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Hard Truths and Helpful Tips About Account-Based Marketing (Part 1)

June 10, 2022 | 296 views

Hard Truths and Helpful Tips
Are you thinking about ditching your revenue team’s creaky, ineffective sales approach and embracing ABM … but aren’t sure of what you need to know? You’ve found the right blog post.

Today, we’re providing some mind-blowing highlights from a recent webinar hosted by Kerry Cunningham, our Senior Principal of Product Marketing.

The webinar unpacked what matters most for launching an effective ABM program and offers actionable tips for sales and marketing teams. It’s well worth a watch. But if you’re short on time, here are some insights. Kerry started the webinar by sharing some hard truths about the state of selling:

Hard Truth #1: If They’re a Lead, You May Be Too Late

B2B sales used to be all about leads. Even now, many revenue teams lean heavily into the lead-based mindset. But the emergence of Account-Based Marketing brought many revelations to revenue teams, including that account opportunities are far more important than individual leads.

When you turn your (obsessive) attention from solo buyers and instead examine the full spectrum of interest or intent that an entire organization is expressing in your solution, you’re able to dramatically increase the quantity and quality of your sales intelligence.

Without this analysis, your team won’t be aware that buyers are conducting so much research on their own that by the time your team determines that they’re an early-stage “lead,” they may in fact be much farther down the buyer’s journey than expected.

Your team plays catchup after that, putting them at a competitive advantage.

Hard Truth #2: B2B Buyers Aren’t Even ‘Buyers’ Anymore

These days, buyers are no longer individuals, but rather teams of people. On average, buying teams often include 10 people, Kerry explained.

“Not everybody involved in the buying process is going to be sitting at the table at the end of that last meeting when they sign the deal,” Kerry said, “but all of those folks are doing some research.”

How big are these teams? From the webinar’s transcript:

Kerry: “For bigger deals, there may be as many as 20 or more people involved. And again, all of those folks are having interactions. In fact, Forrester Research did a study recently that showed that on average, post-pandemic, buyers are having 27 interactions each. So when you have 10 people or 20 people, and they’re having 20-something interactions each, that adds up.”

But there’s an upside to all this activity, Kerry said. As buyers conduct research, they leave behind digital “breadcrumb trails” or “footprints in the snow” across the internet.

Sellers armed with leading account engagement technologies can track, aggregate and de-anonymize these intent signals. ABM tools help them better understand the buyers’ research and buying processes.

Hard Truth #3: You Might Deal with Multiple Buying Teams

Depending on the scope of your solution’s capabilities, your sellers may contend with more than one buying team.

Here’s an example: Let’s say a company is looking for a solution to handle the needs of many departments or divisions. Each division may task its own buyer or buying team to conduct its own research to find solutions that effectively solves its own business problems.

If your solution can serve the needs of multiple divisions, your revenue team is in a good position, especially if your team can proactively identify the divisions’ unique needs. (Account engagement platforms do a great job of this.)

However, don’t assume that your solution can be everything to every division, Kerry warned.

Kerry: “If you sell multiple solutions — say you’re a big tech company and you have three, four, five solutions — you may be selling to multiple buying centers. But those buying centers may not all be great prospects for your solution. So take into account the fact that some of the buying centers inside those specific accounts may or may not be good prospects for you.”

Hard Truth #4: Buyers Think They Know Everything About Your Solution (But Actually Don’t)

Many buyers believe they can get all the information they need about your solution (and your competitors) exclusively through online research, Kerry said. This is super-convenient for buyers, but sellers can’t fully control the narrative. That leads to big problems.

Kerry: “Not all the information that they get is going to be accurate. It certainly may not be how you’d like to present yourself. So one of the things that’s really important is you have to understand how your buyers are finding out about you.”

This requires identifying other likely sources of information — such as content from competitors or unreliable analysts — and proactively engaging buyers with data and talking points that counter this misinformation.

Conclusion

Pivoting to an account-based approach isn’t always easy, especially for revenue teams that are entrenched in a older sales approaches. But making the change to ABM can revolutionize your business, Kerry said.

“Within the first year, 6sense clients who take all of these new techniques on board are able to produce substantially better results, bigger deal sizes, better win rates, and even shorter sales cycles,” Kerry said. “This is really the way B2B ought to be done.”

We’ve covered a few hard truths in this post, but come back tomorrow for Part 2 of this series. We’ll provide some helpful and actionable ABM tips then.

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2022 Total Economic Impact Study Reveals A Potential 454% ROI with 6sense Revenue AI

Article | June 6, 2022

6sense, the leading platform for predictable B2B revenue growth, today announces the results of the commissioned Total Economic Impact (TEI™) study conducted by Forrester Consulting examining the potential return on investment (ROI) by deploying the 6sense Revenue AI solution. The TEI study shows organizations using 6sense Revenue AI can achieve an ROI of 454% over three years, recouping their investment in less than six months with ROI increasing steadily thereafter. These results align with 6sense’s own analysis of customer data which indicates a significant increase in revenue growth obtained within the first two quarters of prioritizing 6sense Qualified Accounts (6QA) which are prospects in-market to buy a solution and represent an ideal fit. “As sales and marketing teams face increasing challenges to predictably grow pipeline and revenue while optimizing resources, our customers rely on 6sense as their unique competitive advantage to help them align on targets, maximize efforts, and significantly scale growth,” said Jason Zintak, CEO of 6sense. “We believe Forrester’s findings confirm that applying AI-driven insights to prioritize and target the right accounts at the right time with 6sense Revenue AI increases revenue and drives efficiencies across sales and marketing.” According to the study participants, before using 6sense Revenue AI their organizations’ traditional marketing and sales efforts had languished while costly time and resource investments no longer provided results. Frustrated revenue teams were ineffective, often using point solutions requiring significant manual effort while delivering little value. They selected 6sense to create pipeline more efficiently and predictably. Leveraging 6sense Revenue AI to capture buying signals and target the right accounts at the right time, the TEI study’s composite customer experienced the following benefits: Increased sales revenues: Interviewees reported that 6sense identified 6QA opportunities were more likely to close and had higher average contract values. By increasingly focusing on prioritized accounts, revenue teams delivered significant gains in profits for their organizations. 2X increases in average contract value 4X increases in win rate 31% increases in opportunity volume Decreased costs: Interviewees cited using 6sense to market and sell more efficiently and effectively. Acting on insights provided by 6sense unlocks significant resource optimization gains, including: 40% reduction in aggregate costs to qualify opportunities 40% reduction in effort to close opportunities 20-40% reduction in time to close deals Study participants reported a wide range of optimization and cost reduction benefits using 6sense Revenue AI including sales productivity gains from enhanced insights and better prioritization, tech stack consolidation, improved conversion rates across the buyer’s journey, reduced customer acquisition costs and optimized marketing spend. One interviewee indicated their customer acquisition costs dropped by nearly 50% within two years of implementing 6sense. “6sense Revenue AI is the first and only platform to apply the power of data, machine learning, and automation across the entire buyers’ journey to provide a better customer experience and produce the kind of pipeline that converts to revenue. This means the entire revenue team makes insight-driven decisions, prioritizes time and resources more effectively, and realizes better outcomes,” said Amar Doshi, SVP of Product and UX at 6sense. “Our customers repeatedly claim results similar to those that participated in the TEI Study.” To develop the study, Forrester interviewed nine 6sense customers, identifying the benefits, risks, and outcomes they experienced while using the company’s product experience platform. Forrester’s (TEI) consulting practice develops business value justification analysis to help organizations understand the financial impact of a technology investment. The TEI methodology has been used for over 20 years by technology organizations. It consists of four components to evaluate investment value: cost, benefits, flexibility, and risk.

