How to Use the Six ABM Processes to Align Sales and Marketing and Drive Real Results

Author - Jon Miller  |  November 21, 2016
Source - http://www.marketingprofs.com/

Account-based marketing (ABM) addresses the biggest problem faced by B2B marketers in the last decade: Traditional strategies focus on high-velocity, low-value deals, and not enough on the major accounts.

ABM is built on six processes that flip the focus from generating leads to courting the companies you want to do business with.

ABM isn't a quick fix: It takes patience and a long-term commitment. But you can drive real results by effectively using the six processes:

Selecting accounts
Discovering contacts
Developing insights
Generating account-relevant content
Delivering account-specific interactions
Orchestrating account-focused plays

How it aligns Sales and Marketing

Orchestration is all about Sales and Marketing working together in coordinated, account-focused plays. It's not a linear process of handoffs from one department to the next; it's a synchronized set of interactions across departments and channels.

Work together for real results

Sales and Marketing alignment might not be the number one reason to adopt an ABM strategy (higher close rates, greater efficiency, and bigger contracts, however, might be), but it is a serious bonus. Greater alignment in any part of your organization improves performance overall.

If you're interested in seeing it in action, start with the process of selecting accounts and see how your teams do. Get everyone in a room, explain the process, and start brainstorming which accounts are worth targeting. When you combine that with the core infrastructure you need to be account-centric (i.e., lead to account matching), you'll be surprised by how quickly you can get an account-based strategy off the ground.