The 8 Commandments of Account-Based Marketing

By Meira McFarquhar

Account-based marketing (ABM) is a tricky concept. While the practice has been around for almost a decade, it can be confusing to determine how to actually get an ABM program off the ground. Plus, once you’ve got a program up and running, there are many opinions on what it takes to make it worthwhile, let alone how to get it to scale.

If you or your team are facing similar problems when it comes to ABM, you’re not alone. Some marketers estimate that almost 90% of the market is still trying to figure it out too.

Sendoso Chief Marketing Officer Dan Frohnen sits down with Gong.io Dir. of Demand Generation Russell Banzon on the B2B Growth podcast to discuss their take on what to do and what not to do when it comes to your ABM program, and share 8 key commandments to follow for the best results.

3 “Thou Shalts” of Account-Based Marketing:

1. DO align your sales and marketing teams: This alignment is essential, as strong coordination between sales and marketing is the foundation of any profitable account-based program. It’s also helpful to have someone on your marketing team that works great with sales, since you need both team’s empathy to get any ABM program started on the right foot.
2. DO come to a mutual agreement of your target list of accounts: Determine the ideal customer profile and personas you want to go after. You have to know where to put your effort and time.
3. DO designate a POC and start on a 1:1 scale: You don’t need to reinvent the wheel here and go after thousands of accounts at once. Start small, prove the value of one successful ABM campaign to your leadership team, and make the case for why ABM should be a core part of your marketing strategy.

5 “Thou Shalt Nots” of Account-Based Marketing

1. DON’T use tech as the solution: You don’t have to buy the fanciest new tech solution on the market in order to kick start your ABM program. The truth is that there’s no magic step that can replace the challenging work of aligning your marketing and sales goals. Use your tech instead to enable your sales and marketing teams to work at their highest level once you’ve determined your strategy.
2. DON’T limit ABM to just one channel: ABM is more than just direct mail. It’s more than just advertising, web personalization, or any other channel alone. Combine all of these methods to build a holistic strategy that can employ across your entire sales and marketing organizations.
3. DON’T run your ABM program in a silo: A successful ABM program is a true team effort. Whether that be coordination from sales on target accounts, or advice from sales development reps on custom outreach sequences, you’ll need contribution across your whole marketing and sales teams for the best results. One person shouldn’t be working on ABM alone!
4. DON’T over automate: The personalized approach to ABM beats automation every time, as it allows you to create raving fans. And those raving fans of your sales and marketing teams become raving fans of your customer success and support teams, and ultimately become the customers that will renew year after year.
5. DON’T stop evolving: Account-based marketing is still a relatively new approach. Continue looking for new processes, try new things, get creative, and stay a learning machine to cut through the noise.

Listen to the full B2B Growth podcast episode for more tips & tricks on how to implement ABM tactics that actually work, and request a demo to find out how Sendoso can boost your personalized outreach!