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ABM ACCOUNTS

How 6sense’s Embedded CDP Creates Immediate Wins

Article | March 9, 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.

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Five Things That Can Make a Difference to ABM in EMEA

Article | July 14, 2021

The shift in buyer behavior has increased the opportunities for digital ABM. Organizations implementing ABM are seeing significant success. But what does the situation in the EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) market look like? ABM is still not well understood in EMEA. Two out of every three ABM programs are not showing optimal performance (Heinz ABM Research). However, things might not be as bleak as they seem. Talking about the 2021 State of ABM in Europe report by Terminus, Albany Vincent, Senior Research Manager at Vanson Bourse said, “While we were not shocked to see the US to be moderately ahead of Europe in their ABM maturity, we were surprised to see how much more eager European companies were to adopt these practices and their American counterparts. It appears to be a very exciting time to be a marketer- especially in Europe." Europe has stringent data laws, so the account-based approach could be the only way for sustainable growth for organizations based in EMEA. Do You Know Enough About ABM Execution? Taking into account the ever-evolving account-based approach, here are five things you should know about ABM and how to implement it for optimal performance: A Curated Account List Is the Secret Ingredient Your target account list should be the result of a conversation between your sales and marketing teams using as much high-quality data as possible. Start off by implementing the program on a small number of accounts and analyze your ROI. Then, periodically revaluate your team performance, tools, skills, and messaging to clear the path for ABM success. Your Sales and Marketing Teams Should Share Their Pizzas Sales and marketing synchronization is the most basic requirement of ABM. The marketing team can enable sales with target accounts’ interests and behavior data. The sales team, on the other hand, can give the marketing team insights into key members of the target account buying group. According to research by ZoomInfo, when the sales and marketing teams are aligned, organizations have a 36% higher customer retention rate and a 67% improved chance of converting leads. Depending Only on MQLs Will Not Get You Far The TechTarget 2021 Media Consumption Survey highlighted that most buying teams have an average of five people, but can also be more than ten. Understanding the intent of the individuals from the buyer group and offering them value through every sales and marketing interaction is crucial to the success of your ABM strategy. Depending on only MQLs can limit the potential of your ABM. Only Strategic Content Brings in the Results You Want Your target accounts are flooded with content every day. To stand out in the crowd and appeal to the individuals in the buying group, you need to align your content with their customer personas. The content should address their pain points and needs. It should be crafted based on an account’s maturity, challenges, and technical abilities. ABM Isn’t Your Regular Marketing Strategy ABM is a strategic approach where the marketing and sales teams share their insights through the account interactions of everyone in an account. Then they collectively reach out to the whole buying team rather than targeting just a few individuals. ABM takes a detailed look at the target account and aligns your business with your prospects’ needs and pain points, and this easily surpasses a regular marketing strategy. Circling Back ABM in EMEA is still evolving. Therefore, organizations need to make special efforts to implement ABM effectively, keeping the target accounts in focus and understanding the attributes of ABM in detail to get the most out of it.

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CORE ABM

Buying Group Marketing: Another Evolution of ABM

Article | May 23, 2022

B2B marketers use account-based marketing (ABM) to generate business because it allows them to drive focused account-level interactions. These interactions are a result of relevant and customized messaging. Today, the messaging focuses on not just one decision-maker but a group within the target account that green lights a buying decision. This natural evolution in ABM implementation is called buying group marketing (BGM). It isn’t a new concept but keeps evolving. B2B marketers are religiously implementing BGM in their ABM strategy to get a competitive edge and to keep up with the changing trends in the ABM industry. Carefully created buyer personas are used to create hyper-personalized campaigns for buying group members. In this sense, BGM is a person-centric marketing approach, differentiating it from an account-based marketing approach. While talking about buying group marketing, Dmitri Lisitski, CEO and Co-Founder, Influ2, a B2B targeted advertising solutions provider, said, "Buying Group Marketing will empower B2B marketers to achieve greater precision by extending this approach more holistically across their programs." How Does BGM Drive Revenue? Revenue factors into every effort that aims to increase sales numbers, retain customers, and engage prospective customers. Let us look into how BGM drives revenue in the B2B domain. Closing the Gap Between Sales and Marketing Organizations struggle to bring sales and marketing teams together. They max out their budgets to make it happen, but more often than not, they do not get the expected results. Additionally, their marketing automation platform doesn’t make the connection between the multiple leads coming from the same account. This lack of insight can affect the performance of the entire demand management process, such as sales, revenue development, and customer organization. Buying behaviors are constantly shifting. It is crucial to use a fresh approach that enables the teams to connect directly with the target accounts’ decision-makers, offering them just what they need through effective campaigns and driving revenue is crucial. In the buying group framework, marketing and sales align their goals and operations, share important insights on buyer personas, orchestrate messaging for campaigns, and collate data from platforms such as CRM and sales engagement tools to successfully find common ground for approaching a buying group. They are no longer stuck on one side of the MQL wall but are involved in every stage of the conversion process. As a result, they guide specific buying group members to make a buying decision and generate revenue. Putting Buyer Experience on Top In a Forrester survey, 94% of respondents said they sold to buying groups that had three or more individuals, while 38% said that they sold to groups of 10 or more. Purchase decisions in large enterprises are never restricted to one individual. The bigger the purchase decision, the bigger the buying committee. The bigger the buying committee, the larger the pool of buyer personas that need targeting. For example, if the HR department of a growing organization realizes that it needs a new human capital resource management system (HCRM) to manage its HR-related processes, then a buying group is created to choose a new system. When this group goes to the market to find a solution, it becomes a potential lead for HCRM providers, and the lead is called a demand unit. Targeting this demand unit with not just the HCRM but also a travel and expense solution (T & E) is possible with BGM. In BGM: Every step in the buyer’s journey is based on buyer personas and presents value to the buying group. Every demand management process focuses on the buying group. Through this approach, multiple types of selling opportunities can be explored. All this effort appeals to different buying group members in different ways and will push them to get in touch with the sales team and make a purchase decision. Offering Solutions to Pain Points Information designed precisely to complete the purchase should be provided to every member of the buying group committee. Interestingly, before making a purchase decision, members of the buying group will explore the content of different solution providers. According to a recent study by Dimensional Research, 90% of buyers thought that positive online reviews of a product or service influenced their buying decision. This is just one type of information that the buying group members will consume before they make a buying decision. With the help of real-time intent targeting or cognitive product targeting, it is easier to understand the customer’s intent through channels like websites, apps, and email. The terms searched, specific or broad, can point to the needs and requirements of a member of the committee. Once the intent is clear, buyer personas can be segmented and targeted with prescriptive content that talks about solutions to their pain points and how the expected results are achieved. For example, if a C-level buying committee member displays a high level of intent activity, then it is highly likely that he or she is looking to make a strategic investment. Such an opportunity will be ready for sales conversion in a couple of months. How Should You Implement BGM on Sales Funnel? We have already established the importance of buying group engagement in driving leads through the sales funnel. When sales and marketing teams share insights, marketing becomes effective and tangible. Now, let us take a look at BGM implementation in the sales funnel: Top of the Funnel While targeting a buying group at the top of the funnel, the focus should be on creating awareness and understanding the demand of the target account. Social media ads and relevant landing pages that act as lead magnets can help achieve this goal. Middle of the Funnel For buying groups in the middle of the funnel, engaging and educating the groups is imperative. Posting relevant content on social media handles can foster interaction with the members. LinkedIn messages from sales development representatives with ad and landing page support are effective. Bottom of the Funnel Conversations that lead to conversion start when the buying group is at the bottom of the funnel. In this stage, the account executives present members with compelling content that addresses their pain points and influences them enough to make a purchase decision. While executing BGM, B2B marketers should begin by understanding the business needs of the target account and create a comprehensive marketing strategy to address these needs. Orchestrating a holistic experience for the buying committee through high-quality, relevant content is the next step. Achieving a strategic, operational and practical alignment with sales will ensure success and higher conversions. Amplitude Drives 5.6x ROI on Ad Spend with Influ2’s Help With Influ2’s person-based advertising, Amplitude, a digital optimization system provider, focused 100% on advertising to key decision-makers within its target accounts. Influ2 used engagement insights to create and execute personalized and attributable B2B marketing. The result was a 5.6x ROI on ad spend. Last Word ABM marketing has evolved with the help of buying group marketing. Implementing BGM with an account-based marketing strategy can create lasting relationships with target accounts, retain existing clients and bring new leads. FAQ What are the three important tenets of buying group marketing? The three important tenets of buying group marketing are understanding the needs of the target account, attaining sales and marketing alignment, and creating a holistic marketing strategy that addresses the pain points of the target account. How is buyer experience different than customer experience? Customer experience focuses on the existing customers in the pipeline, while buyer experience focuses on the prospective customers’ complete buyer journey. How can you engage top-of-the-funnel audiences in buying group marketing? You can engage top-of-the-funnel audiences through social media ads and relevant landing pages that display content relevant to the needs of the target account.

