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The problem isn't the data itself; it's that the data is telling different stories across different channels, or worse, it's telling a story that's already out of date. This breakdown happens in two critical ways: context decay and context fragmentation. Your multi-channel strategy feels disjointed to the buyer because, without a central nervous system, it is. The solution is a strategic approach called context engineering: building dynamic systems to orchestrate your data, ensure narrative consistency, and resolve conflicts automatically. Let's break down the problems and how to solve them.
Problem 1. Context decay: your data has an expiration date.
◆ The point
The information you use to trigger outreach becomes stale faster than your team can act on it.
◆ The detail
Context decay happens when there's a lag between a market event and your messaging. By the time your enrichment tool captures a signal and you launch a sequence, the prospect's reality may have already changed. This leads to irrelevant and sometimes embarrassing outreach.
◆ Real-life example
Your system flags that Innovatecorp just raised a $50M Series B. Your SDRs, following the playbook, launch a sequence congratulating them and pitching a solution to help “scale their growing team”. But two weeks later, before your third email goes out, Innovatecorp announces a pivot and strategic layoffs. Your message about hiring lands with a thud, making your brand look completely out of touch.
◆ The solutions
To combat decay, you need to validate context in real-time.
Dynamic context validation. Build workflows that constantly monitor account data. If a contradictory signal appears (like layoff news after funding), the system should automatically pause the outreach sequence until a human can review it.
Runtime context injection. Before any email or message is actually sent, run a final, instantaneous check. Does the stored context (the funding) still match the current market reality? If not, abort the message or dynamically update it with the fresher signal.
Problem 2. Context fragmentation: your channels aren't talking.
◆ The point
Each of your outreach channels is operating in a silo, creating a confusing and disjointed experience for the buyer.
◆ The detail
Your ad platform, email sequencer, and Linkedin automation tool are all pulling from different data sources. While each touch point might be accurate on its own, together they paint a fragmented picture of why you're reaching out.
◆ Real-life example
A Head of engineering at a target account sees your LinkedIn ad targeting her company's recent funding announcement. The next day, she gets an email from your BDR referencing a technical blog post she engaged with. A few days later, a retargeting ad follows her around the web about a different product feature. To your team, it's a “multi-channel touch”. To the buyer, it's just noise from a company that doesn't seem to have its story straight.
◆ The solutions
To fix fragmentation, you must create a unified narrative spine.
Cross-channel context sync. Establish a single source of truth for all customer context. Whether it's your CRM or a tool like Attio, every platform should read from and write to this central hub. When one signal is updated, it automatically propagates across all channels.
Context prioritization engines. When you have multiple valid signals for an account (e.g., they just hired a new VP, launched a product, and got funding), don't message them about all three at once. Use a system, potentially with AI-powered tools like Clay, to score and rank these signals, leading with the strongest narrative while keeping the others in a queue.
The way forward: start engineering your context.
Implementing this doesn't require ripping out your entire tech stack. It's about orchestrating your existing tools — like Clay for data enrichment, n8n for workflow automation, and Attio for unified data management — in a smarter way.
The impact is immediate and compounding. Teams that engineer their context see:
- Higher pipeline quality because prospects feel understood, not mass-targeted.
- Increased team efficiency with less time wasted on manual data cleanup.
- A better buyer experience that feels consistent and relevant at every touch point.
Start small. Audit your GTM motion to see where context breaks down most often. Pick one problem — decay or fragmentation — and build a simple, automated workflow to fix it. The teams that master this will have a significant advantage as they build more meaningful conversations and, ultimately, a healthier pipeline.
