When is Account Based Marketing Needed?
MarTech Advisor 2018

When is Account Based Marketing Needed?

As published on Jan 8, 2018 in MarTech Advisor


We have all heard the buzz; Account-Based Marketing, Account Based Selling, Account Based Revenue, Account Based Everything…the acronyms are plentiful. I’ll add one more to the mix.

An account based approach (ABA) represents an omni-channel coordinated sales and marketing approach, one that reinforces B2B sales and marketing fundamentals, but more hyper-targeted than in times past. It includes very personalized and customized experiences across ANY automation tool for sales AND marketing. Analysts are catching onto this trend:


When should a company take an Account-Based Approach?

Whatever the name or acronym used, what’s important is that a company agrees that it’s an initiative that’s strategic enough to drive revenue for the organization as a whole where ‘pipeline is the only metric that matters’. When that accountability mindset happens, there must then be a supporting focus of resources, time, and energy from a variety of different places in the company.

There is no ‘one size fits all’ for when ABA is needed but here are some reasons:

  1. Acquiring net-new accounts. Our experiences indicate that several SaaS companies are seeking enterprise growth vehicles, making ABA a popular tactic to do so for growth. Personalization is critical for all sales and marketing touchpoints as accounts as well as contacts are typically ice cold.
  2. Improving the odds of conversion with digital channel tests. When one considers the standard 15% open rate and 2% click-through-rate that prospecting emails can average, many companies look to increase conversion through ABA with a refined message, new omni-channel tactics, and aggressive segmentation approach.
  3. Increasing wallet share. For larger companies, or in certain industries such as financial services, ABA affords an opportunity for cross-sell, up-sell, or deeper penetration within customer accounts in a more methodical, customized approach. These activities lead to higher retention rates, critical for recurring models like SaaS companies have.

Not every situation needs account-based marketing. If you’re dealing with a complex purchase with multiple buyers and long deals, this very well may be relevant for your particular company. If you’ve got a small ASP or a transactional B2B sale, this is not the best approach for you.

We’re in the early days of ABA/ABM as it relates to the modern-day technologies being marketed and sold to help companies leverage some of these tactics. We see across the 100+ ABM deployments my team and I have participated in is that an Account-Based Approach is an investment being made in addition to and in parallel with other marketing efforts and tools, such as inbound and marketing automation. The plane still needs to be flown while the engine is getting upgraded. This makes it a bit challenging for marketers with limited resources or budget to pull ABA off effectively.

In our recent webinar on ABM success, you’ll see more ways to think about ABM/ABA as an overall strategy. In our next part of our ABA blog series, we’ll describe how to convince stakeholders ABA is worth embarking on.


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