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2022 Total Economic Impact Study Reveals A Potential 454% ROI with 6sense Revenue AI

Article | June 6, 2022

6sense, the leading platform for predictable B2B revenue growth, today announces the results of the commissioned Total Economic Impact (TEI™) study conducted by Forrester Consulting examining the potential return on investment (ROI) by deploying the 6sense Revenue AI solution. The TEI study shows organizations using 6sense Revenue AI can achieve an ROI of 454% over three years, recouping their investment in less than six months with ROI increasing steadily thereafter. These results align with 6sense’s own analysis of customer data which indicates a significant increase in revenue growth obtained within the first two quarters of prioritizing 6sense Qualified Accounts (6QA) which are prospects in-market to buy a solution and represent an ideal fit. “As sales and marketing teams face increasing challenges to predictably grow pipeline and revenue while optimizing resources, our customers rely on 6sense as their unique competitive advantage to help them align on targets, maximize efforts, and significantly scale growth,” said Jason Zintak, CEO of 6sense. “We believe Forrester’s findings confirm that applying AI-driven insights to prioritize and target the right accounts at the right time with 6sense Revenue AI increases revenue and drives efficiencies across sales and marketing.” According to the study participants, before using 6sense Revenue AI their organizations’ traditional marketing and sales efforts had languished while costly time and resource investments no longer provided results. Frustrated revenue teams were ineffective, often using point solutions requiring significant manual effort while delivering little value. They selected 6sense to create pipeline more efficiently and predictably. Leveraging 6sense Revenue AI to capture buying signals and target the right accounts at the right time, the TEI study’s composite customer experienced the following benefits: Increased sales revenues: Interviewees reported that 6sense identified 6QA opportunities were more likely to close and had higher average contract values. By increasingly focusing on prioritized accounts, revenue teams delivered significant gains in profits for their organizations. 2X increases in average contract value 4X increases in win rate 31% increases in opportunity volume Decreased costs: Interviewees cited using 6sense to market and sell more efficiently and effectively. Acting on insights provided by 6sense unlocks significant resource optimization gains, including: 40% reduction in aggregate costs to qualify opportunities 40% reduction in effort to close opportunities 20-40% reduction in time to close deals Study participants reported a wide range of optimization and cost reduction benefits using 6sense Revenue AI including sales productivity gains from enhanced insights and better prioritization, tech stack consolidation, improved conversion rates across the buyer’s journey, reduced customer acquisition costs and optimized marketing spend. One interviewee indicated their customer acquisition costs dropped by nearly 50% within two years of implementing 6sense. “6sense Revenue AI is the first and only platform to apply the power of data, machine learning, and automation across the entire buyers’ journey to provide a better customer experience and produce the kind of pipeline that converts to revenue. This means the entire revenue team makes insight-driven decisions, prioritizes time and resources more effectively, and realizes better outcomes,” said Amar Doshi, SVP of Product and UX at 6sense. “Our customers repeatedly claim results similar to those that participated in the TEI Study.” To develop the study, Forrester interviewed nine 6sense customers, identifying the benefits, risks, and outcomes they experienced while using the company’s product experience platform. Forrester’s (TEI) consulting practice develops business value justification analysis to help organizations understand the financial impact of a technology investment. The TEI methodology has been used for over 20 years by technology organizations. It consists of four components to evaluate investment value: cost, benefits, flexibility, and risk.

Read More
ABM ACCOUNTS

3 Effective ABM Tactics for B2B Marketers

Article | March 9, 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.

