First things first. Let’s explain ABM. For those who already know, skip to the next paragraph. ABM is a strategic approach that involves targeting specific accounts or companies. From an account based marketing specialist view, the campaigns are personalized these campaigns are different from those targeting a broad audience. This approach has proven to be more effective. They are known to be effective in generating leads, increasing revenue, and retaining customers. In the world of B2B marketing, account-based marketing (ABM) is becoming increasingly relevant in 2023.
In this blog post, we will discuss a simple 3-step account-based marketing strategy for a B2B SaaS business in 2023.
Step 1: Identify your target accounts
Firstly, Account-based marketing (ABM) has proved to be an effective strategy for B2B SaaS businesses. ABM campaigns help generate leads, increase revenue, and retain customers. However, one of the key challenges of being an account based marketing specialist is identifying the right accounts to target.
In this blog post, we will discuss how to identify accounts for an account-based marketing strategy for a B2B SaaS business in 2023.
Step 2: Define Your Ideal Customer Profile
Secondly, Identifying accounts for an ABM strategy means defining an ideal customer profile (ICP). Your ICP should include the characteristics of the companies that are most likely to benefit from your product. This may include:
- Industry: Identify the industries that your product or service is most relevant to.
- Company Size: Determine the size of the companies that are most likely to benefit from your product.
- Job Title: Identify the key decision-makers within the companies that you want to target.
- Pain Points: Determine the pain points that your product can help solve.
By defining your ICP, an account based marketing specialist can narrow down the list of companies that you want to target. Furthermore, this helps you create a more focused ABM strategy.
Use Case:
ZoomInfo, as we all know, is a leading provider of business information and intelligence. They used their own product to identify their ideal customer profile. They analyze their customer data and identify the common characteristics of their most successful customers. This allows them to create a more focused ABM strategy and target companies that fit their ICP.
Step 3: Conduct Market Research
Thirdly, The next step in identifying accounts for an ABM strategy is to conduct market research. This involves researching your industry and target market. This helps identify companies that fit your ICP. There are several ways to conduct market research, including:
- Industry Reports: Look for industry reports. These reports provide insights into the companies that are most likely to benefit from your product.
- Competitor Analysis: Analyze your competitors’ customer base. This helps you to identify companies that fit your ICP.
- Social Media: Use social media to research companies that fit your ICP.
- Online Databases: Use online databases to research companies that fit your ICP.
By conducting market research, you can identify a list of companies that fit your ICP. Based on this list you can then prioritize them for your ABM strategy.
Use Case:
HubSpot, as we all know, is a leading provider of inbound marketing and sales software. They used a combination of market research and their own customer data to identify companies that fit their ICP. They use online databases and social media to research companies and analyze their own customer data. Today, this helps them identify common characteristics of their most successful customers.
Step 4: Analyze Website Traffic
Fourthly, another way to identify accounts for an ABM strategy is to analyze your website traffic. Use website analytics tools to identify the companies that are visiting your website. Look for companies that fit your ICP and prioritize them for your ABM strategy.
Use Case:
Terminus, an account-based marketing software company, uses website analytics tools to identify the companies that are visiting their website. They prioritize these companies for their ABM strategy. This helps them create personalized marketing campaigns for each account.
Step 5: Identify Decision-Makers
Once you have identified the companies that fit your ICP, the next step is to identify the key decision-makers within those companies. This may include:
Job Title: Identify the job titles of the key decision-makers within the companies that you want to target.
Social Media: Use social media to research the key decision-makers within the companies that you want to target.
Online Databases: Use online databases to research the key decision-makers within the companies that you want to target.
By identifying the key decision-makers within the companies that fit
Analyzing your existing customer base: Look at your current customer base. These insights help you identify common characteristics among your most successful customers. This may include industry, company size, or job title.
Use case
Salesforce, as we all know, is a leading provider of customer relationship management (CRM) software. They use account-based marketing to target specific industries and companies. For example, they created a campaign targeting the healthcare industry. In this segment, they identify key decision-makers and create personalized content for each individual.
Step 6: Create personalized content
The next step in an account-based marketing strategy is to create personalized content for each target account. This involves creating content that is tailored to the specific needs and pain points of each account.
First things first. Let us understand what Personalized Content is.
Personalization
Personalized content is content that is tailored to an individual or a specific audience. It is created to address the specific needs, pain points, and interests of the target audience.
Personalized content can be in the form of emails, landing pages, blog posts, case studies, whitepapers, social media posts, and more.
Importance of Personalized Content in ABM
In any case, Personalized content is a critical element of a successful ABM campaign. Here are some reasons why personalized content is important in ABM:
Increases Engagement
Personalized content undoubtedly increases engagement. Since it speaks directly to the target audience. When you create personalized content that speaks to the needs and interests of your target audience, they are more likely to engage with your content.
According to a study by Evergage, 98% of marketers markedly believe that personalization increases customer relationships. Furthermore, 80% of consumers are more likely to do business with a company that offers personalized experiences.
