Account-Based Marketing Hype – Why Should You Care?
As business-to-business (B2B) companies continue to see the importance of strategies that help them achieve both their marketing and sales goals, the adoption of account-based marketing (ABM) is steadily on the rise. A 2015 survey revealed that about 92% of B2B organizations are realizing the potential of account-based marketing approaches which enable them to align their marketing and sales goals and activities to achieve greater sales revenues.
The survey also noted that more than 60% of these companies are looking forward to using their marketing budget for ABM-focused tools and technologies. The reason is simple: to better align their marketing and sales efforts and to gain more control over these two areas. That’s not all. Most marketing surveys and studies today show a higher rate of ABM adoption; survey findings have concluded that:
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34% of ABM adopters have reported that they have gained tight alignment of marketing and sales efforts.
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More than 46% of companies said that account-based marketing approaches helped them in synchronizing their other marketing activities with ABM activities.
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52% companies have stated to have started up with ABM with their pilot program.
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67% of companies shared that ABM helped them with insights on each account from sales team.
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74% companies adopting account-based marketing said that ABM lets them work more closely with the sales team to identify their account goals.
So the question is, should your company use the potential of account-based marketing in delivering concerted marketing and sales services to client accounts? To help you make the call, we have outlined some of the benefits of account-based marketing and what it offers.
Which ABM offerings will benefit you?
Alignment of sales and marketing
One of the most talked about benefits of account-based marketing approach is that it enables businesses to bridge the gap between the two major functional teams involved in lead and revenue generation – the marketing and sales teams.
This marketing approach allows marketing and sales teams to remain aligned and get updated of each activities – from identifying key accounts, their goals and challenges, developing the relevant communication messages for clients, to persuading key decision makers of each account, finance teams and leadership teams to convert the lead.
With sales teams advancing earlier stages prior to the sales process and marketing teams getting involved in the conversion process – it is ABM strategies which can help companies integrate and utilize two functional teams and making the most of their capabilities. That’s why companies need to shun the traditional methods and adopt a concerted marketing and sales approach to gain greater control over conversion.
Retargeting
Account-based marketing allows marketers to connect with inactive accounts and retarget them with a set of “always-on” strategies. While those accounts are visiting or using a specific site or making a purchase from a specific site, marketers can trace their IP addresses to retarget them and make offers similar to their recent browsing behaviors and online purchases.
Thus, by adopting account-based marketing approaches, businesses can regain the connection with lost leads by retargeting them with account-based marketing approaches.
More personalization and optimization
Another benefit of account-based marketing is that marketers have a greater scope of personalization and optimization. ABM enables companies target their accounts with precise marketing and sales messages and strategies.
Using data collected from analytics and insights, marketers can track engagement and optimize their strategies and messages for better engagement with accounts. ABM strategies enable marketers to deliver communications tailored to specific requirements so that the campaigns will connect with the prospects and improve success rates too.
With 75 percent of customers looking for offers personalized to their needs and preferences, ABM helps marketers engage their targeted audience with the personalized content, information and offers. Account-based marketing methods enable marketers to optimize campaigns to the audience and improve success rates of campaigns.
Reduced Resource Waste
Because account-based marketing is so targeted, marketers can emphasize and plan their marketing resources more efficiently. ABM enables marketers to structure their campaigns with more optimized messages for their targeted client accounts.
Marketers can also evaluate which client accounts are more qualified and engage with sales to decide how to persuade those accounts with the right strategies and with more relevant content, depending on the type of marketing programs.
Analytics and measurements
The ability to analyze and measure the effectiveness of marketing is another major benefit of account-based marketing approaches. In order to evaluate and measure the success of the campaign, whether it is social ads, web, paid ads, email campaigns, or events, you need to use the right analytics and right set of metrics and analytics.
The social data of account-based marketing models enables marketers to understand the current insights of social campaigns, where their social campaigns are falling short and how to improve effectiveness of the campaign. Companies can get updates on the social conversation from social data and insights and optimize the campaign message, target the right audience, and create offers which will attract the audience perfectly.
Did you find the information useful in this article? on account-based marketing useful and plan to migrate to an ABM model? Drop your comments below.
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