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ABM ACCOUNTS

5 Steps for Running Successful ABM Campaigns

Article | July 14, 2021

The shift in buyer behavior has increased the opportunities for digital ABM. Organizations implementing ABM are seeing significant success. But what does the situation in the EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) market look like? ABM is still not well understood in EMEA. Two out of every three ABM programs are not showing optimal performance (Heinz ABM Research). However, things might not be as bleak as they seem. Talking about the 2021 State of ABM in Europe report by Terminus, Albany Vincent, Senior Research Manager at Vanson Bourse said, “While we were not shocked to see the US to be moderately ahead of Europe in their ABM maturity, we were surprised to see how much more eager European companies were to adopt these practices and their American counterparts. It appears to be a very exciting time to be a marketer- especially in Europe." Europe has stringent data laws, so the account-based approach could be the only way for sustainable growth for organizations based in EMEA. Do You Know Enough About ABM Execution? Taking into account the ever-evolving account-based approach, here are five things you should know about ABM and how to implement it for optimal performance: A Curated Account List Is the Secret Ingredient Your target account list should be the result of a conversation between your sales and marketing teams using as much high-quality data as possible. Start off by implementing the program on a small number of accounts and analyze your ROI. Then, periodically revaluate your team performance, tools, skills, and messaging to clear the path for ABM success. Your Sales and Marketing Teams Should Share Their Pizzas Sales and marketing synchronization is the most basic requirement of ABM. The marketing team can enable sales with target accounts’ interests and behavior data. The sales team, on the other hand, can give the marketing team insights into key members of the target account buying group. According to research by ZoomInfo, when the sales and marketing teams are aligned, organizations have a 36% higher customer retention rate and a 67% improved chance of converting leads. Depending Only on MQLs Will Not Get You Far The TechTarget 2021 Media Consumption Survey highlighted that most buying teams have an average of five people, but can also be more than ten. Understanding the intent of the individuals from the buyer group and offering them value through every sales and marketing interaction is crucial to the success of your ABM strategy. Depending on only MQLs can limit the potential of your ABM. Only Strategic Content Brings in the Results You Want Your target accounts are flooded with content every day. To stand out in the crowd and appeal to the individuals in the buying group, you need to align your content with their customer personas. The content should address their pain points and needs. It should be crafted based on an account’s maturity, challenges, and technical abilities. ABM Isn’t Your Regular Marketing Strategy ABM is a strategic approach where the marketing and sales teams share their insights through the account interactions of everyone in an account. Then they collectively reach out to the whole buying team rather than targeting just a few individuals. ABM takes a detailed look at the target account and aligns your business with your prospects’ needs and pain points, and this easily surpasses a regular marketing strategy. Circling Back ABM in EMEA is still evolving. Therefore, organizations need to make special efforts to implement ABM effectively, keeping the target accounts in focus and understanding the attributes of ABM in detail to get the most out of it.

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CORE ABM

Buying Group Marketing: Another Evolution of ABM

Article | May 23, 2022

B2B marketers use account-based marketing (ABM) to generate business because it allows them to drive focused account-level interactions. These interactions are a result of relevant and customized messaging. Today, the messaging focuses on not just one decision-maker but a group within the target account that green lights a buying decision. This natural evolution in ABM implementation is called buying group marketing (BGM). It isn’t a new concept but keeps evolving. B2B marketers are religiously implementing BGM in their ABM strategy to get a competitive edge and to keep up with the changing trends in the ABM industry. Carefully created buyer personas are used to create hyper-personalized campaigns for buying group members. In this sense, BGM is a person-centric marketing approach, differentiating it from an account-based marketing approach. While talking about buying group marketing, Dmitri Lisitski, CEO and Co-Founder, Influ2, a B2B targeted advertising solutions provider, said, "Buying Group Marketing will empower B2B marketers to achieve greater precision by extending this approach more holistically across their programs." How Does BGM Drive Revenue? Revenue factors into every effort that aims to increase sales numbers, retain customers, and engage prospective customers. Let us look into how BGM drives revenue in the B2B domain. Closing the Gap Between Sales and Marketing Organizations struggle to bring sales and marketing teams together. They max out their budgets to make it happen, but more often than not, they do not get the expected results. Additionally, their marketing automation platform doesn’t make the connection between the multiple leads coming from the same account. This lack of insight can affect the performance of the entire demand management process, such as sales, revenue development, and customer organization. Buying behaviors are constantly shifting. It is crucial to use a fresh approach that enables the teams to connect directly with the target accounts’ decision-makers, offering them just what they need through effective campaigns and driving revenue is crucial. In the buying group framework, marketing and sales align their goals and operations, share important insights on buyer personas, orchestrate messaging for campaigns, and collate data from platforms such as CRM and sales engagement tools to successfully find common ground for approaching a buying group. They are no longer stuck on one side of the MQL wall but are involved in every stage of the conversion process. As a result, they guide specific buying group members to make a buying decision and generate revenue. Putting Buyer Experience on Top In a Forrester survey, 94% of respondents said they sold to buying groups that had three or more individuals, while 38% said that they sold to groups of 10 or more. Purchase decisions in large enterprises are never restricted to one individual. The bigger the purchase decision, the bigger the buying committee. The bigger the buying committee, the larger the pool of buyer personas that need targeting. For example, if the HR department of a growing organization realizes that it needs a new human capital resource management system (HCRM) to manage its HR-related processes, then a buying group is created to choose a new system. When this group goes to the market to find a solution, it becomes a potential lead for HCRM providers, and the lead is called a demand unit. Targeting this demand unit with not just the HCRM but also a travel and expense solution (T & E) is possible with BGM. In BGM: Every step in the buyer’s journey is based on buyer personas and presents value to the buying group. Every demand management process focuses on the buying group. Through this approach, multiple types of selling opportunities can be explored. All this effort appeals to different buying group members in different ways and will push them to get in touch with the sales team and make a purchase decision. Offering Solutions to Pain Points Information designed precisely to complete the purchase should be provided to every member of the buying group committee. Interestingly, before making a purchase decision, members of the buying group will explore the content of different solution providers. According to a recent study by Dimensional Research, 90% of buyers thought that positive online reviews of a product or service influenced their buying decision. This is just one type of information that the buying group members will consume before they make a buying decision. With the help of real-time intent targeting or cognitive product targeting, it is easier to understand the customer’s intent through channels like websites, apps, and email. The terms searched, specific or broad, can point to the needs and requirements of a member of the committee. Once the intent is clear, buyer personas can be segmented and targeted with prescriptive content that talks about solutions to their pain points and how the expected results are achieved. For example, if a C-level buying committee member displays a high level of intent activity, then it is highly likely that he or she is looking to make a strategic investment. Such an opportunity will be ready for sales conversion in a couple of months. How Should You Implement BGM on Sales Funnel? We have already established the importance of buying group engagement in driving leads through the sales funnel. When sales and marketing teams share insights, marketing becomes effective and tangible. Now, let us take a look at BGM implementation in the sales funnel: Top of the Funnel While targeting a buying group at the top of the funnel, the focus should be on creating awareness and understanding the demand of the target account. Social media ads and relevant landing pages that act as lead magnets can help achieve this goal. Middle of the Funnel For buying groups in the middle of the funnel, engaging and educating the groups is imperative. Posting relevant content on social media handles can foster interaction with the members. LinkedIn messages from sales development representatives with ad and landing page support are effective. Bottom of the Funnel Conversations that lead to conversion start when the buying group is at the bottom of the funnel. In this stage, the account executives present members with compelling content that addresses their pain points and influences them enough to make a purchase decision. While executing BGM, B2B marketers should begin by understanding the business needs of the target account and create a comprehensive marketing strategy to address these needs. Orchestrating a holistic experience for the buying committee through high-quality, relevant content is the next step. Achieving a strategic, operational and practical alignment with sales will ensure success and higher conversions. Amplitude Drives 5.6x ROI on Ad Spend with Influ2’s Help With Influ2’s person-based advertising, Amplitude, a digital optimization system provider, focused 100% on advertising to key decision-makers within its target accounts. Influ2 used engagement insights to create and execute personalized and attributable B2B marketing. The result was a 5.6x ROI on ad spend. Last Word ABM marketing has evolved with the help of buying group marketing. Implementing BGM with an account-based marketing strategy can create lasting relationships with target accounts, retain existing clients and bring new leads. FAQ What are the three important tenets of buying group marketing? The three important tenets of buying group marketing are understanding the needs of the target account, attaining sales and marketing alignment, and creating a holistic marketing strategy that addresses the pain points of the target account. How is buyer experience different than customer experience? Customer experience focuses on the existing customers in the pipeline, while buyer experience focuses on the prospective customers’ complete buyer journey. How can you engage top-of-the-funnel audiences in buying group marketing? You can engage top-of-the-funnel audiences through social media ads and relevant landing pages that display content relevant to the needs of the target account.

