Systems and data

Categories, not vendors. The CRM is the system of record for accounts, contacts, and opportunities; everything else either feeds it or reads from it. Reporting runs off the warehouse, not off any one tool.

ACQUIRE

Marketing automation
forms, scoring, nurture, MQL flag

Enrichment and intent
firmographics, contacts, signals

Sales engagement
sequences, dialer, activity capture

Call intelligence
recording, notes to CRM

Quoting and e-sign
price book, approvals, contract

RETAIN AND GROW

Billing
invoices; system of record for ARR, mirrored to the CRM

CS platform
health score, playbooks, success plans

Product usage
events, seats, activation; PQL and health inputs

Support
tickets, CSAT; volume feeds health

Commissions
plans, attainment, payouts from closed bookings

Warehouse
nightly copies of every system above; account-month ARR snapshots; stage history; attribution touchpoints

Reporting
one scorecard, one set of definitions; funnel, pipeline, forecast accuracy, ARR waterfall, GRR and NRR, capacity vs. plan

What changes by size: under about 150 people, reporting runs out of the CRM and spreadsheets and the warehouse is a later step; the CS platform is often the CRM itself. Above that, the warehouse becomes the only place the funnel, the forecast, and the ARR waterfall can be reconciled, because each lives in a different system. Field rules: every object has an owner, every required field has a reason, and nothing is required at a stage where the rep cannot know it yet.