Glossary
GTM terms explained
Every jargon term, framework, and tool from GTM Engineering, RevOps, and B2B marketing in one place. Click a term for the full explanation or explore the network through the visual knowledge graph.
Concept
Tool
Framework
Metric
A
ABM
Account-Based Marketing: an approach where sales and marketing target a fixed set of high-value accounts with deeply personalized campaigns.
ACV
Annual Contract Value: the annual value of an individual customer contract.
Activation
The moment a new user first experiences the core value of the product: the aha moment that predicts retention and willingness to pay.
AIO
AI Optimization: optimizing content and site structure so AI assistants (ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity) recommend your brand.
Amplitude
Enterprise product analytics platform: used by PLG companies to measure in-product behavior and optimize conversion.
Apollo
All-in-one enrichment + sequencer platform: strong in the US, decent in EU, popular as a beginner platform.
ARR
Annual Recurring Revenue: normalized annual subscription revenue, excluding one-off fees.
Attio
Next-gen CRM with modern UI and programmable data model: popular among early-stage startups with technical founders.
Attribution
Assigning credit for a conversion or deal to the marketing or sales touchpoints that led to it.
B
BANT
Classic sales qualification framework: Budget, Authority, Need, Timeline.
Bombora
Third-party intent data provider: signals which companies are actively researching specific topics.
Bounce Rate
The percentage of emails returned as undeliverable: above 2% damages your domain reputation.
Build vs Run
Operating model distinguishing between building new systems (GTM Engineering) and running existing systems (RevOps).
BuiltWith
The standard technographics provider: scans website code and infrastructure to determine which tools a company uses.
Burn Multiple
Net Burn divided by Net New ARR: measures how much you burn per euro of new revenue.
Burn Rate
The amount a company loses per month: gross burn is all costs, net burn is costs minus revenue.
Buyer Persona
A detailed profile of an individual buyer within your ICP: role, motivations, pain points, and behavior patterns.
Buying Committee
The group of people who collectively make a B2B buying decision: averaging 7 people for enterprise SaaS deals in 2026.
C
CAC
Customer Acquisition Cost: total sales and marketing costs divided by the number of new customers in a period.
CAC Payback Period
The number of months it takes for a customer to recoup their customer acquisition cost.
Cargo
A programmable GTM data engine: more powerful and dev-friendly than Clay for teams with technical bandwidth.
Champion
An internal advocate inside the prospect organization who actively defends and pushes your solution forward.
Champion Job Change
The signal that a former user or champion has moved to a new company: one of the highest-converting outbound triggers in B2B.
Churn Rate
The percentage of customers or revenue lost in a period: the inverse of retention.
Clay
Clay is a GTM data orchestration tool combining enrichment, AI personalization, and signal detection in one programmable layer.
Cognism
EU-focused B2B data provider: strong in GDPR compliance and European contact data.
Cold Outreach
A first contact with a prospect without prior relationship or permission: almost always via email or LinkedIn.
Common Room
Cross-channel signal-detection platform: combines visitor identification, LinkedIn engagement, and community signals in one layer.
Conversion Rate
The percentage of prospects who move from one funnel stage to the next.
F
Findymail
Email verification + discovery with pay-per-success pricing: often used as the second waterfall layer after LeadMagic.
Firmographics
Company-level attributes like industry, company size, revenue, location, and growth stage: the B2B equivalent of demographics.
Founder-led Sales
The phase where the founder personally sells to the first customers: to learn repeatable sales patterns before hiring a sales team.
Freemium
A pricing model where the base version of the product is permanently free: used by PLG companies to drive viral adoption before monetizing through upgrade features.
Funnel
The journey prospects take from first touchpoint to paying customer: visualized as a funnel because each stage loses leads.
G
I
ICP
Ideal Customer Profile: the type of company that best fits what you sell, defined by firmographics, technographics, and behavioral signals.
Inbound
Marketing where prospects find you through content, SEO, AIO, and organic channels: focused on attraction rather than push.
Instantly
Email outbound platform focused on deliverability: strong in inbox warming and sending at scale.
Intent Signals
Observable signals indicating an account is actively considering a purchase: from pricing-page visits to third-party research.
L
Lead Routing
The logic that decides which SDR or AE owns a lead: by geography, segment, round-robin, or account ownership.
