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What is Account Based Marketing ? And hop one more Anglicism! You are not wrong ... At the same time, if we are to list the words of the company from the language of Shakespeare, an ebook or even two would be necessary. We hear more and more of this term which, if it is no longer new or at least recent, is sometimes still unknown to sales and marketing teams in B2B (yes ... in business to business). In this article, we give you the definition of Account Based Marketing and its benefits .
Definition of Account Based Marketing (ABM)
We could translate ABM as "strategic account
marketing" . As with the already mentioned Smartketing, the famous
alignment of sales and marketing teams, this method consists in bringing
together the two "services" by targeting only target key accounts .
Once identified, it is, like the methodology of Inbound
Marketing , to develop personalized campaigns, while contextualizing the
approach for each key account.
In summary, this is about applying "one to one"
marketing in the B2B world. And therefore to adapt the content offers to each
persona , in each targeted key account and at each stage of the sales cycle.
It is therefore not a question of trading with everyone but
with potential customers for whom your offer solves one or more of their
problems.
And these "interesting" leads help both grow your business and increase revenue .
And how is Account Based Marketing
innovative?
If the method is not new in itself, it is rather an
evolution of the good old KAM (Key Account Manager, the person in charge of the
key accounts from a commercial point of view but also marketing sometimes), the
ABM however conceals some practices which can be considered innovative :
• we use
the blog and content marketing to
attract personas in the prospecting, evaluation or decision phase
• the
social networks and social selling, especially on Linkedin are fully part of
the strategy implementation
• level
tools, we use a CRM and automated marketing
to communicate the sales and marketing teams and make them work on the
same objectives
• it adapts
to new B2B purchasing journeys where, according to Gartner, there are up to
nearly 6 stakeholders (buyers, advisers and other stakeholders) in a sale.
What are the advantage of Account Based Marketing?
The benefits of Account Based Marketing are numerous:
1. At HR level: better team
collaboration
At the time of the end of silos in business, the ABM can
make you gain in efficiency . If
defining your SMART objectives
remains the first step in mobilizing your squads, you must bring
together your sales manager and your marketing manager to make them
collaborate. This is essential if you
want to grow sales while optimizing your marketing strategy .
2. At the financial level: a
maximized return on investment (ROI)
According to Marketo ( marketing automation software like
Hubspot that we use Editor's note), once
the coordination of sales and marketing teams is in place, companies can achieve growth of more than 19% and 15% additional
profitability .
In addition, the study carried out in 2014 by the firm ITSMA
tends to corroborate this since it shows that ABM generates a return on
investment superior to other B2B marketing strategies or tactics.
3. At the Marketing level:
personalization of the process
The right message, at the right time, in the right context,
to the right person. As a reminder, more
than 6 people are involved in a B2B purchase ( Gartner ). It is essential to
seduce ALL of them (yes even the executive assistant who influences the final
decision) at each stage of the sales cycle!
4. And Sales : better measure
results (KPI & Performance)
By focusing on the essentials of targeted accounts , you can
spend more time dissecting and refining the analysis of the effectiveness of
your actions .
For "marketers", nothing like it to prove their
usefulness. They need to measure, prove the ROI and "track" the leads
(prospects). This is great, salespeople need qualified prospects!
What are the stages of Account Based Marketing?
There are 6 key stages in the implementation of an ABM
approach.
1. Identify a clear target
This is about finding and targeting companies rather than
personas. Close collaboration between marketing and sales departments is
essential.
This is the time to share information on customers: size,
number of employees, type of industry or activities, catchment areas, turnover,
market share and probability of being interested in the solutions offered.
You can also replicate recipes that work in your market. For
example by working on the verticalities of your sector.
In addition to this work with your teams, a few searches on
Google, Linkedin or on specialized sites should provide you with the material
you need to identify the decision-makers and influencers of these targeted key
accounts.
2. Prepare a content strategy
for these organizations
It is a significantly different job than that carried out
for Inbound Marketing but it remains complementary. Indeed, let's imagine that
you are targeting the big pool specialists in your market, you will try to
solve the problems of this sector
precisely, not the buyer persona.
As for the editorial strategy and in order to optimize
natural referencing, take care to carefully select the keywords resulting from
the requests of Internet users, their research intention but also the feedback
from your sales teams and the problems encountered at each stage of the
process. buying journey.
3. Produce the right content
Always make sure you produce relevant, quality content to
drive engagement with your targeted strategic accounts. Beware of discounted
content can make it look like your products and services are too. You are what
you post.
4. Choose your channels to
reach the targets
Is your CFO in the swimming pool industry exclusively on
Linkedin? You know what you have to do to occupy the field with ad hoc content.
Take care to promote your content on the appropriate
channels. And it is possible that the DAF, however decision-maker, is not on
Linkedin. Or that the marketing director is a fan of Instagram, but present on
Facebook ....
Once this work is done, you can launch your campaign.
5. Measure the results
obtained
Powerful tools now make it possible to monitor and analyze
the results obtained in real time, for example:
• The
ability to increase the number of contacts in a target account
• The
interactions of contacts linked to the target account with our website and our
content
• Contact
scoring
• Commercial
productivity on these accounts: number of calls, meetings and other emails
exchanged
• The
generated turnover
• etc
6. Iterate!
Repeat what works and improve what needs to be. This
continuous and constant approach is one of the keys to the success of ABM. Get
started!