Effective Ways of Funding Your ABM Strategy

Targeted Account Strategy

Article | February 10, 2022

Account-based marketing has gained momentum incredibly in the B2B industry. ABM promises a higher conversion rate than any other marketing strategy. It is the best personal approach to B2B marketing. If you are new to ABM, here is a little introduction to the strategy. ABM is creating a funnel of your clients and filtering the ones who have higher chances of conversion. Once you have the required data, your sales and marketing team can collaborate to create marketing campaigns for these exclusive clients. This strategy can overcome many challenges faced by the marketing and sales team. Generally, the challenges faced by your businesses can be to Drive retention with the key accounts Deliver relevant content to exclusive customers Boost conversion percentage with the clients most likely to convert Build a strategy for a personalized marketing approach Once you know what ABM is and implement it correctly, your business can easily overcome these challenges. Thus, we have provided some insights on how to overcome hurdles and excel in your ABM campaign. How to Excel in Your ABM Campaign According to B2B data-driven companies, personalization is the biggest challenge to succeed in ABM. Nowadays, B2B clients demand personalization like B2C clients. Now, this is a difficult task as business clients have access to business profiles. Thus, the sales and marketing teams have to develop unique ideas and make extra efforts to personalize campaigns. So basically, this means utilizing the available data in the best way possible. But sometimes, that takes up a massive investment in terms of time and resources. Abhi Yadav, Founder & CTO of Zylotech, says, “Drawing intelligence from data is like pushing a boulder uphill. In most cases, it takes a team of data engineers & scientists an enormous amount of time that comes with a hefty price tag.” So how do you minimize efforts and still excel in your ABM campaign strategy? Well, we have six lessons that organizations have learned while implementing ABM in their marketing strategy. Some of these lessons are answers to why a particular strategy failed. Put Yourself in Your Customer’s Shoes If you have limited access to personal data but have plenty of professional data, put it to the correct use. Put yourself in your customer’s shoes and look at the challenges they are facing at present. You can also think about their future problems and provide solutions to avoid them. Once you think like your customers, strategies and solutions become a simple task. For example, if your targeted client is the MD or CFO of a healthcare sector. Determine how the pandemic has impacted their revenues or how they need to manage personal and government financing in these challenging times. Also, you can provide visionary solutions about future implementations for the healthcare sector. Flip the Funnel The traditional funnel of awareness, interest, consideration, and purchase needs to change. The implementation may work even today, but the conversion process takes time. Thus, it’s time to flip the funnel. Flipping the funnel is the new strategy that is uprooting the traditional funnel. This method implies putting targeted organizations on the top of the funnel and then broadening it. First, it means to target the people of the organizations, then ways to connect them, and then the broadest part is to provide them with appropriate solutions. This funnel strategy has proved to work wonders in the ABM strategy. Personify is the leading constituent management and engagement (CME) platform. Their challenge was to create a funnel for better insights into their target market. Their solution was to partner with product marketing and sales for an ideal customer profile (ICP). Thus the top of the funnel was sorted. Then they researched and set up personalized digital ad campaigns and sales strategies. Thus, these creative campaigns increased their brand awareness, engagement, and conversions. They increased their on-site visitors by 39 times by implementing this strategy. Make the Best Use of Technology There are a plethora of tools available to strategize and implement ABM. But organizations do not make full use of these tools, leading to wastage of time, resources, and resources. Survey the market and know there are tools developed to optimize ABM strategy and keep track of account-based metrics. Implement these tools, and you will notice that your work gets executed faster and in an intelligent way. P.S. Human-assisted AI technologies help organizations to build compelling campaigns and optimize revenue operations. Streamline Your Processes Sometimes organizations do not realize that ABM requires streamlining processes with the regular ones. ABM strategies require experimentation. You have to select the strategy that suits you and your organization in the best way. Thus, ensure that your teams do not get overwhelmed by the process. Thus, define roles, responsibilities, and the entire execution plan when the target accounts are shortlisted. VersionOne, a cloud-based agile application life-cycle management (ALM) software provider, simplified the process by implementing data-driven approaches. Thus, VersionOne gave both teams access to monitor the ABM strategy and the success of the targeted accounts. Thus both the teams worked in collaboration and focused on segmentation. This helped in building a proper pipeline between the sales and marketing teams. This doubled VersionOne’s sales by streamlining the processes between the sales and marketing teams. Focus On Retention ABM is not only targeting exclusive clients and converting them. But you have to track and retain them. Many a time clients convert and the organization forgets to follow up. Thus, it creates a void for current and future clients, as the success rate is incredibly defined by retention. For example, small gestures like regular surveys, emails regarding workflow, and more can play an essential role for the clients to know that you care. Do Not Refrain from Outsourcing Outsourcing is a great way to ease out tasks and get a filtered list of high-value clients. Also, companies that specialize in data-driven technologies can provide you with more relevant information about the clients than your in-house team. So, avail services from experienced companies and industry leaders in providing you with the best list of relevant clients. These professional organizations know the pain-point of the clients, which helps you in planning your ABM strategy. That’s All Folks We hope we have provided you with solutions to the hurdles that you face while strategizing ABM. Remember, ABM strategy cannot be mastered overnight. So set goals, implement ABM, learn from the results and repeat- it is that simple! Frequently Asked Questions Which is the best way to succeed in ABM? The key idea is to focus on the personalization and retention of the clients. Your ABM strategy is likely to succeed if you provide personalized solutions to your exclusive clients. Success in your ABM strategy depends on your team, your account-based marketing campaigns, and the level of experimentation you do. Is it okay to outsource for account-based marketing? If your organization does not want to invest the time, resources, and technology required for ABM, it is good to outsource it. These third-party organizations can help you provide you with a list of the best clients and their information. How important is ABM strategy? ABM is an essential strategy as it helps to shorten the sales process and increases the conversion rate. 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Targeted Account Strategy

