Introduction

In the world of B2B marketing, gaining new clients and retaining existing ones is critical. To achieve this, companies need to market and sell their products/services in a more targeted and personalized manner, and that’s where the importance of account-based marketing (ABM) comes into play. In this section, we will briefly introduce the significance of ABM and how it has become an essential strategy for B2B marketers.

The Importance of Account-Based Marketing (ABM)

ABM is a B2B marketing strategy that focuses on identifying target accounts and delivering personalized content and messaging to them. ABM helps in building long-lasting relationships, increasing customer retention rates, and maximizing revenue. By targeting specific accounts and decision-makers, companies can deliver customized messages that resonate with their unique challenges and pain points. This approach ensures that sales and marketing resources are deployed efficiently and effectively, hence improving ROI.

ABM as an Essential Strategy for B2B Marketers

In recent years, ABM has become an essential strategy for B2B marketers. According to a study by Altera Group, 97% of marketers achieved a higher ROI with ABM than with traditional marketing strategies. ABM helps improve the alignment between the marketing and sales teams, resulting in better collaboration, streamlined processes, and ultimately, better results. It also enables companies to engage with decision-makers directly, thereby increasing the chances of converting them into customers.

• ABM helps in identifying high-value accounts and prioritizing them for targeted outreach.


• It helps in creating a seamless customer experience by delivering personalized content and messaging that caters to the account's unique needs.


• It helps in building strong relationships with customers by engaging with them at a personal level.


• It improves the efficiency of marketing and sales teams by aligning them towards a common goal.


• It delivers higher ROI by targeting key accounts compared to traditional marketing strategies.

Overall, ABM has become an essential marketing strategy for B2B companies looking to maximize their sales, revenue, and customer relationships. By delivering personalized messages to specific decision-makers, ABM offers a targeted and efficient approach to marketing and sales that produces better results.

Best Practice 1: Identify Target Accounts

Identifying target accounts is a crucial first step in any successful account-based marketing (ABM) strategy. In this best practice, we will discuss the importance of identifying target accounts and how to use customer data and analytics to identify them.

Importance of Identifying Target Accounts

Identifying target accounts allows you to focus your marketing efforts on the accounts that are most likely to result in revenue. By analyzing your customer data and gathering insights on your target audience, you can identify accounts that fit the ideal customer profile (ICP) and are most likely to convert. When you focus your efforts on these accounts, you can drive higher engagement rates and better ROI.

Using Customer Data and Analytics

To identify target accounts, you need to have a deep understanding of your ideal customer profile. This means analyzing your customer data to identify key attributes and characteristics that are common among your most valuable customers. Some of the data points you can use to inform your ICP include company size, industry, revenue, location, and job title, among others.

Once you have identified your ICP, you can use analytics tools to gather insights on your target audience. By analyzing website traffic, social media activity, and other data sources, you can gain a better understanding of what your target accounts care about and what motivates them to make a purchase.

Summary

• Identifying target accounts is a crucial first step in any successful ABM strategy


• Analyzing customer data and gathering insights on your target audience is essential for identifying ideal customer profiles


• Analytics tools can be used to gain a better understanding of your target accounts and what motivates them to make a purchase

By following these best practices, you can ensure that your ABM strategy is focused on the accounts that are most likely to result in revenue, leading to better engagement rates and improved ROI.

Best Practice 2: Create Customized Content

In today's highly competitive business environment, creating customized content for specific accounts is imperative to stand out from your competitors. By developing content tailored specifically to your target audience, you can improve engagement and build stronger relationships with your potential customers.

Need for Creating Customized Content

Creating customized content is crucial for Account-Based Marketing (ABM) as it allows you to target key decision-makers within specific accounts effectively. With ABM, you have to create high-value content that resonates with prospects and address their specific pain points. Personalizing content shows that you understand your potential customers’ unique needs, making them feel more engaged and valued.

