Create structured, collaborative Playbooks for landing, managing and growing key strategic accounts.
This guide covers setup from Salesforce integration to creating your first account planning Accord. What's in this article:
- Setting Up 1:1 Accord Mapping with Accounts in Salesforce
- Building Your Account Planning Playbook
- Approve & Start Using Your Playbook
Setting Up 1:1 Accord Mapping with Accounts in Salesforce
First, ensure your Accord workspace is properly configured to work with Salesforce Account objects rather than just Opportunities.
Only Enterprise customers can integrate with Salesforce account objects. Learn more about pricing here.
Go to your Settings and click CRM (this will only be possible if you are a workspace admin).
1. Click into Salesforce Slideout. This is where you can configure which Account fields and values will be available in an Accord’s Salesforce Slideout Menu. Click the Accounts tab. From here, you can configure which Account fields show up in your Slideout Menu, and how it will be displayed in Accord.
2. Next, navigate to Sync Accord data to Salesforce. This is where you can configure which Account data—like execution scores–sync to Salesforce for reporting purposes. We recommend that you create new, custom Salesforce fields for 1:1 simple mapping:
- Accord Account Plan URL: the URL of the connected Accord
- Accord Account Plan Progress: the percent of Accord steps that have been completed.
- Accord Account Plan Execution Score: the connected Accord's Execution Score
- Accord Account Plan Customers Invited: the number of customers who have been invited to the connected Accord
3. Finally, go to Use Salesforce Values in Accord. This enables your team to surface values of Account fields in Accord — data like ARR, what competitive software a customer is already using, etc. Click Add Row, and select Account in the Object Name dropdown to get started.
Building Your Account Planning Playbook
Below is a high-level guide tailored to the Account Planning use case and more detailed Playbook instructions can be found here.
Navigate to the Playbooks section of Accord and then
- Click Create New Playbook
- Select Account in the Salesforce Object Type dropdown; this step ensures that all future Accords created from this Playbook are linked to an Account in Salesforce (not an Opportunity)
- Uncheck Allow customers to be invited if you want to make account plans internal-only, or keep it checked off if reps will be sharing account plans with customers.
Finish your set up by giving your Playbook a name (e.g., "Strategic Account Planning 2026"), and adding a Default Name for all Accords created from this playbook.
Template Your Summary Pages
Summary Pages serve as strategic overview documents within each Accord created from your Account Planning Playbook.
You can set your team up for success—and help them speed up account research—by creating templates with built-in prompts for Accord Intelligence (our AI functionality).
Recommended Summary Page Elements:
- Account Overview: Company background, current relationship status, key metrics
- Account Objectives: What both parties want to achieve
- Growth Opportunities: Identified expansion areas
- Success Metrics: How progress will be measured
- Key Stakeholders: Decision makers and influencers
- Timeline: Major milestones and review dates
You can also create multiple Summary Pages to better organize the above and keep each Summary Page digestible.
➡ Get more details on building compelling, impactful Summary Pages.
✨ Using Accord Intelligence
Accord Intelligence is Accord's AI functionality, and it's incredibly useful when it comes to helping your reps complete in-depth account research and using it to populate the Summary Page within their Account Planning Accords.
How Accord Intelligence Works: Accord Intelligence synthesizes three sources of information to generate high-quality content: your Playbook Context (company descriptions, value props, differentiators), information in each individual Accord (stakeholders, notes, steps), and third-party data (publicly available company information, news, articles).
Setting Up Accord Intelligence for your Account Planning Playbook:
Click on the Context tab within your Playbook. This is where you'll populate information about your product, its value, and the problem it solves.
- Step 1: Define Your Playbook Purpose Clearly state that this Playbook is for "Account Planning" to help AI understand the context and generate appropriate strategic content.
- Step 2: Add Your Company Description Write 2-3 sentences describing your company that match your brand's voice and tone. This ensures AI-generated content aligns with your messaging.
- Step 3: Input Value Propositions Enter your product’s value propositions, tailored by segment, geography, or vertical. Include key differentiators from competitors that you consistently highlight in account planning discussions.
Optimizing Summary Page Content for AI
- Before using Accord Intelligence, go back to your Summary Page and ensure each section includes clear prompts about what content should be captured
- For example, your Strategic Objectives section might specify: "Include customer's current business challenges, desired outcomes, and how our solution addresses their specific needs"
Using Accord Intelligence to Populate Summary Pages
- Once your playbook context is configured, team members can click the Accord Intelligence button in any Account Planning Accord (created from your Playbooks) to automatically generate research-backed content for their Summary pages
- Accord Intelligence will create account-specific strategic overviews, growth opportunities, and business cases tailored to each customer
Design Your Playbook Structure
Go to Next Steps within your Playbook. Lay out the stages and steps of your account planning process. We recommend creating 4 stages with 3-5 steps each. A high-level example for guidance:
Account Discovery & Assessment
- Account Health Review (analyze current relationship status, usage metrics, satisfaction scores, etc.)
- Stakeholder Mapping (identify decision makers, influencers, and champions across departments)
- Business Objectives Analysis (understand customer's strategic priorities and challenges)
- Competitive Landscape Assessment (evaluate threats and positioning opportunities)
Strategic Planning & Team Alignment
- Growth Opportunity Identification (uncover expansion, upsell, and cross-sell possibilities)
- Success Metrics Definition (establish mutual KPIs and measurement criteria)
- Sales Team Alignment (coordinate messaging, personas, and partner plays between AE & BDR)
- Resource & Timeline Planning (allocate team members and set milestone dates)
- Go-to-Market Strategy Review (align with executives and key internal stakeholders)
Execution & Outreach
- Multi-Channel Outreach Campaign (deploy personalized emails, calls, LinkedIn, and events)
- Content & Resource Deployment (share videos, case studies, and marketing materials)
- Account Penetration Activities (secure meetings across all organizational levels)
Set Your Execution Criteria
Execution Criteria enables you to evaluate whether or not specific parts of your account planning Playbook are being executed on.
➡ Get detailed instructions for setting up and using Execution Criteria.
Add Resources to Your Playbook
You can store content—like templates for outreach, competitive battle cards, ROI calculators, etc.—in Accord’s Resource Library (CMS) and embed each resource into Playbook steps. The resources will populate all Accords created from your Account Planning Playbook so your reps will have access to the right resources at every step of their account plan.
➡ Get all the details on using Accord’s Resource Library.
Approve & Start Using Your Playbook
Once your Playbook has been architected and tested, it's important to approve your Playbook.
Approving a Playbook will:
- Attach your personal "stamp of approval" to the Playbook
- Prevent non-admins in your Accord workspace from making changes to the Playbook
- Signal to your team that the Playbook is ready for use
How to approve your Playbook:
- Within your Playbook, select the "⋮" button on the top-right hand corner of the Accord screen
- Select Approve Playbook, and confirm your approval in the confirmation window that appears
Once approved, your team can start using this Playbook to create Accords.
To do so, they need to navigate to the Account Planning Playbook and click the Create Accord from Playbook button. They’ll be prompted to connect the Accord to an Account that already exists in Salesforce.
Alternatively, they can create an Accord first and then select the Account Planning Playbook as part of the setup process.