The Game of Funnel: Reach the next level of success with account based marketing (ABM)
Marshal, August 16, 2017
ABM: A Throwback in 60’s
“Don’t count the people you reach; reach the people that count.” – David Ogilvy
ABM as a tactic in Marketing is not something new. It was even leveraged back in the 60’s; the term “account-based marketing” was however coined in 2004 by ITSMA. Mapping key accounts, crafting personalized campaigns and then running campaigns on targeted
lists crafted for each account was a daily affair.
Quite fortunately it’s not how it’s done today!
Today’s Big Picture
ABM is more sophisticated now. But its root remains the same. Today the focus is more on the person rather the account.
ABM has evolved in its long itinerary. What is even incredible to observe is how it adopted the current digital marketing environment. Since the inception of digital marketing, it’s even more powerful and efficient. What was practiced mostly as an outbound form of marketing is now inbound.
“Account-based marketing: a strategic approach that coordinates personalized marketing and sales efforts to open doors and deepen engagement at specific accounts.”
– Jon Miller, Engagio
By adopting ABM as a marketing tactic, companies have increased their annual contract value to 171%. Not only that, irrespective of the size and type of company, ABM strategies has crucial impact on key metrics such as deal size and pipeline.
GOF- The Game of Funnel
A dynamic account-based program should run adjacent to your existing lead demand funnel. The idea is to carve out 100 best enterprise accounts and execute personalized marketing campaigns leveraging targeted lists.
While organizations are demanding more and more from marketing and sales, challenges too are on the rise with lead generation models. Though you earn great and good amount of market qualified lead (MQLs) the ultimate bottom result remains unimpressive!
So how would you build an efficient account-based strategy for your business?
Firstly, you need to define an ICP (Ideal Customer Profile). Post to which you will have to segment all your target accounts to run personalized campaigns for each account. You will also have to take a call on the resource investment needed to run your campaigns.
Secondly, you will have to go multi-channel. ABM strategies respond better when there are more than 2 or 3 channels.
Thirdly, activate your sales process. Allowing marketing programs to target selected accounts helps sales to activate positive sales action.
And fourthly, maintain and manage customer database leveraging intelligence acquired from 360 degree campaigns.
Building and Adopting Account-Based Strategies
The success of your ABM program hugely depends on how you leverage technology, data and intelligence. Marketers must ensure the best out of their investments that they make to excel in their ABM strategy.
The key to success with these investments lies in understanding not just which new technology to procure, but also how to deploy new and existing technologies in different ways and get aligned with sales to meet account goals, and improve customer experience.
To help you understand better Lake B2B has organized a webinar on 30th August 2017, at 2:00 PM EST. Attend for free! Catch the B2B Pundits Michael Murphy and Arun Pillai(Ron) as they take you through seamless ways to make your business build and adopt a robust Account based Marketing strategy.
You’re invited! Click here to save your seat.
About Lake B2B
Lake B2B has been in business for over 13 years with the objective of providing accurate global B2B database to companies irrespective of their size and revenue. Since then, over 450 clients have used our leads to reach prospects, acquire customers, and run marketing campaigns. Lake B2B is a leading provider of data management services, list solutions, and customer data insights. Our focus over the years has been on improving the efficiency of marketing campaigns, driving more revenue, and increasing profitability of sales and marketing teams in organizations.