Benefits of Creating Customized Content

• Improved engagement and response rates due to personalized and relevant content


• Stronger relationships with your target accounts, leading to increased loyalty and repeat business


• Higher conversion rates through account-based advertising campaigns


• Improved alignment between sales and marketing teams because they are working on the same accounts and have a better understanding of account needs

Tips for Creating Customized Content

• Conduct thorough research on your target accounts to understand their specific pain points, goals, and challenges


• Create a variety of content formats, including blog posts, whitepapers, webinars, and videos to cater to different preferences


• Utilize personalized calls-to-action (CTAs) to increase response rates and drive conversion


• Collaborate with sales teams to gain insights and develop content that aligns with their account-based strategies

To improve your ABM strategy, it is essential to prioritize creating customized content that accurately targets and engages potential customers.

Best Practice 3: Align Sales and Marketing Teams

One of the most essential aspects of a successful ABM strategy is to ensure that the sales and marketing teams are working in alignment towards the same goals. When both teams are on the same page, it can significantly improve the effectiveness of your ABM campaigns and help you achieve your desired results.

Why is Alignment Important?

Alignment between the sales and marketing teams is crucial because they have different focuses, skill sets, and objectives. Marketing teams focus on generating leads and building brand awareness while sales teams are focused on closing deals and generating revenue. When both teams are working together, they can complement each other's strengths and weaknesses, leading to better results.

Alignment also creates a cohesive ABM strategy. When marketing and sales work together, they can target the same accounts and deliver the same messaging, ensuring a consistent experience for prospects and customers at all touchpoints.

How to Achieve Alignment

• Communicate regularly: Encourage regular communication between sales and marketing teams to stay informed about each other's efforts and collaborate on campaigns.


• Set shared goals: Create goals that both teams work towards together, such as increasing revenue and customer retention rates.


• Define an ideal customer profile: Collaborate on defining your ideal customer profile and ensure that both teams understand it to target the right accounts.


• Regularly analyze data: Analyze data and performance metrics together to optimize and adjust strategies based on what's working and what's not.


• Utilize technology: Implement technology such as CRM systems that both sales and marketing teams can use to share information and insights.

Overall, aligning sales and marketing teams is essential to create a cohesive ABM strategy that can drive better results for your business. It requires ongoing communication, shared goals, and utilization of technology to optimize performance and ensure consistent messaging for prospects and customers.

Learn more about how ExactBuyer can help your sales and marketing teams align to create a successful ABM strategy with our real-time contact & company data and audience intelligence solutions. Visit https://www.exactbuyer.com/ for more information.

Best Practice 4: Build Personalized Landing Pages

Personalized landing pages can significantly enhance the user experience for your target accounts. By creating tailor-made pages for specific accounts, you can provide relevant information and make it easier for them to navigate through your website. Here are some ways personalized landing pages can benefit your account-based marketing (ABM) strategy:

1. Increased Conversion Rates

Personalized landing pages can help boost your conversion rates by providing relevant information that speaks directly to your target accounts. By tailoring the content to their needs, interests, and pain points, you increase the chances of converting them into customers.

2. Improved User Experience

Customized landing pages create a more pleasant user experience for your target accounts. They feel understood and catered to, which can influence their perception of your brand and increase the likelihood of them engaging with your content.

3. Higher ROI

By providing value to your target accounts through personalized landing pages, you can improve your return on investment (ROI). This is because the leads generated through these pages are more likely to convert into paying customers, resulting in higher revenue for your business.

4. Enhanced Brand Perception

Personalized landing pages can help build a positive perception of your brand in the eyes of your target accounts. By showing that you understand their needs and can provide solutions to their problems, you position your brand as a trusted advisor and industry expert.

• To build effective personalized landing pages, consider using:




• Dynamic content that changes based on account information


• Targeted messaging and language


• Images and videos tailored to the specific account


• Customized calls-to-action

In conclusion, personalized landing pages are a valuable tool in any ABM strategy. They can help increase conversion rates, improve the user experience, enhance your brand perception, and ultimately, drive revenue for your business.

To learn more about how ExactBuyer can help you build personalized landing pages, visit www.exactbuyer.com.

Best Practice 5: Leverage Social Media

In today's digital age, social media has become an integral part of our daily lives. As a business, it can be a powerful tool to reach your target audience and drive engagement. In account based marketing (ABM), social media can play a key role in identifying and engaging with decision makers at target accounts.

The Potential of Social Media in ABM

Social media can be used to gain valuable insights into the interests and priorities of decision makers within target accounts. By monitoring social media activity, businesses can identify potential pain points or areas of interest that can be used to tailor marketing messages and content to resonate with these decision makers. Social media can also be used to gather information about target accounts, such as their company size, location, and industry.

