If you’ve ever been in a B2B revenue meeting where marketing and sales politely argue over who “sourced” a deal, you’ll know it feels less like collaboration and more like a custody battle. The lead credit tug-of-war has become a default subplot in far too many organizations. And guess what? While we bicker over attribution models, the customer has already moved on — likely to a vendor who didn’t make them fill a 10-field form just to download a brochure.

Back in my time at Tableau, this dynamic came to a head more than once. Sales insisted their reps “worked the account for years,” while marketing countered with campaign logs, email clicks, and webinar registrations. Honestly, both sides were right — and both missed the point. What mattered wasn’t who sourced the lead, but whether we advanced the opportunity together.

That’s when I stumbled upon a truth echoed in Forrester’s B2B Revenue Waterfall: the focus shouldn't be on sourcing — it should be on orchestration.

Think of it this way. In an orchestra, the violinist doesn’t claim they “sourced” the melody. They play their part in a larger performance. The conductor ensures harmony. That’s marketing’s role in the modern revenue team — enabling a seamless buyer journey that sales can convert, not squabbling over who got there first.

Enter the buying group mindset.

When we started mapping buyer roles within each account instead of just contacts, things shifted. We stopped pushing generic nurtures and started customizing outreach for influencers, decision-makers, blockers, and champions. More importantly, we sat with sales and Business Development teams and agreed on definitions: what’s a real opportunity? When should a lead pass over? What signals indicate buying intent across the group?

This isn’t just theory. At Microsoft, marketing and sales share KPIs around group engagement and pipeline velocity — not just MQL counts. Their GTM engine functions like a relay race, with seamless baton passes rather than turf wars. Inspired by that, we introduced shared dashboards at Tableau that showed progress across accounts, not leads. Sales loved it. Suddenly, marketing wasn’t the “email team,” we were co-owners of the revenue number.

And that’s where Account-Based Marketing (ABM) earned its keep. ABM is more than targeted ads and fancy personalization. Done right, it brings marketing and sales into the same room with the same goals: drive growth in high-value accounts.

With one financial services client, we replaced our lead-based scoring with account engagement tiers. Campaign success wasn’t measured in open rates but in stage acceleration and multi-contact interactions. The result? 3x faster deal velocity and a 20% increase in average deal size.

So what’s the fix for this outdated lead credit game? Here’s my playbook:

- Ditch attribution battles. Instead, build joint KPIs around pipeline influence, velocity, and progression.
- Adopt buying group metrics. Track how personas within the same account engage across touchpoints.
- Invest in shared visibility tools. Build dashboards that show how both teams are impacting account movement.
- Celebrate co-wins. Sales may close the deal, but the journey starts with insights, outreach, and engagement — and that’s a team effort.

In essence, if sales and marketing are still arguing over lead origin, you’re missing the bigger opportunity: revenue orchestration.

If this sounds like your team, I can help you rewrite the rules and align marketing with sales for outcomes — not attribution debates. Because let’s be honest, revenue’s a team sport.