Article | November 26, 2021

B2B markets are more competitive than ever. They’re crowded, commoditized, noisy, and everybody is trying to knock on the same doors. So how do you break through the cacophony? The key is to not wait and reach out to your accounts with everyone else but to reach them when they are still early in the buyer’s journey. And that’s where leveraging intent data comes in. With intent data, you can see who is showing interest in your company or your competitors before they respond to your marketing efforts through form fills for content downloads or event RSVPs. You can create orchestrated plays as soon as they are in-market when they are searching. So you can deliver fresh ideas based on knowledge and understanding of an account’s industry and unique business issues before everyone else.

Targeted Account Strategy

Article | July 5, 2022

Here’s a (somehow) well-kept secret about ABX: it can create immediate wins for your teams. When you and your teams start laser-focusing on the right prospects and customers — at the right time — it doesn’t take long for the wins to start piling up. Why? A winning ABX strategy will leverage an AI-powered customer data platform (CDP) that has an existing database of critical information such as: What your ideal customer profile (ICP) looks like Accounts you might not know about that are in-market and ready-to-buy The websites, keywords, and topics your buyers research most The signals your buyers give off when they’re ready to buy When you leverage this historical data, it’s like flipping on a spotlight on your most important accounts and everything they’re doing. Let’s look at why a CDP is so important for an ABX strategy and how you can switch your thinking from, “When will I start seeing ROI?” to “How will I capitalize on all of these opportunities?” How CDPs Bolster Your ABX Strategy Pursuing an ABX strategy means fine-tuning your revenue activities (marketing, sales, operations) to target very specific accounts. The critical data you need about those accounts comes from your CDP, which houses all of the interactions you have with your prospects and customers. That information includes: Web pages they visit Webinars they attend Content they download Calls they have with your sales team The CDP ingests all of that data and starts to learn what your typical buyer looks like, the patterns they follow, and what signals they give off when they’re ready to buy. Over time, and with enough data from your interactions, this information becomes very powerful and enables your teams to start honing their strategies. All of your revenue activities become more efficient because you’re reaching the right buyer at the right time. There’s a problem with traditional standalone CDPs, however. They can’t look backwards. They can only begin collecting data once implemented, and therefore take some time to start uncovering patterns and delivering results. But what if you could unlock the CDP-version of a flying DeLorean that empowers you travel into the past and unlock those missing puzzle pieces — without waiting for your CDP to ingest enough data? Win Fast with a CDP Full of Critical Data The key to unlocking fast wins for your ABX strategy is to utilize a CDP with historical first-party and third-party data. Your buyers have searched keywords related to your offerings, attended industry events, and read third-party review sites long before you implement a stand-alone CDP. Why should you have to wait for the platform to catch up and uncover those insights that are hiding in plain sight? 6sense’s embedded CDP grants you instant access to all of the historical data that our AI-powered platform has collected for years. Previously anonymous accounts that have been researching topics that match your offerings A detailed ICP based on real, historical data Insights into which of your prospects are actually in-market and ready-to-buy Clear evidence on which accounts and buyers should be prioritized We call uncovering this information lighting up the Dark Funnel™. When you shine a light on your Dark Funnel™ your teams can immediately start reaping the benefits. It won’t take months or even weeks to get your first wins — within days you can see a positive impact on your pipeline. Your sales team will get leaner and meaner. No need to spend hours trawling through LinkedIn to find the one uncovered gem of a prospect. As soon as you leverage an embedded CDP loaded with historical data, you’ll discover exactly who your next target should be. Your inside sales team can focus on personalizing outreach, not figuring out who to talk to. Your marketing team will begin improving their engagement numbers without increasing their spend. When a Director of Sales at “Ready-to-Buy Corporation” has been performing some under-the-radar research, the marketing team will receive an alert and can start targeting that person with ads that address their specific pain points. Software development company PTC is a good example. It has used 6sense to uncover more than 1,500 net new high-intent accounts that have generated $18 million in pipeline. “With 6sense, our team has driven outbound success by being empowered, motivated, and eager to strategically prospect to the right targets with relevant messaging,” says Brenda Souto, High Velocity Sales Manager at PTC. Conclusion Traditional standalone CDPs help you capture the interactions you have with your prospects and customers. All of this data is very useful to build a focused and efficient ABX strategy. But, a standalone CDP lacks historical data and trends — meaning it can take longer to see wins and ROI. An embedded CDP with a treasure trove of previous interactions, buying signals, and trend data can instantly prioritize your target accounts. Within days your teams will know much more about your buyers and how to target them with the right message at the right time.

Article | April 10, 2020

As COVID-19 became increasingly widespread in the U.S. last month, Senior Account-Based Marketing Manager Kristin Kolb had to quickly shift her department’s planned Q1 pilot. Originally, it had involved direct mail that the Matillion team was going to send to target audiences in their office. Kolb said they decided on an alternative digital approach, upping the ante with personalization efforts. “You don’t need the latest and greatest technology or idea to create a hypothesis and run a small test to see if it works,” Kolb said. Billtrust’s Director of Revenue Marketing Deirdre Mills also champions personalization. While she believes that ABM is more of an art than a science, she ties relevant prospect information into program data, keeping company initiatives in mind.