Effective Use of Social Media in ABM

When it comes to using social media for ABM, it's important to have a clear strategy in place to ensure that efforts are focused and effective. Here are some tips:

• Identify the social media channels that your target accounts are most active on


• Engage with decision makers at target accounts through social media by commenting on and sharing their posts


• Use social media to promote relevant content and messages that address the pain points and priorities of decision makers at target accounts


• Monitor social media activity to gain insights and adjust ABM strategies accordingly

By effectively leveraging social media in ABM, businesses can strengthen their relationships with decision makers at target accounts and improve the overall success of their ABM efforts.

Best Practice 6: Use Account Based Advertising

Account based advertising (ABA) is a targeted marketing strategy that focuses on reaching specific accounts or companies rather than individual leads. This approach aligns marketing and sales efforts by prioritizing high-value accounts that have a higher likelihood of converting to customers. It involves creating personalized messaging and campaigns that are tailored to the specific needs and pain points of each account.

Benefits of Account Based Advertising

• Improved Targeting: ABA allows for more accurate targeting of high-value accounts, resulting in a higher probability of conversion.


• Personalized Messaging: By tailoring campaigns to specific accounts, ABA increases the relevance and resonance of messaging, making it more likely to resonate with the target audience.


• Aligned Marketing and Sales Efforts: ABA aligns marketing and sales efforts by identifying high-value accounts and creating personalized campaigns that support the sales process.


• Better ROI: By focusing efforts on high-value accounts, ABA can result in better ROI by reducing marketing spend on low-value accounts that are less likely to convert.

Overall, account based advertising is an effective way to improve targeting and align marketing and sales efforts to drive revenue growth.

Best Practice 7: Measure ROI

Account-based marketing (ABM) is a highly targeted approach that focuses on a limited set of high-value accounts. However, to ensure the success of ABM campaigns, it is critical to measure return on investment (ROI). Measuring ROI helps you evaluate the effectiveness of your campaigns, allocate resources more efficiently, and make data-driven decisions.

Importance of measuring ROI in ABM

Measuring ROI is crucial in ABM for the following reasons:

• Helps you determine which accounts are worth targeting and which are not


• Identifies which campaigns are generating revenue and which are not


• Helps you optimize your budget and resources


• Provides data-driven insights for future campaigns

How to track ROI effectively in ABM

Following are steps to track ROI effectively in ABM campaigns:

1. Define your objectives - Clearly define the objectives of your ABM campaign, such as increasing revenue or conversions, and understand how to measure them.


2. Assign metrics to your objectives - Assign relevant metrics to each objective, such as pipeline revenue, deal size or win rate, to track your progress.


3. Track your metrics - Use ABM-specific metrics to track your progress and identify areas for improvement, such as engagement rates or the number of opportunities generated.


4. Measure the ROI - Calculate the ROI by comparing the expenses of the campaign to the revenue generated by the targeted accounts, and use the insights to refine and optimize future campaigns.

By following these steps, you can effectively measure the ROI of your ABM campaigns and make data-driven decisions to optimize your budget and create successful future campaigns.

Best Practice 8: Account Scoring

Account scoring is the process of ranking or prioritizing target accounts based on several factors, including their fit, engagement, and intent. It helps sales and marketing teams to understand which accounts they should focus on, what messaging to use, and how to personalize their outreach. Here are some benefits of account scoring:

1. Increases Sales and Marketing Alignment

Account scoring forces sales and marketing teams to collaborate and agree on the ideal customer profile (ICP). It ensures that both teams have a clear understanding of which accounts should be targeted and how to prioritize them.

2. Drives Efficiency and Effectiveness

Account scoring helps to optimize marketing efforts by focusing on the accounts that are most likely to buy. It helps to eliminate wasted time and resources by avoiding ineffective marketing campaigns that target irrelevant accounts.

3. Personalizes Outreach

Account scoring enables sales and marketing teams to personalize their outreach based on the needs and interests of individual accounts. It helps to tailor messaging and content to the specific pain points and challenges of each account.

