Henry Sung

1. Position ABM as a Strategic Initiative

Marketing and sales leadership should collaborate to define this strategy and communicate the plan and larger initiative to the marketing and sales teams.

• Accounts: Which companies and individuals are we pursuing
• Goals: What are the desired outcomes with each account?
• Tactics: What can marketing and sales do to achieve those goals?
• Responsibilities: Who is responsible for what?
• Measurements: How will marketing and sales be measured on their activities and impact?

2. Staff Up for Succes

The most successful ABM marketers are, in essence, their own CMOs. They are usually senior marketers with:

• An entrepreneurial spirit
• A range of experience in a variety of roles (e.g, field sales, product marketing, solution selling)
• An understanding of and appreciation for the complexities of selling to a committee
• Multi-discipline marketing experience (e.g., personalization, targeting, social media)
• Leadership skills to engage and command the time of executives
• Experience developing compelling messaging and content that inspires trust and motivates action
• Strong storytelling and project management skills
• The confidence and composure to hold their own when interacting with sales and in meetings with customer

3. Agree on Goals with Sales

4. Identify Target Accounts
Here are some attributes to consider when developing a target account list:

• Industry
• Revenue
• Location
• Technology use
• Number of employees
• Competitive product usage
• Current customers

5. Identify Roles or Departments that Influence Buying Decisions

6. Create Content to Drive Engagement Across Target Accounts

In developing and distributing a variety of content, don’t overlook the power of social media. According to LinkedIn’s research, social media factors in every stage of the purchase process, from awareness to selection to implementation.

You can deliver that content in a range of formats, just as you do for your “everyday” marketing, including:

• Videos
• Infographics
• Webinars
• Presentations
• White papers
• Articles
• Reports
• Blog posts
• SlideShare
• E-books

Your Marketing Message Must Reach Vertically and Horizontally Across Target Accounts

The following are potential tactics to use at every stage:

Develop Trust and Share Knowledge

7. Partner with the Sales Team

8. Put ABM into Action

In step 1, you defined responsibilities. For marketing, this likely included:

• Serving content and messages
• Generating leads
• Tracking accounts
• Keeping sales posted on interactions

Possible technologies and tools to call upon include:

• Analytics
• Marketing automation
• Ad serving
• Personalization Account planning
• Progressive profiling
• Customer advocacy marketing
• Salesforce automation
• Customer intelligence
• Social media

9. Measure Impact

Here are the five metrics that Jon Miller of Engagio recommends:

1. Impact: What is the value of marketing’s programs (typically measured by pipeline creation using a multi-touch attribution methodology)? What is the aggregate impact on new pipeline and revenue, as measured by movement through a revenue cycle waterfall?
2. Coverage: Do we know the right people to target within the account?
3. Awareness: Of all the accounts we’re targeting, how many are aware of our company and brand? This can be determine by traffic to your website and LinkedIn company page, for example.
4. Reach: If you hold an event, for example, how many of the people who show up at that event are the right people from the right accounts?
5. Engagement: How much time is the prospect spending with us, whether on our website, attending a webinar, or at events, etc.? What is the aggregate level of engagement for the account (e.g., web traffic, online interaction, attendance at events, and so on)?

Q: What should marketers avoid when it comes to measuring the impact of their ABM initiative?

Don’t use volumebased metrics, such as ‘We ran five campaigns’ or ‘We pushed our three press releases.’
You need to measure ABM by focusing on quality, not quantity. And avoid ‘cost-per’ metrics; when you frame marketing in terms of cost you’re telling the world you’re a cost center.”
– JON MILLER, CEO & Co-Founder, Engagio –

– source from @Linkedin crash course in Account-Based Marketing – 

please ask more questions to hyunrok.sung@gmail.com