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glossary

ICP

Ideal Customer Profile: the description of the account that gets the most value from your product fastest, used to focus targeting, messaging, and qualification.

By The Marketinque TeamReviewed June 2026

An ICP describes the company, not the person: size, industry, stack, growth stage, and above all the live problem that makes your product the obvious answer. Personas describe the people inside that account; the ICP decides whether the account is worth pursuing at all.

It is the cheapest lever in demand generation because it multiplies everything else. A sharp ICP makes channel choices obvious, makes copy specific enough to convert, and gives MQL scoring an honest definition of fit. A vague one quietly taxes every campaign that follows.

Write it from evidence, not aspiration: your fastest-closing, best-retaining customers already define it. The strategy guide starts there, and the demand gen planner turns an ICP and a revenue goal into a working plan.

Sources

  1. April Dunford, Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning (2019)
  2. Geoffrey A. Moore, Crossing the Chasm (1991)

Compiled by The Marketinque Team to our editorial standards.

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