Account-based Marketing (ABM): A Comprehensive Guide
ABM stands for account-based marketing.
ABM, or account-based marketing, is a type of business marketing strategy that focuses resources on a specific group of target accounts within a market. The marketing message is based on the unique characteristics and demands of each account and employs customised campaigns to engage each one.
ABM looks at marketing in a more comprehensive way than merely lead generation. One of the keys to generating the most value from your top accounts is to market to current client accounts to drive upselling and cross-selling.
Advantages of account-based marketing
For B2B organisations that target bigger accounts, account-based marketing is becoming more and more common. Account-based marketing has significant advantages over other marketing strategies for businesses looking to sell to large clients with lengthy sales cycles and sizable transaction sizes.
Personalised marketing strategy
Instead of using a generic strategy, marketers develop personalised messaging for target accounts by using the information they already have about their target audience to customise the campaign’s creative materials to suit their unique wants and characteristics.
Aligning marketing and sales
In order to align and move individual accounts through the pipeline, both before and after lead conversion, marketing teams and sales organisations must collaborate. This involves identifying target accounts, creating campaigns that are specifically tailored for them, and collaborating to identify target accounts.
Accelerated sales cycles
Many parties are involved in major buying decisions. Due to the fact that it begins at a lower level in the business and works gradually up to the main decision maker, this usually slows down the sales process. Because all prospects are nurtured simultaneously in account-based marketing, the cycle is shorter and faster.
Greater ROI
The most effective B2B marketing strategy is account-based marketing since it is precise and measurable and offers the best return on investment. Account-based marketing is said to provide larger returns than any other marketing strategy by 85% of marketers that track ROI.
Less wastage of resources
Time and resources are allocated to a limited number of accounts that are most likely to result in sales. This frees up resources that would otherwise be wasted.
Account-based marketing programs:
Account based marketing starts with the identification of meaningful segments, followed by the identification of marketing initiatives that can be tailored to those segments on the marketing channels that will have the most influence on them. Each organisation will use its own unique marketing channels.
Your strategy for pursuing a given client will be influenced by its unique characteristics, relevant segmentation, and pertinent marketing channels. You should focus your ABM initiatives on the target groups that will be most valuable to your company. Here are a few practical examples of account-based marketing strategies that B2B marketers may use:
Events
One of the best ways for sales teams to influence decision makers has always been in-person events. Personal invites to key prospects from target accounts, exclusive VIP dinners, bespoke gifts and schwag for target accounts, and personalised follow-up after the event are all examples of an ABM approach to events.
Webinars
Like events, webinars may be tailored to be current and relevant for a particular target account. Webinar follow-up and events may be customised for particular businesses, and unique webinar content can be developed with the target audience in mind.
Direct mail
Direct mail has grown in popularity as a means of connecting with prospects inside of a company in an era where everyone is inundated with email. ABM is more targeted, therefore gifts and marketing communication given by direct mail may be of more value because the revenue potential is significantly larger.
Email marketing
Despite direct mail’s growing popularity, email continues to be an effective marketing medium for ABM. Account-based marketing entails creating customised email messages for each firm and person, as opposed to a volume-based marketing strategy that may employ templates and marketing automation.
Paid Ads
PPC and paid social media advertisements are popular methods of contacting target accounts online. Using technologies like IP targeting and retargeting, your display advertisements may be modified to focus on a small number of target accounts rather than casting a wide net. Social media networks like LinkedIn and Facebook allow you to target certain businesses and profiles.
Website Personalization
Online ABM initiatives go beyond simply generating visitors through tailored SEM and inbound marketing campaigns. Website personalization may be used to provide a customized, account-specific experience for target prospects as opposed to the generic website experience once visitors arrive at the site.
Account-based marketing: How to Implement It
A step-by-step tutorial for setting up account-based marketing is provided below.
Step 1: Identify your high-value target accounts
These are the key accounts with the most potential to increase your company’s income.
Step 2: Conduct research on those accounts :
Find out what the client’s needs are, what their problems are, and where they are in their customer journey.
Step 3: Create personalised marketing campaigns.
Develop creative assets that will resonate with the target account, using information from the research phase to support your plan.
Step 4: Launch your personalised marketing efforts.
Deliver your campaigns to the target account.
Step 5: Track the effectiveness of your personalised marketing campaigns
Examine the data to determine how well your campaigns are doing.
Account-based marketing success does not rely just on data. To fully outperform your competition and sell more than ever before, you need high-quality data combined with automation and advanced B2B marketing intelligence. To see how it’s done, book a sales meeting today!
About Vertedge:
We are a media agency trusted by businesses in US, Canada, UK, Middle East, India and around the world to be their consistent provider of leads. We help companies promote their products and services by making it easier to target a larger and more specific audience over a lesser period of time.
Our main objective is to help advertisers, agencies, online B2B IT publishers, media companies and enterprise customers reach buyers and decision makers globally. Once we identify them, we use a suite of proven methods to engage them and turn them into leads.
In short, we take care of your lead generation needs so that you can grow your business profitably giving your company the growth it deserves.
