Ideal Customer Profile Template (B2B ICP)

Summary, deal evidence by segment, firmographics, technology fit, buying triggers, buying group, disqualifiers, fit score with tiers, team use

MarketingStandardideal customer profileAktualisiert 29.10.2026

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Anleitung: Use it when marketing and sales need one shared definition of the best-fit account. Fill the evidence table from closed deals first, then the disqualifiers. The main pitfall is defining the ICP by deal size alone.

Vorschau

Ideal Customer Profile: [Product or business unit]

A business-to-business ideal customer profile (ICP): the kind of organisation that gets the most value from the product, buys fastest and stays longest, described by firmographics, technology, buying triggers and disqualifiers, backed by evidence from won and lost deals, and turned into a fit score sales and marketing can apply. Based on common business-to-business marketing and sales practice. Replace every [bracketed] value and every row marked Example.

Document control

Field	Value
Document ID	[ICP-YYYY-01]
Product or unit	[Name]
Version	[0.1]
Status	[Draft / Approved / Superseded]
Owners	[@marketing-lead], [@sales-lead]
Reviewers	[@customer-success-lead], [@revops]
Evidence period	YYYY-MM-DD to YYYY-MM-DD
Last updated	YYYY-MM-DD
Next review	YYYY-MM-DD

Revision history

Version	Date	Author	Change
0.1	YYYY-MM-DD	[@owner]	First draft from deal analysis
[0.2] (Example)	YYYY-MM-DD	[@owner]	Moved 1,000+ employees to "stretch" tier after win-rate review

1. Summary

[Example: Larkspan's ideal customer is a company with 200 to 999 employees that already runs a mid-market ERP, processes more than 1,500 supplier invoices a month by hand or by email, and has just added a finance leader or entities. They feel the pain at month-end close and can buy within a quarter.]

2. Evidence

Closed opportunities by segment (Example, 24 months):

Segment	Opportunities	Won	Win rate	Average contract value	Median cycle (days)	12-month logo retention
200 to 999 employees, ERP in use	60	27	45.0%	$18,000	62	94%
50 to 199 employees	90	18	20.0%	$7,500	48	81%
1,000+ employees	30	4	13.3%	$42,000	140	Too few to judge
Total	180	49	27.2%

Read: the first segment produced $486,000 of the$ 789,000 new contract value won (27 x $18,000), with the highest win rate and retention.

Other evidence used:

[Example: 14 interviews with customers in the top retention quartile]
[Example: 22 coded win-loss interviews, see sales/win-loss-analysis]
[Example: support ticket volume by segment in the first 90 days]

3. Firmographics

Attribute	Ideal	Acceptable	Must-have?	Data source
Employees (Example)	200 to 999	100 to 199	Yes	Company data provider, LinkedIn
Industry (Example)	Wholesale distribution, light manufacturing, multi-site services	Professional services	No	Provider industry code
Region (Example)	Markets where we invoice in local currency: UK, Ireland, US	EU countries with partner support	Yes	Headquarters address
Legal entities (Example)	2 to 10	1	No	Company registry
Ownership (Example)	Private or private-equity backed	Listed	No	Public sources
[attribute]	[ideal]	[acceptable]	[Yes / No]	[source]

4. Technology and operating situation

Attribute	Ideal	Why it matters	How to detect
ERP (Example)	One of our three native integrations	Setup in weeks, not months	Discovery question, job postings
Invoice volume (Example)	Over 1,500 per month	Enough volume for clear time savings	Discovery question
Current process (Example)	Email inbox and spreadsheets	Largest gap to close	Discovery question
[attribute]	[ideal]	[why]	[how]

5. Buying triggers

Trigger ID	Trigger	Why it creates urgency	Signal source	Typical window
TRG-01 (Example)	New finance leader hired	New leaders review processes in their first 90 days	Job change alerts	30 to 120 days after start
TRG-02 (Example)	Acquisition or new entity	Invoice volume and approval chains grow	News, company registry	0 to 6 months
TRG-03 (Example)	ERP migration announced	Process redesign is already under way	Job postings, partner referrals	During project planning
TRG-04 (Example)	Audit finding on payments	Control gap must be fixed	Customer conversation only	Next audit cycle
[TRG-05]	[trigger]	[why]	[source]	[window]

6. Buying group

Role	Typical title	Cares about	Persona link
Economic buyer (Example)	Chief financial officer	Close speed, control, cost	[`product/persona` file]
Champion (Example)	Accounts-payable manager	Fewer manual steps, fewer late fees	[persona]
Technical evaluator (Example)	ERP or IT lead	Integration, security review	[persona]
[role]	[title]	[cares about]	[link]

7. Disqualifiers

ID	Disqualifier	Reason	Evidence
DQ-01 (Example)	ERP with no supported integration and no budget for one	Implementation stalls, churn risk	5 of 6 churned accounts in this group
DQ-02 (Example)	Under 300 invoices a month	Value too small to justify price	Win-loss coding
DQ-03 (Example)	Requires on-premises hosting	Product is cloud only	Product policy
[DQ-04]	[disqualifier]	[reason]	[evidence]

8. Fit score

Criterion	Points	Rule
Employee band (Example)	25	25 if 200 to 999; 10 if 100 to 199; 0 otherwise
Supported ERP (Example)	20	20 if native integration; 0 otherwise
Invoice volume (Example)	20	20 if over 1,500 a month; 10 if 300 to 1,500
Active trigger (Example)	20	20 if any TRG within its window
Region (Example)	15	15 if UK, Ireland or US; 5 if partner-supported EU
Maximum	100

Tiers (Example): A = 75 or more (named account plays), B = 50 to 74 (programmatic marketing), C = under 50 (nurture only). Any disqualifier overrides the score.

Worked scores (Example): an account with 400 employees, a supported ERP, 900 invoices a month, a new CFO and a UK head office scores 25 + 20 + 10 + 20 + 15 = 90 (tier A). One with 400 employees, an unsupported ERP, 2,000 invoices, no trigger and a US head office scores 25 + 0 + 20 + 0 + 15 = 60 (tier B), but DQ-01 applies if there is no integration budget.

9. How teams use the ICP

Team	Use	Owner
Marketing (Example)	Target account lists, ad audiences, content topics by trigger	[@demand-gen]
Sales development (Example)	Prioritise tier A, open with the active trigger	[@sdr-lead]
Sales (Example)	Qualify out disqualifiers in the first call	[@sales-lead]
Product (Example)	Integration roadmap follows ICP ERPs	[@pm]
[team]	[use]	[@owner]

Data handling: build account lists from business data sources whose terms allow this use, and treat contact-level data as personal data under the privacy rules that apply (see marketing/email-campaign-brief section 3 before mailing any list).

10. Review and validation

Win rate, cycle and retention for tier A beat tiers B and C in the last two quarters.
Sales agrees disqualifiers still hold; any exceptions logged with outcome.
Sample sizes stated; segments with fewer than [Example: 20] opportunities marked as low confidence.

11. Related templates

product/persona, marketing/messaging-framework, marketing/go-to-market-plan, marketing/marketing-plan, marketing/competitive-battlecard, sales/win-loss-analysis, sales/account-plan, mba/mba-segmentation-clustering-card, business/market-research-report.

Standard and licence note

Based on common business-to-business marketing and sales practice for ideal customer profiles (firmographic and technographic criteria, buying triggers, disqualifiers and fit scoring). The structure, text, scoring method and fictional Larkspan figures are original and are one possible method. Template licence: MIT.