How to Create a Winning Target Account List in 2025

Introduction

Building a target account list for ABM isn’t about chasing dream clients—it’s about focusing on the ones you can actually win.

Too many ABM campaigns fail because teams pick accounts based on wishful thinking, not real opportunity.

In this guide, we'll show you how to use Clay to identify and list accounts that are the best fit for your business.

You’ll also learn how to use HubSpot as the ABM platform

Together, these tools will help you build and manage your target account list.

What is Target Account List (TAL)?

A Target Account List (TAL) is a handpicked set of companies where you want to focus your marketing and sales teams firepower.

What makes an account TAL-worthy? Each company on your list should check two boxes:

• They’re high-value accounts—meaning the potential contract size is worth the effort.

• You have a strong shot at winning them—thanks to your competitive edge and solid social proof.

So, why select a few when you could cast a wide net?

• Your contract values are high, so it pays to invest extra attention and resources.

• Your market is niche, and only a handful of companies truly fit your sweet spot.

• You have a specialized offering that’s perfect for certain types of businesses.

• You’re chasing a big logo (often referred to as a named account), and landing it requires a personalized, strategic approach.

Bonus tip: You can segment your TAL to tailor your outreach, sharpen your messaging, and make your offering stand out even more.

But here’s a warning: Don’t go overboard with segments. Too many of them can make your ABM efforts messy and hard to manage. Keep your ABM segmentation simple and strategic—otherwise, you’ll spend more time organizing than actually winning business.

In short: A strong TAL is derived from understanding your target market and narrowing it down to the best fit accounts for your business.

Red Flags for Your Target Account List (and ABM)

Trying to force an enterprise sales model on SMB deals?
That’s like bringing a bazooka to a pillow fight.

Giving every TAL account the same generic offering?
If your “personalization” looks like a mass email, you’re missing the point. Your TAL should give you an opportunity to speak to the accounts specific problems and needs.

Sales and marketing working in silos?
ABM is a team sport. If you’re not playing together, you’ll lose.

Your team isn’t ready for long-term account development?
If patience isn’t your strong suit, ABM might test your nerves. Big wins take time.

You can’t afford a 3–6 month investment period without returns?
ABM is a marathon, not a sprint. If leadership expects instant ROI, expectations need a reset

Marketing budget under 5,000€/month and limited content?
You can’t win big accounts with a single blog post.

Lacking case studies, references, or social proof?
If you have no proof you can deliver, why should anyone believe you?

Product positioning and messaging still in progress?
If you’re still figuring out what you do best, it’s too soon to go all-in on ABM.

No clear competitive differentiation?
If you can’t answer “Why us?” neither can your target accounts.

Team lacks experience in long, nurturing sales cycles?
ABM is about relationships, not quick wins. If your team’s only used to transactional sales, expect a learning curve.

No access to intent data or account intelligence tools?
Flying blind is risky. You need data to know who’s interested and when to engage

Can’t measure account-level engagement and progression?
If you can’t track progress, you can’t improve and iterate.

How Big Should Your Target Account List Be?

The “right” size for your target account list = depends entirely on your account-based marketing strategy.

Go too big, and you’ll spread your resources thin. Go too small, and you might lack scale. 

Here’s a practical breakdown to help you hit the sweet spot:

1:Many ABM (Programmatic ABM)

• TAL Size: 200 to 2,000+ accounts

• Purpose: Drive awareness with light personalization at scale

• Use Case: Perfect for reaching broad segments (like all mid-market companies in a specific industry) using firmographic and technographic filters

• Execution: Automated ad campaigns, light-touch email sequences, and content tailored by firmographic data. Think traditional demand generation connected with targeted outreach backed by intent data and account research at scale.

1:Few ABM (ABM Lite)

• TAL Size: 15 to 100 accounts

• Purpose: Deliver mid-level personalization to a niche segment

• Use Case: When you want to go deep with a specific type of company (e.g., top 15 fashion e-commerce companies in Germany). Use other methods such as interviews or surveys to gather deeper insights for account selection.

• Execution: Deep research, custom content, and enterprise-level outreach. 

1:1 ABM (Strategic ABM)

• TAL Size: 5 to 10 accounts

• Purpose: Land high-stakes deals with full personalization for each account

• Use Case: When you have a named account strategy (e.g., targeting your top 10 dream enterprise logos this year)

• Execution: Custom activities, custom landing pages, tailored buying journeys, multithreaded outreach, and research-driven content.

Quick Rule of Thumb

(Three types of ABM strategy)

Bottom line:
Your TAL should be big enough to hit your revenue targets, but small enough to deliver real, personalized value to each account. 

How to Create a Target Account List with Clay and HubSpot?

Start with ICP alignment:

• Gather the right people: sales, marketing, customer success, and anyone who regularly interacts with customers.

• Define your Ideal Customer Profile together: What industries, company sizes, pain points, and behaviors define your best customers?

• Use data, not opinions: Pull your top 20% of customers by revenue and retention. What patterns emerge?

Translate ICP criteria into Clay-Ready Filters

Your ICP is useless if you can't operationalize it in Clay. Here's how to turn those fluffy descriptions into filters.