4. Improves Customer Experience

Account scoring helps to improve the customer experience by delivering relevant and personalized messaging. It ensures that the customer feels understood and valued, which can build trust and increase the chances of closing the deal.

In conclusion, account scoring is an essential practice for B2B companies that want to increase their efficiency and effectiveness in targeting the right accounts. By prioritizing the accounts that are most likely to buy and personalizing their outreach, sales and marketing teams can improve their alignment, drive revenue, and enhance the customer experience.

Best Practice 9: Coordinate Sales Outreach

One of the key components of an effective Account-Based Marketing (ABM) strategy is the coordination of sales outreach efforts with the overall ABM plan. When sales and marketing teams work together, they can create a cohesive approach that provides maximum value to target accounts and enhances overall success.

How to Coordinate Sales Outreach with ABM Strategies

The following are some tips to help you coordinate your sales outreach efforts with your ABM strategies:

• Identify target accounts that are a good fit for your solution and prioritize them based on buying signals and propensity to purchase. This will help ensure that your sales team is focusing their efforts on the accounts that are most likely to convert.


• Align messaging and content with account-specific needs and pain points. By tailoring your messaging to each account, you can make a stronger connection with the decision-makers and influencers.


• Personalize outreach efforts to key stakeholders. Use insights from your ABM strategy to create a personalized outreach plan for each stakeholder, ensuring that you are communicating with them in a way that resonates with their specific interests and needs.


• Coordinate sales outreach efforts with marketing campaigns. Ensure that your sales team is trained on the ABM strategy and that they are incorporating messaging and content from marketing campaigns into their outreach efforts.


• Use account-level insights to guide outreach timing and frequency. Your ABM strategy should provide insights into when different stakeholders are most active and receptive to outreach efforts, allowing your sales team to time their outreach more effectively.

By coordinating your sales outreach efforts with your ABM strategies, you can create a more effective and efficient approach that results in higher conversions and greater revenue.

Best Practice 10: Continuously Refine Strategy

When it comes to ABM, it's important to remember that success is not a one-time event. Rather, it requires ongoing effort in refining and tweaking strategies to optimize success. By continually monitoring and analyzing results, marketers can make data-driven decisions and adjust tactics for greater impact.

Emphasize the Importance of Continuous Refinement

A key aspect of ABM success is the ability to remain adaptable and responsive to market shifts and customer needs. Emphasize the importance of regular check-ins on performance metrics and KPIs, and encourage cross-functional collaboration to identify opportunities for improvement.

• Regularly review target account lists and adjust as needed based on changing business priorities and market conditions.


• Refine messaging and content to ensure relevance and alignment with the needs and pain points of target accounts.


• Adjust channel mix and tactics to address changing customer preferences and behaviors.


• Optimize budget allocations based on ROI and performance data.

By continuously refining and tweaking ABM strategies, marketers can achieve greater efficiency and effectiveness, resulting in improved engagement, conversions, and overall revenue impact.

Conclusion: Best Practices for ABM

The ABM infographic provides valuable insights into the best practices for B2B marketers. Here is a summary of the top 10 best practices that can benefit your ABM efforts.

1. Define your ideal customer profile (ICP): Identify your target accounts and decision-makers based on their demographics, firmographics, and behaviors.


2. Personalize your messaging for each account: Tailor your messaging to address each account's unique challenges and pain points.


3. Create targeted content: Develop content that speaks to your target accounts' needs and interests.


4. Leverage multiple channels: Use a mix of channels such as email, social media, and phone to engage with your target accounts.


5. Align sales and marketing: Ensure that sales and marketing teams work collaboratively to achieve common goals.


6. Measure and analyze results: Track the success of your ABM campaigns and use data to optimize your strategies.


7. Stay agile: Be flexible and responsive to changes in your target accounts' needs and preferences.


8. Continuously refine your ICP: Regularly update your ideal customer profile based on your learnings and insights.


9. Invest in data quality: Use reliable and up-to-date data to ensure the accuracy of your target account and contact lists.


10. Experiment and iterate: Try new tactics and strategies to continuously improve your ABM efforts.

By following these best practices, B2B marketers can create more effective and targeted ABM campaigns that generate higher engagement and better ROI. We encourage you to try these strategies in your own ABM efforts and see the results for yourself.

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