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RollWorks Presents the ABM Lounge at INBOUND 2022

RollWorks | August 12, 2022

RollWorks is bringing ABM to INBOUND! Today, the account-based marketing (ABM) platform and division of NextRoll celebrated its powerful partnership with HubSpot and announced its presence at HubSpot INBOUND® 22, September 6-9, 2022, in Boston. RollWorks has 16 inspiring sessions designed to help B2B teams ABMify their inbound strategies, as well as the first ever ABM Lounge. "We're excited to have such a strong presence at INBOUND this year, which reflects our market-leading end-to-end partnership with HubSpot. Our integration drives account-focused organizations' strategies by enabling teams of all sizes to identify high-fit, high-intent accounts and buyers, reach them efficiently, and measure impact — truly democratizing ABM and illustrating the power of ABM and inbound marketing," said Mike Stocker, VP of Partnerships at RollWorks. RollWorks ABM Lounge (Level 0, East Side of Boston Convention Center): Inspire your marketing programs, optimize your inbound, and accelerate your impact. Stop by 8:30am - 4:00pm ET to check out the sessions and for your chance to win $25K in RollWorks advertising media credits! Custom design a screen-printed t-shirt or tote bag of your choice, pick up one of our limited-edition ABM hoodies, and grab a coffee and snacks. Schedule a meeting with an ABM expert and learn how to get started with ABM and RollWorks or optimize your ABM program. ABM Lounge special events: Happy Hour: On Thursday, September 8th, from 5:30 - 7:00pm ET, come grab a custom Aperol Spritz or your drink of choice. RSVP for happy hour here. Customizable Donuts & Bottomless Espresso: On Friday, September 9th, from 8:00 - 9:00am ET, join us to celebrate our last few hours at INBOUND with customizable donuts and bottomless espresso drinks. RSVP for breakfast here. 2022 RollWorks + HubSpot Continued Product Innovation Throughout 2022, RollWorks has continued to deepen its commitment to adding more utility in its platform for HubSpot users. This summer, the company launched two new ABM tools: Journey Events for HubSpot®: delivers consolidated account-level visibility within the HubSpot interface to enable B2B organizations to understand what activities are working to drive accounts through the stages of the buying journey, and which activities need to be further optimized. Sales Insights for HubSpot: uses data science to provide a 360-degree view of accounts throughout the buying journey, helping B2B marketers and sales teams to eliminate the guesswork and create timelier and more efficient sales outreach. "RollWorks is a fantastic complement to HubSpot, combining best-in-class inbound marketing and account-based marketing capabilities to effectively grow B2B revenue," said Scott Brinker, VP of Platform Ecosystem at HubSpot. "RollWorks is a fantastic complement to HubSpot, combining best-in-class inbound marketing and account-based marketing capabilities to effectively grow B2B revenue," said Scott Brinker, VP of Platform Ecosystem at HubSpot. RollWorks + HubSpot Customer Success In April, the RollWorks ABM HubSpot App achieved a significant milestone for surpassing 500 installs (150% more than the nearest ABM competitor). Global organizations that leverage the combined power of RollWorks and HubSpot include: SnapFulfil: SnapFulfil leveraged RollWorks and HubSpot to launch and maintain a sales-aligned ABM program that generated high-value leads. Within 10 months, the Cloud Warehouse Management System (WMS) saw 27% of new website visits come from RollWorks and 4,000 new top-of-funnel leads with a 6% conversion to MQLs. "The prospects generated from all of our marketing activities get pulled into HubSpot automatically, where we then narrow our target list to sync with RollWorks. That automatic bi-directional syncing alone saves us a lot of time on manual input." - SnapFulfil Goverlan: Within 13 months, Goverlan identified 95% of closed/won deals were influenced by RollWorks and generated revenue 15x the initial investment cost—all with a nimble, two-person marketing team. "Things have changed since we started targeting accounts, as opposed to just contacts. We're generating 40-50 demo requests a week thanks to this happy marriage between our HubSpot inbound and RollWork ABM program." - Goverlan To learn more about how the market-leading combination of RollWorks and HubSpot drives even more value for your ABM programs, schedule a custom demo today. About RollWorks RollWorks, a division of NextRoll, offers ambitious B2B companies an account-based platform to align their marketing and sales teams and confidently grow revenue. Powered by proprietary data and machine learning, RollWorks' solutions address the needs of organizations large and small — from those with best-in-class ABM programs to those just beginning their exploration. By empowering teams to identify their target accounts and key buyers, reach those accounts across multiple channels, and measure program effectiveness in their system-of-record, RollWorks is an indispensable platform for marketers and sellers who believe that an account-based approach is just good business. To learn more visit www.rollworks.com.

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Crunchbase secures $50M to help customers build pipeline and grow revenue with its account-based prospecting platform

