The Evolution of Marketing: Account Based Marketing (ABM)

Right off the top I’m going to say Account Based Marketing has me more excited than just about any trend in marketing right now. Here’s why:

 

• Millennial research points to the power and necessity of more personal relationships.
• Social behaviors and consumers demand for more customized marketing approaches.
• The overbearing and overwhelming clutter of content prospects have to sort through to find the answers they want/need to arrive at a decision.
• Big data and social data and our ability to capture it, curate it and analyze it to know EXACTLY what our clients want, don’t like, are likely to buy, etc. 
• The emergence of more pointed marketing tools such as automation systems with robust lead scoring capabilities (i.e. Marketo).  

 In my opinion, we are at a unique intersection of business evolution. As I have shown above, not only do we have the ability to know what our customers want through our amazing technology and social platforms, we also have the ability to connect with them on a personal level and give it to them. In no time in our history can I think of a time we have had more perfect conditions when it comes to want and need fulfillment.

 Which leads me to this question: Why, if we have this ability to speak to prospects in such a personal and meaningful way are we continuing to market to the masses based on general personas?

 

To me, ABM is the evolution of marketing, particularly for B2B (B2C, don’t worry, yours is on its way) And I’m not talking about the type of ABM that has historically been reserved for only the biggest of the biggest clients (even then in a limited capacity), but to scale and apply the same ideals and strategies to smaller, but good-sized prospects.  

What?  Launch individual campaigns for all our clients? Well, obviously that isn’t going work from an ROI perspective. However, it can be applied to those companies in the pipeline that are hot (high lead score) and identified worthy of such an investment (meets certain requirements). Those companies may not be the gorillas, but don’t tell me when it comes to meeting numbers (particularly when you’re behind) each and everyone of those you can hook aren’t worth the effort? And really, how much more effort is it?  It’s mostly just a matter of reorganizing and re-prioritizes resources. For example, how many emails really need to go out to an already inundated client base with a low likelihood of responding? Not to mention, the more existing clients you have, regardless of size (well, within reason), the more you stand to grow and benefit from up sell, referrals, etc. 

Over the years I have seen so many campaigns and content pieces created and churned out in a seemingly endless stream.   Sure, a lot of it has value and needs to be there for lead generation and nurturing, but so much of it is wasted on inert prospects.  Instead of casting all these wide nets, lets give our attention to more of those people who actually care about our products and stand to benefit from them the most.

Beyond retention & up-sell: Utilizing customers as part of your marketing strategy

I'll admit it, I’ve been a marketing flirt. At the various companies I have worked for over the years, I have been asked to attract prospects—aquire leads and, well, keep them entertained and interested throughout the buying cycle. Then, like a “player”, my relationship with my prospects ends when they transition from prospect to customer. Sure, I’ve played a role in a few longer-term relationships such as creating retention and up-sell strategies over the years, but it’s never been the main focus. In most companies, managing those relationships—converting customers to fans—has fallen on the shoulders of customer relationship managers, not mine.  

However, because of the emergence of social and how it has disrupted the buying cycle—becoming a crucial element in the evaluation stage, I find myself particularly interested in the customer on a more strategic level these days.  

You see, in our socialized world, customers are the people generating a lot of the content prospects are using to make their buying decisions.  They are adding to the content stream—writing reviews, sharing their latest purchases with their networks, posting pictures of their favorite things. etc.  In my opinion, beyond retention, beyond the potential for up-sell, customers, HAPPY CUSTOMERS, are incredibly valuable when it comes to bringing in new business. However, this valuable resource is rarely tapped for this reason and often not marketed to in a way that will drive new growth.  

 As social’s role is crystallizing, I think it’s a great time for marketers to leverage the “power of the customer” and create a new communication channel around them. For a simple example, instead of sending them up-sell emails meant to get them to buy more products, reposition the email and send them a social-friendly email that gets them to share a special “friends” deal (or associates deal) with their friends. You could further incentivise them with additional discounts of their own if they share it on Twitter  or Facebook, etc.   

This example is just the beginning. The idea here is to control the message and equip existing customers with relevant tools and incentives designed to get them to share or create content online.  This content will not only spread the word to your customers’ networks, but also puts fresh content out there—content that others will inevitably come across when they do their own investigating online. It’s a self-perpetuating strategy.  

Customers are a great resource when it comes to growing business. For starters, customers offer a much better ROI—it is less expensive to keep a customer than it is to find a new one.  Adding to that, they are already invested in your product—your success is in their best interest. When they are convinced of your value, even before becoming treasured “evangelists”, they can be a driving force in the marketplace, particularly when it comes to online content. It just makes sense to make them a part of your long-term sales strategy—and not just as an afterthought. Because of their potential to influence prospects across the Internet at little or no cost, customer-focused campaigns should have as much priority as lead gathering and lead nurturing campaigns. Together, all of these elements have the power to build momentum and drive new growth over the long haul.

 

 

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Learn more at www.kristen-maxwell.com

 

Twitter: Search Engine For “Now”

Regardless of what search engine you use, you know when you punch in those keywords, you’re going to get a million options, and not all of them recent—even on the first page of results.  That’s a lot of clutter to sort through, especially when there is no guarantee you’re going to find something happening “now” or that is timely and relevant. As a result of these frustrations, users are finding ways to further filter their searches for better results.  One way they are doing this is with Twitter.  With approximately 340 million tweets per day and over half a billion active users, Twitter is a gold mine for things happening now. 

 

For example, if you want to find a trending topic, such as something news related, most users know someone or many someone’s will be using Twitter to send out Tweets, often in real time. If something is going on in the world, there is someone, somewhere tweeting about it and linking you to the most up-to-date information.
 
Twitter is also full of new or recent content, making it a fantastic database for those seeking current information on a huge variety of topics.  For fast-paced industries, such as technology, having access to the latest and greatest can be the difference between edging ahead or falling behind.

 

Because a tweet can reach millions of users in a single blow and travels faster than cars, people and other forms of transportation—it’s also a great communication tool when you need to spread the word fast. For that reason, it was used to communicate and coordinate the protests in Eqypt—it truly is a powerful thing. 
 
For these reasons and many others, more and more people are starting their searches with Twitter instead of their stand-by search engines. This is something to keep in mind when you are contemplating your own content and planning your various marketing campaigns and social strategies.

 If you want to learn more about Twitter, its users and their behaviors,  I found this cool infographic.  Enjoy!