Turn traits into filters:

• "Mid-market companies" → Employee count: 100-500

• "Growing SaaS businesses" → Industry: Software + Recent funding rounds or job postings

• "Companies struggling with manual processes" → Technology gaps (e.g., no automation tools) + Job postings for ops roles

Now for the fun part—turn your criteria into a living, breathing account list

1. Create your table

• Open Clay → "New Table" → "Find Companies"

  
  

2. Apply your ICP filters

• Industry: Use specific SIC/NAICS codes, not broad categories

• Company size: Set employee count ranges that match your ICP

• Geography: Be as specific as your go-to-market strategy requires

• Technology: Filter by tools they use (or don't use)

3. Run and refine

• Start with a test query of 50-100 accounts

• Too broad? Tighten industry codes or add technology filters

• Too narrow? Expand geography or adjust company size ranges

• Do the results look like your best customers? If not, adjust until they do.

(Target Account List in Clay)

Account Data Validation: Clean and Qualify

1. Validate URL

• Add "Check if URL is Valid" action in Clay

• Remove companies with invalid, broken, or parked domains

• Flag domains that redirect to generic landing pages

(URL validation in Clay)

2. Check company existence  

• Use Clay's AI research to verify companies are still operating

• Remove defunct startups, acquired companies (unless relevant), or shell companies

3. Remove duplicates

• Different domains for the same company (company.com vs. company.io)

• Subsidiaries vs. parent companies (decide which to target)

Upload TAL to HubSpot

Before pushing your enriched list into HubSpot, make sure every record includes data you mapped in your Ideal Customer Profile.

Next, choose your import method:

• Native Clay integration (Pro plan required):
  Add a Create HubSpot Object action, select Company as the object type, and map each Clay column to its HubSpot counterpart, for example:

  • Name → Company name

  • Domain → Website URL

• • Primary Industry → Industry

  • Employee Count → Number of employees

  • Revenue → Annual revenue

• CSV export (if you’re on Starter or don’t have Pro):

  • Format the CSV according to HubSpot import requirements

  • Import the CSV to HubSpot using the HubSpot import tool

  • Map CSV columns to the corresponding HubSpot properties

(Target Account List Uploaded from Clay to HubSpot)

Rank your TAL in HubSpot with Account Scoring

By combining three types of account-level scoring—Fit, Engagement, and Intent—you can automatically rank every company in your TAL based on:

• How well they match your ICP

• How strong they're engaging with your brand

• How strong their buying signals are

With this setup, you can build HubSpot lists like:

• High Engagement + High Buying Intent

• High Buying Intent only

You spot the highest-value accounts and focus your sales and marketing efforts there:

(Target Account List in HubSpot - High Fit Accounts)

(Target Account List in HubSpot - Accounts with High Buying Intent)

Benefits of Using Clay for TAL Creation

When you build your TAL in Clay, you unlock four concrete advantages:

• Cross-checked data from multiple sources
  Clay taps into over 50 providers, such as Crunchbase, Apollo, BuiltWith, RocketReach and more, then runs each data point through a sequential “waterfall” enrichment to confirm accuracy. By stopping at the first successful lookup, you pay only for verified results.

• Step-by-step filtering to find top accounts
  Clay applies your ICP criteria in layers: starts with broad matches, then adjusts filters to find companies best matching your ICP. That progressive approach turns thousands of raw entries into a focused list of high-fit accounts.

• Direct HubSpot sync for instant activation
  With Clay’s HubSpot connector, enriched company records map straight to custom properties in your CRM. That eliminates CSV exports and manual imports, so your final TAL appears in HubSpot ready for lists, workflows and ABM reporting.

• Detailed technographic insight
  Clay’s multi-provider setup surfaces every tool a prospect runs, giving you granular tech-stack flags. This depth lets you tailor messaging precisely (for example, excluding accounts that use competing solutions) and uncover cross-sell or integration opportunities.

How Can We Help?

Building winning target account list requires both strategic selection criteria and technical execution.

If you're not sure where to start, our team can help.

We specialize in building Clay-to-HubSpot TAL workflows that translate your ICP into enriched account lists, so your sales and marketing teams get strategic targets instead of random cold leads.

TL;DR - Key Takeaways for Target Account Listing

Without proper account selection criteria, teams waste resources on companies that will never buy.

A strategic approach for identifying target accounts using Clay and HubSpot changes this by turning your ICP into actionable, data-driven list.

When done right, it becomes your strategic foundation for HubSpot account-based marketing, improving conversion rates of your marketing and sales efforts.

Key Takeaways for building your Target Account List:

• TAL-Worthy Criteria: Every account should check two boxes:

  • High-value potential – contract size worth the investment

  • Winnable – you have competitive advantage and social proof

• ABM Strategy Sizing:

  • 1:Many (200-2,000+ accounts) – light personalization at scale

  • 1:Few (10-100 accounts) – mid-level personalization for niches

  • 1:1 (5-10 accounts) – full personalization for strategic deals

• Clay Implementation Process:

  • Start with ICP alignment across sales, marketing, and customer success

  • Translate traits into filters (employee count, industry codes, tech stack)

  • Add intent signals (pricing visits, demo requests, LinkedIn engagement)

  • Validate data and remove duplicates

• HubSpot Integration:

  • Use native Clay connector for direct sync (Pro plan)

  • Map fields correctly (name, domain, industry, employee count)

  • Implement account scoring combining Fit, Engagement, and Intent

• Clay Benefits:

  • Multi-source data validation from 50+ providers

  • Progressive filtering to find best-fit accounts

  • Direct HubSpot sync eliminates manual imports

  • Complete technographic insights for precise messaging

• Result: A focused, data-backed list of accounts you can actually win—integrated directly into your ABM workflow.