Crunchbase, Alignment Growth | July 21, 2022

Crunchbase, a prospecting platform powered by best-in-class proprietary data, today announced it has secured $50 million in connection with its Series D funding. Alignment Growth led the oversubscribed round, with participation by existing Crunchbase investors including OMERS Ventures, Mayfield Fund, and Emergence. Alex Iosilevich, Partner at Alignment Growth, will also join the Crunchbase board of directors. Crunchbase's account-based prospecting software enables prospectors—in sales, recruiting, business development, and finance—to find and engage with qualified accounts, while simultaneously creating awareness for companies that want to be discovered. Crunchbase attracts more than 75 million unique visitors annually and recently surpassed 60,000 paying customers with over half of the Fortune 500 and thousands of SMBs represented. "It's more important than ever for businesses to tap into account-based intelligence for their prospecting, whether they're selling, investing, or fundraising. With fast-changing market conditions, prospectors can't rely on spamming contact lists to hit quota. They need a targeted approach that starts with finding qualified accounts and ends with compelling outreach to the right decision-makers—that's exactly what our customers do on Crunchbase," said Jager McConnell, CEO of Crunchbase. "It's more important than ever for businesses to tap into account-based intelligence for their prospecting, whether they're selling, investing, or fundraising. With fast-changing market conditions, prospectors can't rely on spamming contact lists to hit quota. They need a targeted approach that starts with finding qualified accounts and ends with compelling outreach to the right decision-makers—that's exactly what our customers do on Crunchbase," said Jager McConnell, CEO of Crunchbase. The company accelerated its highly capital efficient product-led growth last year with the launch of a suite of all-new SaaS products. These drove a 5x year-over-year increase in new recurring revenue in Q1 2022, and total software ARR is on track to double by end of year. With this upward growth trend, efficient cash management and Series D funding, the company is on a path to profitability. Crunchbase's platform has evolved significantly since its last funding round. The company's software now offers features to guide prospectors throughout their workflow. Customers are reporting improvements in account identification, pipeline generation, email open rates and meeting booking volume. New product capabilities that power these results include: Account discovery: Find companies that meet your ideal customer profile with territory filters, AI-powered recommendations, similar company suggestions, CRM data in search, and 6 billion new data edits in the last year. Account qualification: Focus on growing companies that have buying power using new growth and contraction signals, layoffs and hiring filters, Chrome extension, and Salesforce integration. Account tracking: Stay up-to-date on changes at priority accounts with email alerts, saved searches and lists, as well as searchable user-generated notes and tags. Prospect engagement: Connect with the right leads at the right time directly on Crunchbase with newly added contact data, contact search, Outreach integration, Gmail integration, and auto-generated email templates. "The Crunchbase SaaS platform combines rich and proprietary company data with direct access to decision-makers within a single intuitive interface—at compelling price points—making it a powerful tool for driving ROI across a variety of use cases, from sales to recruiting and more. We expect that Crunchbase will continue to gain accelerated industry adoption and are excited to support the company's growth momentum alongside strong participation from the existing investor group," said Alex Iosilevich, Partner at Alignment Growth. Crunchbase plans to use funds from the Series D to accelerate product innovation and deepen relationships with dealmakers in sales, marketing, finance, recruiting, and executive leadership roles. Upcoming product improvements will include third-party integrations that embed Crunchbase more deeply in existing prospecting workflows, enhancements to actionable machine-learning powered recommendations, new data that delivers insights only available on Crunchbase, and reporting tools to quantify customers' ROI. Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC acted as exclusive financial adviser to Crunchbase in connection with the transaction. Crunchbase is actively hiring. Candidates can view the latest job openings at https://about.crunchbase.com/about-us/careers/. About Crunchbase Crunchbase is a prospecting platform powered by best-in-class proprietary data. It helps over 75 million dealmakers discover, qualify, track, and engage with the right opportunities so they can search less and close more. To learn more, visit about.crunchbase.com and follow Crunchbase on Twitter @crunchbase. About Alignment Growth Founded in 2021, Alignment Growth partners with category-leading companies in Consumer and Business Media, Entertainment, and Technology industry sectors. With its team's multi-decade track record of senior executive operating, strategy, and deal making experience at global Fortune 500 companies, Alignment Growth provides value-added capital solutions to help its portfolio companies achieve their growth ambitions. Additional details are available at alignmentgrowth.com.

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The changing face of brand building in B2B boardrooms

transmission | August 10, 2022

Despite historic skepticism from B2B boardrooms, brand building has been going through somewhat of a renaissance over the past few years. For all too long, the B2B marketing function was seen as a cost-center whose existence was to support sales in accelerating pipeline and maximizing ROI. Mentions of brand in the boardroom could be met with disinterest and to a certain extent, fear, driven by difficulties in measuring its impact on the bottom line. The effects of a negligent approach to B2B brand building were clear. In 2019, the Financial Times partnered with the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) – a professional institute for agencies and individuals working in the UK’s advertising, marketing, and communications industry – to publish the ‘Board-Brand Rift’ report revealing that over half of business leaders rated their knowledge of brand building as ‘average’ to ‘very poor’. But things are changing. In just a few short years, brand has made its way to the top of B2B marketing leaders’ priority lists. Our ‘State of B2B Brand Building 2022’ research report reveals that 71% of B2B marketing leaders acknowledge that boardroom views of brand building have changed significantly in the last 12 months – with over 60% now believing that brand marketing is a strategic business priority. B2B buyers want more from business: The marketplace has seen a huge shift in B2B buyer behavior driven, in part, by the COVID-19 pandemic. Concerns over public health, the environment, and job security contributed to a climate of fear and anxiety in which buyers looked to make more ethical purchase decisions – turning to business as a bastion of societal leadership. Two years on, B2B buyers are increasingly looking to engage with highly resonant and authentic brands. They want to know that the companies they buy from reflect their own values and whether they contribute to wider society, putting purpose above profit. "COVID-19 has accelerated the need for our brand to have a real and meaningful purpose; one that contributes more to the local community and improves lives. This is what our buyers now expect from us." - Survey response from a B2B marketing leader. B2B brands need a clear and defined purpose to stay competitive in today’s marketplace. Brand trust, transparency, and authenticity are all high on the list of customers’ brand selection criteria, and organizations need to respond to match. Thankfully, it seems like they are: Over one-third of those surveyed said they needed to reset their brand strategy and proposition to strengthen the emotional connection with their audience. Competition is at an all-time high: The pandemic, however, was not alone in shaping today’s B2B marketplace. A surge in mergers and acquisitions across B2B industries has intensified market competition, reducing the effectiveness of demand generation campaigns on revenue growth. As a result, B2B organizations have started taking a progressively long-term view of brand. Many are turning to brand awareness campaigns to build memory structures in the minds of prospective future buyers – reflecting Professor John Dawes’ 95:5 heuristic. "We need to keep our company in users’ minds. Creating memorable impressions and standing out from the crowd through our brand is more important than ever before." - Survey response from a B2B marketing leader. However, as brand continues to skyrocket in importance, so does the role of creativity in B2B brand building. Of the B2B marketing leaders we surveyed, 42% highlight the need to better define their brand to help differentiate themselves. Buyers today can be fairly confident that a range of companies can deliver what they require, leaving differentiation to brand rather than a product or service. And this is reflected in how our respondents agree that a shift away from the B2B ‘safe and steady’ approach enables more unique brand positioning and ultimately, improved standout in the hearts and minds of their audience. New approaches, old problems: Perhaps unsurprisingly, shifts in boardroom priorities aren’t without their challenges. While over half of our survey’s respondents said that brand building is equally as important as demand generation in achieving their marketing goals, 40% told us that only 5-20% of their annual marketing budget is allocated to brand building programs. This comes in stark contrast to Les Binet (Head of Effectiveness at adam&eve DDB) and Peter Field’s (a seasoned Marketing Consultant) seminal research piece stating that B2B brands should look to spend 60% of their budget on brand and 40% on demand for optimum effectiveness. For B2B brand marketers to allay boardroom concerns and win increased brand investment, they need to become more market-oriented and talk the language of finance. Providing a clear link between authentic, purpose-driven brand building initiatives, customer acquisition, and increased revenue growth – along with the ability to command higher prices, negotiate better supply chain contracts, and attract better employees – can help demonstrate the commercial value and competitive edge of a brand. Alternatively, B2B marketing leaders can look to relate brand investment to the challenges that keep their CFO awake at night. The B2B Institute’s Jon Lombardo recently spoke on Fergus O'Carroll’s ‘On Strategy’ podcast about the importance of the relationship between marketing and finance. In general, 20% of a company’s stock price is based on short-term cash flows, while the other 80% is based on the long-term. Lombardo argues if CMOs work with their CFO to pair this cash flow-centric view with a customer-centric marketing strategy, they can pave the way for a rebalancing of the marketing budget in favor of brand building initiatives – enabling greater investment in capturing the 80% of future buyers.

