What is Account based marketing? 

Account based marketing is a business marketing strategy that concentrates resources on a set  of target accounts within a market. Account based marketing is typically employed in  enterprise level sales organizations. It is a focused approach to B2B (business to business) marketing in which marketing and sales teams work together to target best-fit accounts and  turn them into customers. 

In this age of information affluence, merchants are always fighting for the attention of  potential customers. Because of this, companies that want to focus on the highest possible  ROI need to place their attention on high-value accounts, keeping account penetration,  marketing penetration and logos in consideration. To reach their objectives, marketing teams  must employ strategies that meld the mastery of sales and marketing to locate, engage with  and close deals with high-value accounts that matter the most. 

Rather than starting with marketing channels in an attempt to generate leads, an ABM  strategy begins with recognizing and targeting best-fit accounts that have the biggest revenue  potential for your business. Businessmen can then use technology to serve personalized  messaging to decision-makers at these accounts on the channels they are actively using. In an  ABM program, this marketing outreach is supplemented by personalized, one-to-one sales  outreach to the same list of target accounts. 

Tactics to drive your ABM process  

1) Formalize your account selection process 

Everything in an account-based marketing strategy depends on a deep and reliable  acknowledgement of the accounts and audiences you are targeting.ABM requires  marketing and sales teams to strategically select and identify accounts to target and  nurture through customized engagement and reinforcement. 

To formalize the account selection process, marketing teams should design target  company personas based on the high-value clients most likely to change and grow.  Evaluate what business goals and values these target accounts tend to share, as well as  what major steps in their buying journey to pave the way for purchase. 

2) Systematize across your sales and marketing teams 

With strong, data-backend target company personas in place, the next step is planning  a pipeline strategy. An account-based marketing strategy looks very dissimilar from  traditional lead generation.

Traditionally, when sales accept a lead from the marketing team, marketing-led  outreach stops and the client engagement process is executed by the sales team. For ABM strategies, successful account engagement instead requires proactive, ongoing coordination between marketing and sales teams. 

 3) Strengthen your tech stack and enlist third-party targeting tools 

The right software stack and technology investments are important for account-based  marketing success. 

ABM software is designed to strengthen each critical step of an ABM strategy: from  account selection through engagement and nurturing, with reporting and analysis  capabilities to inform any necessary adjustments to the strategy as it evolves and  matures. 

Account based Marketing vs. Inbound Marketing 

While ABM is a proven strategy for enterprise deals-our Fortune 500 deals –inbound is a  proven strategy for small and medium-sized business(SMB) deals-our Fortune 5000,000  deals. 

We can also think of inbound marketing as feeding into your ABM funnel. Because if an  inbound lead ends up being part of a target account, ABM can pick up right where inbound  leaves off. 

Some key points used to differentiate are: 

∙ ABM marketing is highly targeted: Instead of relying on broad-reaching campaigns  that aim to draw a larger number of possibilities to you, ABM focuses on just those  prospects that are most likely to buy and uses personalized campaigns to engage them  specifically. 

∙ ABM marketing focuses on accounts, not markets or industries: Account based  marketing enhances a deep understanding of their target accounts in order to create  content and campaigns optimized for them. This is different from the conventional  approach to content marketing where you are addressing a broader market or industry. 

∙ ABM builds off of inbound marketing: Inbound marketing lays the foundation for a  strong ABM strategy by allowing for targeted and efficient resource allocation of  high-value accounts.

Account based marketing and personalization 

Website personalization is an important part of ABM strategy, as it allows you to tailor the  creative and a messaging on a website to each of your target accounts. In the same way that  offsite marketing efforts are personalized for each account, the experience that visitors have  once they land on your site can be tailored through website personalization. 

To sum up with: 

Account-based marketing is not a new concept, but it has recently experienced a resurgence  due to evolving technology and a changing landscape. The implementation of an ABM  strategy can help improve marketing ROI, drive attributed revenue, generate more  conversions and qualified leads, and align sales with marketing.