Goldilocks and the Three Selling Motions
Once upon a time a marketer and a sales rep were working on the same account. It was a big enterprise with real opportunity so they wanted to coordinate their motions. The AE was excited to deepen spend with buyers who already knew the product. While the marketer was focused on building awareness with net-new names inside the same enterprise. Three months later, the sales rep complained the marketer’s content was too top-of-funnel. The marketer accused the sales rep of not understanding how demand works.
This is an allegory of misalignment.
Upsell, cross-sell, and expansion get used like synonyms for "more revenue from the same logo." But they're not. Each describes a different GTM motion and confusing them sends your teams after the wrong stakeholders with the wrong message. Understanding the difference allows your revenue teams to coordinate activities and align on intended outcomes.
Upsell:
This is the simplest motion. The customer already believes in your product, the buying center is the same, and your job is to give their internal champion something they can bring into their budget conversations.
Sales should be on top of renewals and budget cycles, using usage signals as an early warning system and conversation starter for your champion. From there, map who else will needs to weigh in on additional investment: finance, procurement, a skeptical VP. The deal is won or lost in how well your champion can carry a success story into those conversations.
Marketing’s role is to build that story into personalized assets. The best assets for this motion are designed to be forwarded to key stakeholders and answer the questions your champion will get from the buying comittee. This can look like ROI content that’s grounded in the customer’s numbers: time saved, cost avoided, outcomes improved. If you don’t have solid metrics to publish, share case studies that mirror the account as closely as possible, including what triggered their expansion and how it was justified internally.
Cross-sell:
Since with cross-sell motions you're selling a new capability or complimentary products/services, your focus should be on educating customers within the context of their current investments. Sales needs to figure out if this product lives under the same budget, or if it introduces a new owner with different priorities and objections. If it's the latter, you're effectively building a second deal inside the same account. That may mean developing a new champion or helping the existing one navigate outside their lane.
Marketing's job is to bridge trust. You're connecting something the customer already values to something they haven't bought. Think case studies from similar companies who unlocked workflows by connecting new tools or attention-grabbing campaigns that educate customers on new capabilities. If new stakeholders are entering cold you may need to build awareness with top-of-funnel content, while acknowledging the existing relationship. Your messaging should say, "You already trust us for this, here's how that extends into something that also matters to you." Activate this through targeted ABM across paid and email that connects the current use case to the new one, and through champion enablement.
Expansion:
This is where most teams get tripped up. It’s tempting to assume that a strong relationship in one part of an enterprise carries across the whole organization. It usually doesn’t. Different business units have different leadership, goals, and buying processes. To them, you’re a new vendor.
Sales should approach this like a new logo with a slight advantage. The existing relationship can open a door or provide a reference, but it won’t carry the deal. You still need to prospect and build a case tailored to that business unit’s priorities.
Marketing needs to reset as well. It’s a new market within an existing account. Focus on building awareness with the right stakeholders in that specific business unit. Use internal case studies only when the use case is directly transferable. Otherwise, treat them like any other skeptical buyer who needs proof that you understand their world. Activate this through high-reach awareness plays within the account like programmatic, reinforced by high-touch efforts to land with essential stakeholders.
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The moral of the story is that not all growth inside an account is created equal. Upsell, cross-sell, and expansion each require a different playbook. When you name the motion early and clearly, sales and marketing can align with just the right message reaching just the right people at just the right moment.
Hero image by https://www.pexels.com/@nietjuhart/