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RollWorks Presents the ABM Lounge at INBOUND 2022

RollWorks | August 12, 2022

RollWorks is bringing ABM to INBOUND! Today, the account-based marketing (ABM) platform and division of NextRoll celebrated its powerful partnership with HubSpot and announced its presence at HubSpot INBOUND® 22, September 6-9, 2022, in Boston. RollWorks has 16 inspiring sessions designed to help B2B teams ABMify their inbound strategies, as well as the first ever ABM Lounge. "We're excited to have such a strong presence at INBOUND this year, which reflects our market-leading end-to-end partnership with HubSpot. Our integration drives account-focused organizations' strategies by enabling teams of all sizes to identify high-fit, high-intent accounts and buyers, reach them efficiently, and measure impact — truly democratizing ABM and illustrating the power of ABM and inbound marketing," said Mike Stocker, VP of Partnerships at RollWorks. RollWorks ABM Lounge (Level 0, East Side of Boston Convention Center): Inspire your marketing programs, optimize your inbound, and accelerate your impact. Stop by 8:30am - 4:00pm ET to check out the sessions and for your chance to win $25K in RollWorks advertising media credits! Custom design a screen-printed t-shirt or tote bag of your choice, pick up one of our limited-edition ABM hoodies, and grab a coffee and snacks. Schedule a meeting with an ABM expert and learn how to get started with ABM and RollWorks or optimize your ABM program. ABM Lounge special events: Happy Hour: On Thursday, September 8th, from 5:30 - 7:00pm ET, come grab a custom Aperol Spritz or your drink of choice. RSVP for happy hour here. Customizable Donuts & Bottomless Espresso: On Friday, September 9th, from 8:00 - 9:00am ET, join us to celebrate our last few hours at INBOUND with customizable donuts and bottomless espresso drinks. RSVP for breakfast here. 2022 RollWorks + HubSpot Continued Product Innovation Throughout 2022, RollWorks has continued to deepen its commitment to adding more utility in its platform for HubSpot users. This summer, the company launched two new ABM tools: Journey Events for HubSpot®: delivers consolidated account-level visibility within the HubSpot interface to enable B2B organizations to understand what activities are working to drive accounts through the stages of the buying journey, and which activities need to be further optimized. Sales Insights for HubSpot: uses data science to provide a 360-degree view of accounts throughout the buying journey, helping B2B marketers and sales teams to eliminate the guesswork and create timelier and more efficient sales outreach. "RollWorks is a fantastic complement to HubSpot, combining best-in-class inbound marketing and account-based marketing capabilities to effectively grow B2B revenue," said Scott Brinker, VP of Platform Ecosystem at HubSpot. "RollWorks is a fantastic complement to HubSpot, combining best-in-class inbound marketing and account-based marketing capabilities to effectively grow B2B revenue," said Scott Brinker, VP of Platform Ecosystem at HubSpot. RollWorks + HubSpot Customer Success In April, the RollWorks ABM HubSpot App achieved a significant milestone for surpassing 500 installs (150% more than the nearest ABM competitor). Global organizations that leverage the combined power of RollWorks and HubSpot include: SnapFulfil: SnapFulfil leveraged RollWorks and HubSpot to launch and maintain a sales-aligned ABM program that generated high-value leads. Within 10 months, the Cloud Warehouse Management System (WMS) saw 27% of new website visits come from RollWorks and 4,000 new top-of-funnel leads with a 6% conversion to MQLs. "The prospects generated from all of our marketing activities get pulled into HubSpot automatically, where we then narrow our target list to sync with RollWorks. That automatic bi-directional syncing alone saves us a lot of time on manual input." - SnapFulfil Goverlan: Within 13 months, Goverlan identified 95% of closed/won deals were influenced by RollWorks and generated revenue 15x the initial investment cost—all with a nimble, two-person marketing team. "Things have changed since we started targeting accounts, as opposed to just contacts. We're generating 40-50 demo requests a week thanks to this happy marriage between our HubSpot inbound and RollWork ABM program." - Goverlan To learn more about how the market-leading combination of RollWorks and HubSpot drives even more value for your ABM programs, schedule a custom demo today. About RollWorks RollWorks, a division of NextRoll, offers ambitious B2B companies an account-based platform to align their marketing and sales teams and confidently grow revenue. Powered by proprietary data and machine learning, RollWorks' solutions address the needs of organizations large and small — from those with best-in-class ABM programs to those just beginning their exploration. By empowering teams to identify their target accounts and key buyers, reach those accounts across multiple channels, and measure program effectiveness in their system-of-record, RollWorks is an indispensable platform for marketers and sellers who believe that an account-based approach is just good business. To learn more visit www.rollworks.com.

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ABM ACCOUNTS

Crunchbase secures $50M to help customers build pipeline and grow revenue with its account-based prospecting platform

