Account-Based: a new approach to Marketing and Sales for B2B

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Marketing and sales approaches are constantly evolving . That’s why not only following the strategies, but also testing some of them, can be interesting for your business. If you intend to sell to large companies, it’s worth getting to know ABM – Account-Based Marketing . It’s an integrated marketing and sales strategy that, according to research by Altera Group, generates an ROI perceived by 97% of marketing professionals as “slightly higher or higher than other strategies and tactics for B2B audiences”. Did you find it interesting and are curious to know if it makes sense for you? Follow us, we’ll give you a complete overview on the subject! In this article, you’ll learn:

What is Account-Based Marketing ?
How can ABM improve alignment between Marketing and Sales to generate effective sales?
Who is Account-Based Marketing suitable for?
WHAT IS ACCOUNT-BASED MARKETING?
Account-Based Marketing is an integrated marketing and sales rcs data america approach aimed at reaching large accounts (companies). The success of this strategy is due to the personalization of campaigns. This generates greater engagement from influencers and decision-makers in purchasing your product or service. The ABM strategy is based on 4 pillars : account selection, contact collection, relationship with leads and engagement for conversion. Intexfy, on the other hand, considers a fifth pillar – expansion of intelligence -, which we will discuss in a future post. In addition to being recognized as a strategy that generates a higher ROI than other forms of marketing , it is also possible to list several other advantages of implementing ABM:

Target audience engagement – ​​through the generation of more relevant and meaningful content;
Ease of measuring results – due to monitoring the performance of targeted campaigns;
Optimization of resources, since when developing strategies targeted at accounts with high conversion potential, it increases the productivity and production assertiveness of marketing and sales teams.
The ABM strategy can be crucial in presenting a differentiation of your product or service to target companies and contacts , building a good impression of your company in the market. Want to dive a little deeper? We explored the concept of ABM in this other article . Given this scenario… is the traditional sales funnel always effective? Most marketing and sales professionals base their work on the traditional funnel – represented by the funnel on the left – in which attracting prospects, through brand awareness, and generating interest are characterized as the first stages of the relationship. Following the funnel above, on the left, prospects become increasingly interested in the content you offer and recognize your brand as an authority on the subject. From there, these prospects become business opportunities and are passed on to the sales team, which takes the reins in guiding the customer until the sale is closed. In theory, this passing of the baton between teams may seem to work very well with each one working in their “square”. But in practice, in challenging situations for the company, there may be a misalignment between the marketing and sales teams, for example. As a result, it is inevitable that the entire sales funnel will be impacted . Unlike the initial stage of Inbound Marketing – attracting leads – the ABM strategy stands out for its inverted funnel, shown on the right, in which the target companies and their internal contacts are identified in advance for prospecting. In this way, the work of the marketing and sales teams is optimized, as campaigns are produced aimed at the accounts they intend to reach.

HOW CAN ABM IMPROVE ALIGNMENT BETWEEN MARKETING AND SALES TO GENERATE EFFECTIVE SALES?

The characteristics of selling to large customers are the same in most cases: the sales process is usually long, the relationship is long-term, and several people are involved in the purchasing process. According to Salesforce , in B2B sales, the number of people involved in the purchasing process has increased from 5 to 7. With these characteristics, there are several problems between teams:

Marketing raises the lack of updating customer records, incomplete or unreliable metrics, lack of attention from generated leads.
The sales team, on the other hand, complains about bad leads and lack of support with materials to close important accounts.
It’s not hard to see that, with different mindsets and objectives for each department, misalignments can be recurrent. Therefore, if ABM is not yet practiced in your company, now is the time! In this strategy, the mindset – of both teams – works in an integrated manner. The marketing team and the sales team work together with the same goal: to attract contacts from target accounts, convince them and close deals. Because of this, we can say that this approach is one of the easiest ways to align marketing and sales.

WHO IS ACCOUNT-BASED MARKETING SUITABLE FOR?
Account-Based Marketing is used in a few situations. We’ve put together a checklist to help you figure out if this strategy makes sense for your business:

Is your company B2B?
Is the sales process (or cycle) long?
Is the number of potential customers countable?
Are there multiple people who influence and decide the purchase?
Is the average ticket high?
Is there a need to customize campaigns to attract this audience?
If you answered “yes” to all of these questions, Account-Based Marketing may be the right strategy for your business! The more expensive a solution is for B2B customers, the greater the volume of research about the offer. In this way, ABM becomes an effective personalization strategy for conversion, as generating more value for those involved in the purchase process increases the chances of sales. If you would like more information about ABM and Intexfy, get in touch with us. We are available to bring you closer to these topics.