyst’s Account Growth Suite. Their responses revealed that to be account manager-friendly and actionable, data must help them focus and be timely.

Focused data

Account managers need the clutter removed, yet many systems present each account manager with all account managers’ accounts. We built our system with personalised views to show each account manager’s accounts, and only their accounts. At the start of each working week, they need to know where to focus their attention first. They want to see, at a glance, the clients that don’t appear to be getting full value from their licences. It’s an early warning sign that without action, they’re at risk of churn.

The ability to see recency and consistency of user action makes a real difference. So, we created a colour-coded system with sparkline charts to show trends in weekly active users and weekly report views – the two key indicators of account health.
Now account managers can not only focus on the priority accounts, they can go into calls with useful, personalised news for their client lead.

Timely insight

Accounts are sending signals all the time through users’ behaviour. But with ‘pull’ data – ie the requirement for the account managers to go in and decode all users’ data to find the ones that reveal the chance to upsell and cross-sell – some opportunities are missed because they simply weren’t seen in time.

We include a section in the Account Growth Suite to show all the users who’ve accessed the marketing page of a particular report outside a licence, how many times they’ve done so and when. Account managers can use this to understand how much interest there is in a report and how current that interest is.

But we realised we could do more, so we created a mechanism to ‘push’ opportunities straight to the account managers in real time. The Suite sends a weekly warm leads email alert to the account managers highlighting the highest interest in off-subscription reports, providing a great reason to talk to clients about the new licences that could meet business needs right now.

A clear picture for senior leaders

Senior leaders with responsibility for the account management function are also busy people, often with roles spanning multiple functions in their business. They need to understand the health of the accounts across the business in order to manage their team’s performance.  They don’t want to rely on anecdotal evidence alone that an account is likely to renew, nor get a nasty surprise when they don’t.

In our system, leaders can filter by account manager to see the performance of their accounts and the leads that have come in. The organisation can also use the system to see whether marketing activity like e-shots is generating leads.

In conclusion  

Continuing economic uncertainty/market volatility was the biggest challenge for 64% of individuals surveyed in our Analyst Research Leadership Survey 2025. Analyst firms expressed concern that clients will face increasing budget pressures due to the current economic and political climate. “Demand for our services is dependent on client budgets,” noted one respondent.

When budgets are under pressure, clients need to prioritise their investments in content. The tools in the Content Catalyst Account Growth Suite aren’t intended to replace CRM systems or in-depth data from Google Analytics. Instead, they help account managers and their leaders to prioritise too.

Click here to book a demo of the Content Catalyst Account Growth Suite.