Crunchbase, Alignment Growth | July 21, 2022

Crunchbase, a prospecting platform powered by best-in-class proprietary data, today announced it has secured $50 million in connection with its Series D funding. Alignment Growth led the oversubscribed round, with participation by existing Crunchbase investors including OMERS Ventures, Mayfield Fund, and Emergence. Alex Iosilevich, Partner at Alignment Growth, will also join the Crunchbase board of directors. Crunchbase's account-based prospecting software enables prospectors—in sales, recruiting, business development, and finance—to find and engage with qualified accounts, while simultaneously creating awareness for companies that want to be discovered. Crunchbase attracts more than 75 million unique visitors annually and recently surpassed 60,000 paying customers with over half of the Fortune 500 and thousands of SMBs represented. "It's more important than ever for businesses to tap into account-based intelligence for their prospecting, whether they're selling, investing, or fundraising. With fast-changing market conditions, prospectors can't rely on spamming contact lists to hit quota. They need a targeted approach that starts with finding qualified accounts and ends with compelling outreach to the right decision-makers—that's exactly what our customers do on Crunchbase," said Jager McConnell, CEO of Crunchbase. "It's more important than ever for businesses to tap into account-based intelligence for their prospecting, whether they're selling, investing, or fundraising. With fast-changing market conditions, prospectors can't rely on spamming contact lists to hit quota. They need a targeted approach that starts with finding qualified accounts and ends with compelling outreach to the right decision-makers—that's exactly what our customers do on Crunchbase," said Jager McConnell, CEO of Crunchbase. The company accelerated its highly capital efficient product-led growth last year with the launch of a suite of all-new SaaS products. These drove a 5x year-over-year increase in new recurring revenue in Q1 2022, and total software ARR is on track to double by end of year. With this upward growth trend, efficient cash management and Series D funding, the company is on a path to profitability. Crunchbase's platform has evolved significantly since its last funding round. The company's software now offers features to guide prospectors throughout their workflow. Customers are reporting improvements in account identification, pipeline generation, email open rates and meeting booking volume. New product capabilities that power these results include: Account discovery: Find companies that meet your ideal customer profile with territory filters, AI-powered recommendations, similar company suggestions, CRM data in search, and 6 billion new data edits in the last year. Account qualification: Focus on growing companies that have buying power using new growth and contraction signals, layoffs and hiring filters, Chrome extension, and Salesforce integration. Account tracking: Stay up-to-date on changes at priority accounts with email alerts, saved searches and lists, as well as searchable user-generated notes and tags. Prospect engagement: Connect with the right leads at the right time directly on Crunchbase with newly added contact data, contact search, Outreach integration, Gmail integration, and auto-generated email templates. "The Crunchbase SaaS platform combines rich and proprietary company data with direct access to decision-makers within a single intuitive interface—at compelling price points—making it a powerful tool for driving ROI across a variety of use cases, from sales to recruiting and more. We expect that Crunchbase will continue to gain accelerated industry adoption and are excited to support the company's growth momentum alongside strong participation from the existing investor group," said Alex Iosilevich, Partner at Alignment Growth. Crunchbase plans to use funds from the Series D to accelerate product innovation and deepen relationships with dealmakers in sales, marketing, finance, recruiting, and executive leadership roles. Upcoming product improvements will include third-party integrations that embed Crunchbase more deeply in existing prospecting workflows, enhancements to actionable machine-learning powered recommendations, new data that delivers insights only available on Crunchbase, and reporting tools to quantify customers' ROI. Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC acted as exclusive financial adviser to Crunchbase in connection with the transaction. Crunchbase is actively hiring. Candidates can view the latest job openings at https://about.crunchbase.com/about-us/careers/. About Crunchbase Crunchbase is a prospecting platform powered by best-in-class proprietary data. It helps over 75 million dealmakers discover, qualify, track, and engage with the right opportunities so they can search less and close more. To learn more, visit about.crunchbase.com and follow Crunchbase on Twitter @crunchbase. About Alignment Growth Founded in 2021, Alignment Growth partners with category-leading companies in Consumer and Business Media, Entertainment, and Technology industry sectors. With its team's multi-decade track record of senior executive operating, strategy, and deal making experience at global Fortune 500 companies, Alignment Growth provides value-added capital solutions to help its portfolio companies achieve their growth ambitions. Additional details are available at alignmentgrowth.com.

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ACCOUNT BASED ADVERTISING,TARGETED ACCOUNT STRATEGY

The changing face of brand building in B2B boardrooms

transmission | August 10, 2022

Despite historic skepticism from B2B boardrooms, brand building has been going through somewhat of a renaissance over the past few years. For all too long, the B2B marketing function was seen as a cost-center whose existence was to support sales in accelerating pipeline and maximizing ROI. Mentions of brand in the boardroom could be met with disinterest and to a certain extent, fear, driven by difficulties in measuring its impact on the bottom line. The effects of a negligent approach to B2B brand building were clear. In 2019, the Financial Times partnered with the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) – a professional institute for agencies and individuals working in the UK’s advertising, marketing, and communications industry – to publish the ‘Board-Brand Rift’ report revealing that over half of business leaders rated their knowledge of brand building as ‘average’ to ‘very poor’. But things are changing. In just a few short years, brand has made its way to the top of B2B marketing leaders’ priority lists. Our ‘State of B2B Brand Building 2022’ research report reveals that 71% of B2B marketing leaders acknowledge that boardroom views of brand building have changed significantly in the last 12 months – with over 60% now believing that brand marketing is a strategic business priority. B2B buyers want more from business: The marketplace has seen a huge shift in B2B buyer behavior driven, in part, by the COVID-19 pandemic. Concerns over public health, the environment, and job security contributed to a climate of fear and anxiety in which buyers looked to make more ethical purchase decisions – turning to business as a bastion of societal leadership. Two years on, B2B buyers are increasingly looking to engage with highly resonant and authentic brands. They want to know that the companies they buy from reflect their own values and whether they contribute to wider society, putting purpose above profit. "COVID-19 has accelerated the need for our brand to have a real and meaningful purpose; one that contributes more to the local community and improves lives. This is what our buyers now expect from us." - Survey response from a B2B marketing leader. B2B brands need a clear and defined purpose to stay competitive in today’s marketplace. Brand trust, transparency, and authenticity are all high on the list of customers’ brand selection criteria, and organizations need to respond to match. Thankfully, it seems like they are: Over one-third of those surveyed said they needed to reset their brand strategy and proposition to strengthen the emotional connection with their audience. Competition is at an all-time high: The pandemic, however, was not alone in shaping today’s B2B marketplace. A surge in mergers and acquisitions across B2B industries has intensified market competition, reducing the effectiveness of demand generation campaigns on revenue growth. As a result, B2B organizations have started taking a progressively long-term view of brand. Many are turning to brand awareness campaigns to build memory structures in the minds of prospective future buyers – reflecting Professor John Dawes’ 95:5 heuristic. "We need to keep our company in users’ minds. Creating memorable impressions and standing out from the crowd through our brand is more important than ever before." - Survey response from a B2B marketing leader. However, as brand continues to skyrocket in importance, so does the role of creativity in B2B brand building. Of the B2B marketing leaders we surveyed, 42% highlight the need to better define their brand to help differentiate themselves. Buyers today can be fairly confident that a range of companies can deliver what they require, leaving differentiation to brand rather than a product or service. And this is reflected in how our respondents agree that a shift away from the B2B ‘safe and steady’ approach enables more unique brand positioning and ultimately, improved standout in the hearts and minds of their audience. New approaches, old problems: Perhaps unsurprisingly, shifts in boardroom priorities aren’t without their challenges. While over half of our survey’s respondents said that brand building is equally as important as demand generation in achieving their marketing goals, 40% told us that only 5-20% of their annual marketing budget is allocated to brand building programs. This comes in stark contrast to Les Binet (Head of Effectiveness at adam&eve DDB) and Peter Field’s (a seasoned Marketing Consultant) seminal research piece stating that B2B brands should look to spend 60% of their budget on brand and 40% on demand for optimum effectiveness. For B2B brand marketers to allay boardroom concerns and win increased brand investment, they need to become more market-oriented and talk the language of finance. Providing a clear link between authentic, purpose-driven brand building initiatives, customer acquisition, and increased revenue growth – along with the ability to command higher prices, negotiate better supply chain contracts, and attract better employees – can help demonstrate the commercial value and competitive edge of a brand. Alternatively, B2B marketing leaders can look to relate brand investment to the challenges that keep their CFO awake at night. The B2B Institute’s Jon Lombardo recently spoke on Fergus O'Carroll’s ‘On Strategy’ podcast about the importance of the relationship between marketing and finance. In general, 20% of a company’s stock price is based on short-term cash flows, while the other 80% is based on the long-term. Lombardo argues if CMOs work with their CFO to pair this cash flow-centric view with a customer-centric marketing strategy, they can pave the way for a rebalancing of the marketing budget in favor of brand building initiatives – enabling greater investment in capturing the 80% of future buyers.

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INBOUND 22

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INBOUND 22

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