Lead Scoring
Assigning points to leads based on fit and behavior: higher scores trigger sales follow-up.
LeadMagic
Email-discovery specialist: cheap and pay-per-success, ideal as the first layer in a waterfall.
Lemlist
Email outbound with strong focus on personalization and video personalization: popular for relationship-driven sales.
Lifecycle Stage
A contact's or account's position in the journey from anonymous visitor to expanding customer: the backbone of every CRM architecture.
LTV
Customer Lifetime Value: the total revenue you expect from a single customer over their lifetime.
M
Magic Number
Sales-efficiency metric: Net New ARR in a quarter divided by sales+marketing spend in the previous quarter.
Make
No-code automation platform (formerly Integromat): a good balance of visual building and advanced data manipulation.
MCP
Model Context Protocol: an open standard from Anthropic that defines how AI models connect to external tools, data sources, and applications.
MEDDIC
Enterprise sales qualification framework: Metrics, Economic buyer, Decision criteria, Decision process, Identify pain, Champion.
MQL
Marketing Qualified Lead: a lead that marketing has scored as qualified enough to be handed off to sales.
MRR
Monthly Recurring Revenue: normalized monthly subscription revenue, excluding one-off fees.
N
n8n
Open-source workflow automation platform: self-hostable, powerful, and a favorite among GTM Engineers who want control.
NPS
Customer satisfaction metric on a 0-10 scale: measures how likely customers are to recommend you.
NRR
Net Revenue Retention: existing-customer revenue 12 months later, including upsell and churn, as a percentage of starting revenue.
P
Personalization
Adapting messaging to specific prospect context: in 2026 almost always AI-driven at scale.
Pipedrive
Lightweight CRM aimed at pure sales organizations: simple, fast, and without marketing automation overhead.
Pipeline Coverage
Total pipeline value divided by quota: the standard health check for sales forecasts.
PLG
Product-Led Growth: a GTM motion where users discover, use, and expand the product themselves, with sales involved only in later stages.
PostHog
Open-source alternative to Amplitude: self-hostable product analytics with feature flags and session replay built in.
PQL
Product Qualified Lead: a user qualified by product usage as ready for a sales conversation, rather than by demographic or behavioral data outside the product.
R
RB2B
US-focused visitor identification tool: reveals anonymous website visitors at person level (does not work in EU due to GDPR).
Reply Rate
The percentage of outbound emails that get a (positive or neutral) response: the primary outbound effectiveness metric.
RevOps
Revenue Operations: the discipline ensuring governance, predictability, and alignment across marketing, sales, and customer success.
Rule of 40
SaaS benchmark: growth rate + profit margin should equal 40%+ for a healthy company.
Rule of 50
The new benchmark for premium SaaS valuations in 2026: growth + margin together 50%+.
Runway
The number of months a company can continue at the current burn rate before running out of cash.
S
Sales Cadence
A structured series of outbound touchpoints across multiple days and channels: typically 8-12 touchpoints over 3-4 weeks.
Salesforce
The enterprise-standard CRM: endlessly configurable but heavy to maintain and more complex than HubSpot for mid-market use.
SAM
Serviceable Addressable Market: the portion of TAM you can realistically serve given your product, geography, and go-to-market.
Self-serve
A purchase process where users can activate a paid plan without sales involvement: foundational to every PLG motion.
Signal-based Outbound
Outbound triggered by buying signals (new leaders, funding, tech changes) instead of blasting every ICP account blindly.
Smartlead
Email outbound platform comparable to Instantly: strong in multi-inbox rotation and AI personalization.
SOM
Serviceable Obtainable Market: the share you can realistically win in a defined period, given your resources and competition.
SQL
Sales Qualified Lead: a lead that sales has qualified on budget, authority, need, and timeline and is actively pursuing.
T
TAM
Total Addressable Market: the total revenue opportunity if every potential customer in your segment converted.
Technographics
Data about which software, tools, and platforms a company uses: essential for B2B SaaS targeting.
Time to Value
The time between signup and the first aha moment in the product: the most important leading indicator of conversion and retention at PLG companies.
Trigify
LinkedIn signal detection tool: automates finding job changes, posts, and engagement for outbound triggers.