Improved Conversion Rates
Personalized content improves conversion rates. The reason is simple to understand. This type of content is tailored to the specific needs and in addition, interests of the target audience. In effect, when you create personalized content that speaks to the pain points and challenges of your target audience, they are more likely to convert.
According to a study by Hubspot, personalized calls-to-action (CTAs) have a 42% higher conversion rate than non-personalized CTAs.
Enhances Customer Retention
Personalized content enhances customer retention because it demonstrates that you understand the needs and interests of your customers. When you create personalized content that speaks about the challenges and goals of your customers, they are more likely to remain loyal to your brand.
According to a study by Epsilon, 80% of customers are more likely to do business with a company that offers personalized experiences.
Use Cases
Here are some use cases of companies that have successfully used personalized content in their ABM campaigns:
Demandbase
Demandbase is a leading ABM software provider. They use their own product to define their target accounts. They analyze their website traffic. As a result, this helps them identify the companies that fit their ideal customer profile (ICP). This allows them to create personalized content for each account. This personalization basically includes website personalization, email marketing, content marketing, and social media marketing.
Examples related to opportunities in content personalization
Personalization in Case Studies: Create case studies that highlight how your product or service has helped companies in similar industries or with similar pain points.
Whitepapers: Create whitepapers that provide in-depth information on topics that are relevant to your target accounts.
Personalization in Webinars: Host webinars that provide valuable information to your target accounts and showcase your expertise.
Personalized content is chiefly essential to the success of an account-based marketing strategy. It helps to establish your company as a thought leader in your industry and builds trust with your target accounts.
Use case:
Terminus, an account-based marketing software company, created a personalized direct mail campaign for a target account. The campaign included a customized gift box that contained a personalized letter, a personalized eBook, and a pair of socks with the target account’s logo. Surprisingly, The campaign resulted in a meeting with the target account and ultimately closed a deal worth $100,000.
Step 7: Choose your channels
The final step in an account-based marketing strategy is to choose your channels. In effect, This involves selecting the channels that you will use to deliver your personalized content to your target accounts.
Choosing the right channel is critical to the success of an ABM campaign. Here are some tips on how to choose the right channel for an ABM campaign:
Know Your Target Audience
The first step in choosing the right channel is to know your target audience. You need to understand their preferences, interests, and behaviors, particularly. This will undoubtedly help you to determine the channels they are most likely to engage with.
For example, if your target audience is a group of busy executives, you may want to consider email as the primary channel since it allows them to consume content on their own time.
Align Channels with Your Goals
The second step in choosing the right channel is to align the channels with your goals. For example, if your goal is to increase engagement, you may want to consider social media as the primary channel since it allows for two-way communication.
Leverage Multi-Channel Approach
Thirdly, choosing the right channel is to leverage a multi-channel approach. In like fashion, This approach involves using multiple channels to reach your target audience. By using a multi-channel approach, you can significantly increase the chances of reaching your target audience and improving the success of your ABM campaign.
Use Cases
Here are some use cases of companies that have successfully chosen the right channel in their ABM campaigns:
Marketo
Marketo as we all know is a marketing automation software company. Also, They used a multi-channel approach in their ABM campaign. Correspondingly, they used email, social media, and direct mail to reach their target accounts. Besides, they also created personalized content for each account. Also, they delivered personalized content through different channels.
By using a multi-channel approach in their ABM campaign, Marketo was able to markedly achieve a 450% increase in engagement with their target accounts.
Uberflip
Uberflip is a content marketing platform that used a multi-channel approach in its ABM campaign. They used email, social media, and webinars to reach their target accounts. They also created personalized content for each account, This personalized content was delivered through different channels.
By using a multi-channel approach in their ABM campaign, Uberflip was surprisingly able to achieve a 300% increase in engagement with their target accounts.
Snowflake
Snowflake is a cloud-based data warehousing company. They used a single-channel approach in their account based marketing specialist campaign. Markedly, They used direct mail to reach their target accounts. Additionally, they created personalized content for each account, which they delivered through direct mail.
By using a single-channel approach in their ABM campaign, Snowflake was able to straightaway achieve a 46% increase in engagement with their target accounts.
There are several channels to choose from, including:
Email: Send personalized emails to key decision-makers within your target accounts.
Direct mail: Send personalized direct mail campaigns to key decision-makers within your target accounts.
Social media: Use social media, like an account based marketing specialist to connect with key decision-makers within your target accounts and also, share personalized content.
Events: Host events that are tailored to the needs and interests of your target accounts.
Indeed, Choosing the right channels is critical to the success of your account-based marketing strategy. You want to choose channels that your target accounts are most likely to engage with.
Use case:
Demandbase, an account based marketing specialist software company, markedly, created a targeted LinkedIn ad campaign for a target account. The ad campaign targeted the key decision-makers within the target account and as a result, lead to a 75% increase in engagement with the target.
In case I missed something in Account Based Marketing, please reach out in the comments hence we can cover it in the next blogs.