The days of cold-calling, spray and pray, and sending generic emails are over. Even customization and segmenting of target audiences have their limitations. The key to B2B demand generation today is personalization. That’s why so many companies are turning to B2B account based marketing (ABM) to empower their sales and marketing teams.
A study by Forrester shows that an ABM approach increases the likelihood of exceeding revenue goals. Of those marketers adopting ABM for their B2B marketing platform, 87% say ABM outperforms their other marketing initiatives. Marketers consistently point to ABM for improving win rates and creating long-term customers.
So, what is B2B account based marketing and how does it create the personalization you need to generate more conversions? Let’s define the terms, show you how it works, and provide you with some real-life examples of personalization in action.
What Is Account Based Marketing?
Account based marketing is a focused approach to B2B selling by targeting the best-fit prospects to turn them into customers. Marketing and sales teams work together to identify a smaller group of high-value prospects to create personalized messaging.
Rather than focus on broad audiences, marketers can create exceptionally personalized content designed to move customers through the buying journey. This goes beyond targeting buyer personas and customer profiles. Marketers get to know these prospects in-depth to tailor content specifically for them.
Personalizing Content that Leads to Conversions
Let’s say someone runs a company that is in the process of acquiring another business and you are marketing a software platform that helps with data migration. Which of these two approaches do you think is more likely to make an impact?
- An email that talks about how your company helps with data migration across various industries,
- A personalized email that details how you can quickly consolidate their multi-cloud data centers currently on Amazon AWS and Oracle into a unified system?
Personalizing content does take some due diligence, but it demonstrates to prospects that you understand their unique business and the challenges they face.
Now, what if the CEO clicks on a link in your email and it takes them to a custom landing page with the logos of his company and their new acquisition along with a roadmap of how you will complete the data migration process specifically for them? Think you’ll get their attention?
Creating this one-on-one personalized customer experience leads to significantly more engagement and creates more conversions. That’s the essence of ABM.
Personalizing content for high-value customers can go well beyond crafting emails and blog posts with custom solutions, too.
Examples of Personalizing Content and Account Based Marketing Execution
Some marketers take it to extremes.
Here’s an example. A company trying to attract T-Mobile to become a customer did a deep dive into the company’s CEO at the time. When they checked John Legere’s Twitter account, they realized he was a big fan of Batman. So, they created a comic book version of their sales pitch and how the two companies could work together to fight crime find solutions to their business challenges.
Sometimes it’s not as extreme, but just as productive. A SaaS provider targeted customers that had completed product demos but had not taken any further action a month after the demo. They created content specifically tailored for how to launch their product and a checklist to get started. By customizing the content to move B2B buyers to act, they increased their closing rate by 41%.
Account based marketing execution for another company included creating specific content for B2B buyers and tagging them individually in social media posts to call attention to their marketing campaign. Yet another software company segmented its targets by their prospects’ current CRM platform. Rather than talk about how they can integrate with different CRMs, they personalized content to the specific CRM platform that their target prospects used.
Content Orchestration and Personalization
Yes, this level of content orchestration is more labor-intensive. There’s a dedicated research, brainstorming, and focused B2B account based marketing execution that must take place. While you can’t afford to provide the level of intense focus for all your prospects, you can — and should — bring this level of attention to key targets. It may be exactly what you need to do to increase conversions with your absolute best prospects.
No doubt you’ve heard of the 80/20 rule, more formally known as the Pareto Principle. The Pareto Principle in business posits that 80% of your revenue will come from the top 20% of your clients. While the percentages may be different in your industry, you know that your biggest and most loyal customers account for your largest recurring revenue base.
By targeting those with the potential to join that 20%, you are significantly increasing the odds of sales success that will have a material impact on your bottom line.
A Consistent Marketing Approach
That doesn’t mean you can’t also target broader groups rather than individuals. While ABM should be an integral part of your marketing and sales efforts, it’s not the only thing you should be doing to attract customers and close deals.
For example, your ABM approach might be part of a bigger market push. While you are creating messaging for the broader market, you can personalize the same messaging to the select few you are targeting as part of your ABM. This creates a consistent message that can reinforce your efforts and save time, since you’re not always starting from scratch each time you want to personalize your content.
By developing an overall theme, creating messaging for each stage of the buyer’s journey, and personalizing the content for your ABM targets, you are creating a recipe for increasing conversions.
Activate Your Sales Team with ABM Solutions and Personalized Content
Folloze empowers B2B sales and marketing teams to build trust with today’s buyers. Using B2B account based marketing strategies, content orchestration, and personalized marketing, we help companies fuel growth across the entire customer journey.
Take your ABM solutions to the next level and activate your sales team. Contact Folloze today to request a demo.
