Your board meeting question: "Marketing drove 500 new opportunities. Great. What about the 2,000 existing customers who could expand tomorrow?"
Here's the uncomfortable truth: While you're burning budget acquiring customers with 180-day sales cycles, your existing customers—who already trust you—are being ignored.
The 2025 Revenue Marketing Index reveals that only 20% of B2B organizations have achieved Revenue Marketing maturity, with customer lifecycle marketing being one of the biggest gaps. The mature 20% treat existing customers as their primary growth engine. The other 80%? Still chasing new logos while expansion opportunities walk out the door.
Focus: 90% on acquisition
Customer marketing: Reactive, if any
Expansion strategy: "That's Sales' job"
Typical NRR: 85-95%
Result: High churn, low expansion, expensive growth
Focus: Balanced lifecycle approach
Customer marketing: Dedicated team & strategy
Expansion strategy: Marketing-driven programs
Typical NRR: 110-130%+
Result: Predictable expansion, lower CAC, compound growth
You can't perfectly track expansion influence, so you don't try. Revenue Leaders measure customer health and expansion rates, not touch-by-touch attribution.
Marketing owns prospects, Customer Success owns customers. Result: Nobody owns growth. Revenue Leaders break this artificial barrier.
74% still measure MQLs and pipeline, not customer lifetime value or net revenue retention. You optimize what you measure.
New logos feel like wins. Expansion takes 90-180 days even with warm customers. Most marketers don't have the patience.
Only 34% of marketers have the skills for modern marketing. Customer marketing requires different expertise than demand generation.
Year 1 After Acquisition:
Years 2-5 Growth Trajectory:
B2B Reality: 60-70% of revenue potential comes AFTER the initial sale
Reality Check: Customer marketing is a 12-month journey to revenue impact, not a 90-day sprint
The Strategy: Customer Success + Marketing partnership. Dedicated "Customer Marketing" team equal in size to demand gen.
The Result: 125% average NRR across all segments. Expansion revenue exceeds new business revenue.
The Strategy: Academy-driven adoption. Free tools create expansion opportunities. Community as growth engine.
The Result: SMB customers with Enterprise-level NRR. 40% of revenue from customer expansion.
The Strategy: Developer advocacy program. Usage-based expansion model. Technical content for existing users.
The Result: 120%+ NRR for 20+ quarters. Land-and-expand perfected.
Demand Gen Team: 15 people
Customer Marketing: 1-2 people
Budget Split: 90/10
Tech Stack: All acquisition
Demand Gen Team: 10 people
Customer Marketing: 8 people
Budget Split: 60/40
Tech Stack: Full lifecycle
If 70% of revenue comes after the sale, why does only 10% of your team focus there?
Every day you ignore customer marketing is a day your competitors strengthen their revenue base.
The math is simple: Expand or expire.
Revenue Marketing isn't about choosing between new and existing customers. It's about recognizing where sustainable growth actually comes from.
Yes, it takes 12 months to build a world-class customer marketing engine. But your competitors started 12 months ago.
When will you start?
Find out where you stand on customer marketing maturity and get the playbook for sustainable growth.